From: Dani Eder (danielravennest@yahoo.com)
Date: Tue Apr 02 2002 - 14:45:06 MST
It sounds like what you are talking about is
the Singularity as a discontinuity in the
rate of progress in technology versus a
continuation of the gradual acceleration
of progress we have seen so far.
Which is likely to happen depends on whether
the rate of progress depends on how smart
the smartest intelligences are or whether
it depends on the total quantity of intelligence
available.
So far, the maximum smartness has been approximately
constant. The increase in the rate of progress
can be explained by the growth in human
population, and the increasing fraction of that
population spending time doing science and
engineering. The latter is mostly a function
of the increasing number of people in developed
or fast developing countries where lots of people
get higher education, versus the remainder of the
world that operates on subsistence agriculture
and practically no education.
The future discontinuity which we refer to as
the singularity can occur if (a) we develop one
self-improving AI that by itself can bootstrap
up to an intelligence level where it can rapidly
improve technology, or (b) the aggregate amount
of computer power available per technology worker
becomes large enough to 'amplify' their
productivity.
Daniel
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