Depends on what is mean by "rapid" and "self-improving" and "AI". AGI is a flying car mythology. Narrow AI is improving and the rate is accelerating. The curr

Depends on what is mean by "rapid" and "self-improving" and "AI". AGI is a flying car mythology. Narrow AI is improving and the rate is accelerating. The current speed (1st derivative) is unimportant, but there is a differential equation-like feedback function to it and it will accelerate (2nd derivative): speed proportional to the amount present. People and technology form a coupled system that is somewhat a super-organism. That cycle is amplifying in a way that is not necessarily obvious (it doesn't happen in public) or continuous (or discrete for that matter). For the foreseeable future, technology does not yet constitute a self-assembling or self-modifying closed system. It is still entirely dependent on human effort. What is happening is that people are relying on and exploiting the efforts of AI that had not happened previously. This is one change, more visible than most, that is leading to more efficiencies, more changes, and more technological advancement. Fully automated factories, software development, systems engineering, and chip design may not happen anytime soon but they are both possible and probable due to the forcing function and Tragedy of the Commons of human greed.