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Author Topic:   The Social Implications Of "The Singularity Moment"
Phat
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From: Denver,Colorado USA
Joined: 12-30-2003
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Message 1 of 2 (604452)
02-12-2011 10:39 AM


Recently, I read an article in Time Magazine titled 2045: The Year Man Becomes Immortal In it, they discuss the rapid advance in artificial intelligence, and have popularized the phrase "The singularity" as the moment when computers become capable themselves of designing more intelligent computers ad infinitum.
Time Magazine writes:
It's impossible to predict the behavior of these smarter-than-human intelligences with which (with whom?) we might one day share the planet, because if you could, you'd be as smart as they would be. But there are a lot of theories about it. Maybe we'll merge with them to become super-intelligent cyborgs, using computers to extend our intellectual abilities the same way that cars and planes extend our physical abilities. Maybe the artificial intelligences will help us treat the effects of old age and prolong our life spans indefinitely. Maybe we'll scan our consciousnesses into computers and live inside them as software, forever, virtually. Maybe the computers will turn on humanity and annihilate us. The one thing all these theories have in common is the transformation of our species into something that is no longer recognizable as such to humanity circa 2011. This transformation has a name: the Singularity.
Personally, I think that such an advance will free humans up to become more artistic, but I wonder how we will be able to understand and direct the technology if it progresses beyond the mathematical and technological comprehension of most of us?
Social Ideas In Creation/Evolution? Mod, you decide where to put it.

AdminSlev
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Message 2 of 2 (604513)
02-12-2011 7:15 PM


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