The Good Quote
Open menu
Quotes
Authors
Topics
More
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
#
Home
Authors
Vernor Vinge
American
Writer
About the author
When people speak of creating superhumanly intelligent beings, they are usually imagining an AI project.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#People
#Project
It is a point where our old models must be discarded and a new reality rules.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Old
#Reality
#Rules
Note that I am not proposing that AI research be ignored or less funded.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Research
The dilemma felt by science fiction writers will be perceived in other creative endeavors.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Will
#Science
#Writers
#Fiction
The physical extinction of the human race is one possibility.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Race
#Possibility
Within thirty years, we will have the technological means to create superhuman intelligence.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Will
#Years
#Intelligence
The work that is truly productive is the domain of a steadily smaller and more elite fraction of humanity.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Work
#Humanity
In fact, there was general agreement that minds can exist on nonbiological substrates and that algorithms are of central importance to the existence of minds.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Fact
#Importance
#Agreement
#Existence
When I began writing science fiction in the middle '60s, it seemed very easy to find ideas that took decades to percolate into the cultural consciousness; now the lead time seems more like eighteen months.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Time
#Now
#Science
#Writing
#Ideas
#Consciousness
#Fiction
#Months
The problem is not simply that the Singularity represents the passing of humankind from center stage, but that it contradicts our most deeply held notions of being.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Being
IA is something that is proceeding very naturally, in most cases not even recognized by its developers for what it is.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
I have argued above that we cannot prevent the Singularity, that its coming is an inevitable consequence of the humans' natural competitiveness and the possibilities inherent in technology.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Possibilities
#Technology
I argue in this paper that we are on the edge of change comparable to the rise of human life on Earth.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Life
#Earth
#Change
I am suggesting that we recognize that in network and interface research there is something as profound (and potential wild) as Artificial Intelligence.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Research
#Network
#Intelligence
#Potential
How will the approach of the Singularity spread across the human world view?
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Will
#World
Even the largest avalanche is triggered by small things.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
But if the technological Singularity can happen, it will.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Will
But every time our ability to access information and to communicate it to others is improved, in some sense we have achieved an increase over natural intelligence.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Time
#Ability
#Information
#Sense
#Intelligence
Another symptom of progress toward the Singularity: ideas themselves should spread ever faster, and even the most radical will quickly become commonplace.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Will
#Ideas
#Progress
#Radical
Animals can adapt to problems and make inventions, but often no faster than natural selection can do its work - the world acts as its own simulator in the case of natural selection.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Work
#Problems
#World
#Animals
#Inventions
And for all my rampant technological optimism, sometimes I think I'd be more comfortable if I were regarding these transcendental events from one thousand years remove... instead of twenty.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Years
#Events
#Optimism
We humans have millions of years of evolutionary baggage that makes us regard competition in a deadly light.
Vernor Vinge,
American
Writer
#Years
#Light
#Competition