I really like Shane's observation below that people just don't think
Singularity is coming for a very long time. The beginning affects are
already here. Related to this, I've got a few additional thoughts to share.
We're not looking into singularity yet, but the convergence has already
started. Consider that the molecular economy has the potential to bring
total social upheaval in its own right, without singularity. For example,
what happens when an automobile is weighs around 400 pounds and is powered
by a battery that never needs charging. What happens to the oil industry?
What happens to politics because of what happens to the oil industry? How
will a space elevator by 2012 change the balance of power? Nanoweapons?
World War III? China/India industrialization and resulting pollution? As
announced recently what happens when the world warms to its hottest level in
a million years? When biodiversity reduction goes critical and plankton die
and oxygen fails?
I'm sure you know about most of these things and how quickly they are
moving, but my point is, trouble isn't coming...it's here. Not only should
we be thinking about these things now, but I think it is our social
responsibility. That is, if we want children to grow up and inhabit this
world with any level of normalcy...or at all.
Any number of things could bring our glorious house crashing down in a
matter of days or months. When the Soviet economy crashed, nuclear
physicists were standing in the soup line over night. The same could easily
be seen of us in a global economic crash. Our scholarly/industrial
existence is really very fragile. It doesn't take much for our hierarchy of
needs to return to survival.
Our human track record of late in terms of creating advance is really quite
good, but in terms of dealing with the social impacts of that advance is
really very, very poor and immature. All of our wonderful creations are
already making quite a big global mess. So who's to say that our continued
focus on modernist, profit-centric values will result in any thing less than
more and more advance alongside escalating social issues?
In my mind, singularity is no different. I pesonally see it providing just
another tool in the hand of mankind, only one of greater power. And this
power holds the potential to fulfill human values and human intention, which
is the piece we really aren't managing well. Bad intentions and bad values,
combined with a bigger tool, equals bigger trouble.
Given our human track record and factors already outside of our control, we
have a far better chance of destroying what we have now (the rest of the
way) than we have of realizing singularity. Not that we shouldn't continue
to seek singularity, but we need a hard look at the values and intentions
than we're basing these efforts on.
See the Second Enlightenment Conference: http://www.2enlightenment.com
Elizabet Sahtouris will be keynote (http://www.ratical.org/LifeWeb/)
Kind Regards,
Bruce LaDuke
Managing Director
Instant Innovation, LLC
Indianapolis, IN
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.hyperadvance.com
----Original Message Follows----
From: "Shane Legg" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Reply-To: singularity@v2.listbox.com
To: singularity@v2.listbox.com
Subject: Re: [singularity] Convincing non-techie skeptics that the
Singularity isn't total bunk
Date: Mon, 25 Sep 2006 23:16:12 +0200
I'd suggest looking at Joy's "Why the future doesn't need us" article in
Wired.
For some reason, which isn't clear to me, that article was a huge hit,
drawing
in people that normally would never read such stuff. I was surprised when
various educated but non-techie people I know started asking me about it.
I think the major problem is one of time scale. Due to Hollywood everybody
is familiar with the idea of the future containing super powerful
intelligent (and
usually evil) computers. So I think the basic concept that these things
could
happen in the future is already out there in the popular culture. I think
the key
thing is that most people, both Joe six pack and almost all professors I
know,
don't think it's going to happen for a really long time --- long enough that
it's
not going to affect their lives, or the lives of anybody they know. As such
they
aren't all that worried about it. Anyway, I don't think the idea is going
to be
taken seriously until something happens that really gives the public a
fright.
Shane
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