Sunday, September 29, 2013

The Flight Singularity?

I was thinking today to try and explain what a technological Singularity is. Then I thought about what a person about 15 years old thought was real in 1890. So, imagine you were born about 15 years after the Civil War Started and it is now 1890. So, you might have read Jules Verne's

Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea - Wikipedia, the free ...

and you might have read:

Around the World in Eighty Days - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Around_the_World_in_Eighty_Days
1889 – Nellie Bly undertook to travel around the world in 80 days for her newspaper, ... Her book Around the World in Seventy-Two Days, became a best seller.
And you might have read:

The Mysterious Island - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mysterious_Island
The Mysterious Island (French: L'Île mystérieuse) is a novel by Jules Verne, published in 1874. The original edition, published by Hetzel, contains a number of ...
So, you would understand the concepts (in Theory) that hot air balloons could lift a few people into the air and transport them on the prevailing winds to somewhere else mysterious. And you would understand (in theory) that Submarines might be built sometime in the near or far future.
But, you would not even entertain the concept of something so far fetched as "Heavier than air aircraft like the Wright brothers used at Kitty Hawk yet.
Even when the Wright brothers flew many people thought it was an abomination or against God because it wasn't natural and made no sense at all to people. In 1890 your parents if you were 15 might have a wood cook stove and kerosene lamps (if they were middle class) and if they were very rich they might have Gas lights and maybe a gas stove for cooking (I'm not sure about the gas stove).

Your parents likely owned a buckboard or carriage (if you were middle class or above) for going to church and hauling things to your home or farm because most people your age lived on farms then that were middle class and above still.
But, you would have no idea at all that heavier than air aircraft would fly around the world let alone across your cornfield in 1890. That likely would be a completely impossible concept to grasp. Now we accept airplanes and most of us in the developed nations have even flown 1 or more times to many different places. 
However, though I had flown a private plane myself in the air in Santa Fe New Mexico in 1956 when I was 8 years old (I didn't take off or land then) I did not fly in a passenger jet until 1966 the year I graduated from High School during Christmas vacation to go to a Church Christmas Conference in Chicago, Illinois with my girlfriend and her brother. So, even though I was born around 1950 I didn't fly in a passenger plane until 1966 but I had already taken off a private plane with an instructor sitting next to me and flown private planes as a part time pilot including from Yucca Valley to the Los Angeles area when I was 12.
So, if we compare now to 1890 as a 15 year old and what that person knew then to now with the coming Technological Singularity which will change things not only in one direction like flight did but in literally all decision making directions at once, what can we imagine is going to happen to the human race in all this? What is going to happen to governments in all this? What is going to happen to all human rights in all this?
These are the important questions to ask including what jobs and careers will still be there for you to work at now and into the future.
Here are some of the jobs that are (to a greater or lesser degree that are presently disappearing here on EArth)
Factory Worker
Truck Driver
Taxi Driver
Bus Driver
Limosine driver
Every kind of driver paid or unpaid
Use your imagination for the rest
(The above jobs likely will be gone at least in the developed nations by 2050 completely or to a greater or lesser degree).
So, people need to get involved to help people train for careers that actually will exist 10 and 20 years from now rather than careers that are going to go away partially or completely worldwide.
Here is something I quoted on the Jet Age from Wikipedia:
The History of Technology: The Jet Age

And here is a button for the History of Aviation at Wikipedia:
History of aviation

Okay, now let us take this in the direction of Technological Singularity from Technological Flight Singularity(in other words only a very small minority of people even thought motorized flight in an aircaft (only gliders then in 1890) would EVER be possible or even probable.

So, here we are now with our own (Unknown) prejudices that we don't even know that we have just like the person at age 15 didn't know that he or she had prejudices necessarily in 1890 when they were 15. It was just that they likely believed what the people around them believed for the most part and then when they were 28 years old they were likely shocked out of their minds that Heavier than air flight was even possible let alone probable in 1903 at Kitty Hawk with the Wright Brothers. And the Flight Singularity began then in 1903 with the shock of "My God! Something heavier than Air can fly with an engine no less! That's impossible!"

Now flash forwards to today when we think, "Computers can't do complex things like people can with many many variables unknown until you have to deal with them" WRONG! Computers can now drive cars in California and Nevada and I believe in Nevada in some areas where they test them humans don't even need to be onboard while the cars drive themselves. And this is right now!

So, if computers can now make a car robotic and a plane robotic. What can't they do? That actually is a fairly unknown answer right now because as recently as 2004 (including some software designers) people believed Cars wouldn't be successful at driving themselves possibly ever.

If software and hardware can deal with all the variables of driving a car or plane with no human supervision (they do this right now and have in planes since the late 1990s or before in some military planes. And if you are talking about autopilots

Now, imagine what it takes to do all this. First you need video cameras and sensors of all kinds interfaced all together and capable of instant response. And, it has to be the right response all the time so human lives aren't endangered or their pets.

Autopilot - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autopilot
An autopilot is a system used to guide a vehicle without assistance from a person. Autopilots are used in aircraft, boats (known as self-steering gear), space craft, ...

The first aircraft autopilot was developed by Sperry Corporation in 1912.

But if you are talking about planes flown from the ground

radio controlled aircraft 

 

The earliest examples of electronically guided model aircraft were hydrogen-filled model airships of the late 19th century.

So, the very first airships that could be electronically guided were in the late 1800s.

So, this is something to think about too.

  • An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), colloquially known as a drone, is an aircraft ... but autonomous control is increasingly being employed ...
    128 KB (18,402 words) - 11:25, 26 September 2013
    So, more and more no pilots on the ground will control military and domestic drones at all.
    Now, think about yourself being 15 in 1890 and think about yourself today. The future is just as unpredictable for us all now as it was for you theoretically in 1890. This is what the Technological Singularity is all about and why so many people are concerned about it now and in the future.
    It is also one of the concerns of people worried about the end of world wide human rights through the NSA Worldwide and through instruments like Facebook where you mortgage your children's future privacy by everything you put on Social media sites including their potential careers into the future. But, even more than the NSA you should be worried more about every other governments NSA and CIA even more. Because the U.S. secret agencies are in some ways the most publicly scrutinized in the world. For the U.S. this is a good thing and a bad thing. But, most nations secret agencies run amok because there is no scrutinization at all at least on a public level in those countries.
    I try to never go to Facebook but 1 to 4 times a year it is the only way to contact someone or to find out more about what is going on through pictures or writings or videos regarding friends and relatives.

    Here is a more of a programmers view of the Singularity:

    Imagine programming code for operating systems of all kinds as legos reaching up to the sky with guy wires stabilizing them from winds and rain and lightning. Now imagine thousands to millions to even trillions of lines of code and subroutines stretching on up to the sky. Now, you see that absolutely every line of code (all the millions of them) has to work perfectly every single time for that Operating system to work. Now add trillions of lines of code for all the applications programs on everything that works on any computer around the world stretching out maybe almost to the moon.

    Now, take supercomputers that might be able to process subroutines and programs from here to Pluto in a day or maybe even an hour. However, if one line of code is wrong maybe the whole thing will crash and not work. Or, maybe there is a line of code that is hit with a bolt of lightning, and this lack of that line of code kills people in some device somewhere here on earth. However, no one really understands how this is possible and after all, there were hundeds of programmers writing this code. And often lines of code and subroutines are borrowed from other Operating systems or applications that were written 50 years ago or more at this time and just translated into a new programming language that is used more now. So, most often a programmer isn't even writing all the code but plugging in subroutines and only writing the commands to join them properly so they interface with all the other pieces. So, what if that programmer didn't fully understand all the potential relationships between all the subroutines and so someone else dies and then someone else and someone else and then someone else. Is any programmer responsible for these deaths? NO. The reason for this is that by then potentially thousands and millions of software programmers both living and dead had something to do with what happens but no one of them is culpable for anything.

    And this is part of the future regarding Technological Singularity, unless the computers are sentient and programmed for looking for these types of anomalies. And even then who programmed that computer? What thousands to millions of people programmed that computer or robotic creature that might have sentience?

    So, you see there is no responsibility for legal action other than suing the manufacturer of the product and for a variety of reasons even they might not be liable for any deaths for ANY reason legally. Even though they might get a lot of bad press (unless they have a good publicity agent). So, to me, this is the problem with Technological Singularity. And this will be only 1 problem in 100 or 1 problem in 1000 or 1 problem in 1 million that will actually occur(but likely be covered up completely if possible by the companies or governments involved).

    The potential positive parts of a Technological Singularity:

    This sort of stuff is literally infinite. But, here are a few of the potentially positive results of a Singularity.

    1. You can create a perfect clone of your mind, your body, your life and you might even have multiple bodies to live through and just stay at home while you live through them so if a replacement body dies (any age you want it to be and however you want it to look) you just get another replacement and keep on vicariously living in that body instead.

    2. If your present body dies you can live on as digital information that can interface with and even advise all of your relatives if you or they want. But, I see all sorts of legal problems with doing this too.

    3. If all work is done by Information Technology and robotic devices no hard labor will be necessary for anyone to do unless they want to to get exercise or want and experience doing that.

    4. If all robotics and Information technology devices are communally owned all could financially benefit from anything they do ongoing as long as the population of earth stayed static (no one could be born unless someone passed on).

    5. It might be possible to send one of your bodies to another planet and to live vicariously there as well and experience living there and surviving there from your own home (or backyard or pool here on earth).

    6. It might be possible for 3d printers to print not only things but also food and maybe even clone things presently growing or medicines for example.

    7. Whatever your religion (as long as it is compatible with all other people on earth (non-violent) people may be able to create areas of Earth as literal heaven realms for people with like minded beliefs ongoing for hundreds or thousands of years.

    8. It may be potentially possible to never die ever (however, as time moves on boredom and just things breaking down or fatal accidents might occur at any age. So, some people theoretically could live 200, 500, 5000 or 10,000 years or longer depending upon a whole lot of factors and probabilities yet to be fully understood by present day psychologists, religious and spiritual people, exercise specialists, educators, doctors and healers etc.

 





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