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{{trope}}
▲[[File:singularitarian.jpg|link=Dresden Codak|right]]
{{quote|"''As I see it, the main problem in designing a plausible 23rd century these days isn't lack of grandeur, it's the imminence of changes so fundamental and unpredictable they're likely to make the dramas of 2298 as unintelligible to us as the Microsoft Anti-Trust Suit would be to Joan of Arc.''"
|'''[http://www.xibalba.demon.co.uk/jbr/trek/next.html Justin B. Rye]'''}}
A ''Technological Singularity'' is a theoretical point in technological development beyond which things are incomprehensible to anyone who came before. Predictions of what life will be like after a Singularity are by definition
Some writers are hopeful, and look to improvements: an end to death, scarcity, and the errors of ignorance and stupidity. There is the prospect of self-editing, [[Mind Control|mental]] and [[Genetic Engineering Is the New Nuke|physical]]: people [[Transhuman|finally able to be whatever they wish to be]]. A singularity can be transcendent; we [[Rewriting Reality|hack]] [[Breaking the Fourth Wall|the cracked walls]] [[Reality Warper|of reality itself]] and move on to [[Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence|better things]]. This is an excellent [[Hand Wave]] or a literal [[Deus Ex Machina]] for writers struggling with the impossibility of plots involving entities many orders of magnitude greater than themselves or the reader. Others see no end: endless ecstatic ascent.
The singularity is sometimes called the "rapture of the [[
[[Romanticism Versus Enlightenment|The less hopeful works point out the dangers.]] Environmental exhaustion. There are [[Apocalypse How|all these extinction scenarios]] so ready to hand. Our extinction by an uncontrollable creation, [[Turned Against Their Masters|intelligent]] or [[Grey Goo|not]]. There is the question of ''who'' inherits the wonders of acceleration: us or our posthuman descendants? [[Beware the Superman|Can we coexist]] in [[Pro-Human Transhuman|peace]]? Charles Stross sometimes envisages a singularity runaway as enjoyable as unchaining [[Eldritch Abomination|Cthulhu]] on a bad day. The Black Goat knows the answer to Fermi's question. [[The Matrix|Agent Smith]] does not like you.
There's also a question of who, exactly, gets to be part of the Singularity; while technology is progressing at leaps and bounds in the First World, there are plenty of places around the world where people have little-to-no access to the kind of technologies most tropers take for granted, and even within the First World not everyone has an equal share of the pie ("We are the 99%," anyone?). Far from ushering in a utopia of egalitarianism and plenty in which everyone is part, there are plenty who argue that the Singularity could just accelerate elitism, creating an exclusive club where only those who can afford to pay can take part.
Note is also taken of how hard it is to ''uninvent'' something without [[Medieval Stasis|completely halting the inventing species and its descendants]]. For instance, as time goes on, the probability that mankind will use (or make [[Fun Size|pocket size]]) any given [[Weapon of Mass Destruction]] increases, [[Morton's Fork|while only]] a similar [[Apocalypse How|civilization-ending]] catastrophe and/or mass [[Earth-That-Was|Ascension Into Space]] would result in humans [[Catch-22|forgetting]] said knowledge. Of course, a middle path involves either economic collapse or [[Future Imperfect|imperfect transcription of knowledge]] followed by a [[Feudal Future]]. Or a merely grimy [[Used Future]], sort of the future equivalent of the [[Dung Ages]].
A singularity may produce [[Sufficiently Advanced Alien
Some writers content themselves with "soft singularities": technologies that cause an unforeseen societal phase change, in the veins of the steam engine, motorized transportation, or computers. Soft-singularity transistors create portable radios and end the tyranny of distance. "Hard" singularities end people; turn them into radio waves. Don't confuse these uses of "hard and soft" with [[Mohs Scale of Sci Fi Hardness]]; some people even consider them opposite in meaning, since the "soft singularity" is fairly plausible according to science as we understand it, while the "hard singularity" is a lot more speculative.
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The purposes of including a Singularity in the setting of a story, beyond the [[Rule of Cool]], can be to examine the difference between how people of particular political philosophies approach change. In both cases, a singularity is a revolution, but political radicals want to throw away the whole system of society in one go, excited with the possible rewards, where conservatives tend to focus on all the risks, which are appropriately grave. Characters (and writers) of either bent can find much to say about the topic.
In order to get around the problems some viewers ([[Viewers are Morons|are thought to]]) have relating to the troubles of, say, [[Charles Stross|super-intelligent flocks of pigeons]] or [[Greg Egan|12-dimensional hermit crabs]], stories set after
See also [[No Transhumanism Allowed]] and [[Transhuman]].
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{{examples}}
== Hard Singularities ==
=== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ===▼
▲== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* This could be one interpretation of The Claw's plan in ''[[Gun X Sword]]''. Other interpretations could be [[Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence|ascending to a higher state]] or [[The End of the World as We Know It|mass genocide]].
* This is basically the whole point of ''[[Neon Genesis Evangelion]]''. The purpose of {{spoiler|SEELE and NERV is to make it so that mankind can control the powers of both [[Eldritch Abomination|Adam and Lilith]] in order to ascend to a state where [[Hive Mind|all minds are one]] as God. Not that they asked mankind's opinion before doing so...}}
* The Wired from ''[[Serial Experiments Lain]]'' eventually becomes this. Maybe.
=== [[Film]] ===
* Although it predates the term "Singularity" by decades, the film ''[[Forbidden Planet]]'' is about a civilization that [[Sufficiently Advanced Aliens|transcended instrumentality]]. [[The End of the World as We Know It|Not that it ended well]] for them, of course.
=== [[Literature]] ===
* ''Picoverse'' and ''CUSP'' by Robert A. Metzger.
* ''[[Accelerando]]'' by [[Charles Stross]]. Towards the end of the novel, the posthuman protagonists are referred to as living in the mentally retarded backwater slums of the universe, and yet are immortal shapeshifters who can have all their dreams come true. That is how amazing the singularity is. On the other hand, it's not at all clear that the entities at the center of the hard singularity are really sapient, anymore. The logic of Capitalism 2.0 suggests that self-awareness might well be a market inefficiency to be dispensed with. They are not called the "Vile Offspring" for nothing. Then again, there's the Cat, which is, quite clearly a post-organic super intelligence who {{spoiler|openly mocks us for having pathetically limited brains that are easy for it to manipulate with its superior theory of mind. How can you deal with something so powerful that its ideas about you are ''equivalent to'' you?}}
* In ''Glasshouse''
* In ''[[The Eschaton Series|Singularity Sky]]'' (yet another Stross work) a society in a sort of Industrial Age stasis is introduced to the fruits of a thousand years of human development and nanotech replicators which effectively destroy their economy and social structure overnight
:A character from another society mentions how much they dislike and fear Upload civilizations; beings used to living in virtual realities where everything is backed up and can be restored at will do not always treat things and people in the real world with much respect and caution because they have little concept of impermanence and mortality.
* [[Arthur C. Clarke]]'s ''[[
** In [[The Space Odyssey Series]], this is what happened to the race that created the Monoliths... and they eventually do it to {{spoiler|David Bowman and Hal}}.
* [[Vernor Vinge]]'s ''[[Across Realtime|Marooned in Realtime]]''. A technology for freezing time within impervious "bobbles" allows a community to sleep through a singularity. They emerge to find no survivors and no hard information on what happened. From the last survivor to go into hibernation, they know that as the singularity approached, people became brighter, more connected and more powerful. But what actually happened unknown and perhaps unknowable. Multiple theories for what happened are presented, although it's strongly implied that the characters who believe the singularity hypothesis are correct. Given who the author is, I think that it's fairly obvious which side he agrees with.
* ''[[Zones of Thought|A Fire Upon the Deep]]'', by the same author, allows non-singularity and singularity to coexist, because of different physical laws in different parts of the galaxy. In fact there is a stupidity anti-singularity at the center of the galaxy, where even Babbage engines barely work: the Unthinking Depths.
* In the ''[[Polity Series]]'', humans are ruled by [[A Is]]: gods that refuse to take part in the singularity for unknowable reasons. It is suggested that they rather like the way they are right now. After all, not even the most powerful [[A Is]] of the Polity could even begin to imagine what comes after the singularity... when you have near infinite patience and are effectively immortal, there's no need to go blindly rushing into the unknown without some very, very serious thought. Where's the rush? It is said in a footnote in one of the novels that the Singularity came and nobody really cared. The majority seem to enjoy being human.
* The Minds of [[Iain M Banks|Iain M. Banks']] ''[[The Culture|Culture]]'' novels. The entire Culture is the result of a [[Deus Est Machina]]. Though [[Death Is Cheap]] due to most people [[Virtual Ghost|backing themselves up]], aside from a bit of cybernetic enhancement, [[Watch It Stoned|drug glands]] from genetic manipulation and the literal prevalence of the [[Most Common Superpower]], the humans in both settings tend to be content with being, well, human. This is incredibly [[Justified Trope|justified]]
:[[Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence|Ascending To A Higher Plane Of Existence]] is not banned or even discouraged, and the technologies to do so are readily available. However, people and civilizations who choose to sublime tend to stop interacting with less-advanced cultures with the exception of the occasional [[Deus Ex Machina]]. To just about all observers, it seems as if they committed particularly grandiose and complicated suicide. The Minds are thus not inclined to attempt it, and are in fact really freaking paranoid about even studying the phenomena too closely. The various Ascended species (appear to) look down on the Culture and its citizens as more than a little immature and irresponsible for not just subliming instead of sticking around to enjoy the physical plane.
:At least one other civilization, the Overarch Bedeckants from ''Excession'', seem quite firmly grounded in physical reality, and yet exhibit powers as vastly in excess of the Culture's as the abilities of the Culture exceed ours. Their ability to escape the Heat Death of their own Universe is one. Possibly there are benefits to not Ascending.
* In ''[[The Golden Oecumene|The Golden Age]]'', most humans seem to spend their time building elaborate dream worlds and abstract art pieces, while the AIs, who have rates of cognition humans cannot match, mostly explore abstract mathematics. The conflict begins when the hero realizes he isn't satisfied with this.
* ''Hot Head'' by Simon Ings features The Massive: a computational device of astronomic
* ''[[Blood Music]]'' by Greg Bear: a character creates biological computers from his own cells. Inside his own body, the new cells evolve, becoming self-aware. The microscopic civilization they construct transforms the protagonist, then spreads, assimilating most of North America. Finally, the new civilization is forced to transcend
** In ''Darwin's Radio'' also by Greg Bear, humanity's "junk DNA" contains a retrovirus that transforms fetuses into next-gen humans. Apparently, evolution isn't the slow process we believe it to be, but rather some semi-sentient [[Hive Mind]] churning out a new and better model. Last time this happened was when the Neanderthals began squeezing out Homo Sapiens instead of Homo Neanderthalis. {{spoiler|The governments of the world is less than happy about this, and put all the new kids in concentration camps.}}
* ''The Time Ships'' by Stephen Baxter features an extreme singularity. A Victorian inventor of a time machine changes history, thereby giving rise to a hyperintelligent race that travel back in time to the big bang. They edit the big bang to give rise to an infinity of universes containing ever grander versions of themselves.
* Rudy Rucker's ''Postsingular'' ''begins'' with Mars being turned into
* [[Ken MacLeod]]'s ''Fall Revolution'' series follows humanity through a singularity where a vast number of artificially generated AIs and uploaded human minds upgrade their own intelligence and capabilities to godlike levels, before burning out and collapsing leaving the wreckage of their birth behind them for the rest of mundane humanity to sort out
:Turns out that running your mind faster and faster means the real world just seems to take longer and longer to do anything. In the end, the entire uploaded civilization runs its course over an enormous span of simulated time, but only a few hours to human observers.
* In ''Newton's Wake'' the technological tools of genetics and nanotechnology that let them ascend were repressed for many years to prevent a singularity. A successful uprising by one nation broke the power of the suppressive governments, and in a few short years technology rushed ahead. In the end, super-capable, super-fast, super-destructive war machines appear almost overnight and crush human resistance across the world.
* The Conjoiners of [[Alastair Reynolds]] ''Revelation Space'' novels had their own singularity, caused firstly by the acceleration of brain function to superhuman speeds, and then the direct mind-to-mind communication between conjoiners to allow their slightly hive-mind-ish society to develop near-lightspeed fuel-less spaceship drives, highly capable nanotechnology, and ultimately communication with the past. Unaugmented humanity shared many of the things the conjoiners made, and the conjoiners themselves whilst becoming somewhat alien were still recognizably human and could interact with baseline humans without too much difficulty, but the two sides did clash several times. They might be seen more as [[Our Elves Are Different|elves]] rather than godlike transcendent beings.
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* ''Perfect Imperfection'' by Polish author Jacek Dukaj is all about this. For an example, it begins with one (hundreds of years old) character being assassinated ''twice'' the same day... And this dude is one of the traditionalist ''Standard'' Humans. Dukaj invented his own grammar for those who aren't, as male-female-neuter division (it matters in Polish) no longer applies to them. Pocket universes are routinely exploited, for things both big (Solar System has been moved to one) and small (instant communication is easy, when physical constants are manipulated so that the message travels any distance in just one Planck-time). Virtual reality is mixed with actual one in proportions dependent on one's needs. And on top of all this, an [[Fish Out of Temporal Water|astronaut]] from what could be [[Space Opera]] for us, but is ages past in this world.
* The Solarian Combine in [[Alan Dean Foster]]'s ''Design for Great-Day'' is a multispecies [[Hive Mind]] that is seeking to evolve into a higher order of consciousness (while still having enough mental power to spare to send ships into neighboring galaxies to resolve their disputes). It is implied that The Singularity will be the result. This is also an example of nested singularities, as the Solarian Combine is itself the product of a singularity event that produced the [[Hive Mind]] in the first place.
* ''[[The Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect]].'' [[
* The ''Minds'' series of teen novels by Carol Matas at first appear to be set in a fairly typical [[High Fantasy]] world, albeit one based around [[Psychic Powers|psionics]] rather than magic. At the end of the second book, ''More Minds,'' however, we learn that {{spoiler|theirs is actually a post-singularity society which long ago agreed to maintain the illusion of a storybook-style magical land by general consensus, because the alternative was [[Reality Is Out to Lunch|rampant chaos]] as everyone's godlike [[Reality Warper|Reality Warping]] powers ran unchecked.}}
* ''[[Man After Man: An Anthropology of the Future|Man After Man]]'' by Dougal Dixon. One post-human race has become crippled by mutational meltdown and completely dependent on technology, another becomes aquatic and evolves into a mermaid-type creature, another is genetically and cybernetically modified for space, etc. At the end, the [[Transhuman Aliens]] return to Earth and end up destroying all surface life on it.
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** In the Void Trilogy The Void itself at the heart of the galaxy was created by the firstlifes, who were the first sentient life in the galaxy to evolve and it (the Void) had the potential to consume everything in the outside galaxy, which the firstlifes believed to be lifeless anyways.
* [[Michael Moorcock]]'s trilogy "The Dancers at The End of Time" is set in a post-singularity society inhabited by almost omnipotent beings.
* ''After Life'' by Simon Funk starts with an uploaded human intelligence and gradually moves through
* Hannu Rajaniemi's ''[[The Quantum Thief]]'' takes place indeterminate time after the Technological Singularity, when things have calmed down a bit. The seven scientists who developed the technology for human uploading have become Sobronost deities that rule over the entire inner Solar System, save for Mars with an iron fist, and [[Blue and Orange Morality]] prevails for most of the posthumans within their sphere of influence.
* The classic [[Harlan Ellison]] story "[[I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream]]" is about a seemingly godlike AI who hates ''everyone.'' It ends about as well as you'd expect.
* This trope is [[Older Than They Think|way older]] than you may expect. ''[http://www.gutenberg.org/files/27462/27462-h/27462-h.htm The Last Evolution]'' is a [[Older Than Television|1932]] short story by [[John W. Campbell]] about a future where mankind and robots coexist peacefully. When aliens attack the Solar System using [[Death Rays]] of an unknown type, mankind builds a robot of unheard-of intelligence to figure out a defense. Said robot builds an even more advanced machine, which builds even more avanced robots, up to the creation of a race of [[Energy Beings]] that [[Curb Stomp]] the enemy fleet. Too bad that mankind, and all organic life, has been killed in the battle... So the superintelligent energy beings inherit the Earth.
=== [[Live-Action TV]] ===
* Amita mentions it in the ''[[Numb3rs]]'' episode "First Law", when a true artificial intelligence may have been created. She seems very sad when {{spoiler|it turns out to be a fake, brute-force expert system}}.
* Near the end of ''[[The Event]]'''s [[Cut Short|only season]], [[Title Drop|it was revealed that the title]] referred to an expected future evolution into a higher plane by the show's alien race, which humanity would not survive.
* The Q Continuum is hinted to have become the ultimate example of this in ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation]]''. In ''[[Star Trek: Voyager]]'' it's shown that they've lived that way for so long they're already bored of it, and that the only logical place their species can go to move forward, is to move backward.
=== [[Tabletop Games]] ===
* ''[[Eclipse Phase]]'' is set a couple of centuries after a hard singularity. Transhumanism is rampant, except in a few bioconservative holdouts like the Jovian Republic. It depends a lot on what you consider to be a singularity. Humans certainly have exceptional technology and live in a transhuman undying future and while this has had a lot of interesting effects things are understandable to us. The 'true' singularity did not happen to us, but it happened very close. {{spoiler|We built [[A Is]] that made themselves more smart and powerful and eventually they passed into the singularity and tried to destroy the human race and then vansihed off into the ether. And the game is set after that.}}
=== [[Video Games]] ===
* ''[[Escape Velocity]] Nova'' features the Krypt, {{spoiler|a [[Hive Mind]] of glowing purple spheres capable of space travel. The crypt was originally the leadership council of the Vell-os (telepathic humans), and they used nanotechnology to turn themselves into the Krypt}}. A singularity is implied, tens of thousands of years down the line in at least two plotlines.
* In ''[[Brutal Legend]]'' we learn that the world was once inhabited by a race of [[Our Titans Are Different|titans]] who invented things like cars and music. After growing and advancing for several millenia the titans were giant, all-knowing entities of spiritual perfection who could no longer be confined by the physical world. In the final stage of their evolution they ascended into the heavens and became the Metal Gods.
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** Ultimately, {{spoiler|preventing a technological singularity is the goal of the Reapers. They fear rampant technological growth will end with artificially created races destroying all organic life. Thus, they allow civilization to reach a certain apex before setting things back to zero.}}
=== [[Web Comics]] ===
* ''[[Dresden Codak]]''. [https://web.archive.org/web/20130726070607/http://www.dresdencodak.com/cartoons/dc_039.html Here's Kim's explanation of the idea.]
{{quote|
'''Kim''': Shut up. You just wait. }}
** [http://dresdencodak.com/2007/12/17/no-side/ And here's where Kim is told quite clearly that some aren't as enthusiastic about it as she is.]
{{quote|
'''Kim''': ''Good!'' All they ever do is ''Die!'' ''Or leave.'' }}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130726234620/http://archive.picturesforsadchildren.com/93/ Humorously mocked] in ''[[Pictures for Sad Children]]'', which points out that advancements are usually restricted to the rich and that the poor are often left behind. The idea that silicon can have any role in a fundamental changes to the human condition is rejected on the basis that computers are only used for entertainment and warfare.
=== [[Western Animation]] ===
* In the last episode of ''[[Aeon Flux]]'', Trevor Goodchild makes a comment that human society (and humans) of his time would be completely incomprehensible to humans who lived a thousand years in the past. Considering how the entire series was scripted as an experiment in surreal storytelling, Trevor's statement was very to the point.
== Soft Singularities ==
=== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ===▼
▲== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* The backstory (or rather, [[Time Travel|future history]]) of the ''[[Suzumiya Haruhi]]'' novels and [[Anime]] features a soft singularity that spells the end of mechanical technology as contemporary humans understand it, leaving humanity the same but technology completely unrecognizable. As a literary device, this is mostly to [[Hand Wave]] how [[Time Travel]] works and to make a character from [[The Future]] [[No Social Skills|completely oblivious]] to things like personal computers. This also includes the Data Integration Thought Entity that has reached its evolutionary end and has its non-tangible technology that equals [[Magic From Technology|magic]].
* According to ''[[Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha]]'', mankind has the tendency to destroy itself with technology with no "enlightenment" occurring. After a certain level, a precocious child can accidentally (or intentionally) program their toys to destroy planets and dimensions. The heroes try to keep technological levels down with magic for this reason. It is implied that magic, and indeed most of their current universe, is part of the wreckage of an earlier singularity. This series could out-grimdark ''[[Warhammer
=== [[Film]] ===
* ''[[Waking Life]]''. One character discusses the "New Evolution".
=== [[Literature]] ===
* In ''[[Pandora's
* In ''Accelerando'' by [[Charles Stross]], posthuman upload characters try to place the singularity in time: one suggests it hasn't happened yet, and one suggests it was back in the 1960s when the first network packet was sent.
* William Gibson's [[Cyberpunk]] novel ''All Tomorrow's Parties'' ends with an AI becoming flesh by means of cheap atomic assembly; emerging from "every 7-Eleven in Christendom".
* ''[[The Difference Engine]]'' by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling is an extended journey through a soft singularity. The widespread use of a working Babbage engine brings the IT revolution to Victorian times.
* The ''Ægypt'' books by John Crowley. The protagonist, Pierce Moffatt discovers that there is more than one history of the world. The ancient world was governed by alchemy, magic and astrology, and then the world changed to what we know now. The moment this change occurred was basically a protracted Singularity called the Renaissance and our distorted memories about this old world, now lost, are what gave rise to fortune telling and stories about Gypsies. And the sixties.
* Several [[Greg Egan]] novels, especially ''[[Diaspora]]'' and ''Schild's Ladder'' take place ''after'' Singularities. Diaspora in particular casts most of its characters as genderless AIs who think something like a thousand times faster than human beings {{spoiler|and wind up travelling through various multidimensional - as in, bearing more than 3 spatial dimensions - parallel universes.}} [[Greg Egan]] generally looks upon singularities as an adolescent power fantasy more worthy of primates. His position seems to be that a mature real-world advanced civilization will find they can create everything they need for themselves inside a few kilos of virtual world substrate. To this end in ''Crystal Nights'', he has Lucian ridiculing singularity seekers as "Uberdorks battling to turn the moon into computronium." and "Throwing [[Grey Goo]] around like monkeys throwing turds while they draw up their plans for Matrioshka brains."
* In Asimov's ''[[I, Robot (literature)|I, Robot]]'', this trope is {{spoiler|the entire point}}.
* The "Change" syringes in ''[[Beggars in Spain]]'' use [[Bio Augmentation]] to turn an entire generation of human beings autotrophic. Changed people can obtain all the nutrition they need from just lying out in the sun: they can photosynthesize, fix nitrogen directly from the atmosphere, and absorb nutrients directly through the skin via special tubules that liquefy and absorb certain kinds of organic matter. (Yes, this does lead to [[Clothing Damage]]. Most people wear plastic clothes by that time anyhow.)
* [[William Shatner]] (yes, [[Star Trek|that one]]) takes the concept a bit too literally in his ''[[Quest For Tomorrow]]'' novels. As the protagonist Jim (!) discovers, long ago, a Huzzna ship discovers Earth and finds two species of primitive humanoids on it: our own ancestors and the Neanderthals. The latter turn out to be naturally telepathic. Seeking to find out which genes cause telepathy and improve themselves, the crew transplant a number of the Neanderthals to a different world and kill the rest with a genetically-engineered plague, which doesn't harm the other humanoids. After their experiments yield no results, the Huzzna decide to wipe out the Neanderthals in order to prevent anyone else from succeeding. Some of them survive and rebuild their civilization. Hundreds of thousands of years later, they are re-discovered by the Huzzna, who send a fleet to wipe them out. By that point, the Neanderthals (who advance much slower than humans due to lack of writing) have only just managed to reach the Industrial Revolution. Facing destruction, they use their telepathy to "[[Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence|Leap]]" - turning them all into a single nigh-omnipotent being. The process also results in the star collapsing into a black hole (a literal singularity), destroying the Huzzna armada. Now, the Neanderthals' distant cousins, humans, appear to be nearing the threshold themselves, although they achieve it using technological means, by joining millions of minds into a single computing entity - the most powerful computer in the galaxy. Fearing humanity's Leap, the Huzzna and their long-time enemies join forces and send a huge armada to destroy Earth (apparently, the Huzzna never learn). Facing with extinction, humanity will undoubtedly use the Mind Arrays to force-Leap themselves. Unfortunately, doing this will unravel the very fabric of reality. As Jim explains, the Multiverse was created by a God-like being formed by the natural Leaps of all galactic races with humanity being the key. Force-Leaping humans and turning the Sun into a black hole will result in this never happening. Thus, the Multiverse will not be created. He ends up going back in time and altering his own past, effectively [[Retcon
=== [[Music]] ===
* [[Industrial]]/[[Steampunk]] entertainer [[Doctor Steel]] weaves the concept of a technological singularity throughout his music, videos and writings, even having a song entitled ''The Singularity''. He has even been interviewed by transhumanist institutes and authored a paper on the subject.
=== [[Video Games]] ===
* A silly example: ''[[Morrowind]]'' effectively lets the [[Player Character]] become a one-man Singularity, courtesy of a [[Game Breaker]]. The steps are simple. Craft an intelligence enhancing potion. Use the stat boost to craft a better intelligence enhancing potion. Repeat until your intelligence stat is much higher than you could get using any normal method, and then exploit it for all it's worth, such as making equally powerful boosts to all other stats. The depressing singularity variation pays a visit if you boost your speed (constantly smashing into walls) or jumping (jump outside the game world) attributes.
** In the lore of the ''[[The Elder Scrolls]]'' series, this is one theory as to what happened to the Dwemer/Dwarves. They had been largely atheistic in a world of living gods and demons everywhere, focusing on developing ever-increasing magic and technology. They'd even devised reliable methods of reading the eponymous Scrolls, artifacts from outside time that blind, drive mad, and/or kill any mortal attempting to read them. And built a device around the heart of a dead god capable of granting the user immortality. Until one day they just... disappeared. Leaving behind technology that's still beyond any of the other races of the world thousands of years later. Maybe they ascended, or left for another world. Maybe they just all died, but in a way that leaves no corpse, ghost, or any of the other things that happen to the dead of other races and Dwemer killed before their disappearance. Nobody knows, and all attempts to study the incident or recreate their experiment have failed (often lethally).
=== [[Web Comics]] ===
* ''[[A Miracle of Science]]'' features a localized Singularity: Human colonists on Mars isolate themselves from the rest of the solar-system, inexplicably evolve a [[Hive Mind]], and start [[Faster-Than-Light Travel|tearing holes in the laws of physics]]. Advances in nanotechnology, gravitics and energy-transmission makes them <s> gods</s> [[Insistent Terminology|just really powerful]]. The rest of humanity is rather spooked.
* According to ''[[Questionable Content]]'', [http://questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=1777 the Singularity happened yesterday]. Nobody really noticed.
=== [[Web Original]] ===
* The ''[[
=== [[Western Animation]] ===
* In one of the new episodes of ''[[Futurama]]'' Bender achieves a Singularity after Cubert overclocks his CPU and he proceeds to add more and more processors until he becomes practically omniscient. [[Status Quo Is God|Of course]] he allows himself to be downgraded back to normal so Momcorp doesn't try his friends for breaking his EULA.
=== Real Life ===▼
▲== Real Life ==
Depending on your definition, Singularities, of varying "hardnesses", '''have already happened''' several times:
* The origin of life on Earth. Compared to what came before, this may be the hardest singularity ''ever''.
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And then there's speculation about '''what might happen next'''...
* Economist Robin Hanson has speculated that [
▲* Economist Robin Hanson has speculated that [http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/robotics/robotics-software/economics-of-the-singularity/0 whole brain emulation] could be the cause of the ''next'' singularity. Notably, his article predicts that the global economy will double ''every week''. He also speculates there could be insect-size robot knowledge workers living like humans.
* With the Industrial Revolution or the invention of writing we had a complete departure from the previous sort of existence in ways no one predicted or fathomed. On the other hand, sentient artificial beings [[The Matrix|are]] [[Battlestar Galactica|not]] [[Halo|a]] [[Terminator|new]] [[Andromeda|idea]]. It wouldn't be a ''totally'' unpredicted change, though which bits would turn out to be [[Truth in Television]] and which "[[Reality Is Unrealistic]]" is up for grabs.
* The mass application of cheap [[wikipedia:3D printing|3D printing]] has been suggested by some futurists as killing off the manufacturing industry for almost anything smaller than a microwave. Why go out to buy a toothbrush or wrench when you can download blueprints and make a cheaper, customized version in your own home?
* A few futurists have predicted [[Brain Uploading]] by 2050. If computers continue to double in power every two years, by that time the computer that upload is in will be thousands of times more powerful than its original human brain... but that's a big if. The exponential growth must end sometimes, quite possibly short of the computing power needed to make such scenarios viable. What will actually happen by 2050 is the subject of vigorous debate, and probably will still be on December
** It's already known roughly how far semiconductor computation can go, and it should be more than enough - and that's not even accounting for competing technologies, like optic and quantum computers.
** However, this also predicates a better understanding of the human brain itself. And, as any psychologist can tell you, there's a ''lot'' we don't know. Let's start with basic stuff: how is memory stored? What portion of the human brain would need to be mapped onto the computer's hard drive? It is assumed that one day we will know the answer to this question, but until we do, brain-uploading is going nowhere.
* The existence of the human brain proves that it's possible to have a machine with at least the same complexity as a brain. The chances are that it won't be achieved with the current model of computer technology - two-dimensional semiconductors only go so far. Three-dimensional circuits may be the thing.
* [[wikipedia:Omega point|The Omega Point]].
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hKG5l_TDU8 Charlie Kam] is [[Major-General Song|The Very Model Of A Modern Singularitarian]].
* [[Vernor Vinge]] has written several essays describing how he expects the singularity to happen.
* A variation of the mind uploads is immortality. Presumably Type II. What form this would take is unclear, but either as a result of radically enhanced medical science and genetic engineering, or as a result of consciousness uploads, it would by definition make post-immortality life on Earth nearly incomprehensible to those in the past. As an example, most vampire fiction stops with its incredibly [[Badass]] Elder vampires being a few hundred years old, anything much older being too arcane or too difficult to write - and nearly invariably a [[Complete Monster]] when they do occur. According to [[wikipedia:Aubrey de Gray|Aubrey de Gray]], immortal humans could easily triple-up [[The Vampire Chronicles|LeStat]] and that's if they weren't particularly careful. Imagine ''that'' culture shock to any point in human history.
* The [https://web.archive.org/web/20120616070928/http://singinst.org/ Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence] is an organization hoping to ''engineer'' the Singularity by making an Artificial Intelligence significantly more intelligent than a human. The idea is that said AI will then be able to create most of the aforementioned technology (given the right resources). They also want [http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/LessWrong_Wiki to increase world reserves of Genre Savvy], to avert [[
* Ray Kurzweil is probably the foremost advocate of the hard singularity and often regarded as being one of the most optimistic among authorities of the subject. He believes the near future will see human extension and transformation through genetic engineering followed on (and probably overlapping with) nanotechnology which will lead to better long term maintenance and upgrades of the human body and radical improvements in the versatility, precision and energy efficiency of manufacturing. Finally, robots will mature and become prevalent. In particular, he believes many robots can and will be of the [[Ridiculously Human Robot]] variety (right down to the highly nuanced emotional states) which, combined with augmented reality, virtual reality, and whole brain emulation, will blur the lines between persons of natural and artificial origin.
** He acknowledges the challenges along with way. The genetic revolution will lead to smaller and smaller groups being able to engineer biological superweapons. This will lead to an exponentially increasing probability of a global scale attack. This in turn will be countered by the nano machine revolution since nanobots will be able to overpower any virus. But the nanotech revolution will create its own destructive potential which necessitates us moving to (or creating a species of) synthetic resilient bodies with human and/or synthetic intelligences (with the possibility for hybrids of the two.)
** What he envisions for the next singularity (that's right, [[Up to Eleven|he's thinking two major singularities ahead]]) is that we will begin saturating the universe with self replicating, self improving substrate of maximum computational density (dubbed computronium by some.) And that the universe itself will become an immense super intelligence beyond all fathoming which we may or may not be a part of. Hence the "rapture of the nerds."
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