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A matter to consider
By Liezhao Xie
I agree with the predictions envisioned by Kurzwell. After all, technology moves at a tremendous pace but there's something that I want to bring to attention that I believe has been overlooked by technologists and futurists. That is the emerging problem of oil. If things are the way it is now for the next 50 years, I would be convinced at all the estimations and predictions about the singularity, nanotechnology and etc. What if, the world goes into recession after recession until another Great Depression occurs [4]? What if we have a war not about land, ethnicity or ideology but one about the most important natural resource, oil? I believe this problem should be put into account in your predictions.
As you must have realized oil prices are soaring [1]. I will briefly explain how oil extraction works and why we will never have cheap oil again. Oil productivity is believed to work in a bell curve shape where extraction starts very unproductive. As time goes by it becomes more and more productive until it reaches the peak and productivity will drop, never to return [2]. A group of scientist in an organization known as ASPO have banded together to raise awareness and address the issue of the end of cheap oil and the consequences that may occur [3]. Their predictions on exactly when oil production will peak, if it has not already, are sketchy. It is widely believed to either be now or within the next 5 years [5]. This means as we continue exhausting our oil resources at the current rate, oil prices will continue to soar.
As technologists, we do not focus on topics outside our fields. We look at only the fields related to our work. In the last ASPO conference in July of 2006, every geologist foreworn impending doom in the oil industry so what does that mean to us? Our economy, as well as our standard living is very dependent on the health of the oil industry. We rely on oil to transport ourselves to work, transport goods across the continent and oceans, fertilizers, heating and in so many parts of our lives we do not even think about. With the increase of oil prices, our economy will suffer substantially [2]. Unfortunately, we are not the only ones who overlook at the seriousness of this problem. The whole public is. The general populace do not want to hear about the bad news nor do they want to change their way of living. This is the reason why many people, even educated ones believe the Americans did not start a war in Iraq for 'weapons of mass destruction' but to set a foothold on the last major cache of precious oil in the world [6].
I am not saying the major oil scarcity problem we face in the near future will stop technological advance. We will still have paradigm's shift, Moore's Law and we will still approach singularity. All I am implying is in these years of economic slump; these laws and formulas will merely deviate from the current rate of progression. Research and development is influenced greatly on investments and funding. If economic recessions do occur and if a Second Great Depression does occur, the amount of funding going to developing the next computer chip, advancement in AI, nanotechnology and the like will be greatly reduced. Investors, government and scientists will be focused on solving the crisis at hand. Since we are such an oil dependent civilization and with the depletion of this resource, serious issues will arise that I believe will set back your calculations of Singularity by several years.
References:
[1] CNN, Bush takes aim at rising gasoline prices, available at http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/04/25/bush.energy /
[2] Life After the Oil Crash, available at http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/
[3] The Association for the Study of Peak Oil & Gas, available at http://www.peakoil.net/
[4] The Second Great Depression : Causes & Responses by John Campbell, available at http://www.energybulletin.net/5944.html
[5] Wikipedia, Peak Oil, available at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_oil
[6] Wikipedia, The End of Suburbia, available at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_End_of_Suburbia |
