Technology (part deux)
Ok I know I already ranted about this but we were talking about it and I wanted to say some more on here. Technology currently is advancing at an exponential rate. That is, there was 1000’s of years between the wheel and the train and then only a few decades between trains and automobiles and then only a few years between that and flight and eventually space flight. Just one example of how it speeds up. If technology were to continue increasing exponentially, then eventually it would be increasing at an almost exponential rate. Earlier I was saying it could be some great invention that could cause this, like time travel or a brain computer interface (BCI). I think obviously with time travel that is what would happen. But then is there a ceiling? If technology is advancing at an infinite rate, is there a ceiling where we know everything? Where we even know why? I doubt it. I think it is a question of scale. If technology is advancing at an even faster rate then time will just seem to go by that much faster and the rate will be relatively the same. Especially if time travel is involved. Perhaps we are zipping through major inventions every few days, but that seems like nothing when time is no longer relevant because of time travel. The other thing is, if technology does increase at an infinite rate and there is some ceiling, then do we eventually know everything? Do we know why we’re here? And if we do, then do we even continue to exist?
May 23rd, 2006 at 10:18 pm
[…] I’ve been reading the book “The Singularity is Near” by Ray Kurzweil, which Holly and Rick gave me for Christmas. It’s all about the accelerating rate of technology and what will happen when that rate approaches infinity (the singularity). This is something I discussed in one of my old rants from 2003 (Part 1, Part 2). I speculated that this infinite rate could be reached when we can manipulate and travel in time. Since an actual rate of infinity seems impossible, would we be able to differentiate between close to infinity and really really close to infinity? Would our perception of time change as technologies are developed at such an absurd rate? […]