The Singularity as Religion (yes/no links)

lukeprog

My own opinion is that it's not worth much to argue over the boundaries around a vague term like 'religion,' and of course the question should not be 'Does the Singularity hypothesis share some features with religious hypotheses' but instead 'Is the Singularity hypothesis plausible, and what are its likely consequences?'

There is a subset of the pro-Singularity individuals that is acting in an a very religious fashion. See prior discussion here where ata pointed to the Singularity 2045 Facebook group which includes the text:

To raise awareness of the Singularity, which is expected to occur no later than the year 2045, we must reach out to everyone on the 1st day of every month.

At 20:45 hours (8:45pm) or earlier on the 1st day of each month we will send SINGULARITY MESSAGES to friends or strangers.

Example message:

"Nanobot revolution, AI aware, technological utopia: Singularity2045."

Year 2045 is our deadline for the Singularity. Heightened awareness will ensure the Singularity happens sooner rather than later. Our goal is to make the Singularity happen by 2045 at the latest.

This isn't just a small group of random people either. Michael Anissimov and Aubrey de Grey are both administrators.

I was similarly somewhat alarmed by that when I found it, but I think for the most part it's just one very (um...) enthusiastic person. (curiousepic (below) is almost certainly correct about why some non-crazy persons are administrators of the Facebook group.) I'd bet that nobody actually does the monthly 20:45 SINGULARITY MESSAGES thing.

9benelliott15y

Does anyone know where the 2045 figure came from? Is there anything more to it than "hmm, we need a date that's distant enough to not strain plausibility but close enough that most people expect to still be alive".

1[anonymous]15y

Admin on Facebook isn't opt-in, it's more like they clicked "yes" when invited to join the group and then the group creator set them as admins in order to increase the status of his group.