54 years ago, Roger Penrose formulated the cosmic censorship conjecture. At the time, many frightening questions about general relativity's predictions were being raised. When it was used to evaluate black holes (gravitational singularities), general relativity said that if somehow we could exchange information in and out of the singularity, then our notion of structure would break down. The universe would stop being deterministic. Therefore, Penrose tried to save general relativity by saying that such singularities could not exist.

Something is deterministic if we can calculate all future and past states of it with a single state. We often assume the universe is deterministic and predictable, since that makes those calculations useful. According to GR, the state inside those singularities are unknown and unpredictable. However, if we were able to interact with that unknown space, then it becomes clear that we can no longer predict everything.

The type of singularities most are familiar with reside within black holes. GR says that each has an event horizon, which is the point past which no events inside can influence state outside. Singularities without an event horizon are called "naked", and therefore could affect outside state. This is more so a mathematical and philosophical problem than a practical one. This isn't known to be a groundbreaking issue when physicists want to take real measurements, but it is a problem for reconciling theories.