John Smart

John Smart Founder of SingularityWatch.com and Chairman, Institute for Accelerating Change (IAC) Understanding the Singularity (sponsored by Quantum Theology & the Future Mind) Enchanted Broccoli Forest Lounge, 1115 Campus Drive East, Stanford University Tuesday, May 20, 2003, 7:00 pm-9:00 pm Edited by Peter Y. Chou

Preface: As I was leaving Urs Hölzle's Stanford lecture on "Google Search" at the Gates Computer Science Building on May 14, a flyer caught my attention. A paper clip attached a 3"x3" image of a Tibetan Bodhisattva to the flyer— it announced a May 20th talk on "Understanding the Singularity" with John Smart, sponsored by the Quantum Theology & the Future Mind with an URL at the bottom. What fascinated me was the 010101010101 surrounding the Bodhisattva's image. Somehow the 1 & 0 symbolized both the Buddhist concept of form & emptiness as well as the physics Singularity concept of an infinite dense universe collapsing into a black hole of nothingness. I was eager to go but had no idea where EBF was on the Stanford campus. I finally located it on Campus Drive East at the bottom edge of a campus map, and learned that EBF stands for Enchanted Broccoli Forest. When I read more on technological singularity and how we are evolving to become transhuman and posthuman in 20-60 years, I thought to myself "What an adventure— going to an enchanted broccoli forest as a human being and coming out as some transhuman robot." I told a few friends that if I don't come back, the broccoli forest singularity has swallowed me up. One friend told me, "Don't let them put a robot chip in your brain, I like you just the way you are!" It took me a while to find EBF, but once there, it didn't seem so strange— just a small college dorm on the outskirts of the Stanford campus. Chris Smith, one of the student organizers of this lecture series, greeted me in the lounge, and told me about his interest in Tibetan Buddhism, hence the clip-on to the lecture flyer. About 30 people attended the lecture, half were students. Here are my lecture notes from John Smart's dynamic talk on how the technological singularity will transform human life sooner than we think. 37 slides were shown in Smart's PowerPoint presentation which ended at 8:35 pm with another half-hour Q&A session. I've linked back to John Smart's SingularityWatch.com on material copied from his site. For a more detailed presentation, order Smart's 70-minute audio CD Understanding the Singularity v.1.0, which has an accompany booklet that filled many of the gaps in my notes taking.

Before beginning his talk, John passed around some two dozen books for us to browse through. He recommended these seminal books on singularity, robotics, nanotechnology, and artificial intelligence. "If any of these books interest you", he said, "go to the Stanford Bookstore and buy them for serious study. I went to Cal Berkeley, and we didn't have a great bookstore as you do here. Do you know that the Stanford Bookstore is the largest of its kind west of the Mississippi?" I jotted the titles with authors and dates of all the books he passed around for future consultations. [My comments are in brackets & the added web links are mine.] (1) Four Types of Future Studies     • Exploratory ("possible" futures)     • Consensus-Driven ("world's preferred": NATO, UN)     • Agenda-Driven ("my preferred")     • Research-Predictive ("inevitable" vs. "changeable") The last one is the critical one for singularity studies. (Technological Singularity is more than 10 years out). All the future is not predictable. Special subsets are extremely predictable. Test to see if they're 2, 3 years true; 5-10 years true. Most of the people know computers are 2x faster for the same amount of money every two years (Moore's Law). Everything have actual limits except computation. Computation is the only thing in the universe that doesn't slow down. It uses less time, space, matter, and energy. Carver Mead calls this greater physical efficiency over time. Rolf Landauer: no minimum level of computation due to Planck scale. Special subset of evolution: from that needs less to do calculation; no competition around. Bacteria double through complexity— exponential growth as the number of bacteria grows. (2) Systems of Change     • Individual/Sexual (vitality, creativity, spirituality)     • Family/Relationship (cultural, social, psychological)     • National/Tribal (political, economic)     • Planetary/Species (peace, globalization, environmental)     • Universal (science & technology, computation)     • Multiversal (post-singularity) While the first four systems evolved slowly, Sci-Tech is growing asymptotically. Futurists need to be aware of this. What comes after universal computational closure? [Will our universe blossom into a multiverse? See Universe or Multiverse Symposium]. Are all of these astrobiologically inevitable? We're about to hand over the baton. NASA-AMES holds conferences on astrobiology. Our Sun is iron-rich. You're going to find homonoid life-forms. Science & technology is a universal dialogue. Gravity is true everywhere (John drops a pamplet to the floor). (3) Future Studies is about 50% Science & Technology Studies (STS) Future of Vitality Future of Life Human Spirit Behavior Culture Government Economy Governace The Earth Mind Engineering Computation Complexity The Universe Two kinds of way to build the beehive: 1) Biotechnology— twiddle of the genes. Society will slow this down. No cloning. Minimize use of this and that. 30,000 genes which we don't understand. 2) Bottom-up: physcists playing with autonomy (human independence). 1000 transitors on a ciruit board (1970's Intel). 1990's software like Dawn (humans didn't design it). EDA designed it (automated way of design). Late 1990' evolutionary computation. System tries out millions of ways and comes out with the best solution. 10,000,000 times faster than humans. Wing model— Body on a pole with electronic muscles. 3 hours and it's flying (algorithm). Daniel C. Dennett: Master Modular Mind (MMM), author of Brainchildren: Essays on Designing Minds (1998). Marvin Minsky: Society of Mind (1988). Psychobiologist Roger W. Sperry— cool to stand 3 feet above your head while speaking to me. (4) Something Curious Is Going On!     The Developmental Spiral     An Unexplained Physical Phenomenon This is the coolest thing I'm telling you tonight! Your professors are not going to tell you this! Carl Sagan in his Dragons of Eden (1977) talks about a cosmic calendar (J-shaped curve). The carbon-long chain systems to do their own evolution. If the universe began on Jan. 1, Dinosaurs came out Sept. 15, Humans came out Dec. 30, and Science in the last 10 seconds. 100 years ago, the watchword was who's got the POWER (tertiary), 50 years ago— who's got the MONEY (secondary), Now— who's got the TECHNOLOGY (primary). What technology is going to pop up next? Everyone in the corporate world wants to be the first in technological innovation. [Here I disagree with Smart's analysis of the trends in power, money, and technology with time. The reason the CEOs want technology first is because it will bring them power and money. Find me someone who invents a new technology and gives it away free, and we have a Bodhisattva or compassionate sage who cares for others more than himself. I've met sages who have declined invitations from Kings and Presidents, and wondered why these Heads of States with power & money still need to consult a sage to find enlightenment and inner peace.] (5) Six Types of Singularities     • Mathematical (equations leading to infinities; Schwarzchild)     • Physical (discontinuities as in phase transitions)     • Cosmological (black holes, white holes, Big Bangs)     • Computational (the universe-as-computing-system)     • Developmental (convergent process of accelerating change)     • Technological (effective machine consciousness) The technological singularities are the usual meaning of "singularity" as used generically by futurists. The technological singularity hypothesis is an amalgam of at least the following discrete concepts: 1) "singular" human-competitive A.I. emergence (A.I. "singularity") 2) discontinuity (physical-dynamical singularities) 3) unknowability (computational-cognitive singularities) 4) convergent (developmental singularity) 5) hierarchical (developmental singularity) 6) instantaneity (developmental singularity) 7) reproductive (developmental singularity) Can't planets wake up and bat asteroids away? Planets can't bat asteroids away. But humans with psychology can do it. (6) The Developmental Spiral Hominid Age (Genus Homo, Generative Vocal Language) Archaic Age (Homo sapiens sapiens) Tribal Age (Complex Language, Tools, and Culture) Agricultural Age (Horticulture, Writing Systems) Empires Age (Autocracy, Organized Warfare) Artifice Age (Organized Religion, Prescientific Inquiry) Scientific Age Industrial Age Information Age Symbiotic Age Autonomy Age Tech Singularity   2,000,000 yrs ago 100,000 yrs ago 25,000 yrs ago 7,000 yrs ago 3,000 yrs ago 1,500 yrs ago 380 yrs (1500-1770) 180 yrs (1770-1950) 70 yrs (1950-2020) 30 yrs (2020-2050) 10 yrs (2050-2060) Circa 2060 A good book to read in connection to this "Developmental Spiral" is Ray Kurzweil's The Age of Spiritual Machines: When Computers Exceed Human Intelligence (1999) (7) Gentle Tightening Subcycles Technological Subcycles 1390-1500, 110 yrs, Final Pre-Scientific Revolution 1500-1600, 100 yrs, 1st Scientific Revolution 1600-1690, 90 yrs, 2nd Scientific Revolution 1690-1770, 80 yrs, 3rd Scientific Revolution 1770-1840, 70 yrs, 1st Industrial Revolution 1840-1900, 60 yrs, 2nd Industrial Revolution 1900-1950, 50 yrs, 3rd Industrial Revolution 1950-1990, 40 yrs, 1st Computer Revolution 1990-2020, 30 yrs, 2nd Computer Revolution 2020-2040, 20 yrs, 1st Symbiotic Revolution 2040-2050, 10 yrs, 2nd Symbotic Revolution 2050-2060, 10 yrs, Multiple Autonomy Revolutions Circa 2060 Technological Singularity Prominent Features Oresme (1323-82: Coordinate Geom., Exponents, Series) Copernicus Heavenly Bodies (1543) Vesalius (1543) Bruno (1600), Kepler (09) Galileo (32) Descartes (37) Newton Principia (1687, 1704) Linnaeus (1735) "CWT: Coal, Wood, Textiles" Watt Steam Eng, 1769 "SST: Steam, Steel, and Telegraph" "ICE: Internal Combustion, Chemistry, Electricity" "Dig. Computers, Engineering, Multinationals, TV" Planetnet, Global Entertainment, Trade, Security" "GUI, LUI, & NUI (Agents), Peace/Equity/Justice Era" Deep Symbiosis, Global Telepresence,BR> Minor Magic" "Progressive Autonomy, Developmental Intelligence" "AI Earthpark." Shortly after: Uploads and Full Nanotech. (8) "Final Force" Pre-Singularity Subcycles Coming Eras: Proposed Details • A 30-year cycle, from 1990-2020: Building out the 1st generation Internet Grid (the so-called "stupid network"), early intelligence amplification (IA), commercial biotechnology, ongoing miniaturization, weak nanotech (academic evolvable hardware), 2nd generation robots, early evolutionary computing. Major national and international trade, sociopolitical, and security convergence reforms (G8, WTO, UN, IAEA, etc.) begin. • A 20-year cycle, from 2020-2040: The modularly intelligent, distributed, semi-ubiquitous LUI network, creating impressive, commercial intelligence amplification (IA), via first generation personality capture (weak uploading) in LUI/lifecam systems. Powerful biotech (isolated "medical miracle" therapeutics, negligible human bio-augmentation due to equity and ethical concerns), early computational nanotech (true evolvable hardware), 3rd generation adaptive robots, commercial evolutionary computing, ongoing significant sociopolitical reform, and peace/justice/equity crusades become dominant. Early Transparent Society, accelerating compassion begins. Age of Materialism slowly unraveling (economizing, creative free time, voluntary simplicity increasing in first world economies). • A 10-year cycle, from 2040-2050: Second generation LUI, with second generation personality capture/first-generation uploading (strong interior modeling of the attention, drives, motives, past history, emotional state, etc. of the interfaced human), leads to a new, deeper symbiosis with our semi-intelligent machines and networks. Yet IA strategies (intelligence amplification, direct human empowerment), while still the dominant change drivers in this ere, are progressively being overshadowed by AI strategies (artificial/autonomous intelligence, indirect human empowerment), as significant though still limited autonomy emerges in our ubiquitous AI platforms. More powerful biotech ("Common Miracles"), limited human augmentation, mature computational nanotech, 4th generation self-reconfiguring robots, mature evolutionary computing. Sociopolitical systems and major power groups begin to see their impending extinction/transformation. Personal, social and spiritual transformations become big issues. Materialism loses further ground. By mid-2040's, most humans are still singularity-unaware, but hundreds of millions across the globe sense an approaching "hurricane" of change. • 2050: Era of Strong Autonomy. The 10-year cycle is followed, in this caricature, by progressively shorter 5-, 2-, and 1-year cycles, each substantially more autocatalytic. Human support of and adjustment to successive technology paradigms becomes steadily less necessary, as each is noted to be more self-regulating, self-provisioning, self-repairing, self-directing, self-generating, and involving low level bottom-up evolutionary developmental processes that are increasingly opaque to top down human observers. Technological safety and oversight will likely be one of our central concerns and enterprises at this time. Nevertheless, we will be sheparding a substrate that will be increasingly more self-balancing, and rapidly self-correcting in its mistakes. At this stage, most human-machine interfaces will be impressively seamless and human-centric, involving a range of what may be termed "second-generation uploading" techniques: capture and instantiation of the personality, intentionality, and experience history of the user into all the machine systems we use. By 2050, human-machine interfaces will be seamless and human-centric. GUI (graphic-user interface) will give way to LUI (linguistic-user interface). There will be a symbiotic age after the computer age with greater intelligence amplification. Personality capture will record all your mental states and emotions. There is right now a "Smart Cathy" doll on sale for $300 that will perk up when a child cries to comfort the child. (9) Technological Singularity— Overview • Circa 2060: Technological Singularity. The AI (and shortly thereafter, AI's) claim self-awareness. Autonomous Technological Intelligence emerges on Earth. True, third-generation uploading of human personality and conscious architecture to the machine substrate begins to occur in an accelerating fashion thereafter, driven by human curiosity and highly ethically constrained autonomous intelligence, proceeding in a technically reversible process, at least at first. The world population hits its maximum (2050-2060) and declines increasingly rapidly thereafter. [Warren Sanderson, "The End of Population Growth" Nature, 412, 543-545 (2001); National Geographic News "Forecast Sees Halt to Population Growth" (August 6, 2001)] (10) Dickerson's Law: Biochemistry's Equivalent to Moore¹s Law Dickerson's Formula Predicts Rising Number of Solved 3-Dimensional Protein Structures In 1977, Richard Dickerson, then a professor of physical chemistry at Caltech, noted that the number of protein crystal structures had risen from one solved by the end of 1961 to 23 solved by the end of 1977. His formula predicted that by March 2001, scientists would have solved the 3-D structures of a grand total of more than 12,000 proteins. Prof. Arthur Arnone found that the equation predicted that there would be 12,066 crystal structures solved by March 27, 2001. By that date, the Protein Data Bank (PDB) had posted 12,123 protein structures, only 57 more than Dickerson's forecast. The Dickerson formula was accurate to within 0.5%. (11) Developmetal Singularity— Overview     • Post 2060: Full AI simulation of human thoughtspace       (cf. our multimillion dollar bacteria "metabolome" simulations).     • Historical Computational Closure: astronomy, geography, business       will have declining utility of maps and computation.     • "Inner space" not outer space, now appears to be our constrained       developmental destiny, incredibly soon in cosmological time.       [Source: Martin Harwit, Cosmic Discovery (1981)] (12) The Big Bang Is intelligent life in the process of creating a local black hole, which will "bounce" to create a new universe? Does universal life cycle through the multiverse from (big bang) singularity to (black hole) singularity, in the same manner that a seed creates an organism which in turn creates a new seed? Of the trillions of black holes in our universe— which may each go on to create new universes— is there a continuum of complexity in their offspring. [See: Black Holes and Smolin's Cyclic Recursion] (13) A Computational, MEST Compressing Universe:       Eight Sample Substrates (and their Info Processing and Storage systems) Substrate I.P. System 1. Galactic-Subatomic 2. Stellar-Elemental 3. Planetary-Molecular 4. Biomass-Unicellular 5. Multicellular-Nerrologic 6. Cultural-Linguistic 7. Computational-Technologic 8. AI-Hyperconscious "Galactic" "Atomic" "Chemetic" "Genetic" "Dendritic" "Memetic" "Algorithmic" "Technetic" (14) Understanding MEST Compression Is MEST compression a measure of time? It appears that MEST compression creates intelligence as it "runs down pre-existing potential hills" in the universe, ending in trillions of local black holes, each containing the highest local evolutionary developmental intelligence possible given their time-to-formation and local environmental constraints. (15) Saturation: A Biological Lesson Why does saturation occur in systems of relatively fixed replicative complexity (populations, ideas, technologies), but not in computation itself? Let's take a lesson from biology. There are two commonly cited reasons for the slowdown of accelerating growth in living systems: 1) Resource limits (material, energetic, spatial, & temporal) within a niche. 2) Competitive limits (species of similar complexity competing/cooperating) in the same niche. (16) Sagan, Chaisson, Moore, Vinge, and Smart Sagan's Cosmic Calendar ("J" Shaped curve) (The Dragons of Eden, 1977) Chaisson's Phi, a Free Energy Rate Density (erg/second/gram) (Cosmic Evolution, 2001) Galaxies 0.5 Stars 2 Planets (early) 75 Plants 900 Animals/Genetics 20,000 (104) Brains (human) 150,000 (105) Culture (human) 500,000 (105) Int. Comb. Engines (106) Jets (108) Pentium Chips (1011) Moore's Law (110 years, 5 substrates) The Vingean Singularity Nano and Quantum (Femto) Computation     Meso => Nano => Pico => Femto => Atto => Zepto, Yocto...                   10-9       10-12     10-15       10-18     10-21   10-24... Planck Length, 10-35 meters. Planck Second, 10-43 seconds.     "The Quantum of Spacetime" We already have attosecond lasers! Black Holes in Spacetime (Trillions of Cosmological Singularities) Singularity and Continuity Smart's Cosmic Calendar ("U" Shaped curve)     (Exploring the Technological Singularity, 2001) Lesson: We Appear Headed for A Developmental Singularity. (17) Two Types of Change: Evolution vs. Development Left & Right Hands of Evolutionary Development     Evolution is Random, Chaotic, Contingent     Development is Predictable, both in Trajectory and in Cycle         Dev. Cycle: (Growth => Maturity => Replication => Senescence)     Key Example: "The Twin's Thumbprints" Beyond Darwinism: At Least Six Types of Selection Cambrian Explosion and the Problem of 35 Unchanging Body Plans     Neo-Darwinists vs. Developmentalists (18) The "Left & Right Hands" of Evolutionary Development (19) Cambrian Explosion (20) Memetic Evolutionary Development (21) Beyond Darwinism (22) System Meta-Props: Interdependence (23) System Meta-Properties: Immunity (24) System Meta-Properties: Incompleteness (25) Growth and Limits of Competition (26) What are Black Holes? (27) Lee Smolin's Answer (28) A U-Shaped Curve (29) The Fermi Paradox (30) What are Black Holes? (31) Lee Smolin's Answer (32) Robo Sapiens (33) AI-in the-Interface (aka IA) (34) A Transparent Society (35) After Satellites, What? (36) Six Closing Questions 1. What would you monitor/scan/measure today to see if we are on     an S-Curve or J-Curve of global computational change? 2. What methods would you use to distinguish evolutionary randomness     from developmental trajectory? 3. Is the tech singularity coming? What? When? Where? How? Why? 4. What are our control options for accelerating and ever more     autonomous computation? 5. What are better and worse paths of technology development? 6. How do we promote unity, balance, and accelerating compassion     in the transition?     Give First and Third World Curves, 1900 to 2000.     A Proposition: The third world curve is largely ours to choose. (37) Six Action Items 1. Check out SingularityWatch.com 2. Sign up for our Accelerating Times Newsletter 3. Join our Institute for Accelerating Change (IAC) 4. Come to our Accelerating Change Conference (ACC 2003) 5. Buy and browse Ray Kurzweil's The Age of Spiritual Machines 1999. 6. Send any feedback to johnsmart(at)singularitywatch(dot)com

© Peter Y. Chou, WisdomPortal.com P.O. Box 390707, Mountain View, CA 94039 email: peter@wisdomportal.com (8-27-2003)