The futuristic term “technological singularity” is increasingly entering our lives. According to the most pessimistic forecasts of scientists and various experts, no later than 2030 this concept will become part of our reality. So what does this mysterious phrase mean? With numerous modern encyclopedias, technological singularity is interpreted as a hypothetical moment when technological progress acquires such speed and complexity that would be inaccessible to human understanding.
Simply put, artificial intelligence will reach a level of development at which a person may be superfluous, or even a dangerous competitor to “smart” electronic creatures. For decades, futurists and science fiction writers have been scaring us with a possible “riot of cars.” But only relatively recently this hypothetical problem began to be seriously discussed in the scientific community.
For the first time, the term “technological singularity” was spoken in an article by mathematician and writer Vernon Vinge, presented in 1993 at a symposium held by NASA in conjunction with the Ohio State Aerospace Institute . Soon, the events predicted by scientists and comparable, in his opinion, with the very appearance of man on the planet, began to come true.
The first manifestation of such a key and epoch-making event as technological singularity was not long in coming. The turning point in human development and consciousness of people was the 1997th year. In May of that year, designed by IBM specialists, the one and a half-ton electronic “monster” Deep Blue, equipped with 250 processors, defeated world champion Garry Kasparov, who had never been defeated, in a stubborn and intense chess match. At this moment, it became clear that the world will never be the same ...
The course of this fight, perhaps the most significant confrontation in the history of human civilization, deserves special attention. The grandmaster won the first batch without any problems. At the beginning of the second, Kasparov, trying to lure his electronic opponent into an ingenious trap, sacrificed two pawns.
Deep Blue this time thought (if I may call it that) for an unusually long time - almost a quarter of an hour. Although before that I spent no more than three minutes on decision-making. And only when there was a real threat of being in time trouble, did the machine make a return move. The result was joyless for the human mind. The machine did not accept the victim, she won the game ...
The next three ended in a draw. But the computer won the last batch in a brilliant style, leaving no chance to a person. In it, Deep Blue simply defeated the great grandmaster. So, humanity has learned about a new generation of electronic machines, whose intelligence is superior to human. And who have just amazing learning ability.
Modern cars have gone even further. Neurophysiologists claim that the computational ability of the human brain is about one hundred trillion operations per second. The amount of conscious memory of an ordinary person is only two and a half gigabytes. And the working speed of today's supercomputers is a speed of 115 trillion. As for the volume of the storage device, it may not apply. However, they do not know fatigue, poor health, doubt, hesitation, other human weaknesses. Therefore, futurologists believe that technological singularity is inevitable.
Of course, modern biotechnology is quite capable of providing mankind with means of improving natural intellectual abilities. Which will lead to the appearance of such a phenomenon as the singularity of consciousness. In this case, a person runs the risk of becoming part of a machine-human interface. And then it will be impossible to predict the further development of our civilization, based on the principles of sociology and habitual behavioral norms. The situation will simply get out of human control in its traditional sense.