"Philip Greenspun Writes About the Singularity," or, "How to Do It Wrong!"

What would you call people who pay $25,000 for a nine-week course of study with a collection of Silicon Valley optimists? “Singularly Stupid”?

Name calling. This can in no way contribute to any discussion where understanding is the goal. Arguably, it follows that the rest of the essay is not intended to help people's understanding.

The idea of the singularity is that technology, especially in the form of artifically intelligent robots, will solve all of our problems and technological advance will speed up exponentially starting roughly around the year 2030.

The point is that the rate of advances in nearly all fields is exponential. Doubly exponential, in fact. That is, the exponent is growing at an exponential rate. And it's not that all of our problems will be solved, it's that the advances will be so dramatic that rules derived from how things are now--this side of the singularity--are useless for understanding what happens after the singularity.

So far technology innovation hasn’t outstripped Malthusian human population growth. We can grow more food more efficiently, but the number of human mouths to feed has grown just about as fast, so that we struggle to feed everyone. A lot of what we’ve done over the past few hundred years has come at the cost of using up the Earth, e.g., clearing forest for farmland or digging up coal and oil and lighting it on fire, taking all of the Cod out of the North Atlantic.

One of the most blatant straw men I've seen in a long time. First, technological innovation hasn't outstripped Malthusian population growth because technological innovation is the cause of it! Frankly, there are a lot of sad things about having 6 billion people on earth, but I think that about 6 billion of them would vote against programs that say, reduced the food supply.

Second, this ignores the amount of stuff we are able to get out of a unit of matter taken from the environment, and the amount of pollution produced by a unit measure of production, and the amount of dispersal for a given amount of pollution. In short, it categorically ignores any good that can have come from technology.

Far from freeing us from cleaning the house, Artificial Intelligence thus far has failed to live up to promises made by professors seeking research funding in 1960 (that reminds me I need to do laundry!).

It's probable that this fallacy has a proper name, but I've always called it Ascription of Intent. And I'm talking about the first implicit fallacy, which is an assertion that professors lied about AI for the sole reason of obtaining funding. The other fallacy is an ad hominem attack, namely that because professors were (allegedly) lying to get funding, AI is [useless|stupid|malevolent|a bad thing].

Given the track record of tech as a mixed blessing and as a slower agent for change than predicted, do young people need to prepare for 2030? Can they prepare by listening to Ray Kurzweil, or anyone else born in 1948? Should they fork over $25,000 for nine weeks or simply watch old Jetsons episodes?

It's coming thick and fast, now. Technology is a slower agent of change than predicted? Really? Who's predictions? I remember a prediction about computers someday being smaller than a rhinoceros, and another about how every town will have one telephone. Even 20 years ago, did anyone imagine that a global computer network would be so pervasive that even logically fallacious essays would be conveyed instantaneously the world over?

Furthermore, his point is specifically and directly addressed by Kurzweil et al. Actually, not even 'et al.' In 'The Singularity Is Near,' Kurzweil talks about how even scientists--especially scientists--underestimate the pace of progress because of their proximity to the drudgery of their own various specialties. He talks about how the aggregate adds up more quickly than humans are able to directly sense, and that it takes analysis to get a true picture of the rate of progress. I think we need to insist that Greenspun at least obey the principle of charity and put the best representation of his opponent's argument forward, rather than the worst. (And not just for the sake of charity, but because that is how collective knowledge--rather than, for example, an author's personal agenda--would be advanced.)

And what does anyone's birth date have to do with it? He may as well have comment on the race, creed, national origin, sexual orientation, or eye color of Singularity advocates.

Maybe I will kick off the comments section with a realistic tech innovation that would change the world in a positive way. My pick: A better battery (cheaper, lighter, higher power density). That would enable the use of renewable energy in every kind of portable application, e.g., cars and airplanes, and also make it much more practical to use wind and solar generation.

Has he not heard of Lithium-Ion batteries? He's not heard of the Tesla Roadster? Is he asserting that battery technology is the only factor limiting the adoption of renewable energy? Power generation density isn't an issue? High capital costs aren't an issue? Regulatory hurdles aren't an issue? It's batteries that are going to save us?

The "[s]pecial offer' at the end doesn't even rise to the level where comment is necessary.

Addendum:

There has been a lot of hand-wringing recently over the direction that HN has been taking. That this article has made the front page should be taken as food for thought in this regard. The content of this article didn't even rise to the level of 'commentary' or 'argument.' It's easy to get off track into name-calling, non-sequiters, and simple wrong-headedness; this applies to comments as well as story submissions. I'm not here arguing whether this article should have been front-paged. I am arguing that, if you care about HN, one of the things you can do is make sure that your comments do not resemble this article in vacuity, stupidity, needless over-emotionalism, or fallaciousness.