Last May I attended the Singularity Summit at Stanford University. In the next couple of months I am going to write about science and technology and the relevance to things economic. I am also going to revisit the topic of global warming and an example of what happens when science gets shoved aside for the sake of hype, politics and irrationality.
Let's review a few things first. This is the web site for the event: http://sss.stanford.edu/
While this is, on the surface, the thesis that advancements in artificial intelligence and nanotechnology are about the take off there are substantial economic implications.
What is the Singularity?
In math and physics the expression "singularity" means something akin to things no longer behaving the was they did but instead growing "by leaps and bounds." If you want a dictionary definition - singularity: a point at which the derivative of a given function of a complex variable does not exist but every neighborhood of which contains points for which the derivative exists. In short it's a place where the rate of change (the derivative) grows gigantically.
First a capsule from the web site:
"In futures studies, the singularity represents an "event horizon" in the predictability of human technological development past which present models of the future cease to give reliable or accurate answers, following the creation of strong AI or the enhancement of human intelligence. Many futurists predict that after the singularity, humans as they exist presently won't be the driving force in scientific and technological progress, eclipsed cognitively by posthumans, AI, or both, with all models of change based on past trends in human behavior becoming obsolete.
In the 1950’s, the legendary information theorist John von Neumann was paraphrased by mathematician Stanislaw Lem as saying that “the ever-accelerating progress of technology…gives the appearance of approaching some essential singularity in the history of the race beyond which human affairs, as we know them, could not continue.”
What these dudes are saying is that technology is progressing at an ever increasing rate and that soon this will have a qualitative as well as quantitative aspect. In short: technology is about to change mankind is a manner that will be irreversibly.
The best expostulation of this is in Ray Kurzweil's "The Singularity is Near." That web site is updated regularly and contains any major paper or talk on the topic - pro and con.
In Kurzweil's words: "What, then, is the singularity? It's a future period during which the pace of technological change will be so rapid, its impact so deep, that human life will be irreversibly transformed. Although neither utopian or dystopian, this epoch will transform the concepts that we rely on to give meaning to our lives, from our business models to the cycle of human life, including death itself. Understanding the singularity will alter our perspective on the significance of our past and the ramifications for our future. To truly understand it inherently changes one's view of life in general and one's own particular life."
What Are They Talking About?
The thrust of what Kurzweil is postulating is this:
1) increased capacity in brain scanning technology will soon (he's talking
something like 20 years) be able to understand the actually mechanism which
the brain uses
2) advances in the capability of computer processing technology will continue
per Moore's
Law. Note here that according to Kurzweil this can be done with MOSFET
technology and does not require molecular
computers which are the next vista
3) there will continue to be significant advances in Artificial Intelligence
(AI) theory and software.
Put them together and you have a computer which is capable of human though and (I'm simplifying things here) can think as well a a human can but at something greater than 1 billion times the speed of our woefully slow brains. In short, the human brain is a wonderful this but it is slow as compared to the speed of a computer.
In general, others who are accepting of Kurzweil's these in the main are less aggressive about the timeline. Kurzweil retorts by noting (and I may have the numbers slight inaccurate but the concept is accurate) that when the human genome project started was supposed to take 15 years. When half that time was complete the project was 1% finished. The other 99% was completed in the next 5 years. That is the nature of nonlinear growth. In practice the work that gets done in the early stage enables the subsequent work to get done faster. We find new, faster methods as our experience and data base increase.
Before Kurzweil
In the limited reading which I have done one of the earliest talks on this came from the eminent physicist Richard Feynman is his address to the American Physical Society in December 1959. This was when computers took up massive rooms and no one knew what MOSFET technology was. Feynman saw the possibilities as being limited only by the constants and laws of physics. Feynman mused about nanotechnology. "What could we do with layered structures with just the right layers? What would the properties of materials be if we could really arrange the atoms the way we want them? They would be very interesting to investigate theoretically. I can't see exactly what would happen, but I can hardly doubt that when we have some control of the arrangement of things on a small scale we will get an enormously greater range of possible properties that substances can have, and of different things that we can do."
The Summit
Getting back to the Singularity Summit itself, I must say that I was stunned by the reactionary attitude of many of the speakers and the audience. Many of the speakers expressed a dystopian concern that Kurzweil's thesis would lead to some highly advanced state of disaster.
In addition to Kurzweil, there were three speakers who impressed me. One was Sebastian Thrun. This was the dude behind Stanford University's winning entry in the DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) Grand Challenge. This is about autonomous driving as in a vehicle with no driver and no remote control. In the DARPA 2005 challenge the vehicles drove over 132 miles of Mojave desert dirt road given the course only 2 hours before the "green flag."
I loved Sebastian's talk because it was light in spirit ("We loaded the map in 30 seconds and spent the remaining 1 hour 59 minutes and 30 seconds drinking beer") and because he had actually done something. The year before, the race ended in disaster as no entry completed even 10% of the course. Next year DARPA is taking it to the streets by sponsoring an urban version of this - so look both ways before crossing. Sebastian also graciously pointed out that Stanford's team just barely beat the 2-4th finishers, "It's not a victory for a specific institution. It was a victory for the field." He also spiced-up his speech with hilarious slides of the misfortunes (alleged or otherwise) of Stanford's rival in sports - UC Berkeley.
There is another interesting thread to this DARPA story. Rather that throw money at folks as grants the said: You pay for you own stuff and we will offer a $2 million cash prize to whoever completes the course faster than everyone else.
This is not merely a whim on the part of the Defense Department. The issue of autonomous driving takes on a somewhat less than light note when the objective is moving cargo about Iraq. This is all about not getting soldiers blown up. The military is supposed to make a third of their vehicles autonomous within the next 10 years. On the social side, it might be the case that we can save lives by replacing drunk drivers with autonomous one. This is not just some techno nuts speaking. Read this from Bill Lutz. He is Vice-Chairman of GM and a believer.
In short, major strides have been made in AI. Computers can play chess on the level of the grand master and they can now drive cars and will soon be able to do so in a practical day-to-day manner. One of the speakers comments that while something like chess playing was regarded as an example of human intelligence, now that a computer can do it some dismiss the accomplishment. In short, as activities one indicative of intelligence are accomplished by computers the set of intelligent things is reduced by the luddites.
The second speaker who impressed me was Eric Drexler. Eric is the "father of nanotechnology." Some of Drexler's works can be found http://www.e-drexler.com/ starting here.
The third speaker who impressed me was a guy named John Smart. And this guy is really smart. You can get some information about what he does at http://www.accelerating.org/. The reason that John made such an impression on me was that he was the one person speaking who seemed to have a comprehensive idea in his head as to what this (the good and the bad) was all about.
Getting Back on Topic - Sort of
Fine. What does all of this have to do with macroeconomics? Real simple. This is the next technical frontier. Apart from the brain scan/AI vision of Kurzweil - nanotechnology offers the potential to make things very inexpensively. Nanotech may be able to produce building materials, food, fuel, and you-name-it without resorting to the energy intense Industrial Revolution paradigm of mining raw materials, refining them and moving them someplace else to be manufactured. Think of this a China in a Box. (I mean the country not the stuff you put in the dishwasher.) Nanotechnology is the ultimate form of recycling: Give me your tired, your poor. Your worn out atoms yearning to breathe free. And I'll make you a hamburger and a 2x4.
In short the economic vision here is gigantically greater Productivity (GDP/hour worked). To me this represents nothing short of a postindustrial economy. Folks would have what they need: food, shelter, clothing, medicine with cost being no object because it is so low.
To review what I last wrote on this see RateWatch #481 A Very Different Take on Productivity
I must add that after attending this summit I was stunned at the reactionary fears of so many people there. Clearly, there remains even in academia a measure of luddite technophobia. Maybe that's a bit unfair. It may be nothing more than the PC regarding global warming and the fears in the 1970's that zapped nuclear power and, well, that helped create global warming. Let me take one more step back. I am not stating or implying that all of this is without risk. As long as the risk of creating a disaster is minuscule the reward makes the whole thing worth trying.
A perfect summation to this piece is the quotation printed on the back of the booklet for the Summit. "It is hard to make predictions, especially about the future." -- Yogi Berra
Some web sites about this topic:
Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence
Acceleration Studies Foundation
If you have something to add to this discussion please post a comment on the blog.
Dick Lepre
Recent Comments