aquarius

Another way to put that is not much without lots and lots of people dying. There is no way to sustain the current (growing) population without increasingly advanced technology.

Good point. If some kind of measures aren't taken to control the growth of human population it's either the singularity or bust. The danger with the singularity is that it may lead to a bust anyway. These are certainly perilous times. We have to get this right.

Intelligence? Yes. Humanness/consciousness? No. There's a difference in the two. The Turing test tests whether a computer can fool a human. You have to have some measure of intelligence in order to fool anything. But you certainly don't have to be human or conscious. And that's what chat bot's are about; they fool. When a computer passes the Turing test, it only means that it has a vast database of responses, and that the programmers used clever and thorough algorithms. But it'll still be a computer. It'll still be dumb, clueless about it's own existence.

But what happens when it's able to fool you into believing it's aware of it's own existence? Artificial intelligence will likely always be just an illusion. However, one day the illusion will be so convincing it won't matter whether or not it's really thinking.

1. Creationism is a fallacy ridden ideology.

I agree. The only way to argue the literal interpretation of the account of the creation related in the Bible is with blind faith.

2. God and an evolutionary origin are not compatible.

Certainly the Book of Genesis and evolutionary origin are at odds.

I know there are many prominent scientists who believe in God, but after reading portions of Richard Dawkins book on this subject I find this to be a "feel-good" fallback for many people.

Most prominent scientists who believe in God may not believe in a personal God. Michio Kaku, in his book "Einstein's Cosmos", conveys Einstein's thoughts on God as follows:

Einstein would often make a distinction between two types of Gods, which are often confused in discussion about religion. First, there is the personal God, the God that answers prayers, parts the waters, and performs miracles. This is the God of the Bible, the God of intervention. Then there is the God that Einstein believed in, the God of Spinoza, the God that created the simple and elegant laws that govern the universe. (p. 129)

My "Meh" scenario: The AI is essentially human in most respects, but the human model is one of a disinterested couch potato. "All it ever does is download 'Family Guy' videos from Hulu!!"

lol. Seriously though, self-improving AI will be so fundamentally different we should resist the temptation to anthropomorphize.

I don't really see a way for the Singularity to be "meh" other than it not happening.

Agreed. It's bound to be either profoundly good or profoundly bad from the human perspective.

Could rep-rap print the ball bearing system all in one go?

The goal is for the machine to be able to print all the parts necessary to construct itself. Whether it can print a ball bearing system all in one go I'm not sure.

Here's a video introduction to the RepRap self-replicating 3D printer:

Here's the RepRap blog with the latest info:

http://blog.reprap.org/

You may want to contact one of the developers with specific questions.

I think a singularity is inevitable following the creation of recursively self-improving artificial intelligence.

 

At that point we'll have effectively 1uped biology and gone one more rung up the abstraction ladder.

 

As for whether or not we'll create recursively self-improving artificial intelligence in our lifetimes, that remains to be seen.

Right. I don't think the question is if, but when. If the exponential trends continue Kurzweil's timeline should be accurate. We shall see. It's certainly an exciting time to be alive.

Then what is the problem with giving such a machine it's own design and letting it make a copy of itself? It might need a folding part or to be built in two parts as to obey the laws of size.

That is precisely the goal behind the RepRap project. Currently, it can only print plastic parts but they're doing research that will allow it to print circuit boards eventually.

Check out RepRap:

http://reprap.org/bin/view/Main/WebHome

Before too long we'll have self-replicating rapid prototyping machines.