# Time to Singularity: “2005–2020, peak 2008–2010”

> 2005-2020 / peak at 2008-2010

Canonical URL: https://foom.hyperplex.org/p/ets

Chapter: Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence

Category: timelines & doom

Predicted: 2001

Resolution date: 2020

Status: falsified by events

Status detail: The prediction was resolved as falsified by events in 2020

Original source label: SL4 ETS poll, Jun 2001; his entire reply

## Resolution

The window closed in full on January 1, 2021. No Singularity was observed at the peak or elsewhere.

## Context and outcome

Asked on the SL4 mailing list when he expected the Singularity, Yudkowsky gave a range along with its most likely point. A month later, he stressed that the dates were meant as targets rather than expressions of optimism. Real mental effort had gone into making it 2010 instead of 2020 or 2030. Every year in the range has now passed.

## Supporting receipts

> 2005-2020 peak at 2008-2010

Context: His complete two-line reply to the SL4 poll on Estimated Time to Singularity.

Source: [SL4, 12 Jun 2001](http://sl4.org/archive/0106/1491.html)

> People may have first heard us talking about 2010 and thought we were just being overoptimistic, not realizing how much mental effort went into figuring out how to make it "2010" instead of "2020" or "2030".

Context: Recalling how the Singularity target date was deliberately engineered down to 2010.

Source: [SL4, 22 Jul 2001](http://sl4.org/archive/0107/1820.html)

> We would very much like to do it in ten years, but if it takes twenty years to do it then we will SPEND twenty years, because this *is* a crusade and the entire planet is at stake.

Context: Framing SIAI's ten-year timeline as the last great crusade in human history.

Source: [SL4, 22 Jul 2001](http://sl4.org/archive/0107/1820.html)

## Sources

- [ETS poll (2001)](http://sl4.org/archive/0106/1491.html)
- [The Quest for Singularity](http://sl4.org/archive/0107/1820.html)