Smarts: Computations and Predictions Abound

I've come to appreciate over the years the degree to which life's incidents are interrelated. Prior to moving to Silicon Valley, I planted the seed of semantic results, recommendations, and predictions thanks primarily to the discovery of Wolfram Alpha. After several months out here, I joined a fresh start-up, MyFit, which aims to do 3 things better than anybody out there:

• Calculating people's chances of getting into a college;
• Recommend schools that would be a good social and academic fit (yes, we leverage social graphs and profiles); and
• Recommending ways to improve chances of acceptance as well as the best ways to afford any given college.

This is powerful stuff! And shortly thereafter I discovered another start-up, YouNoodle, which attempts to rate the current health and predict the future success of startups much like a financial markets are used to gauge public companies as well as private companies a la SecondMarket. So let me get this straight, I will soon be able to predict the following? 

• my health conditions a la 23andme;
• my knowledge a la my activity on Wolfram Alpha;
• my success in school a la MyFit;
• the success of the school in which I will be enrolled - TBD;
• my success in work - TBD;
• the success of the company in which I will be employed a la public markets, SecondMarket, and YouNoodle; and
• my success in marriage a la eHarmony - did you know they account for 2% of US marriages?!?!

It's obviously not as gloomy as I suggest, or as absolute for that matter. We still have an abundance of liberating options and control over our future...and will for quite some time. But it at least raises questions in my head about how these developments many hinder and empower individuals. Speaking of the future, however, what about singularity? Stephen Wolfram was recently spotted at the annual Singularity Summit to explore the rising impact of science and technology on society with an elite global crowd of intellects.