For some of you, this will be old hat (ancient history, even). For lots of people, however, the notion of a technological Singularity will be new — and disturbing in a way that hokey woo-woo New Age 2012 Mayan calendars ending is not. Glenn Reynolds writes about it in the December issue of Popular Mechanics:
For some time now, futurists have been talking about a concept called the Singularity, a technological jump so big that society will be transformed. If they’re right, the Industrial Revolution — or even the development of agriculture or harnessing of fire — might seem like minor historical hiccups by comparison. The possibility is now seeming realistic enough that scientists and engineers are grappling with the implications — for good and ill.
When I spoke to technology pioneer and futurist Ray Kurzweil (who popularized the idea in his book The Singularity Is Near), he put it this way: “Within a quarter-century, nonbiological intelligence will match the range and subtlety of human intelligence. It will then soar past it.”
Even before we reach that point, Kurzweil and his peers foresee breathtaking advances. Scientists in Israel have developed tiny robots to crawl through blood vessels attacking cancers, and labs in the United States are working on similar technology. These robots will grow smaller and more capable. One day, intelligent nanorobots may be integrated into our bodies to clear arteries and rebuild failing organs, communicating with each other and the outside world via a “cloud” network. Tiny bots might attach themselves to neurons in the brain and add their processing power — and that of other computers in the cloud — to ours, giving us mental resources that would dwarf anything available now. By stimulating the optic, auditory or tactile nerves, such nanobots might be able to simulate vision, hearing or touch, providing “augmented reality” overlays identifying street names, helping with face recognition or telling us how to repair things we’ve never seen before.
Of course, there are some very scary scenarios as well: you think it’s bad when your email address or bank information gets hacked? How much worse will it be when you’re wearing your immersive technology 24/7? And how much worse again when you’re not wearing it at all, but have it embedded in your body? Being “hacked” then becomes life endangering, not just inconvenient. Charles Stross has written a few books exploring different possible futures (particularly Glasshouse and Halting State, both excellent and highly recommended novels, BTW), and it’s just possible that he’s being too optimistic.
Destructive technologies generally seem to come along sooner than constructive ones — we got war rockets before missile interceptors, and biological warfare before antibiotics. This suggests that there will be a window of vulnerability between the time when we develop technologies that can do dangerous things, and the time when we can protect against those dangers. The slower we move, the longer that window may remain open, leaving more time for the evil, the unscrupulous or the careless to wreak havoc. My conclusion? Faster, please.
