# Exponential Growth of Technology and the Singularity **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 5, 2010, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608 "2010-07-05T16:29:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608/41 "2010-07-06T19:15:44Z")
> [@furt](#): > > The feel of the wind in your face when you climb to the top of your first mountain. > > The smell of the ocean. > > The beautiful desolation of the boardwalk in winter. > > How it feels when my fiancee smiles at me. > > You know, the stuff that makes us human. Pfft. There’s an app for that. ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608/42 "2010-07-06T19:55:45Z")
> [@furt](#): > > The feel of the wind in your face when you climb to the top of your first mountain. > > The smell of the ocean. > > The beautiful desolation of the boardwalk in winter. > > How it feels when my fiancee smiles at me. > > You know, the stuff that makes us human. Indeed. I don’t understand why everyone is so gaga about becoming the Borg, or a sentient grey goo, or something else bizarre or unpleasant. To name just one thing, they can take my sense of humor away from me when they pry it from my cold dead locked jaws. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608/43 "2010-07-06T21:26:54Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > Pfft. There’s an app for that. Not for the Android. At least not for the ones other than \*\*furt’s \*\*smiling wife.☹ ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608/44 "2010-07-06T22:51:47Z")
To be clear, I don’t claim that computer technology specifically is inherently exponential, but that technology in general is. Any given field of technology eventually gets about as good as it’ll ever get, but then new fields of technology emerge to be the cutting edge of development. > [@](#): > > As for machine intelligence, well, there aren’t any prospects for strong AI any time soon, and we have no reason to hope we’ll make any progress. If we do get a strong AI, it will come as a shock. So we could get something tomorrow, but we have no reason to suspect anything tomorrow. But the improvements in weak AI are not to be sneered at. Just Google itself is a huge achievement. Personally, I think that when we do get strong AI (it’ll happen eventually; it’s just when it’ll happen that’s up for guessing), it’ll be from Google or something like it just gradually getting smarter and smarter until eventually we can’t move the goalposts far enough back to exclude it. ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608/45 "2010-07-06T22:58:08Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > To be clear, I don’t claim that computer technology specifically is inherently exponential, but that technology in general is. Any given field of technology eventually gets about as good as it’ll ever get, but then new fields of technology emerge to be the cutting edge of development. > > . Yes, but there is an assumption there. That there are a very large number of “fields” of technology to become the new front runner. And not only that, but the newest front runner somehow bootstraps the others even further along and/or itself for that matter. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2010, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608/46 "2010-07-06T23:09:22Z")
> [@peledre](#): > > What doesn’t it contain? Here is a simple, uncute, example. Those of us of a certain age have noted that for students today, if it isn’t on the web it doesn’t exist. Not everything has been digitized yet. We are frequently standing up in conferences and pointing out to students and young faculty that their wonderful new idea got tried out 25 years ago. The danger of your statement is that if you think everything is on the web you won’t look off it, and your search will be overly constrained. ---
**Author:** ![peledre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/779978/32.png) [@peledre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peledre)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608/47 "2010-07-07T04:21:12Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > Here is a simple, uncute, example. Those of us of a certain age have noted that for students today, if it isn’t on the web it doesn’t exist. Not everything has been digitized yet. We are frequently standing up in conferences and pointing out to students and young faculty that their wonderful new idea got tried out 25 years ago. > The danger of your statement is that if you think everything is on the web you won’t look off it, and your search will be overly constrained. Things like this:[http://oyc.yale.edu/](http://oyc.yale.edu/) I think are very important. But I certainly take your point that not _everything_ has made it to the web. However, in general most of human knowledge can be accessed on the web, in the sense of a universal encyclopedia. ---
**Author:** ![peledre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/779978/32.png) [@peledre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peledre)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608/48 "2010-07-07T04:23:09Z")
> [@furt](#): > > The feel of the wind in your face when you climb to the top of your first mountain. > > The smell of the ocean. > > The beautiful desolation of the boardwalk in winter. > > How it feels when my fiancee smiles at me. > > You know, the stuff that makes us human. You’re speaking about emotions, which are essentially just electro-chemical reactions in our brain. ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608/49 "2010-07-07T13:35:51Z")
The qualia associated with said reactions are more than that. ---
**Author:** ![peledre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/779978/32.png) [@peledre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peledre)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608/50 "2010-07-07T14:30:18Z")
> [@John\_DiFool](#): > > The qualia associated with said reactions are more than that. Subjective experience is difficult, but I think at some point in the future we’ll have good enough VR that we won’t be able to tell the difference between it and reality. ---
**Author:** ![Bytegeist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/9dc877/32.png) [@Bytegeist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bytegeist)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608/51 "2010-07-07T15:08:49Z")
> [@peledre](#): > > … but I think at some point in the future we’ll have good enough VR that we won’t be able to tell the difference between it and reality. The pop-up ads will be a dead giveaway. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 7, 2010, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608/52 "2010-07-07T16:31:44Z")
I would maintain that anything that inherently can’t be put online (like how it feels to fall in love, or whatever) isn’t “knowledge” to begin with, or at least not part of “human knowledge”. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [July 8, 2010, 12:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608/53 "2010-07-08T12:57:03Z")
> [@John\_DiFool](#): > > The qualia associated with said reactions are more than that. Cite? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/exponential-growth-of-technology-and-the-singularity/545608.md?page=2)