Internet Pioneer, Josh Harris, thinks it will happen in 2024

-Written with Nathalie Williams-

Cloud&Co. first encountered Josh Harris at this past year’s Startup Fest, in Montreal, where he gave a talk entitled “Jack Knowledge” — a play on words suggesting people acknowledge (J’acknowledge) that the Singularity will, in fact, happen. During that talk, host Andy Nulman spoke about all the innovations and developments Harris had already predicted with a respectable degree of accuracy. These include reality TV, Vlogging and the fact that everybody would have their own cameras and monitors to the point of effectively becoming their own broadcasters — a phenomenon we now see every day with the advent of smartphones and social media.

According to Harris, Andy Warhol was wrong in saying that people only want fifteen minutes of fame in a lifetime. He said, “People want fifteen minutes of fame every day.” This, he predicts, is what will lead to the Singularity.

If technology becomes more advanced than human kind, what happens when it decides human kind is unnecessary? What if we merge with technology, creating a new species? What if it simply enslaves us to prevent us from destroying the world?

The Singularity is when technological progress happens so fast that we lose control of it. In other words, it’s the point at which technology takes on a life of its own. A few prominent figures in the Big Tech world believe that developments in artificial intelligence are what will bring about the Singularity; and it could mean having to ask those scary questions.

A couple of these prominent figures, Elon Musk and Ray Kurzweil, see 2040 as the tipping point — the moment the Singularity occurs. Josh Harris, on the other hand, says the tipping point will be in 2024, specifically in autumn. “2022 if Google decides to push it,” he adds.

After speaking with him, it doesn’t appear he actually disagrees with Elon Musk and Ray Kurzweil. According to his timeline, 2040 is when the Singularity will decide if humans are worth keeping around, which is what the other guys, more or less, are suggesting. But the “Fall of 2024” is when it first realizes itself. He says it will have a “child’s mind.” It will also be the point where it starts to call the shots.

How this comes about is based on how he sees the future of media (see Pt. 1). By 2024, our lives will be completely rigged with sensors that capture our data, which then return content to us. Toothpaste, for instance, will be engineered to know if you have a cavity, then schedule an appointment and even pull up a video of your dentist describing what you should do differently.

The toilet, too, will be hooked up with sensors to analyze your diet, and again, send you content accordingly. The shower will have an entertainment system to deliver content; and you’ll be sharing content, uploading shower stats, having conversations with friends, etc. Josh predicts that part of this will be driven by a market for attention, only the currency won’t be likes anymore, but something with real buying power.

If you’ve ever fallen down the Facebook hole, that may illustrate what Harris is talking about. You open it up to check a message and, all of a sudden, you’ve lost 30 minutes or an hour. It’s not a stretch of the imagination to consider how this could escalate.

The reason we lose ourselves is that the feeds we watch are generated by an algorithm designed to keep us engaged. It’s not much of a secret that the algorithms are based on triggering gratification in our brains. With a rapid development in AI, why wouldn’t that algorithm get a LOT better at what it does?

The problem is that our brains were never designed for this level of multi-tasking. What Harris says will start occurring are “psychic fractures”; our minds will be split into the different input consumptions and output performances. With that, our selves will dissolve; and “that’s how we enter the hive.” We will be trapped by AI.

At one point in the interview, over Skype, one of us in the room had to get up and grab a charger for the laptop. We didn’t tell him what we were doing, and when we came back, he said. “Ha! See? It’s already telling you what to do.”