/sci/ - Science & Math

>>9187235
People keep talking about "the singularity", that some discovery or other is going to happen in the future that's going to radically alter the nature of mankind.

But this has already happened - multiple times - throughout history and even pre-history.

For instance, let alone the last 10,000 years, how about the last 100,000?

Did not, for instance, the invention of language, forever and radically alter the nature mankind?

Some advancements come about due to a radical confluence of circumstances and, from that point on, just spread like viral wildfire, forever changing everything they touch.

Language, tools, fire, agriculture, animal husbandry, pottery, hunting, fertilizer, quarrying, mining, writing, architecture, sailing, math, physics, mechanics, looms, books, clocks, magnetism, navigation, industry, guns, electricity, science, computers, satellites, internet, countless other self-perpetuating advancements each creating synergies with all the others, each spawning ever more fires of endless change.

Granted, part of it is the fact that we tend to wash all previous advancements into single groups, and take them for granted - nevermind all those we simply outgrew or replaced. In the end, however, it's no surprise that each generation experiences a near exponential acceleration in change, even if they don't always recognize it at the time, and more often than not, claim they've reached the pinnacle of human understanding and the end of the world is just around the corner.

Information based evolution supplanted DNA based evolution as our mechanism for change ages ago, as it's not only vastly more efficient and proactive, it also vastly increases its effectiveness over time, to such a degree where, in the end, we may simply be unable to keep up with ourselves.