A central tension in the field, one that muddies the timeline, is how “the Singularity”—the point when technology becomes so masterly it takes over for good—will arrive. Will it come on little cat feet, a “slow takeoff” predicated on incremental advances in A.N.I., taking the form of a data miner merged with a virtual-reality system and a natural-language translator, all uploaded into a Roomba? Or will it be the Godzilla stomp of a “hard takeoff,” in which some as yet unimagined algorithm is suddenly incarnated in a robot overlord?