Ich bin noch nicht singularitarian.

The singularity, as described in Kurzweil’s, The Singularity is Near, is a technological messiah. Kurzweil even states that the singularity will bring about the epoch in which “The Universe Wakes Up.” This epoch sounds to me like the messianic age of peace, but instead ushered in by more intelligent powers than ourselves rather than divine powers. Not only does Kurweil predict that AI will far outpace our own intelligence, but he predicts that the meshing of AI with human intelligence will make it possible to surpass traditional limits, such as the speed of light and death! All of which I am immediately skeptical of.
Throughout all of our history there have been predictions of end times (and if the singularity brings about fundamental changes such as making death a worry of the past, we can safely, an ironically, call the singularity an end time since it will bring such a distinctly new beginning) occurring in a lifetime and, it seems to be a fairly uninteresting aspect of humanity, namely, that we attach more importance to the age in which we live in than other times (I don’t think that Jesus will return to earth as the messiah in my lifetime, or anyone’s lifetime) because all of the predictions have been wrong, the world didn’t end, this lifetime didn’t turn out to be the more important than another lifetime. In this case, I guess what I would say to a singularitarian is, “you will not live forever.”
But The Singularity is Near is a very interesting book because, although falling into the End-of-the-World-Prediction category (Kurzeil briefly suggests that the big bang could have been a singularity, which on his part is a direct comparison to an end of the world scenario), it is a popular-science book that is supported by evidence. In fact, well supported. One day, the world will end, or at least, humans will end (not to say that I think the singularity will be the end of humans), therefore there must be more important eras (importance is in this case just suggesting a relationship with a more broader historical perspective, ending, for me, doesn’t suppose more meaning than any other part of a process). And, maybe this era is more important than others, at least I think it is important to understand why someone like Kurweil thinks so.
Thus far, regarding the scientific subjects mentioned, I am most interested in how cellular automata can produce complex patterns with simple instructions. How reversible computing can effectively make computations without expending any energy. And how nanotubes will bring about what Kurweil thinks will be the next technological paradigm: three dimensional molecular computing. Having only read the first three chapters, I look forward to reading more about Kurzweil’s philosophical speculations about what the singularity will be like, which I expect him to discuss in the seventh chapter.

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