Actually I've written multithreaded real-time machine controls using watchdog timers. But you know what? Those controls don't have the same continuous experience of time that humans have, with an awareness of a past and anticipation of the future, all happening in the present. As a programmer of industrial machines I am well aware of what computer controlled closed loop systems are capable and what they are not capable of. And they are far, far from what humans can do, not just in a quantitative sense but in a qualitative sense.

A human being has multiple utility functions and has to mediate between all of them--I assume a singularity machine would have to do the same, considering the complexity required to learn about and manipulate the universe. Nature evolved sentience to do this mediating--perhaps sentience isn't necessary to achieve this (after all, feathers aren't required to fly) but I suspect if it isn't, we'll still have to come up with some mechanism--just putting together a bunch of utility functions won't be sufficient.

You can make a machine that is many orders of magnitude more intelligent than a human, but unless it has the mechanisms to want something, it won't want anything. Think about what it would take to program a conscious being, just think about how we humans are aware of time and the movement of time--as a software engineer it boggles my mind trying to think about how the brain accomplishes that. Then to program a machine (biological or not) to want something in a fairly consistent way over a period of time under changing circumstances...it takes more than just brute force processing time to accomplish that. We biological machines are aware of ourselves, and we have no idea how we accomplish that. We are going to have to figure that out before we make the singularity machine.

Growing up I harvested tobacco for 3 summers starting at aged 13. I've worked in a factory feeding an arbor saw painting machine. I've worked 3 years unloading trucks and stocking shelves in department stores. After harvesting the tobacco plants for the first couple hours it kinda surprised me that we had to keep on going for six more hours. And then come back the next day and do it again. It was a major motivator to get an education.

I do some of my best thinking while doing mundane chores. Plus, having to do mundane chores gives one a realistic view of what is required to maintain ones existence in the universe. If everything was "just done" for you, you would take it for granted and see the universe as existing to serve you.

1. Iraq is a sovereign nation that requested that our troops leave. Do we want an Empire where we keep troops in nations where they are not wanted?

2. The way Republicans talk about Benghazi you'd think Obama was there launching RPGs into the compound himself.

3. If Obama had demanded a single payer plan rather than a conservative health care plan that included private insurance, spending months trying to compromise with the Republicans, you would be more believable in your statement.

4. How many counties, cities have they conquered?

5. A couple years ago Russia owned Ukraine. Their position in the world is much weaker now than when Obama came to office.

6. China is surrounded my American allies. Their army is mainly for containing their own population. Just look at Hong Kong.

7. Not specific enough for me to address.

This is the most peaceful, most prosperous time in history. Really. There are just a hell of a lot of whiners who lack historical perspective.

Just to be clear, you're saying that "there just happens to be a Being capable of creating universes" is more likely than "there just happens to be particles and laws of the universe that can eventually lead to intelligence". Well, at this point argument is really impossible.

I, personally, would love to believe in a Creator. That would be so cool, to have some all powerful being who is looking over us. However, I'm not going to believe in something because I want to believe in it. I believe in what evidence points to as being most likely to be true.

The danger of a free society is that people are allowed to believe whatever they want to believe in. This means you'll get a lot of people believing things, not because it is the most likely thing to be true (the standard scientific explanation) but because it sounds cool (god or ancient aliens created us). It's fine if a few people believe these fringe theories that fly in the face of scientific evidence, but there's a tipping point where if you have enough people disregarding science, you could get something like the Islamic State.

Good point. What if Neanderthals could create viable offspring with Homo Erectus but modern humans couldn't?

Life is messy.

If by "artificial distinction" you mean the classification of lifeforms into different groups based on physical and genetic characteristics, the boundaries of those classifications made by scientists, then you have a valid point. A species is generally understood as a population that can interbreed and produce viable offspring. Homo sapiens and homo neanderthalis obviously can do so, so they should be the same species. However, there is a valid argument for them being classified a subspecies, due to measurable physical and genetic differences.

There is a bump in this 2014 graph between 20 and 25 that is comparable to the baby boom.

It's especially surprising considering that there is a population bulge of young people with the Millennials. Conventional wisdom states that since most crimes are committed by people in their teens and twenties, such a population bulge would increase crime. I guess it's time to toss out conventional wisdom.

Zombie Apocalypse Shelters.