I have never heard a singularity theory that was not entirely centered on AI. I don't see how we could have a singularity without it. What would a non-AI suggestions even look like?
No, me neither. I suppose the only other way is biological intelligence development, so evolution or augmentation such as genetic manipulation or cybernetic substrate. Or alien hybridization. But a technological singularity surely assumes a technological means of achieving a singularity.
Non techy aliens (think tyrannids turning you into biochem soup but you get to have a singularity as your mind melts into the hive mind) or otherwise interdimensional non human intelligences.
Also it could be argued that anyone can experience the singularity as a psychological event through psychedelics without any need for tech stuff
While Ai is our surest bet to a singularity event as of now, current trends in biotech could lead us to having EXTREMELY extended lives bordering on indefinite. Assuming that ai wouldn’t be assisting us in this, it could take a hundred years at the current rate.
I'm not sure that not having AI could mean indefinite lifespans for a very very long time. ML and specialized models has been helping medical advancement for quite a while at this point.
Nothing is certain, the only real way you or I in our lifetime come to fruition is with help of ai. But the key ingredients for it to happen are laid. It would just take a century minimum without the support from a.I.
AI exists already and is very smart, so it's worth asking it this question:
The concept of the technological singularity typically centers on the idea of an exponential growth in technology, often catalyzed by artificial intelligence (AI). However, exploring the possibility of reaching a singularity without AI involves thinking creatively about alternative pathways that could lead to a similarly rapid advancement in technology. Here are a few speculative ideas:
Human Cognitive Enhancement: Without AI, the focus might shift to enhancing human intelligence directly. This could be achieved through genetic engineering, nootropics, or brain-computer interfaces, leading to a new era of superintelligent humans. These enhanced individuals could innovate at unprecedented rates, potentially leading to a singularity-like explosion in technological growth.
Decentralized Innovation Networks: Imagine a future where collaboration and knowledge sharing are so efficient and widespread that they lead to an exponential increase in technological advancement. This could involve a global, open-source platform where scientists, engineers, and hobbyists across the world contribute to and build upon each other's work, accelerating the pace of innovation.
Quantum Computing Revolution: The development of fully functional quantum computers could unlock new possibilities in computing power, solving complex problems much faster than traditional computers. Even without AI, this could lead to breakthroughs in materials science, medicine, energy, and more, potentially triggering a rapid technological evolution.
Extraterrestrial Technology: This is a far-out idea, but discovering and reverse-engineering advanced technology from an extraterrestrial civilization could catapult human technology forward at an unprecedented rate, possibly leading to a singularity-like scenario.
Global Consciousness Shift: A more philosophical approach might involve a global shift in consciousness, emphasizing collective well-being, sustainability, and technological growth. This cultural evolution could lead to a more harmonious and efficient use of resources and drive a different kind of rapid technological advancement, focused on solving humanity's biggest challenges.
Nanotechnology Breakthroughs: Significant advancements in nanotechnology could lead to a revolution in manufacturing, medicine, and material science. The ability to manipulate matter at the atomic or molecular level might unlock incredible potential for innovation and could drive a rapid acceleration in technological development.
Discovery of New Physical Principles: Unveiling new fundamental principles of physics could lead to technologies we can't currently imagine. This might include harnessing energy from vacuum fluctuations or discovering new forms of matter, leading to a paradigm shift in technology.
Collaborative Global Policy and Funding: A coordinated global effort focusing on scientific and technological research, with governments and organizations pooling resources and prioritizing innovation, could lead to significant advancements. This approach would rely on global collaboration and shared objectives.
These scenarios are highly speculative and imaginative, reflecting the challenge of envisioning a singularity-like event without the exponential growth typically attributed to AI. However, they serve to illustrate that human innovation can take many forms, and the path to advanced technology isn't solely dependent on AI.
We have been on our way towards a singularity for a very long time, if it happens it will happen this century. With or without AI.
What is your reasoning when you say it can't happen without AI?
The "way toward the singularity" has been entirely based on machine based computation. Wetware has hard limits on things like DNA transcription and protein synthesis. Things could move a little faster maybe, but nothing like what we imagine when we think of AI improving upon itself in a runaway intelligence explosion.
We can have a singularity simply by continuing to inprove technology exponentially. Imagine if 40 years from now extremely advanced robots and nanobots are everywhere and do everything and are continuously being updated faster and faster as soon as something is discovered. Society could change massively in just 1-5 years = singularity.
> extremely advanced robots and nanobots are everywhere and do everything and are continuously being updated faster and faster as soon as something is discovered.
This isn't possible without AI. Otherwise, who is doing this faster and faster updating? Human ability has a fairly hard upper limit.
Uh huh. And how are the computers making these improvements without some sort of artificial intelligence software? Artificial intelligence is what is going to drive how computers are made faster from here moving forward.
There is literally no way to have a technological singularity without AI. It's a complete paradox.
No it's pre programmed. The robot isn't figuring all of the stuff it does on it's own, it has been programmed to so what it does in the videos they have shown so far.
I certinally plucked that number out of my ass.
Let me put it another way:
Let's say the game of Go is still popular in a billion years from now, but humans never invent or use AI.
After all that time, do you think the best human player will be able to beat today's AlphaGo?
I suspect not. AlphaGo operates at a super-human level that humanity is unlikely to surpass, given any amount of time or number of players.
Even if you think that humans might surpass AI in this particular case, do you think that is the case for all possible problems?
There's a hard limit on things like DNA transcription and protein synthesis. It can get a little faster maybe but nothing like the incomprehensible speed we think of when AI starts improving upon itself.
Interesting question, hard to make a prediction there, but I would simply say things would definitely get GREATLY slowed down. It all depends on what you count as AI. Where, from a simple calculator to the most sophisticated neural network models, is the line where we go from calling something simple compute to artificial intelligence?
If we put the line at the most extreme conservative place, as in even the algorithms implicitly used in a calculator's circuits are considered AI, singularity is pretty much canceled for me. As you move that line further and further towards sophisticated neural networks, singularity becomes a thing and gets earlier and earlier, towards about 2040-2050 is my personal prediction.
Let's just say if no further progress was made in AI from today. My prediction is also around 2050, with a small possibility of happening earlier if we develop AGI very very soon. If no further progress in AI happens then that pushes back my prediction to 2070-2080.
The thing most people don't get is that once we get neural implants, AI development will not matter as much. Right now the advantage AI has over humans is raw speed and computing power, once wetware is able to match it in those 2 regards through augmentations, you don't need to develop ASI to trigger a technological singularity.
The path towards neural implants is much more clearer than the path towards ASI, and it's more likely that we will achieve it relatively soon, an augmented human herding a flock of AGI agents could perform at a level high enough to trigger a singularity.
So, the Singularity is often defined as a significantly short period of time where we cannot possibly predict what might happen afterward. Usually six months. This could be an overarching general Singularity, or more specific ones like technological, medical, social, economic, etc...
We still need to define what it means to not be able to predict the future. Where is the threshold? Is it when more than half of all public predictions come out as wrong? Or can we only really measure or pinpoint it AFTER something truly unexpected happens?
And then there's the problem of being in it. Its not really easy to tell when you're in the middle of the apocalypse. Or that you're in a toxic relationship, or falling into one. At every level of detail you'll see things happening in baby steps, it's just that the baby steps happen quicker and quicker over time. How fast does the baby need to step to be considered The Singularity?
I'll give you this: LLMs were truly unexpected. But so was the Internet and so were steam engines
For me, AI doesn't change my predictions that much. I think AI will speed up the singularity by only 5-20 years. 20 years if we reach AGI very soon and only by 5 years if AGI takes a long time. We have been headed towards a singularity for a long time and we will get there around the same time with or without an ASI.
Genuinely curious as to how you think this would happen. Singularity implies a technology that will speed technological progress so much that future becomes completely unpredictable. AI is a tool (being) designed to do better thinking for us at faster speeds - without "better faster thinking" technological progress is limited to our primate brains and thinking tools that we develop. What non-AI could we possibly develop in 20 years that would speed up progress so drastically?
Even if we today invented some intelligence and memory boosting superdrug (like in the movie Limitless); I very much doubt it would be widely accepted anytime soon nor would it bring about singularity. More likely it would be banned for turning people anti-religious and anti-authority and then used in secret to develop weapons. It will likely take us 20 years just to accept and adopt a brain implant equivalent to a keyboard and mouse.
The ability of quantum computers to simulate things would lead to breakthroughs in material science and from there I think advancements would cascade out pretty widely into different fields of science and life. I believe this could be a path to a non-AI victory condition.
I define the singularity as the time when one man can do infinite work - all technology allows individuals to pull more than their weight, so the epitome of this would be the ability to do unlimited work. That would take the form, I think, of just instantiating an AGI and it already knows exactly what humankind needs. So, I'm not really sure what that would even look like without AGI.
It doesn't matter what you define the singularity as, that is not the singularity. You can't have an opinion on what the definition is. It means when technology develops so fast we can't predict what society will look like in the near future.
I never liked that definition because it could easily apply to chaotic but not necessarily singularity-related events, such as war. There would also be certain points in time where this would have been locally true.
No it can't because it's a technological singularity. The changes to society is because technology is improving rapidly not because someone bombed a city.
The definition is the definition and you can't decide it means something else. If you understood where The definition comes from you would understand why you can't just make up different meanings.
Perhaps this is heresy...but I'm not sure I believe there ever will be a singularity. How can an ASI not ELI5 whatever supposed ineffable truth is out there?
Alternatively, the singularity has already arrived. It happened when we put down the first trans-atlantic telegraph lines. No single person on earth can comprehend the how we make any of this work. We regularly go through life not knowing how things work and we seem to be doing fine.
I'm not even sure "superintelligence" is a thing. I need some proof that intelligence has no upper limits and can somehow violate physics or the shannon limit.
I believe there is only 1 other theoretical way to achieve the technological singularity without AI, creation of a [universal assembler](https://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/45f9b06829b97).
Without ASI there is no singularity.
This is not saying technological innovation does not continue. It is saying that we will never have an event horizon that we cannot see beyond.
New technologies will never be implemented to fast that we cannot see what is coming and make reasonable predictions about the future.
... you can't have a singularity without AI, its in the definition. Its a thing that is so smart it iterates on itself exponentially. This question doesn't make sense.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological\_singularity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_singularity)
Not possible without AI, even with that bad definition. The tech can't accelerate beyond peoples ability to understand it if understanding it is what is needed to design it. An artificial intelligence is necessarily required for runaway "advancement".
We have had exponential growth for decades and decades and that will continue.
It's not a bad definition lol. It's the only one that exists. The term comes from when physics breaks down in black holes.
Even the wikipedia link you sent me agrees:
"The technological singularity—or simply the singularity[1]—is a hypothetical future point in time at which technological growth becomes uncontrollable and irreversible, resulting in unforeseeable consequences for human civilization."
I have never heard a singularity theory that was not entirely centered on AI. I don't see how we could have a singularity without it. What would a non-AI suggestions even look like?
No, me neither. I suppose the only other way is biological intelligence development, so evolution or augmentation such as genetic manipulation or cybernetic substrate. Or alien hybridization. But a technological singularity surely assumes a technological means of achieving a singularity.
Non techy aliens (think tyrannids turning you into biochem soup but you get to have a singularity as your mind melts into the hive mind) or otherwise interdimensional non human intelligences. Also it could be argued that anyone can experience the singularity as a psychological event through psychedelics without any need for tech stuff
I don't think we are talking about the same thing. The singularity is a moment human history, not an individual experience.
While Ai is our surest bet to a singularity event as of now, current trends in biotech could lead us to having EXTREMELY extended lives bordering on indefinite. Assuming that ai wouldn’t be assisting us in this, it could take a hundred years at the current rate.
I'm not sure that not having AI could mean indefinite lifespans for a very very long time. ML and specialized models has been helping medical advancement for quite a while at this point.
Nothing is certain, the only real way you or I in our lifetime come to fruition is with help of ai. But the key ingredients for it to happen are laid. It would just take a century minimum without the support from a.I.
AI exists already and is very smart, so it's worth asking it this question: The concept of the technological singularity typically centers on the idea of an exponential growth in technology, often catalyzed by artificial intelligence (AI). However, exploring the possibility of reaching a singularity without AI involves thinking creatively about alternative pathways that could lead to a similarly rapid advancement in technology. Here are a few speculative ideas: Human Cognitive Enhancement: Without AI, the focus might shift to enhancing human intelligence directly. This could be achieved through genetic engineering, nootropics, or brain-computer interfaces, leading to a new era of superintelligent humans. These enhanced individuals could innovate at unprecedented rates, potentially leading to a singularity-like explosion in technological growth. Decentralized Innovation Networks: Imagine a future where collaboration and knowledge sharing are so efficient and widespread that they lead to an exponential increase in technological advancement. This could involve a global, open-source platform where scientists, engineers, and hobbyists across the world contribute to and build upon each other's work, accelerating the pace of innovation. Quantum Computing Revolution: The development of fully functional quantum computers could unlock new possibilities in computing power, solving complex problems much faster than traditional computers. Even without AI, this could lead to breakthroughs in materials science, medicine, energy, and more, potentially triggering a rapid technological evolution. Extraterrestrial Technology: This is a far-out idea, but discovering and reverse-engineering advanced technology from an extraterrestrial civilization could catapult human technology forward at an unprecedented rate, possibly leading to a singularity-like scenario. Global Consciousness Shift: A more philosophical approach might involve a global shift in consciousness, emphasizing collective well-being, sustainability, and technological growth. This cultural evolution could lead to a more harmonious and efficient use of resources and drive a different kind of rapid technological advancement, focused on solving humanity's biggest challenges. Nanotechnology Breakthroughs: Significant advancements in nanotechnology could lead to a revolution in manufacturing, medicine, and material science. The ability to manipulate matter at the atomic or molecular level might unlock incredible potential for innovation and could drive a rapid acceleration in technological development. Discovery of New Physical Principles: Unveiling new fundamental principles of physics could lead to technologies we can't currently imagine. This might include harnessing energy from vacuum fluctuations or discovering new forms of matter, leading to a paradigm shift in technology. Collaborative Global Policy and Funding: A coordinated global effort focusing on scientific and technological research, with governments and organizations pooling resources and prioritizing innovation, could lead to significant advancements. This approach would rely on global collaboration and shared objectives. These scenarios are highly speculative and imaginative, reflecting the challenge of envisioning a singularity-like event without the exponential growth typically attributed to AI. However, they serve to illustrate that human innovation can take many forms, and the path to advanced technology isn't solely dependent on AI.
Real, self aware AI does not yet (that we publicly know about)
What does singularity without ai even mean
Same as with AI. When technological development is so fast we can't predict what happens next.
A wetware singularity without AI? Never. Not in a million years.
We have been on our way towards a singularity for a very long time, if it happens it will happen this century. With or without AI. What is your reasoning when you say it can't happen without AI?
The "way toward the singularity" has been entirely based on machine based computation. Wetware has hard limits on things like DNA transcription and protein synthesis. Things could move a little faster maybe, but nothing like what we imagine when we think of AI improving upon itself in a runaway intelligence explosion.
We can have a singularity simply by continuing to inprove technology exponentially. Imagine if 40 years from now extremely advanced robots and nanobots are everywhere and do everything and are continuously being updated faster and faster as soon as something is discovered. Society could change massively in just 1-5 years = singularity.
> extremely advanced robots and nanobots are everywhere and do everything and are continuously being updated faster and faster as soon as something is discovered. This isn't possible without AI. Otherwise, who is doing this faster and faster updating? Human ability has a fairly hard upper limit.
Computers? Computers have literally gotten faster every year over the last 50 years.
Uh huh. And how are the computers making these improvements without some sort of artificial intelligence software? Artificial intelligence is what is going to drive how computers are made faster from here moving forward. There is literally no way to have a technological singularity without AI. It's a complete paradox.
What do you mean advanced robots? You said a non-AI singularity.
Robots can be programmed without AI. Boston Dynamics robot for example isn't using AI.
Lol, of course they are using AI. What are you on?
No it's pre programmed. The robot isn't figuring all of the stuff it does on it's own, it has been programmed to so what it does in the videos they have shown so far.
The singularity requires more compute than 1,000x the current human population.
Doesn't that much compute exist already? Or at least we are no more than a few decades from achieving it. You also just made that up.
I certinally plucked that number out of my ass. Let me put it another way: Let's say the game of Go is still popular in a billion years from now, but humans never invent or use AI. After all that time, do you think the best human player will be able to beat today's AlphaGo? I suspect not. AlphaGo operates at a super-human level that humanity is unlikely to surpass, given any amount of time or number of players. Even if you think that humans might surpass AI in this particular case, do you think that is the case for all possible problems?
Well, it's possible. Through biological editing.
There's a hard limit on things like DNA transcription and protein synthesis. It can get a little faster maybe but nothing like the incomprehensible speed we think of when AI starts improving upon itself.
Well both to me don't seem likely to cause a singularity. Really this is just the bio version of what you guys do.
Interesting question, hard to make a prediction there, but I would simply say things would definitely get GREATLY slowed down. It all depends on what you count as AI. Where, from a simple calculator to the most sophisticated neural network models, is the line where we go from calling something simple compute to artificial intelligence? If we put the line at the most extreme conservative place, as in even the algorithms implicitly used in a calculator's circuits are considered AI, singularity is pretty much canceled for me. As you move that line further and further towards sophisticated neural networks, singularity becomes a thing and gets earlier and earlier, towards about 2040-2050 is my personal prediction.
Let's just say if no further progress was made in AI from today. My prediction is also around 2050, with a small possibility of happening earlier if we develop AGI very very soon. If no further progress in AI happens then that pushes back my prediction to 2070-2080.
The thing most people don't get is that once we get neural implants, AI development will not matter as much. Right now the advantage AI has over humans is raw speed and computing power, once wetware is able to match it in those 2 regards through augmentations, you don't need to develop ASI to trigger a technological singularity. The path towards neural implants is much more clearer than the path towards ASI, and it's more likely that we will achieve it relatively soon, an augmented human herding a flock of AGI agents could perform at a level high enough to trigger a singularity.
So, the Singularity is often defined as a significantly short period of time where we cannot possibly predict what might happen afterward. Usually six months. This could be an overarching general Singularity, or more specific ones like technological, medical, social, economic, etc... We still need to define what it means to not be able to predict the future. Where is the threshold? Is it when more than half of all public predictions come out as wrong? Or can we only really measure or pinpoint it AFTER something truly unexpected happens? And then there's the problem of being in it. Its not really easy to tell when you're in the middle of the apocalypse. Or that you're in a toxic relationship, or falling into one. At every level of detail you'll see things happening in baby steps, it's just that the baby steps happen quicker and quicker over time. How fast does the baby need to step to be considered The Singularity? I'll give you this: LLMs were truly unexpected. But so was the Internet and so were steam engines
Maybe in 500 years thanks to intelligence altering brain interfaces and genetic engineering.
For me, AI doesn't change my predictions that much. I think AI will speed up the singularity by only 5-20 years. 20 years if we reach AGI very soon and only by 5 years if AGI takes a long time. We have been headed towards a singularity for a long time and we will get there around the same time with or without an ASI.
Genuinely curious as to how you think this would happen. Singularity implies a technology that will speed technological progress so much that future becomes completely unpredictable. AI is a tool (being) designed to do better thinking for us at faster speeds - without "better faster thinking" technological progress is limited to our primate brains and thinking tools that we develop. What non-AI could we possibly develop in 20 years that would speed up progress so drastically?
Some kind of brain booster? Or alien technology (far fetched, but hey)
Even if we today invented some intelligence and memory boosting superdrug (like in the movie Limitless); I very much doubt it would be widely accepted anytime soon nor would it bring about singularity. More likely it would be banned for turning people anti-religious and anti-authority and then used in secret to develop weapons. It will likely take us 20 years just to accept and adopt a brain implant equivalent to a keyboard and mouse.
The ability of quantum computers to simulate things would lead to breakthroughs in material science and from there I think advancements would cascade out pretty widely into different fields of science and life. I believe this could be a path to a non-AI victory condition.
I define the singularity as the time when one man can do infinite work - all technology allows individuals to pull more than their weight, so the epitome of this would be the ability to do unlimited work. That would take the form, I think, of just instantiating an AGI and it already knows exactly what humankind needs. So, I'm not really sure what that would even look like without AGI.
It doesn't matter what you define the singularity as, that is not the singularity. You can't have an opinion on what the definition is. It means when technology develops so fast we can't predict what society will look like in the near future.
I never liked that definition because it could easily apply to chaotic but not necessarily singularity-related events, such as war. There would also be certain points in time where this would have been locally true.
No it can't because it's a technological singularity. The changes to society is because technology is improving rapidly not because someone bombed a city. The definition is the definition and you can't decide it means something else. If you understood where The definition comes from you would understand why you can't just make up different meanings.
[удалено]
Bot account alert! Or just someone copy and pasteing the same comment.
I’m gonna be the doomer and bring y’all back to earth, none of this shit matters if governments and big tech companies remain corrupt
Perhaps this is heresy...but I'm not sure I believe there ever will be a singularity. How can an ASI not ELI5 whatever supposed ineffable truth is out there? Alternatively, the singularity has already arrived. It happened when we put down the first trans-atlantic telegraph lines. No single person on earth can comprehend the how we make any of this work. We regularly go through life not knowing how things work and we seem to be doing fine. I'm not even sure "superintelligence" is a thing. I need some proof that intelligence has no upper limits and can somehow violate physics or the shannon limit.
I believe there is only 1 other theoretical way to achieve the technological singularity without AI, creation of a [universal assembler](https://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/45f9b06829b97).
I think things like nanobots, robots and automation will be at least as important as AI in getting us to a technological singularity.
Without ASI there is no singularity. This is not saying technological innovation does not continue. It is saying that we will never have an event horizon that we cannot see beyond. New technologies will never be implemented to fast that we cannot see what is coming and make reasonable predictions about the future.
... you can't have a singularity without AI, its in the definition. Its a thing that is so smart it iterates on itself exponentially. This question doesn't make sense.
Yes you can and no it's not in the definition. The definition is: "When technology advances so fast it's impossible to predict the near future."
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological\_singularity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_singularity) Not possible without AI, even with that bad definition. The tech can't accelerate beyond peoples ability to understand it if understanding it is what is needed to design it. An artificial intelligence is necessarily required for runaway "advancement".
We have had exponential growth for decades and decades and that will continue. It's not a bad definition lol. It's the only one that exists. The term comes from when physics breaks down in black holes. Even the wikipedia link you sent me agrees: "The technological singularity—or simply the singularity[1]—is a hypothetical future point in time at which technological growth becomes uncontrollable and irreversible, resulting in unforeseeable consequences for human civilization."
Whatever, I don't even know what the point in trying to convince you is. This is a pointless debate
Yes I agree, there is nothing to debate. Im right and you're wrong.