From: Philip Witham (p.j.witham@ieee.org)
Date: Mon Apr 19 1999 - 15:27:31 MDT
>As more people become immortal, at the edge of the Singularity, the amount of >procrastination which occurs in society will amplify at exponential rates, >leading to a major braking effect on growth of all kinds.
You've just described me in a nutshell - I won't have to wait for the singularity for this to occur! I've optimized my life for minimum effort to maintain my basic needs, and spend the rest of the time reading, learning and playing. The result being that as I grow older, I find myself working fewer and fewer hours for the same result financially. Many people would do this if they could.
However, those who continue to work hard will stay way out ahead in influence, money and power, as always. My question would be, "Can an individual experience a personal rate of technological growth that outstrips, is decoupled from, the rate of growth in society at large?" Can money buy a faster rate of growth, or does it just buy you the best tech that is available at this time?
As all material things become more like software, I think it boils down to: can the best technology remain proprietary, or will it all leak into the public domain? If one can keep the latest developments proprietary, I think we'd see individuals and groups experiencing their own personal singularities, and the mass of humanity lagging behind, happy with their easy life.
- PW
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