In philosophy, the word "singularity", derived from the Latin "singulus" - "single, single", means the singularity, the uniqueness of something - a being, event, phenomenon. Most of all, modern French philosophers, in particular, Gilles Deleuze, pondered over this concept. He interpreted the singularity as an event that generates meaning and has a point character. “These are turning points and bending points; bottlenecks, nodes, vestibules and centers; melting, condensation and boiling points; points of tears and laughter, illness and health, hope and despondency, points of sensitivity. " But at the same time, while remaining a specific point, the event is inevitably connected with other events. Therefore, the point is at the same time a line expressing all the modifications of this point and its interconnections with the whole world.
In other sciences, the term "singularity" began to denote individual, special phenomena for which the usual laws cease to operate. For example, in mathematics, a singularity is a point at which a function behaves irregularly - for example, tends to infinity or is not defined at all. A gravitational singularity is an area where the space-time continuum is so curved that it turns into infinity. It is generally accepted that gravitational singularities appear in places hidden from observers - according to the "principle of cosmic censorship" proposed in 1969 by the English scientist Roger Penrose. It is formulated as follows: "Nature abhors a naked (ie, visible to an external observer) singularity." In black holes, the singularity is hidden behind the so-called event horizon - the imaginary edge of a black hole,beyond which nothing breaks out, not even light.
But scientists continue to believe in the existence of "naked" singularities somewhere in space. And the most striking example of a singularity is a state with an infinitely high density of matter that occurs at the moment of the Big Bang. This moment, when the entire universe was compressed at one point, remains a mystery to physicists - because it involves a combination of mutually exclusive conditions, for example, infinite density and infinite temperature.
In the field of IT, another singularity is waiting for the arrival - the technological one. Scientists and science fiction writers use this term to designate that turning point after which technical progress will accelerate and become so complicated that it will be beyond our understanding. The term was originally proposed by the American mathematician and science fiction writer Vernor Vinge in 1993. He expressed the following idea: when a person creates a machine that is smarter than a person, history will become unpredictable, because it is impossible to predict the behavior of an intellect that is superior to a human. Vinge suggested that this would happen in the first third of the 21st century, sometime between 2005 and 2030.
In 2000, the American specialist in the development of artificial intelligence Eliezer Yudkowski also hypothesized that perhaps in the future there will be an artificial intelligence program capable of improving itself at a speed many times greater than human capabilities. The closeness of this era, according to the scientist, can be determined by two signs: growing technogenic unemployment and the extremely rapid spread of ideas.
“This will probably turn out to be the most rapid technological revolution we have known before,” Yudkowski wrote. - It will fall, most likely, like a snowfall - even to the scientists involved in the process … And then what will happen in a month or two (or a day or two) after that? There is only one analogy that I can draw - the emergence of humanity. We will find ourselves in a posthuman era. And despite all my technical optimism, I would be much more comfortable if I was separated from these supernatural events a thousand years, not twenty."
The theme of the technological singularity was inspired by the writers of the "cyberpunk" genre, for example, it is found in the novel by William Gibson "Neuromancer". She is also shown in the popular novel by modern science fiction writer Dan Simmons "Hyperion" - it describes the world, in addition to people, inhabited by Iskins - that is, bearers of artificial intelligence who come into conflict with humanity.