Back in 2005 – before the rise of social media or smart phones, let alone blockchain, metadata and OpenAI – computer scientist and entrepreneur Ray Kurzweil published a breathlessly prophetic account of what he called “the singularity”.
Kurzweil meant a moment in the not-too-distant future when super-intelligent technology would suddenly exceed all imaginable human capacities, absorb humanity into its operations, and spread its mastery across nothing less than the universe itself. The Singularity is Near, his title ominously declared. And he was confident enough in his calculations to offer a precise date: 2045.
