From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_singularity
Technological singularity refers to the hypothesis that technological progress will become extremely fast, and so make the future unpredictable and qualitatively different from today.
Although technological progress has been accelerating, it has been limited by the basic intelligence of the human brain, which has not changed significantly for millennia. However with the increasing power of computers and other technologies, it might soon be possible to build a machine that is fundamentally more intelligent than humans.
If such a machine were built, then the machine itself could build a more intelligent machine. If the machine is more intelligent than humans, then presumably it would be better at building a more intelligent machine. The more intelligent machine would then be better at building an even more intelligent machine. This process might continue exponentially, with ever more intelligent machines making bigger increments to the intelligence of the next machine. (This process is referred to as Recursive self improvement.)
I. J. Good described this as an “intelligence explosion”. It is quite different from normal technological progress because the underlying intelligence is increasing. The term Technological Singularity reflects the idea that the change may happen suddenly, and that it is very difficult to predict how such a new world would operate…
…A flashback character in Ken MacLeod’s 1998 novel The Cassini Division dismissively refers to the singularity as “the Rapture for nerds”, though the singularity goes on to happen anyway.
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