Submitted by kalavala93 t3_10nejij in singularity
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kalavala93 OP t1_j68b0v3 wrote
As I read that you sounded like a sage.
BigZaddyZ3 t1_j68b87e wrote
Lmao… Hopefully you meant that as compliment bro. Either way that’s how I’m gonna take this. 😂
kalavala93 OP t1_j68ccbu wrote
I did. Some is always a compliment. One thing I read about is thr burden of knowledge is higher...like it takes more time for people to learn something but my problem with this take is I feel like good science is the ability to consolidate information..for example for us to be able to have a nuclear powered engine in an aircraft carrier we had to have a diesel engine which was born from a steam engine. I don't know anyone who makes steam engines anymore nor does someone need to learn how to make a steam engine in order to make a nuclear reactor engine. Isn't science about consolidating old science?
BigZaddyZ3 t1_j68dk6w wrote
Yeah, I just thought you might have been being sarcastic haha.
I agree that burden of knowledge probably isn’t that big of a factor tho. I just chalk it up to there being less “unknowns” or incorrect ideas that need to be disrupted then there were in the past. It’s similar to how the rate of new “land discovery” has slowed down since the days of Christopher Columbus as well right? It’s simply because we’ve discovered most of the land on Earth and now it’s hard to come by new undiscovered areas. Exact same thing is happening with science most likely.
Reddituser45005 t1_j68eytx wrote
I agree but I also think we are on the threshold of a time of rapid scientific advancement. As an example, we’ve known about protein folding and gene function for decades so advances driven by AlphaFold or CRISPR may not qualify as disruptive discoveries but they will lead to revolutionary changes in our approach to medicine and our understanding of underlying biology. That same process is happening across multiple fields where the foundational science is understood but rapid technological advances are transforming the way that knowledge is used.
Sieventer t1_j68alc7 wrote
We are about 10-20 years to AGI probably, so it's not a big deal to wait a bit.
rixtil41 t1_j68bmoq wrote
That mite because our understanding of things in general is more or less prefect. You dont need a new theory of reality to make full dive vr, AGI, ect.
kalavala93 OP t1_j68chcj wrote
Perhaps. I tend to have a Rodney Brooks opinion of agi. Very possible but more complicated than we think and I sayvthat even with the advances in chatgpt.
nohwan27534 t1_j68gm9h wrote
New breakthroughs in general - can't rely on them in the same Moores law sense, but they still happen
I'd also argue I don't know that scientific progress has slowed per se, more we've sort of finished our backlog of stuff and it's just the newer stuff that's less easy to come by.
There's also the idea of, everything in retrospect seems faster - get a good list of the year to year big stuff, it might not be that different, but if like 6 big things happened in 2011 or whatever and you're like "eh nothing big has happened in like 2 months", those two months feel a lot closer, pressing, than the 2011 two months per event on average
CHARRO-NEGRO t1_j68ma99 wrote
I think we live in a time of disruptive progress. If you see the humane kind since the beginning, the last century is disruptive, 100 year period in 10,000 + years of humans is pretty disruptive. Also, the discoveries that change the science take many years in be applied to a commercial level, for example Watson and Crick discover the DNA in 1953, between 1990-2003 the human genome project was aiming to sequence de entire human genome, and right now are more than 400 research projects in gene therapy. In the next decade you will see many genetic disorders been cure. The basic science is slow in our lifetime but disruptive to humankind
BigZaddyZ3 t1_j68ai1f wrote
Tbh, I always thought the whole “disruptive science has slowed down” thing was misunderstood by most. In order for a discovery to be disruptive to a field of science, it has to turn the current understanding of the field on its head. (Which implies that previous theories and ideas were incorrect all along). Once a field matures over time, it’s only natural that there will be less “disruptive” discoveries as our understanding of those fields become more and more concrete.
In other words, it’s not something that needs to be “overcome”. It’s a good sign that our current science is becoming more and more bulletproof and undeniable. (Unlike in the past, where we’d have a theory that was totally wrong, and then some new discovery would “disrupt” the industry.) It just means we’re actually starting to understand the world around us for real now.