singularity

name

1. The technological singularity.

   “The notion of the Singularity is predicated on Moore's Law, the 1965 observation by the Intel co-founder Gordon Moore, that the number of transistors that can be etched onto a sliver of silicon doubles at roughly two year intervals.”

noun

Etymology: From Middle English singularite, from Old French singularité, from Late Latin singulāritās (“singleness”), from Latin singulāris (“single”). By surface analysis, singular + -ity.

1. The state of being singular, distinct, peculiar, uncommon or unusual.

   “Pliny addeth this ſingularity to the Indian ſoil, that it is without weeds, that the second year the very falling down of the seeds yieldeth corn.”

   “I took notice of this little figure for the singularity of the instrument.”

2. An unusual action or behaviour.

   “When about 16 years of age I happened to meet with a book, written by one Tryon, recommending a vegetable diet. I determined to go into it. […] My refusing to eat flesh occasioned an inconveniency, and I was frequently chid for my singularity.”

   “"Do you know," said she to Guido one morning, when, after asking her to sing, the Englishman had left the room in the very middle of her song, "that I have taken a fancy into my head, which quite accounts for Mr. Arden's singularities: it is, that I am like some one whom he loved and lost in early youth; and though the loss is dreadful, the love is yet pleasant to remember."”

3. A point where all parallel lines meet.
4. A point where a measured variable reaches unmeasurable or infinite value.
5. The value or range of values of a function for which a derivative does not exist.
6. Ellipsis of gravitational singularity (“a point or region in spacetime in which gravitational forces cause matter to have an infinite density; associated with black holes”).

   “At this singularity the laws of science and our ability to predict the future would break down. However, any observer who remained outside the black hole would not be affected by this failure of predictability, because neither light nor any other signal could reach him from the singularity.”

   “Consequently the interior of a black hole is empty, with a singularity at the centre.”

7. Ellipsis of technological singularity (“a hypothetical turning point in the future, the culmination of ever-accelerating technological progress, when human history as we have known it ends, and a strange new era begins. For some writers, the catalyst is superhuman machine intelligence”).

   “One conversation centered on the ever accelerating progress of technology and changes in the mode of human life, which gives the appearance of approaching some essential singularity in the history of the race beyond which human affairs, as we know them, could not continue.”

   “Within thirty years, we will have the technological means to create superhuman intelligence. Shortly after, the human era will be ended. […] I think it's fair to call this event a singularity ("the Singularity" for the purposes of this paper).”

8. Anything singular, rare, or curious.

   “Your Gallerie / Haue vve paſs'd through, not vvithout much content / In many ſingularities; […]”

   “[N]either my Birth, my Education, nor the generall courſe of my life can promiſe no ſingularitie in any part of thoſe Actes they treate of: […]”

9. Possession of a particular or exclusive privilege, prerogative, or distinction.

   “St. Gregory, being himself a Bishop of Rome, and writing against the title of Universal Bishop, saith thus, "None of all my predecessors ever consented to use this ungodly title; no bishop of Rome ever took upon him this name of singularity."”

   “Catholicism […] must be understood in opposition to the legal singularity of the Jewish nation.”

10. Celibacy, singleness (as contrasted with marriage).

    “Marriage is the mother of the world, and preserves Kingdomes, and fils Cities, and Churches, and Heaven itself: Celibate, like the flie in the heart of an apple, dwels in a perpetuall sweetnesse, but sits alone, and is confin'd, and dies in singularity; but marriage, like the useful bee, builds a house and gathers sweetnesse from every flower, and labours and unites into Societies and Republicks, and sends out colonies, and feeds the world with delicacies, and obeys its king, and keeps order, and exercises many vertues, and promotes the interest of mankind, and is that state of good things to which God hath designed the present constitution of the world.”

    “Gradually the implication of biblical monotheism created an entailment of singularity and monogamy in sexual relations.”