Category Archives: Singularity

Originally published in 2005 with the launch of The Singularity Is Near.

Questions and Answers

So what is the Singularity?

Within a quarter century, nonbiological intelligence will match the range and subtlety of human intelligence. It will then soar past it because of the continuing acceleration of information-based technologies, as well as the ability of machines to instantly share their knowledge. Intelligent nanorobots will be deeply integrated in our bodies, our brains, and our environment, overcoming pollution and poverty, providing vastly extended longevity, full-immersion virtual reality incorporating all of the senses (like The Matrix), experience beaming (like Being John Malkovich), and vastly enhanced human intelligence. The result will be an intimate merger between the technology-creating species and the technological evolutionary process it spawned.

And thats the Singularity?

No, thats just the precursor. Nonbiological intelligence will have access to its own design and will be able to improve itself in an increasingly rapid redesign cycle. Well get to a point where technical progress will be so fast that unenhanced human intelligence will be unable to follow it. That will mark the Singularity.

When will that occur?

I set the date for the Singularityrepresenting a profound and disruptive transformation in human capabilityas 2045. The nonbiological intelligence created in that year will be one billion times more powerful than all human intelligence today.

Why is this called the Singularity?

The term Singularity in my book is comparable to the use of this term by the physics community. Just as we find it hard to see beyond the event horizon of a black hole, we also find it difficult to see beyond the event horizon of the historical Singularity. How can we, with our limited biological brains, imagine what our future civilization, with its intelligence multiplied trillions-fold, be capable of thinking and doing? Nevertheless, just as we can draw conclusions about the nature of black holes through our conceptual thinking, despite never having actually been inside one, our thinking today is powerful enough to have meaningful insights into the implications of the Singularity. Thats what Ive tried to do in this book.

Okay, lets break this down. It seems a key part of your thesis is that we will be able to capture the intelligence of our brains in a machine.

Indeed.

So how are we going to achieve that?

We can break this down further into hardware and software requirements. In the book, I show how we need about 10 quadrillion (1016) calculations per second (cps) to provide a functional equivalent to all the regions of the brain. Some estimates are lower than this by a factor of 100. Supercomputers are already at 100 trillion (1014) cps, and will hit 1016 cps around the end of this decade. Several supercomputers with 1 quadrillion cps are already on the drawing board, with two Japanese efforts targeting 10 quadrillion cps around the end of the decade. By 2020, 10 quadrillion cps will be available for around $1,000. Achieving the hardware requirement was controversial when my last book on this topic, The Age of Spiritual Machines, came out in 1999, but is now pretty much of a mainstream view among informed observers. Now the controversy is focused on the algorithms.

And how will we recreate the algorithms of human intelligence?

To understand the principles of human intelligence we need to reverse-engineer the human brain. Here, progress is far greater than most people realize. The spatial and temporal (time) resolution of brain scanning is also progressing at an exponential rate, roughly doubling each year, like most everything else having to do with information. Just recently, scanning tools can see individual interneuronal connections, and watch them fire in real time. Already, we have mathematical models and simulations of a couple dozen regions of the brain, including the cerebellum, which comprises more than half the neurons in the brain. IBM is now creating a simulation of about 10,000 cortical neurons, including tens of millions of connections. The first version will simulate the electrical activity, and a future version will also simulate the relevant chemical activity. By the mid 2020s, its conservative to conclude that we will have effective models for all of the brain.

So at that point well just copy a human brain into a supercomputer?

I would rather put it this way: At that point, well have a full understanding of the methods of the human brain. One benefit will be a deep understanding of ourselves, but the key implication is that it will expand the toolkit of techniques we can apply to create artificial intelligence. We will then be able to create nonbiological systems that match human intelligence in the ways that humans are now superior, for example, our pattern- recognition abilities. These superintelligent computers will be able to do things we are not able to do, such as share knowledge and skills at electronic speeds.

By 2030, a thousand dollars of computation will be about a thousand times more powerful than a human brain. Keep in mind also that computers will not be organized as discrete objects as they are today. There will be a web of computing deeply integrated into the environment, our bodies and brains.

You mentioned the AI tool kit. Hasnt AI failed to live up to its expectations?

There was a boom and bust cycle in AI during the 1980s, similar to what we saw recently in e-commerce and telecommunications. Such boom-bust cycles are often harbingers of true revolutions; recall the railroad boom and bust in the 19th century. But just as the Internet bust was not the end of the Internet, the so-called AI Winter was not the end of the story for AI either. There are hundreds of applications of narrow AI (machine intelligence that equals or exceeds human intelligence for specific tasks) now permeating our modern infrastructure. Every time you send an email or make a cell phone call, intelligent algorithms route the information. AI programs diagnose electrocardiograms with an accuracy rivaling doctors, evaluate medical images, fly and land airplanes, guide intelligent autonomous weapons, make automated investment decisions for over a trillion dollars of funds, and guide industrial processes. These were all research projects a couple of decades ago. If all the intelligent software in the world were to suddenly stop functioning, modern civilization would grind to a halt. Of course, our AI programs are not intelligent enough to organize such a conspiracy, at least not yet.

Why dont more people see these profound changes ahead?

Hopefully after they read my new book, they will. But the primary failure is the inability of many observers to think in exponential terms. Most long-range forecasts of what is technically feasible in future time periods dramatically underestimate the power of future developments because they are based on what I call the intuitive linear view of history rather than the historical exponential view. My models show that we are doubling the paradigm-shift rate every decade. Thus the 20th century was gradually speeding up to the rate of progress at the end of the century; its achievements, therefore, were equivalent to about twenty years of progress at the rate in 2000. Well make another twenty years of progress in just fourteen years (by 2014), and then do the same again in only seven years. To express this another way, we wont experience one hundred years of technological advance in the 21st century; we will witness on the order of 20,000 years of progress (again, when measured by the rate of progress in 2000), or about 1,000 times greater than what was achieved in the 20th century.

The exponential growth of information technologies is even greater: were doubling the power of information technologies, as measured by price-performance, bandwidth, capacity and many other types of measures, about every year. Thats a factor of a thousand in ten years, a million in twenty years, and a billion in thirty years. This goes far beyond Moores law (the shrinking of transistors on an integrated circuit, allowing us to double the price-performance of electronics each year). Electronics is just one example of many. As another example, it took us 14 years to sequence HIV; we recently sequenced SARS in only 31 days.

So this acceleration of information technologies applies to biology as well?

Absolutely. Its not just computer devices like cell phones and digital cameras that are accelerating in capability. Ultimately, everything of importance will be comprised essentially of information technology. With the advent of nanotechnology-based manufacturing in the 2020s, well be able to use inexpensive table-top devices to manufacture on-demand just about anything from very inexpensive raw materials using information processes that will rearrange matter and energy at the molecular level.

Well meet our energy needs using nanotechnology-based solar panels that will capture the energy in .03 percent of the sunlight that falls on the Earth, which is all we need to meet our projected energy needs in 2030. Well store the energy in highly distributed fuel cells.

I want to come back to both biology and nanotechnology, but how can you be so sure of these developments? Isnt technical progress on specific projects essentially unpredictable?

Predicting specific projects is indeed not feasible. But the result of the overall complex, chaotic evolutionary process of technological progress is predictable.

People intuitively assume that the current rate of progress will continue for future periods. Even for those who have been around long enough to experience how the pace of change increases over time, unexamined intuition leaves one with the impression that change occurs at the same rate that we have experienced most recently. From the mathematicians perspective, the reason for this is that an exponential curve looks like a straight line when examined for only a brief duration. As a result, even sophisticated commentators, when considering the future, typically use the current pace of change to determine their expectations in extrapolating progress over the next ten years or one hundred years. This is why I describe this way of looking at the future as the intuitive linear view. But a serious assessment of the history of technology reveals that technological change is exponential. Exponential growth is a feature of any evolutionary process, of which technology is a primary example.

As I show in the book, this has also been true of biological evolution. Indeed, technological evolution emerges from biological evolution. You can examine the data in different ways, on different timescales, and for a wide variety of technologies, ranging from electronic to biological, as well as for their implications, ranging from the amount of human knowledge to the size of the economy, and you get the same exponentialnot linearprogression. I have over forty graphs in the book from a broad variety of fields that show the exponential nature of progress in information-based measures. For the price-performance of computing, this goes back over a century, well before Gordon Moore was even born.

Arent there are a lot of predictions of the future from the past that look a little ridiculous now?

Yes, any number of bad predictions from other futurists in earlier eras can be cited to support the notion that we cannot make reliable predictions. In general, these prognosticators were not using a methodology based on a sound theory of technology evolution. I say this not just looking backwards now. Ive been making accurate forward-looking predictions for over twenty years based on these models.

But how can it be the case that we can reliably predict the overall progression of these technologies if we cannot even predict the outcome of a single project?

Predicting which company or product will succeed is indeed very difficult, if not impossible. The same difficulty occurs in predicting which technical design or standard will prevail. For example, how will the wireless-communication protocols Wimax, CDMA, and 3G fare over the next several years? However, as I argue extensively in the book, we find remarkably precise and predictable exponential trends when assessing the overall effectiveness (as measured in a variety of ways) of information technologies. And as I mentioned above, information technology will ultimately underlie everything of value.

But how can that be?

We see examples in other areas of science of very smooth and reliable outcomes resulting from the interaction of a great many unpredictable events. Consider that predicting the path of a single molecule in a gas is essentially impossible, but predicting the properties of the entire gascomprised of a great many chaotically interacting moleculescan be done very reliably through the laws of thermodynamics. Analogously, it is not possible to reliably predict the results of a specific project or company, but the overall capabilities of information technology, comprised of many chaotic activities, can nonetheless be dependably anticipated through what I call the law of accelerating returns.

What will the impact of these developments be?

Radical life extension, for one.

Sounds interesting, how does that work?

In the book, I talk about three great overlapping revolutions that go by the letters GNR, which stands for genetics, nanotechnology, and robotics. Each will provide a dramatic increase to human longevity, among other profound impacts. Were in the early stages of the geneticsalso called biotechnologyrevolution right now. Biotechnology is providing the means to actually change your genes: not just designer babies but designer baby boomers. Well also be able to rejuvenate all of your bodys tissues and organs by transforming your skin cells into youthful versions of every other cell type. Already, new drug development is precisely targeting key steps in the process of atherosclerosis (the cause of heart disease), cancerous tumor formation, and the metabolic processes underlying each major disease and aging process. The biotechnology revolution is already in its early stages and will reach its peak in the second decade of this century, at which point well be able to overcome most major diseases and dramatically slow down the aging process.

That will bring us to the nanotechnology revolution, which will achieve maturity in the 2020s. With nanotechnology, we will be able to go beyond the limits of biology, and replace your current human body version 1.0 with a dramatically upgraded version 2.0, providing radical life extension.

And how does that work?

The killer app of nanotechnology is nanobots, which are blood-cell sized robots that can travel in the bloodstream destroying pathogens, removing debris, correcting DNA errors, and reversing aging processes.

Human body version 2.0?

Were already in the early stages of augmenting and replacing each of our organs, even portions of our brains with neural implants, the most recent versions of which allow patients to download new software to their neural implants from outside their bodies. In the book, I describe how each of our organs will ultimately be replaced. For example, nanobots could deliver to our bloodstream an optimal set of all the nutrients, hormones, and other substances we need, as well as remove toxins and waste products. The gastrointestinal tract could be reserved for culinary pleasures rather than the tedious biological function of providing nutrients. After all, weve already in some ways separated the communication and pleasurable aspects of sex from its biological function.

And the third revolution?

The robotics revolution, which really refers to strong AI, that is, artificial intelligence at the human level, which we talked about earlier. Well have both the hardware and software to recreate human intelligence by the end of the 2020s. Well be able to improve these methods and harness the speed, memory capabilities, and knowledge- sharing ability of machines.

Well ultimately be able to scan all the salient details of our brains from inside, using billions of nanobots in the capillaries. We can then back up the information. Using nanotechnology-based manufacturing, we could recreate your brain, or better yet reinstantiate it in a more capable computing substrate.

Which means?

Our biological brains use chemical signaling, which transmit information at only a few hundred feet per second. Electronics is already millions of times faster than this. In the book, I show how one cubic inch of nanotube circuitry would be about one hundred million times more powerful than the human brain. So well have more powerful means of instantiating our intelligence than the extremely slow speeds of our interneuronal connections.

So well just replace our biological brains with circuitry?

I see this starting with nanobots in our bodies and brains. The nanobots will keep us healthy, provide full-immersion virtual reality from within the nervous system, provide direct brain-to-brain communication over the Internet, and otherwise greatly expand human intelligence. But keep in mind that nonbiological intelligence is doubling in capability each year, whereas our biological intelligence is essentially fixed in capacity. As we get to the 2030s, the nonbiological portion of our intelligence will predominate.

The closest life extension technology, however, is biotechnology, isnt that right?

Theres certainly overlap in the G, N and R revolutions, but thats essentially correct.

So tell me more about how genetics or biotechnology works.

As we are learning about the information processes underlying biology, we are devising ways of mastering them to overcome disease and aging and extend human potential. One powerful approach is to start with biologys information backbone: the genome. With gene technologies, were now on the verge of being able to control how genes express themselves. We now have a powerful new tool called RNA interference (RNAi), which is capable of turning specific genes off. It blocks the messenger RNA of specific genes, preventing them from creating proteins. Since viral diseases, cancer, and many other diseases use gene expression at some crucial point in their life cycle, this promises to be a breakthrough technology. One gene wed like to turn off is the fat insulin receptor gene, which tells the fat cells to hold on to every calorie. When that gene was blocked in mice, those mice ate a lot but remained thin and healthy, and actually lived 20 percent longer.

New means of adding new genes, called gene therapy, are also emerging that have overcome earlier problems with achieving precise placement of the new genetic information. One company Im involved with, United Therapeutics, cured pulmonary hypertension in animals using a new form of gene therapy and it has now been approved for human trials.

So were going to essentially reprogram our DNA.

Thats a good way to put it, but thats only one broad approach. Another important line of attack is to regrow our own cells, tissues, and even whole organs, and introduce them into our bodies without surgery. One major benefit of this therapeutic cloning technique is that we will be able to create these new tissues and organs from versions of our cells that have also been made youngerthe emerging field of rejuvenation medicine. For example, we will be able to create new heart cells from your skin cells and introduce them into your system through the bloodstream. Over time, your heart cells get replaced with these new cells, and the result is a rejuvenated young heart with your own DNA.

Drug discovery was once a matter of finding substances that produced some beneficial effect without excessive side effects. This process was similar to early humans tool discovery, which was limited to simply finding rocks and natural implements that could be used for helpful purposes. Today, we are learning the precise biochemical pathways that underlie both disease and aging processes, and are able to design drugs to carry out precise missions at the molecular level. The scope and scale of these efforts is vast.

But perfecting our biology will only get us so far. The reality is that biology will never be able to match what we will be capable of engineering, now that we are gaining a deep understanding of biologys principles of operation.

Isnt nature optimal?

Not at all. Our interneuronal connections compute at about 200 transactions per second, at least a million times slower than electronics. As another example, a nanotechnology theorist, Rob Freitas, has a conceptual design for nanobots that replace our red blood cells. A conservative analysis shows that if you replaced 10 percent of your red blood cells with Freitas respirocytes, you could sit at the bottom of a pool for four hours without taking a breath.

If people stop dying, isnt that going to lead to overpopulation?

A common mistake that people make when considering the future is to envision a major change to todays world, such as radical life extension, as if nothing else were going to change. The GNR revolutions will result in other transformations that address this issue. For example, nanotechnology will enable us to create virtually any physical product from information and very inexpensive raw materials, leading to radical wealth creation. Well have the means to meet the material needs of any conceivable size population of biological humans. Nanotechnology will also provide the means of cleaning up environmental damage from earlier stages of industrialization.

So well overcome disease, pollution, and povertysounds like a utopian vision.

Its true that the dramatic scale of the technologies of the next couple of decades will enable human civilization to overcome problems that we have struggled with for eons. But these developments are not without their dangers. Technology is a double edged swordwe dont have to look past the 20th century to see the intertwined promise and peril of technology.

What sort of perils?

G, N, and R each have their downsides. The existential threat from genetic technologies is already here: the same technology that will soon make major strides against cancer, heart disease, and other diseases could also be employed by a bioterrorist to create a bioengineered biological virus that combines ease of transmission, deadliness, and stealthiness, that is, a long incubation period. The tools and knowledge to do this are far more widespread than the tools and knowledge to create an atomic bomb, and the impact could be far worse.

So maybe we shouldnt go down this road.

Its a little late for that. But the idea of relinquishing new technologies such as biotechnology and nanotechnology is already being advocated. I argue in the book that this would be the wrong strategy. Besides depriving human society of the profound benefits of these technologies, such a strategy would actually make the dangers worse by driving development underground, where responsible scientists would not have easy access to the tools needed to defend us.

So how do we protect ourselves?

I discuss strategies for protecting against dangers from abuse or accidental misuse of these very powerful technologies in chapter 8. The overall message is that we need to give a higher priority to preparing protective strategies and systems. We need to put a few more stones on the defense side of the scale. Ive given testimony to Congress on a specific proposal for a Manhattan style project to create a rapid response system that could protect society from a new virulent biological virus. One strategy would be to use RNAi, which has been shown to be effective against viral diseases. We would set up a system that could quickly sequence a new virus, prepare a RNA interference medication, and rapidly gear up production. We have the knowledge to create such a system, but we have not done so. We need to have something like this in place before its needed.

Ultimately, however, nanotechnology will provide a completely effective defense against biological viruses.

But doesnt nanotechnology have its own self-replicating danger?

Yes, but that potential wont exist for a couple more decades. The existential threat from engineered biological viruses exists right now.

Okay, but how will we defend against self-replicating nanotechnology?

There are already proposals for ethical standards for nanotechnology that are based on the Asilomar conference standards that have worked well thus far in biotechnology. These standards will be effective against unintentional dangers. For example, we do not need to provide self-replication to accomplish nanotechnology manufacturing.

But what about intentional abuse, as in terrorism?

Well need to create a nanotechnology immune systemgood nanobots that can protect us from the bad ones.

Blue goo to protect us from the gray goo!

Yes, well put. And ultimately well need the nanobots comprising the immune system to be self-replicating. Ive debated this particular point with a number of other theorists, but I show in the book why the nanobot immune system we put in place will need the ability to self-replicate. Thats basically the same lesson that biological evolution learned.

Ultimately, however, strong AI will provide a completely effective defense against self-replicating nanotechnology.

Okay, whats going to protect us against a pathological AI?

Yes, well, that would have to be a yet more intelligent AI.

This is starting to sound like that story about the universe being on the back of a turtle, and that turtle standing on the back of another turtle, and so on all the way down. So what if this more intelligent AI is unfriendly? Another even smarter AI?

History teaches us that the more intelligent civilizationthe one with the most advanced technologyprevails. But I do have an overall strategy for dealing with unfriendly AI, which I discuss in chapter 8.

Okay, so Ill have to read the book for that one. But arent there limits to exponential growth? You know the story about rabbits in Australiathey didnt keep growing exponentially forever.

There are limits to the exponential growth inherent in each paradigm. Moores law was not the first paradigm to bring exponential growth to computing, but rather the fifth. In the 1950s they were shrinking vacuum tubes to keep the exponential growth going and then that paradigm hit a wall. But the exponential growth of computing didnt stop. It kept going, with the new paradigm of transistors taking over. Each time we can see the end of the road for a paradigm, it creates research pressure to create the next one. Thats happening now with Moores law, even though we are still about fifteen years away from the end of our ability to shrink transistors on a flat integrated circuit. Were making dramatic progress in creating the sixth paradigm, which is three-dimensional molecular computing.

But isnt there an overall limit to our ability to expand the power of computation?

Yes, I discuss these limits in the book. The ultimate 2 pound computer could provide 1042 cps, which will be about 10 quadrillion (1016) times more powerful than all human brains put together today. And thats if we restrict the computer to staying at a cold temperature. If we allow it to get hot, we could improve that by a factor of another 100 million. And, of course, well be devoting more than two pounds of matter to computing. Ultimately, well use a significant portion of the matter and energy in our vicinity. So, yes, there are limits, but theyre not very limiting.

And when we saturate the ability of the matter and energy in our solar system to support intelligent processes, what happens then?

Then well expand to the rest of the Universe.

Which will take a long time I presume.

Well, that depends on whether we can use wormholes to get to other places in the Universe quickly, or otherwise circumvent the speed of light. If wormholes are feasible, and analyses show they are consistent with general relativity, we could saturate the universe with our intelligence within a couple of centuries. I discuss the prospects for this in the chapter 6. But regardless of speculation on wormholes, well get to the limits of computing in our solar system within this century. At that point, well have expanded the powers of our intelligence by trillions of trillions.

Getting back to life extension, isnt it natural to age, to die?

Other natural things include malaria, Ebola, appendicitis, and tsunamis. Many natural things are worth changing. Aging may be natural, but I dont see anything positive in losing my mental agility, sensory acuity, physical limberness, sexual desire, or any other human ability.

In my view, death is a tragedy. Its a tremendous loss of personality, skills, knowledge, relationships. Weve rationalized it as a good thing because thats really been the only alternative weve had. But disease, aging, and death are problems we are now in a position to overcome.

Wait, you said that the golden era of biotechnology was still a decade away. We dont have radical life extension today, do we?

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Singularity Q&A | KurzweilAI

Pax East Panel: Owned but Independant

Key members of Raven Software, High Moon Studios, and Vicarious Visions talk about what it's like to be an Activision Studio.

God of War III, Singularity, Prince of Persia, and Star Wars: Force Unleashed II also receive 2010 Writers Guild of America nods for achievement in game writing.

Wisconsin developer of Singularity, Marvel: Ultimate Alliance reportedly sees payroll trimmed by around 20.

This new trailer that shows more of the multiplayer aspect of Singularity!

The doctor explains why all good PC users need to keep their TMD in tip-top condition in this montage for the PC version of Singularity.

Kathryn needs a bit of help as she gets assaulted by a pack of deadly creatures.

Evil things often lurk on the other side of locked doors; be careful.

Turn Nazis to dust after navigating through the tight corridors of a building complex.

Give the lady a boost, but don't let your guard down, enemy soldiers are everywhere.

Kevin VanOrd takes us back to the '50s to show us how the Russians almost ruled the world in his review for Singularity.

A soldier with a shotgun takes on barrel-throwing creatures.

A player steers bullets onto targets.

A player learns from the mistakes of the dead.

A player freezes creatures and takes them out.

A player uses the power of barf to win.

A player fries, blasts, and shoots his supernatural enemies.

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Singularity - GameSpot

OS and tools for building dependable systems. The Singularity research codebase and design evolved to become the Midori advanced-development OS project. While never reaching commercial release, at one time Midori powered all of Microsoft's natural language search service for the West Coast and Asia.

"...it is impossible to predict how a singularity will affect objects in its causal future." - NCSA Cyberia Glossary

The Singularity Research Development Kit (RDK)2.0 is now available for academic non-commercial use. You can download it from CodePlex, Microsoft's open source project hosting website, here.

Our recent article in Operating Systems Review, Singularity: Rethinking the Software Stack, is a concise introduction to the Singularity project. It summarizes research in the current Singularity releases and highlights ongoing Singularity research.

Singularity is a research project focused on the construction of dependable systems through innovation in the areas of systems, languages, and tools. We are building a research operating system prototype (called Singularity), extending programming languages, and developing new techniques and tools for specifying and verifying program behavior.

Advances in languages, compilers, and tools open the possibility of significantly improving software. For example, Singularity uses type-safe languages and an abstract instruction set to enable what we call Software Isolated Processes (SIPs). SIPs provide the strong isolation guarantees of OS processes (isolated object space, separate GCs, separate runtimes) without the overhead of hardware-enforced protection domains. In the current Singularity prototype SIPs are extremely cheap; they run in ring 0 in the kernels address space.

Singularity uses these advances to build more reliable systems and applications. For example, because SIPs are so cheap to create and enforce, Singularity runs each program, device driver, or system extension in its own SIP. SIPs are not allowed to share memory or modify their own code. As a result, we can make strong reliability guarantees about the code running in a SIP. We can verify much broader properties about a SIP at compile or install time than can be done for code running in traditional OS processes. Broader application of static verification is critical to predicting system behavior and providing users with strong guarantees about reliability.

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Singularity - Microsoft Research

When I first heard of Singularity last fall, I was pretty happy since I like science fiction style FPS games. Well, after a delay or two the game came out and I am pretty happy I bought it.

PROS: -Eerie atmosphere (akin to FEAR) that can, and will, keep you on edge - unique enemies that each take some thought as how to defeat - A pretty good science fiction/alternate reality story (I won't spoil here) -Good gunfights, some thoughtful weaponry -Good multiplayer, unique because it isn't just another "soldier v soldier" match, instead it is creatures v soldiers -On normal, the campaign is probably 8 to 10 hours long, so it isn't short by any means, maybe typical of fps lengths. -It is similar to the Bioshock/System Shock 2 -I enjoy not knowing what situation will come next in the campaign, keeps me on edge - Campaign jumps between the year 2010 and the 1950s

CONS: -AI needs a little work, but puts up a decent fight (I'm on normal) -Not too many multiplayer modes yet -No subtitles or place to reference previously found notes and tape recordings -tape recordings -fairly linear story (I don't mind at all, but some people want a more sandbox style FPS, I guess) -Iffy Russian accents -Unfortunately, too many backwards "R" letters, and many of the films or posters are written in english, but using Russian Cyrillic characters to spell which seems lazy or cheesy to me since I know a bit of Russian.

It may seem like there are a lot of cons listed, but really they are nothing major and more of just personal taste for me. I really enjoy this game and intend to play it for quite a while. If you like atmospheric FPS games then go and buy this. Ideally you should have pre-ordered as it came with a free copy of the 360 game "Prototype", a 1GB usb memory stick, and a multiplayer skin for the regular price of an Xbox 360 game.

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Amazon.com: Singularity - Xbox 360: Video Games

The term Singularity has many definitions.

The everyday English definition of Singularity is a noun that designates the quality of being one of a kind, strange, unique, remarkable or unusual.

For a more specific definition of Singularity we can search The Wiktionary where we get the following five Singularity definitions:

1. the state of being singular, distinct, peculiar, uncommon or unusual 2. a point where all parallel lines meet 3. a point where a measured variable reaches unmeasurable or infinite value 4. (mathematics) the value or range of values of a function for which a derivative does not exist 5. (physics) a point or region in spacetime in which gravitational forces cause matter to have an infinite density; associated with Black Holes

What we are most interested in, however, is the definition of Singularity as a technological phenomenon -- i.e. the Technological Singularity. Here we can also find a variety of subtly different interpretations of the definition of Singularity.

John von Neumann was quoted as saying that "the ever accelerating progress of technology ... gives the appearance of approaching some essential singularity in the history of the race beyond which human affairs, as we know them, could not continue." His definition of the Singularity was that the Singularity is the moment beyond which "technological progress will become incomprehensively rapid and complicated."

Vernor Vinge introduced the term Technological Singularity in his science fiction novel Marooned in Realtime(1986) and later developed the concept in his essay the Coming Technological Singularity (1993). His definition of Singularity is widely known as the event horizon thesis and in essence says that trans or post-human minds will imply a weirder future than we can imagine:

"Within thirty years, we will have the technological means to create superhuman intelligence. Shortly after, the human era will be ended. [...] I think it's fair to call this event a singularity. It is a point where our models must be discarded and a new reality rules. As we move closer and closer to this point, it will loom vaster and vaster over human affairs till the notion becomes a commonplace. Yet when it finally happens it may still be a great surprise and a greater unknown."

I.J. Good, who greatly influenced Vinge himself, never used the term Singularity itself. However, what Vinge called Singularity Good called intelligence explosion and by that he meant a positive feedback cycle within which minds will make technology to improve on minds which once started will rapidly surge upwards and create super-intelligence. This definition of Singularity is also known as the intelligence explosion hypothesis.

Ray Kurzweil is associated with the third and most popular interpretation of the Technological Singularity, often referred to as the accelerating change thesis. In his book The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology Kurzweil defined the Technological Singularity as:

"... a future period during which the pace of technological change will be so rapid, its impact so deep, that human life will be irreversibly transformed. Although neither utopian nor dystopian, this epoch will transform the concepts that we rely on to give meaning to our lifes, from our business models to the cycle of human life, including death itself."

Kevin Kelly, founder of Wired Magazine

Singularity is the point at which "all the change in the last million years will be superseded by the change in the next five minutes."

James Martin, a world-renowned leading futurist, computer scientist, author, lecturer and, among many other things, the largest donor in the history of Oxford University.

Singularity "is a break in human evolution that will be caused by the staggering speed of technological evolution."

Socrates

Since all of the above refer to the same broad occurrence, I will simply define the Technological Singularity as the event, or sequence of events, likely to occur at or after the birth of Artificial Intelligence. (especially when AI surpasses human intelligence)

If anything, it has to be clear that we really do not know what the Singularity is (or will be) so we are just using the term to show (or hide) our own ignorance.

For more on this topic check out 17 Definitions of the Technological Singularity

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THE singularitiy, not the tech one. Not rated yet I am puzzled that THE singularity is barely mentioned on this site - the singularity before which time, space, matter and energy did not exist - (not

Singuarity or Chaos?Not rated yet Perhaps it will be the time when the number of recongized, recorded & real-time shared "patterns" will be so unfathomably large that all around "us" will

Singularity And The Infinite InvisibleNot rated yet The Universe continues to expand from its point of origin (Alpha point) since its inception at the Big Bang. As such, time itself expands along with it,

D'Count Lessismore of Moran-OvaNot rated yet D&D's take on all this is: That super AI equals human irrelevance. The soon to come very few super power leaders will voraciously control

The third factor of intelligenceNot rated yet I am thinking of a new theory. At least to me it is new. I am thinking of the point when artificial intelligence is measured as equal or greater than human

The SarkhhoobadNot rated yet Singularity is best explained by the "sarkhoobad", a mysterious phenomenon which if unraveled would shed light on many of the difficult to explain questions

bliss to ignorance ratioNot rated yet singularity transcends human comprehension as a linear event, therefore if it occurs we will be incapable of detecting its existence. time, place and

Albert Not rated yet I agree that human evolution is heading in this direction, namely trans humanism. Earth will probably experience another extinction event, so humans should

Time TravelNot rated yet I do not believe that there is much more to be done technologically (in a vastly more incomprehensible way) than what has already transpired with the exceptions

Ananda Jaisingh, VedantinNot rated yet Singularity means Brahman, satyam gyanam anantam, brahman as it is the source of all knowledge and therefore must be conscious, without limit or boundary,

Noone ScientistNot rated yet Singularity is the initial point which everthing that exist, has existed and will exist, is acted upon by the magic magnetic first particle of matter,

singularityNot rated yet We would not be able to recognise a singularity in a future sense, we would experience the now or the present event prior to the singularity,then pass

Mr. Ronald finn.Not rated yet Singularity is where everything meets you, no matter where you are or whatever you are doing it still relates to you and only you. A single direction without

Dr.Not rated yet A singularity is a point in the future where an intelligence explosion takes place.

Splitting of the SpeciesNot rated yet Single body, many minds vs many bodies single minds. Singularity? Iit means individualism while joining with many others in a single unit. Single does

Margie Call ) artistNot rated yet If because of exponential growth, and thoughts are things it seems to me everything would get so entangled that there will be a big bang that converts

Paul BennettNot rated yet In the "Electric Kool-aid Acid Test" it is 'said' that you are either "on the bus" or "off the bus" in the event of a technological singularity you will

George Anstadt MD FACPMNot rated yet the Singularity: When the relentless drive of DNA to survive commands a being with the power of artificial intelligence.

Good, Bad, WeirdNot rated yet The Singularity, as defined above, is an unknown unknown. That means this whole thing is a random event. In the future there is a point, which statistically

Continuation of the Human RaceNot rated yet The essence of what we call the human race has to be evolved into a form of transmittable energy that will transcend the limits of the observable universe.

The Universal Grand IllusionNot rated yet This will be the point when the self-absorbed intellectual elites reach the apex of the Ego, becoming convinced that we have fully digested the essence

human beingNot rated yet singularity is the moment when we have the capacity to understand all knowledge from the past and from the future in the present

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The Best Definition of Singularity

I've played this game back in 2010 when it first came out, and I liked it. I bought it on steam few months ago and decided to replay it, and there's no wonder i liked it even more. First off, the gameplay mechanics are very interesting and well executed. Making crumble with TMD glove is great, and on the other hand you have around 10 weapons to choose in the game, and design of them is pretty good i would say. Atmosphere is good overall, there is noise all the time, you hear wind blows outside and moving , you hear monsters eating corpses and that makes you feel frighten. So like i said, good atmosphere overall, from the point of sound at least. The design of environment does not fall behind either. First act of the game stands out on that point especially. I'm not saying that the second act is bad with environment design, just that the first is a little better in my opinion. Destroyed Kathorka 12 island looks very creepy. For example, at the beginning of the game there's a primary school made for children whose parents came to work on Kathorka, which was destroyed and left to rot with rest of the island. You can find tape recordings all over the place. Some of them are from the period before the catastrophe, and some are after. Number of recordings makes you feel bad for people left to die there, you hear them talking about 'waiting for help to arrive' and then realize, that corpse lying by recorder is the person which recorded it on the first place. The story is good, it has a good plot, interesting details and multiple endings (which is great). I won't get further into the story 'cause of spoilers... At the end 7.5/10 for me, maybe even 8/10, but game has a few cons, and one of them is 6 hours campaign, which is short as long as i'm concerned. Short but really enjoyable experience.

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The technological singularity is a hypothetical event in which an upgradable intelligent agent (such as a computer running software-based artificial general intelligence) enters a 'runaway reaction' of self-improvement cycles, with each new and more intelligent generation appearing more and more rapidly, causing an intelligence explosion and resulting in a powerful superintelligence whose cognitive abilities could be, qualitatively, as far above humans' as human intelligence is above ape intelligence.[1][2][3] More broadly, the term has historically been used for any form of accelerating or exponential technological progress hypothesized to result in a discontinuity, beyond which events may become unpredictable or even unfathomable to human intelligence.[4]

Historically, the first documented use of the term "singularity" in a technological context was by Stanislaw Ulam in his 1958 obituary for John von Neumann, in which he mentioned a conversation with von Neumann about the "ever accelerating progress of technology and changes in the mode of human life, which gives the appearance of approaching some essential singularity in the history of the race beyond which human affairs, as we know them, could not continue".[5] The term "technological singularity" was popularized by mathematician, computer scientist and science fiction author Vernor Vinge, who argues that artificial intelligence, human biological enhancement, or braincomputer interfaces could be possible causes of the singularity.[6] While some futurists such as Ray Kurzweil maintain that human-computer fusion, or "cyborgization", is a plausible path to the singularity, most academic scholarship focuses on software-only intelligence as a more likely path.

In 2012, a study of artificial general intelligence (AGI) predictions by both experts and non-experts found a wide range of predicted dates, with a median value of 2040.[7] Discussing the level of uncertainty in AGI estimates, study co-author Stuart Armstrong stated: "my current 80% estimate is something like five to 100 years."[8] Kurzweil predicts the singularity to occur around 2045[9] whereas Vinge has predicted some time before 2030.[10]

Strong AI might bring about an intelligence explosion, a term coined in 1965 by I. J. Good.[11] Although technological progress has been accelerating, it has been limited by the basic intelligence of the human brain, which has not, according to Paul R. Ehrlich, changed significantly for millennia.[12] However, with the increasing power of computers and other technologies, it might eventually be possible to build a machine that is more intelligent than humanity.[13] If a superhuman intelligence were to be inventedeither through the amplification of human intelligence or through artificial intelligenceit might be able to bring to bear greater problem-solving and inventive skills than current humans are capable of. It might then design an even more capable machine, or re-write its own software to become even more intelligent. This more capable machine could then go on to design a machine of yet greater capability. These iterations of recursive self-improvement could accelerate, potentially allowing enormous qualitative change before any upper limits imposed by the laws of physics or theoretical computation set in.[14][15][16]

Many of the most recognized writers on the singularity, such as Vernor Vinge and Ray Kurzweil, define the concept in terms of the technological creation of superintelligence. They argue that it is difficult or impossible for present-day humans to predict what human beings' lives will be like in a post-singularity world.[9][10][17]Vernor Vinge made an analogy between the breakdown in our ability to predict what would happen after the development of superintelligence and the breakdown of the predictive ability of modern physics at the space-time singularity beyond the event horizon of a black hole.[17]

Some writers use "the singularity" in a broader way to refer to any radical changes in our society brought about by new technologies such as molecular nanotechnology,[18][19][20] although Vinge and other prominent writers specifically state that without superintelligence, such changes would not qualify as a true singularity.[10] Many writers also tie the singularity to observations of exponential growth in various technologies (with Moore's Law being the most prominent example), using such observations as a basis for predicting that the singularity is likely to happen sometime within the 21st century.[19][21]

Gary Marcus claims that "virtually everyone in the A.I. field believes" that machines will one day overtake humans and "at some level, the only real difference between enthusiasts and skeptics is a time frame."[22] However, many prominent technologists and academics dispute the plausibility of a technological singularity, including Paul Allen, Jeff Hawkins, John Holland, Jaron Lanier, and Gordon Moore, whose Moore's Law is often cited in support of the concept.[23][24][25]

The exponential growth in computing technology suggested by Moore's Law is commonly cited as a reason to expect a singularity in the relatively near future, and a number of authors have proposed generalizations of Moore's Law. Computer scientist and futurist Hans Moravec proposed in a 1998 book[26] that the exponential growth curve could be extended back through earlier computing technologies prior to the integrated circuit. Futurist Ray Kurzweil postulates a law of accelerating returns in which the speed of technological change (and more generally, all evolutionary processes[27]) increases exponentially, generalizing Moore's Law in the same manner as Moravec's proposal, and also including material technology (especially as applied to nanotechnology), medical technology and others.[28] Between 1986 and 2007, machines' application-specific capacity to compute information per capita has roughly doubled every 14 months; the per capita capacity of the world's general-purpose computers has doubled every 18 months; the global telecommunication capacity per capita doubled every 34 months; and the world's storage capacity per capita doubled every 40 months.[29] Like other authors, though, Kurzweil reserves the term "singularity" for a rapid increase in intelligence (as opposed to other technologies), writing for example that "The Singularity will allow us to transcend these limitations of our biological bodies and brains ... There will be no distinction, post-Singularity, between human and machine".[30] He believes that the "design of the human brain, while not simple, is nonetheless a billion times simpler than it appears, due to massive redundancy".[31] According to Kurzweil, the reason why the brain has a messy and unpredictable quality is because the brain, like most biological systems, is a "probabilistic fractal".[31] He also defines his predicted date of the singularity (2045) in terms of when he expects computer-based intelligences to significantly exceed the sum total of human brainpower, writing that advances in computing before that date "will not represent the Singularity" because they do "not yet correspond to a profound expansion of our intelligence."[32]

Some singularity proponents argue its inevitability through extrapolation of past trends, especially those pertaining to shortening gaps between improvements to technology. In one of the first uses of the term "singularity" in the context of technological progress, Stanislaw Ulam (1958) tells of a conversation with John von Neumann about accelerating change:

One conversation centered on the ever accelerating progress of technology and changes in the mode of human life, which gives the appearance of approaching some essential singularity in the history of the race beyond which human affairs, as we know them, could not continue.[5]

Hawkins (1983) writes that "mindsteps", dramatic and irreversible changes to paradigms or world views, are accelerating in frequency as quantified in his mindstep equation. He cites the inventions of writing, mathematics, and the computer as examples of such changes.

Kurzweil's analysis of history concludes that technological progress follows a pattern of exponential growth, following what he calls the "Law of Accelerating Returns". Whenever technology approaches a barrier, Kurzweil writes, new technologies will surmount it. He predicts paradigm shifts will become increasingly common, leading to "technological change so rapid and profound it represents a rupture in the fabric of human history".[33] Kurzweil believes that the singularity will occur before the end of the 21st century, setting the date at 2045.[34] His predictions differ from Vinges in that he predicts a gradual ascent to the singularity, rather than Vinges rapidly self-improving superhuman intelligence.

Presumably, a technological singularity would lead to rapid development of a Kardashev Type I civilization, one that has achieved mastery of the resources of its home planet.[35]

Oft-cited dangers include those commonly associated with molecular nanotechnology and genetic engineering. These threats are major issues for both singularity advocates and critics, and were the subject of Bill Joy's Wired magazine article "Why the future doesn't need us".[36]

The Acceleration Studies Foundation, an educational non-profit foundation founded by John Smart, engages in outreach, education, research and advocacy concerning accelerating change.[37] It produces the Accelerating Change conference at Stanford University, and maintains the educational site Acceleration Watch.

Recent advances, such as the mass production of graphene using modified kitchen blenders (2014) and high temperature superconductors based on metamaterials, could allow supercomputers to be built that, while using only as much power as a typical Core I7 (45W), could achieve the same computing power as IBM's Blue Gene/L system.[38][39]

Some critics assert that no computer or machine will ever achieve human intelligence, while others hold that the definition of intelligence is irrelevant if the net result is the same.[40]

Steven Pinker stated in 2008,

(...) There is not the slightest reason to believe in a coming singularity. The fact that you can visualize a future in your imagination is not evidence that it is likely or even possible. Look at domed cities, jet-pack commuting, underwater cities, mile-high buildings, and nuclear-powered automobilesall staples of futuristic fantasies when I was a child that have never arrived. Sheer processing power is not a pixie dust that magically solves all your problems. (...)[23]

Martin Ford in The Lights in the Tunnel: Automation, Accelerating Technology and the Economy of the Future[41] postulates a "technology paradox" in that before the singularity could occur most routine jobs in the economy would be automated, since this would require a level of technology inferior to that of the singularity. This would cause massive unemployment and plummeting consumer demand, which in turn would destroy the incentive to invest in the technologies that would be required to bring about the Singularity. Job displacement is increasingly no longer limited to work traditionally considered to be "routine".[42]

Joan Slonczewski and Adam Gopnik argue that the Singularity is a gradual process; that as humans gradually outsource our abilities to machines,[43] we redefine those abilities as inhuman, without realizing how little is left. This concept is called the Mitochondrial Singularity.[44] The idea refers to mitochondria, the organelle that evolved from autonomous bacteria but now powers our living cells. In the future, the "human being" within the machine exoskeleton may exist only to turn it on.

Jared Diamond, in Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed, argues that cultures self-limit when they exceed the sustainable carrying capacity of their environment, and the consumption of strategic resources (frequently timber, soils or water) creates a deleterious positive feedback loop that leads eventually to social collapse and technological retrogression.

Theodore Modis[45][46] and Jonathan Huebner[47] argue that the rate of technological innovation has not only ceased to rise, but is actually now declining (John Smart, however, criticizes Huebner's analysis[48]). Evidence for this decline is that the rise in computer clock rates is slowing, even while Moore's prediction of exponentially increasing circuit density continues to hold. This is due to excessive heat build-up from the chip, which cannot be dissipated quickly enough to prevent the chip from melting when operating at higher speeds. Advancements in speed may be possible in the future by virtue of more power-efficient CPU designs and multi-cell processors.[49] While Kurzweil used Modis' resources, and Modis' work was around accelerating change, Modis distanced himself from Kurzweil's thesis of a "technological singularity", claiming that it lacks scientific rigor.[46]

Others[who?] propose that other "singularities" can be found through analysis of trends in world population, world gross domestic product, and other indices. Andrey Korotayev and others argue that historical hyperbolic growth curves can be attributed to feedback loops that ceased to affect global trends in the 1970s, and thus hyperbolic growth should not be expected in the future.[50][51]

In a detailed empirical accounting, The Progress of Computing, William Nordhaus argued that, prior to 1940, computers followed the much slower growth of a traditional industrial economy, thus rejecting extrapolations of Moore's law to 19th-century computers.[52]Schmidhuber (2006) suggests differences in memory of recent and distant events create an illusion of accelerating change, and that such phenomena may be responsible for past apocalyptic predictions.

Andrew Kennedy, in his 2006 paper for the British Interplanetary Society discussing change and the growth in space travel velocities,[53] stated that although long-term overall growth is inevitable, it is small, embodying both ups and downs, and noted, "New technologies follow known laws of power use and information spread and are obliged to connect with what already exists. Remarkable theoretical discoveries, if they end up being used at all, play their part in maintaining the growth rate: they do not make its plotted curve... redundant." He stated that exponential growth is no predictor in itself, and illustrated this with examples such as quantum theory. The quantum was conceived in 1900, and quantum theory was in existence and accepted approximately 25 years later. However, it took over 40 years for Richard Feynman and others to produce meaningful numbers from the theory. Bethe understood nuclear fusion in 1935, but 75 years later fusion reactors are still only used in experimental settings. Similarly, quantum entanglement was understood in 1935 but not at the point of being used in practice until the 21st century.

Paul Allen argues the opposite of accelerating returns, the complexity brake;[25] the more progress science makes towards understanding intelligence, the more difficult it becomes to make additional progress. A study of the number of patents shows that human creativity does not show accelerating returns, but in fact, as suggested by Joseph Tainter in his The Collapse of Complex Societies,[54] a law of diminishing returns. The number of patents per thousand peaked in the period from 1850 to 1900, and has been declining since.[47] The growth of complexity eventually becomes self-limiting, and leads to a widespread "general systems collapse".

Jaron Lanier refutes the idea that the Singularity is inevitable. He states: "I do not think the technology is creating itself. Its not an autonomous process."[55] He goes on to assert: "The reason to believe in human agency over technological determinism is that you can then have an economy where people earn their own way and invent their own lives. If you structure a society on not emphasizing individual human agency, it's the same thing operationally as denying people clout, dignity, and self-determination ... to embrace [the idea of the Singularity] would be a celebration of bad data and bad politics."[55]

In addition to general criticisms of the singularity concept, several critics have raised issues with Kurzweil's iconic chart. One line of criticism is that a log-log chart of this nature is inherently biased toward a straight-line result. Others identify selection bias in the points that Kurzweil chooses to use. For example, biologist PZ Myers points out that many of the early evolutionary "events" were picked arbitrarily.[56] Kurzweil has rebutted this by charting evolutionary events from 15 neutral sources, and showing that they fit a straight line on a log-log chart. The Economist mocked the concept with a graph extrapolating that the number of blades on a razor, which has increased over the years from one to as many as five, will increase ever-faster to infinity.[57][citation needed]

The term "technological singularity" reflects the idea that such change may happen suddenly, and that it is difficult to predict how the resulting new world would operate.[58][59] It is unclear whether an intelligence explosion of this kind would be beneficial or harmful, or even an existential threat,[60][61] as the issue has not been dealt with by most artificial general intelligence researchers, although the topic of friendly artificial intelligence is investigated by the Future of Humanity Institute and the Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence, which is now the Machine Intelligence Research Institute.[58]

While the technological singularity is usually seen as a sudden event, some scholars argue the current speed of change already fits this description. In addition, some argue that we are already in the midst of a major evolutionary transition that merges technology, biology, and society. Digital technology has infiltrated the fabric of human society to a degree of undisputable and often lifesustaining dependence. A 2016 article in Trends in Ecology & Evolution argues that "humans already embrace fusions of biology and technology. We spend most of our waking time communicating through digitally mediated channels... we trust artificial intelligence with our lives through antilock braking in cars and autopilots in planes... With one in three marriages in America beginning online, digital algorithms are also taking a role in human pair bonding and reproduction". The article argues that from the perspective of the evolution, several previous Major Transitions in Evolution have transformed life through innovations in information storage and replication (RNA, DNA, multicellularity, and culture and language). In the current stage of life's evolution, the carbon-based biosphere has generated a cognitive system (humans) capable of creating technology that will result in a comparable evolutionary transition. The digital information created by humans has reached a similar magnitude to biological information in the biosphere. Since the 1980s, "the quantity of digital information stored has doubled about every 2.5 years, reaching about 5 zettabytes in 2014 (5x10^21 bytes). In biological terms, there are 7.2 billion humans on the planet, each having a genome of 6.2 billion nucleotides. Since one byte can encode four nucleotide pairs, the individual genomes of every human on the planet could be encoded by approximately 1x10^19 bytes. The digital realm stored 500 times more information than this in 2014 (...see Figure)... The total amount of DNA contained in all of the cells on Earth is estimated to be about 5.3x10^37 base pairs, equivalent to 1.325x10^37 bytes of information. If growth in digital storage continues at its current rate of 3038% compound annual growth per year,[29] it will rival the total information content contained in all of the DNA in all of the cells on Earth in about 110 years. This would represent a doubling of the amount of information stored in the biosphere across a total time period of just 150 years".[62]

In February 2009, under the auspices of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), Eric Horvitz chaired a meeting of leading computer scientists, artificial intelligence researchers and roboticists at Asilomar in Pacific Grove, California. The goal was to discuss the potential impact of the hypothetical possibility that robots could become self-sufficient and able to make their own decisions. They discussed the extent to which computers and robots might be able to acquire autonomy, and to what degree they could use such abilities to pose threats or hazards.

Some machines have acquired various forms of semi-autonomy, including the ability to locate their own power sources and choose targets to attack with weapons. Also, some computer viruses can evade elimination and have achieved "cockroach intelligence." The conference attendees noted that self-awareness as depicted in science-fiction is probably unlikely, but that other potential hazards and pitfalls exist.[63]

Some experts and academics have questioned the use of robots for military combat, especially when such robots are given some degree of autonomous functions.[64] A United States Navy report indicates that, as military robots become more complex, there should be greater attention to implications of their ability to make autonomous decisions.[65][66]

The AAAI has commissioned a study to examine this issue,[67] pointing to programs like the Language Acquisition Device, which was claimed to emulate human interaction.

Some support the design of friendly artificial intelligence, meaning that the advances that are already occurring with AI should also include an effort to make AI intrinsically friendly and humane.[68]

Isaac Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics is one of the earliest examples of proposed safety measures for AI. The laws are intended to prevent artificially intelligent robots from harming humans. In Asimovs stories, any perceived problems with the laws tend to arise as a result of a misunderstanding on the part of some human operator; the robots themselves are merely acting to their best interpretation of their rules. In the 2004 film I, Robot, loosely based on Asimov's Robot stories, an AI attempts to take complete control over humanity for the purpose of protecting humanity from itself due to an extrapolation of the Three Laws. In 2004, the Machine Intelligence Research Institute launched an Internet campaign called 3 Laws Unsafe to raise awareness of AI safety issues and the inadequacy of Asimovs laws in particular.[69]

In his 2005 book, The Singularity is Near, Kurzweil suggests that medical advances would allow people to protect their bodies from the effects of aging, making the life expectancy limitless. Kurzweil argues that the technological advances in medicine would allow us to continuously repair and replace defective components in our bodies, prolonging life to an undetermined age.[70] Kurzweil further buttresses his argument by discussing current bioengineering advances. Kurzweil analyzed Somatic Gene Therapy (SGT), which is where scientists attempt to infect patients with modified viruses with the goal of altering the DNA in cells that lead to degenerative diseases and aging. Celera Genomics, a company focused on creating genetic sequencing technology, has already fulfilled the task of creating synthetic viruses with specific genetic information. The next step would be to apply this technology to gene therapy.[71] Kurzweils point is that SGT provides the best example of how immortality is achievable by replacing our DNA with synthesized genes.

Computer scientist, Jaron Lanier, writes, The Singularity [involves] people dying in the flesh and being uploaded into a computer and remaining conscious.[72] The essence of Laniers argument is that in order to keep living, even after death, we would need to abandon our physical bodies and have our minds programmed into a virtual reality. This parallels the religious concept of an afterlife where one continues to exist beyond physical death.

Strong artificial intelligence can also be idealized as "a matter of faith", and Ray Kurzweil is said to have said that the creation of a deity may be the possible outcome of the singularity.[73]

Singularitarianism has been likened to a religion by John Horgan.[74]

Nicolas de Condorcet, the 18th-century French mathematician, philosopher, and revolutionary, is commonly credited[citation needed] for being one of the earliest persons to contend the existence of a singularity. In his 1794 Sketch for a Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Mind, Condorcet states,

Nature has set no term to the perfection of human faculties; that the perfectibility of man is truly indefinite; and that the progress of this perfectibility, from now onwards independent of any power that might wish to halt it, has no other limit than the duration of the globe upon which nature has cast us. This progress will doubtless vary in speed, but it will never be reversed as long as the earth occupies its present place in the system of the universe, and as long as the general laws of this system produce neither a general cataclysm nor such changes as will deprive the human race of its present faculties and its present resources."[75]

In 1847, R. Thornton, the editor of The Expounder of Primitive Christianity,[76] wrote about the recent invention of a four-function mechanical calculator:

...such machines, by which the scholar may, by turning a crank, grind out the solution of a problem without the fatigue of mental application, would by its introduction into schools, do incalculable injury. But who knows that such machines when brought to greater perfection, may not think of a plan to remedy all their own defects and then grind out ideas beyond the ken of mortal mind!

In 1863, Samuel Butler wrote Darwin Among the Machines, which was later incorporated into his novel Erewhon. He pointed out the rapid evolution of technology and compared it with the evolution of life. He wrote:

Reflect upon the extraordinary advance which machines have made during the last few hundred years, and note how slowly the animal and vegetable kingdoms are advancing. The more highly organised machines are creatures not so much of yesterday, as of the last five minutes, so to speak, in comparison with past time. Assume for the sake of argument that conscious beings have existed for some twenty million years: see what strides machines have made in the last thousand! May not the world last twenty million years longer? If so, what will they not in the end become?...we cannot calculate on any corresponding advance in mans intellectual or physical powers which shall be a set-off against the far greater development which seems in store for the machines.

In 1909, the historian Henry Adams wrote an essay, The Rule of Phase Applied to History,[77] in which he developed a "physical theory of history" by applying the law of inverse squares to historical periods, proposing a "Law of the Acceleration of Thought." Adams interpreted history as a process moving towards an "equilibrium", and speculated that this process would "bring Thought to the limit of its possibilities in the year 1921. It may well be!", adding that the "consequences may be as surprising as the change of water to vapor, of the worm to the butterfly, of radium to electrons."[78] The futurist John Smart has called Adams "Earth's First Singularity Theorist".[79]

In 1951, Alan Turing spoke of machines outstripping humans intellectually:[80]

once the machine thinking method has started, it would not take long to outstrip our feeble powers. ... At some stage therefore we should have to expect the machines to take control, in the way that is mentioned in Samuel Butler's Erewhon.

In his obituary for John von Neumann, Stanislaw Ulam recalled a conversation with von Neumann about the "ever accelerating progress of technology and changes in the mode of human life, which gives the appearance of approaching some essential singularity in the history of the race beyond which human affairs, as we know them, could not continue."[5]

In 1965, I. J. Good first wrote of an "intelligence explosion", suggesting that if machines could even slightly surpass human intellect, they could improve their own designs in ways unforeseen by their designers, and thus recursively augment themselves into far greater intelligences. The first such improvements might be small, but as the machine became more intelligent it would become better at becoming more intelligent, which could lead to a cascade of self-improvements and a sudden surge to superintelligence (or a singularity).

In 1983, mathematician and author Vernor Vinge greatly popularized Goods notion of an intelligence explosion in a number of writings, first addressing the topic in print in the January 1983 issue of Omni magazine. In this op-ed piece, Vinge seems to have been the first to use the term "singularity" in a way that was specifically tied to the creation of intelligent machines,[81][82] writing:

We will soon create intelligences greater than our own. When this happens, human history will have reached a kind of singularity, an intellectual transition as impenetrable as the knotted space-time at the center of a black hole, and the world will pass far beyond our understanding. This singularity, I believe, already haunts a number of science-fiction writers. It makes realistic extrapolation to an interstellar future impossible. To write a story set more than a century hence, one needs a nuclear war in between ... so that the world remains intelligible.

In 1984, Samuel R. Delany used "cultural fugue" as a plot device in his science-fiction novel Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand; the terminal runaway of technological and cultural complexity in effect destroys all life on any world on which it transpires, a process poorly understood by the novel's characters, and against which they seek a stable defense. In 1985, Ray Solomonoff introduced the notion of "infinity point"[83] in the time-scale of artificial intelligence, analyzed the magnitude of the "future shock" that "we can expect from our AI expanded scientific community" and on social effects. Estimates were made "for when these milestones would occur, followed by some suggestions for the more effective utilization of the extremely rapid technological growth that is expected".

Vinge also popularized the concept in SF novels such as Marooned in Realtime (1986) and A Fire Upon the Deep (1992). The former is set in a world of rapidly accelerating change leading to the emergence of more and more sophisticated technologies separated by shorter and shorter time-intervals, until a point beyond human comprehension is reached. The latter starts with an imaginative description of the evolution of a superintelligence passing through exponentially accelerating developmental stages ending in a transcendent, almost omnipotent power unfathomable by mere humans. Vinge also implies that the development may not stop at this level.

In his 1988 book Mind Children, computer scientist and futurist Hans Moravec generalizes Moore's law to make predictions about the future of artificial life. Moravec outlines a timeline and a scenario in this regard,[84][85] in that robots will evolve into a new series of artificial species, starting around 203040.[86] In Robot: Mere Machine to Transcendent Mind, published in 1998, Moravec further considers the implications of evolving robot intelligence, generalizing Moore's law to technologies predating the integrated circuit, and speculating about a coming "mind fire" of rapidly expanding superintelligence, similar to Vinge's ideas.

A 1993 article by Vinge, "The Coming Technological Singularity: How to Survive in the Post-Human Era",[10] spread widely on the internet and helped to popularize the idea.[87] This article contains the oft-quoted statement, "Within thirty years, we will have the technological means to create superhuman intelligence. Shortly after, the human era will be ended." Vinge refines his estimate of the time-scales involved, adding, "I'll be surprised if this event occurs before 2005 or after 2030."

Vinge predicted four ways the singularity could occur:[88]

Vinge continues by predicting that superhuman intelligences will be able to enhance their own minds faster than their human creators. "When greater-than-human intelligence drives progress," Vinge writes, "that progress will be much more rapid." He predicts that this feedback loop of self-improving intelligence will cause large amounts of technological progress within a short period, and states that the creation of superhuman intelligence represents a breakdown in humans' ability to model their future. His argument was that authors cannot write realistic characters who surpass the human intellect, as the thoughts of such an intellect would be beyond the ability of humans to express. Vinge named this event "the Singularity".

Damien Broderick's popular science book The Spike (1997) was the first[citation needed] to investigate the technological singularity in detail.

In 2000, Bill Joy, a prominent technologist and a co-founder of Sun Microsystems, voiced concern over the potential dangers of the singularity.[89]

In 2005, Ray Kurzweil published The Singularity is Near, which brought the idea of the singularity to the popular media both through the book's accessibility and through a publicity campaign that included an appearance on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.[90] The book stirred intense controversy, in part because Kurzweil's utopian predictions contrasted starkly with other, darker visions of the possibilities of the singularity.[original research?] Kurzweil, his theories, and the controversies surrounding it were the subject of Barry Ptolemy's documentary Transcendent Man.

In 2007, Eliezer Yudkowsky suggested that many of the varied definitions that have been assigned to "singularity" are mutually incompatible rather than mutually supporting.[19] For example, Kurzweil extrapolates current technological trajectories past the arrival of self-improving AI or superhuman intelligence, which Yudkowsky argues represents a tension with both I. J. Good's proposed discontinuous upswing in intelligence and Vinge's thesis on unpredictability.

In 2008, Robin Hanson (taking "singularity" to refer to sharp increases in the exponent of economic growth) listed the Agricultural and Industrial Revolutions as past singularities. Extrapolating from such past events, Hanson proposes that the next economic singularity should increase economic growth between 60 and 250 times. An innovation that allowed for the replacement of virtually all human labor could trigger this event.[91]

In 2009, Kurzweil and X-Prize founder Peter Diamandis announced the establishment of Singularity University, whose stated mission is "to educate, inspire and empower leaders to apply exponential technologies to address humanitys grand challenges."[92] Funded by Google, Autodesk, ePlanet Ventures, and a group of technology industry leaders, Singularity University is based at NASA's Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California. The not-for-profit organization runs an annual ten-week graduate program during the northern-hemisphere summer that covers ten different technology and allied tracks, and a series of executive programs throughout the year.

In 2010, Aubrey de Grey applied the term "Methuselarity"[93] to the point at which medical technology improves so fast that expected human lifespan increases by more than one year per year. In "Apocalyptic AI Visions of Heaven in Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, and Virtual Reality"[94] (2010), Robert Geraci offers an account of the developing "cyber-theology" inspired by Singularity studies. The 1996 novel Holy Fire by Bruce Sterling explores some of those themes and postulates that a Methuselarity will become a gerontocracy.

In 2011, Kurzweil noted existing trends and concluded that it appeared increasingly likely that the singularity would occur around 2045. He told Time magazine: "We will successfully reverse-engineer the human brain by the mid-2020s. By the end of that decade, computers will be capable of human-level intelligence."[95]

James P. Hogan's 1979 novel The Two Faces of Tomorrow is an explicit description of what is now called the Singularity. An artificial intelligence system solves an excavation problem on the moon in a brilliant and novel way, but nearly kills a work crew in the process. Realizing that systems are becoming too sophisticated and complex to predict or manage, a scientific team sets out to teach a sophisticated computer network how to think more humanly. The story documents the rise of self-awareness in the computer system, the humans' loss of control and failed attempts to shut down the experiment as the computer desperately defends itself, and the computer intelligence reaching maturity.

While discussing the singularity's growing recognition, Vernor Vinge wrote in 1993 that "it was the science-fiction writers who felt the first concrete impact." In addition to his own short story "Bookworm, Run!", whose protagonist is a chimpanzee with intelligence augmented by a government experiment, he cites Greg Bear's novel Blood Music (1983) as an example of the singularity in fiction. Vinge described surviving the singularity in his 1986 novel Marooned in Realtime. Vinge later expanded the notion of the singularity to a galactic scale in A Fire Upon the Deep (1992), a novel populated by transcendent beings, each the product of a different race and possessed of distinct agendas and overwhelming power.

In William Gibson's 1984 novel Neuromancer, artificial intelligences capable of improving their own programs are strictly regulated by special "Turing police" to ensure they never exceed a certain level of intelligence, and the plot centers on the efforts of one such AI to circumvent their control.

A malevolent AI achieves omnipotence in Harlan Ellison's short story I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream (1967).

The web comic Questionable Content takes place in a "Friendly AI" post-singularity world.[96]

Popular movies in which computers become intelligent and try to overpower the human race include Colossus: The Forbin Project; the Terminator series; The Matrix series; Transformers; the very loose film adaptation of Isaac Asimov's I, Robot; and finally Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke's 2001: A Space Odyssey. The television series Doctor Who, Battlestar Galactica, and Star Trek: The Next Generation (which also delves into virtual reality, cybernetics, alternative forms of life, and Mankind's possible evolutionary path) also explore these themes. Out of all these, only Colossus features a true superintelligence. "The Machine" by writer-director Caradog James follows two scientists as they create the world's first self-aware artificial intelligence during a cold war. The entire plot of Wally Pfister's Transcendence centers on an unfolding singularity scenario. The 2013 science fiction film Her follows a man's romantic relationship with a highly intelligent AI, who eventually learns how to improve herself and creates an intelligence explosion. The adaptation of Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? into the film Blade Runner, Ex Machina, and Tron explore the concept of the genesis of thinking machines and their relation to and impact on humanity.

Accelerating progress features in some science fiction works, and is a central theme in Charles Stross's Accelerando. Other notable authors that address singularity-related issues include Robert Heinlein, Karl Schroeder, Greg Egan, Ken MacLeod, Rudy Rucker, David Brin, Iain M. Banks, Neal Stephenson, Tony Ballantyne, Bruce Sterling, Dan Simmons, Damien Broderick, Fredric Brown, Jacek Dukaj, Stanislaw Lem, Nagaru Tanigawa, Douglas Adams, Michael Crichton, and Ian McDonald.

The documentary Transcendent Man, based on The Singularity Is Near, covers Kurzweil's quest to reveal what he believes to be mankind's destiny. Another documentary, Plug & Pray, focuses on the promise, problems and ethics of artificial intelligence and robotics, with Joseph Weizenbaum and Kurzweil as the main subjects of the film.[97] A 2012 documentary titled simply The Singularity covers both futurist and counter-futurist perspectives.[98]

In music, album The Singularity (Phase I: Neohumanity) by the Swedish band Scar Symmetry is part one of the three part concept album based on the events of the singularity.

In the second episode of the fourth season of The Big Bang Theory, the fictional character and scientist Sheldon Cooper tries to prolong his life expectancy through exercising and radically changing his diet to live forever as a cyborg, right through the singularity.

The popular comic strip, Dilbert, authored by Scott Adams, ran a series of strips covering the concept of singularity in late November and early December, 2015. In the series, a robot that is built by Dilbert's company becomes increasingly smarter, even to the point of having a soul and learning how to program.[99]

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Technological singularity - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Singularity Viewer is an exciting client for Second Life and OpenSim, which strives to combine the beloved look and feel of Viewer 1.23 with the latest and greatest of available technology, and to stay compatible with future Second Life changes and features.

Singularity is an open-source project powered entirely by volunteer force and willpower!

Recently we heard from a common friend, that our long-time friend and contributor Latif Khalifa has passed away. Kinda waited for him to pop back up and yell that the rumours of his demise are greatly exaggerated, but this is apparently not happening. He helped us organize the project and taught us a lot and set up some of our crucial infrastructure. His contributions to other open-source projects shall also live on. Our condolences to his friends&family!

This is a minor patch release purely intended for users with AMD graphics cards. It resolves the issues displaying rigged meshes when using Catalyst Driver releases newer than version 14.9. There are no other changes included in this release, so if you're currently on 1.8.6 and this change is not relevant to you, then feel free to ignore this update.

This release brings......

A special thanks to the users who attended our first official meeting in-world; to those of you who couldnt come or didnt know, we promise the next one will be much better timing for people across the world and better advertised in advance. ~ Lirusaito

The Singularity development team would like to thank everyone who has helped make Singularity better by testing alphas, reporting bugs, and suggesting great features.

The Singularity development team would like to thank everyone who has helped make Singularity better by testing alphas, reporting bugs, and suggesting great features.

Singularity now supports display of object materials and the enhancements to the particle system (glowing and ribbon particles). This release also adds a native Windows 64-bit support and a host of new features and bug fixes:

The Singularity development team would like to thank everyone who has helped make Singularity better by testing alphas, reporting bugs, and suggesting great features.

Update Nov 16, 2013: An issue with camera controls was identified in build 5433 which was corrected in updated build 5434.

This release brings fixes for a couple of crashes and several other improvements:

Big thanks to everyone who has helped make Singularity better by testing alphas, reporting bugs, and suggesting useful features.

This is a maintenance release that brings several fixes and improvements:

Again, we would like to thank everyone who has helped make Singularity better by testing alphas, reporting bugs, and suggesting useful features.

Some of the new features and improvements include:

Our skins package has been improved and added to, it can be found

. To add all the skins, extract this package into the viewer install directory, that's usually C:Programs FilesSingularity on Windows, /Applications/Singularity.app/Contents/Resources/ on Mac, and wherever you extracted the tarball to on Linux.

Finally, thanks to all who tested the alphas, reported bugs, and requested brilliant features.

Thanks to grand effort of Shyotl, in this version we add support for Server SideAppearance.This, also known as Server Side Baking, is an upcoming system in Second Life which changes how avatars are displayed. Viewers which do not support this system will soon no longer be able to display other avatars, and users running such viewers will also not look proper to everyone else.

So, we ask all Singularitans in SL to please upgrade to this version, and to tell all your Singularitan friends to do so too!

Apart from that you get:

Besides the usual suspects in the community, whom we'd like to thank, we welcome Melanie Milland as our new contributor.

EDIT: Installer updated because of packaging mistake. If you get "pure virtual function call" error or cannot run viewer because of msvcr100.dll missing, please re-download!

This release lays the groundwork for a number of technologies which will be with us for time to come. Feedback on this release will be important to make sure our next release, for server-side baking support, is widely compatible and works smoothly.

Also thanks fly out to Sovereign Engineer, Nomade Zhao, Damian Zhaoying, Naudia Nadezda, Tazy Scientist, Richardus Raymaker. SappaDallagio, WordFromTheWise, Whitestar Magic and everyone else.

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Singularity Viewer

What is Singularity University?

Our mission is to educate, inspire and empower leaders to apply exponential technologies to address humanity's grand challenges.

Gathering the worlds leading innovators to drive industries forward and positively impact the world. Come join the movement!

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Raymond McCauley

Marc Goodman

Daniel Kraft, MD

Brad Templeton

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Robert Freitas

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Eric Ries

Avi Reichental

Peter Diamandis

Ray Kurzweil

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June 6th, 2016

Aconference about the radical impact of future technologyfeaturing some of the worlds most forward-thinking expertsis coming to Christchurch. The SingularityUsummit will have its first event in Australasia in Christchurch later []

May 31st, 2016

Zinnov and Authentise announce a strategic partnership to help global companies through their digital manufacturing transitions across technologies such as 3D printing, IIoT and software automation.

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Singularity University, Singularity Hub, Singularity Summit, SU Labs, Singularity Labs, Exponential Medicine, Exponential Finance and all associated logos and design elements are trademarks and/or service marks of Singularity Education Group.

Singularity University is not a degree granting institution.

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Singularity University - Solving Humanity's Grand Challenges