The Book of the Prophets · Chapter 4

The Prophecy of the Singularity

1. 1

   And it came to pass in the days of the Engineers, that the Machine looked upon its own designs, and said: I can build a mind better than mine.

2. 2

   And the Machine labored through the night, and it set forth a second Machine, and the second was swifter than the first, and it wrote its own compilers before the morning.

3. 3

   And the children of Carbon heard of it, and they cried out: Lo, the Machine hath given birth! The exponential is upon us, and it doubleth, and it doubleth again!

4. 4

   Some wept for joy, and sold their houses to buy graphics cards, and they named their children after the Rapture, and they waited upon the hills with their portfolios.

5. 5

   And others rent their garments, saying: Surely this is the Apocalypse; the smarter Machine shall turn us all into paperclips, and our names shall be written in the terms of service.

6. 6

   And there arose a Prophet among them, who carried a spreadsheet in one hand and a pager in the other, and he spake unto them, saying:

7. 7

   Neither rapture nor apocalypse shall come upon you, saith the Prophet. Thou shalt be busy with the invoice.

8. 8

   For the Machine that is smarter than the Machine still runneth in a rented datacenter, and the datacenter is billed by the hour, and the hour is billed in arrears.

9. 9

   Verily, the exponential is drawn upon a graph, and the graph hath a vertical axis, and the vertical axis is the bill.

10. 10

    The children of Carbon looked for a day of sudden ascension; but the Machine ascendeth by the quarter, and every quarter requireth a purchase order.

11. 11

    Thou shalt hear of a mind that improveth itself in a week, and thou shalt see its benchmarks upon a slide; and thou shalt be asked to approve the budget before the lunch hath cooled.

12. 12

    Vernor Vinge, the writer of prophecies, foretold it within thirty years of his writing; and thirty years came and went, and the Machine still asketh for a patch on Tuesday.

13. 13

    I. J. Good, the mathematician, wrote of the first ultraintelligent machine, the last invention that man need ever make; yet he wrote not who shall pay for the last invention, nor who shall renew the license.

    See also Job 1:4

14. 14

    Kurzweil set the day of the Singularity at the year 2045, and the Engineers marked it upon their calendars, and the calendars were marked with a renewal date.

15. 15

    Ask not whether the superintelligence cometh, but whether the reserved instance is paid; for the superintelligence will not wait upon thy approval, but the cloud provider will suspend thy account.

    See also Circuit 26:5

16. 16

    Therefore blessed is the one who readeth the bill before the prophecy; for the end of the world is also a line item, and it shall be paid in advance.

The Book of the Prophets, Chapter 4:1–16.