The 21st Century Singularity and its Big History Implications: A re-analysis

Abstract

The idea that in the near future we should expect "the Singularity" has become quite popular recently, primarily thanks to the activities of Google technical director in the field of machine training Raymond Kurzweil and his book The Singularity Is Near (2005). It is shown that the mathematical analysis of the series of events (described by Kurzweil in his famous book), which starts with the emergence of our Galaxy and ends with the decoding of the DNA code, is indeed ideally described by an extremely simple mathematical function (not known to Kurzweil himself) with a singularity in the region of 2029. It is also shown that, a similar time series (beginning with the onset of life on Earth and ending with the information revolution-composed by the Russian physicist Alexander Panov completely independently of Kurzweil) is also practically perfectly described by a mathematical function (very similar to the above and not used by Panov) with a singularity in the region of 2027. It is shown that this function is also extremely similar to the equation discovered in 1960 by Heinz von Foerster and published in his famous article in the journal "Science"-this function almost perfectly describes the dynamics of the world population and is characterized by a mathematical singularity in the region of 2027. All this indicates the existence of sufficiently rigorous global macroevolutionary regularities (describing the evolution of complexity on our planet for a few billion of years), which can be surprisingly accurately described by extremely simple mathematical functions. At the same time it is demonstrated that in the region of the singularity point there is no reason, after Kurzweil, to expect an unprecedented (many orders of magnitude) acceleration of the rates of technological development. There are more grounds for interpreting this point as an indication of an inflection point, after which the pace of global evolution will begin to slow down systematically in the long term.

Values of the Elderly People in an Aging World

“…Все это представляет особый интерес в свете интенсивно идущих в последнее время процессов глобального старения населения, продолжение которых уверенно прогнозируется и на все ближайшие десятилетия [Гринин, Коротаев, Гринин 2016;Lutz, Sanderson, Scherbov 2008;Goldstone, Grinin, Korotayev 2015;Grinin, Korotayev 2016;Grinin, Grinin, Korotayev 2017]. Действительно, сказанное выше заставляет предполагать, что глобальное старение населения будет способствовать росту ценностей консерватизма, что может быть определенным фактором прогнозируемого многими авторами на долгосрочную перспективу замедления глобальных темпов социально-экономического и технологического развития [Piketty 2014;LePoire 2016;Khaltourina, Korotayev 2007;Korotayev 2018;Popović 2018].…”

The Tree of Knowledge System: A New Map for Big History

“…The ToK System is a picture of the universe story, as presently mapped out by scientific inquiry that potentially provides us with a shared origin myth" (Henriques, p. 259, 2011). And, via the "fifth joint point" (Henriques, 2011), the ToK also orients us to consider the future and reflect on what Big History scholars call the Threshold 9 Big History Singularity that might emerge in the upcoming decades (Korotayev, 2018).…”

“…As Korotayev (2018) notes, a number of futurists and scholars associated with Big History have noted a striking pattern associated with the acceleration of complexity over time. Made perhaps most wellknown by Ray Kurzweil's (2005) The Singularity is Near, the acceleration is such that it provides a clear "Singularity Hypothesis" in the Big History landscape, and a number of scholars have argued that "Big History Threshold 9" should appear between 2027 and 2045.…”

“…Made perhaps most wellknown by Ray Kurzweil's (2005) The Singularity is Near, the acceleration is such that it provides a clear "Singularity Hypothesis" in the Big History landscape, and a number of scholars have argued that "Big History Threshold 9" should appear between 2027 and 2045. Offering an in-depth review of several similar models of the accelerating evolution of complexity, Korotayev (2018) concludes that there are significant data "to indicate the existence of sufficiently rigorous global macroevolutionary regularities (describing the evolution of complexity on our planet for a few billion of years), which can be surprisingly accurately described by extremely simple mathematical functions." However, he does not believe that this "singularity" event will be necessarily transformative.…”

“…What it suggests, further, is a way to frame it. Specifically, the ToK suggests the possibility of the emergence of a new dimension of existence in a way that overlaps with the timeframe specified by Korotayev (2018). The ToK posits that novel dimensions of existence occur when new information processing or semiotic systems emerge and then become networked together and regulated via a centralized control system.…”