Comments on Off The Pink: Singularity Happens

Ah, the whole human nature thing.That's another po...

2007-11-02T20:29:00.000-04:00

Ah, the whole human nature thing.

That's another potential deal-breaker as far as the on-rushing singularity goes. What happens when technological change alters "human nature" and human physiology?

And I'm not talking cyborgs. We're already morphing human beings beyond their design specs just with changes in food intake and something as simple as shoes and clothing. Throw in pharmacology, and who knows what can happen? We're one or two neurochemicals away from removing the biological need for sleep. Think about that for a little while. What happens when everyone has 33% more time on their hands?

Another person that thinks that nanotechnology may...

2007-11-02T19:17:00.000-04:00

Another person that thinks that nanotechnology may not be the way to the singularity. That's heresy in some circles (but I'm a heretic in those same circles).

Rapid prototyping is neat and has lots of uses (I have used it quite often myself), but it is nowhere near the level required to even think of a singularity. First, the good quality (high tolerance) stuff is made out of plastics which has terrible material properties. They have improved, but they are still far off from a machined metal part. The metallic rapid prototyping is an order of magnitude worse as far as tolerances go and usually require handworking or machining to get a workable part.

Second issue with rapid prototyping: it takes a lot of energy to produce a part, which is fine if you are producing only one or a few parts, but it needs to get really fast and power consumption needs to come down (or power needs to become really, really cheap), especially to compete with casted, forged, or even machined metals.

So, its a step in the right direction, but they need to come up with a whole set of different technologies than those listed to even think about using rapid prototyping widely.

As for the possibility of a singularity itself, here is a "what if": Can the nature of humanity even cope with a singularity. At some point, will human nature itself apply some sort of friction to technological advancement keeping a true singularity from becoming reality.

BTW fun topic.

Actually, we don need no stinking nanites. . .We'r...

2007-11-02T08:30:00.000-04:00

Actually, we don need no stinking nanites. . .

We're edging closer to a replicator economy without them. Rapid prototyping has been around since the 90's and if you think print-on-demand is going to change the publishing industry, think of iPod on demand (and I mean the whole damn iPod, songs included). What happens when I can download furniture?

With the cheap thermonuclear energy, I'd add self-...

2007-11-02T00:09:00.000-04:00

With the cheap thermonuclear energy, I'd add self-maintaining machines that do the vast amount of physical labor (thus cheap energy with the little to no human intervention robot produces a "fabrication with abandon" type economy). Nanotech? Maybe, but I am not yet convinced that self-replicating nanomachines will produce the singularity. Like genetic "engineering" we are still a far cry from being able to truely engineering living machines. My guess is that nanotech will be the same way, that it will exist a long time before someone revolutionary figures how how to turn that technology into something to trigger a singularity.

But I've been wrong before.