The Singularity

I recently read an article in Rolling Stone about Ray Kurzweil, who seems like a very interesting character.  He is an inventor who pioneered enabling computers to read text and to translate it into speech.  He is in the Inventors Hall of Fame and has received the National Medal of Technology.  He is known for his ability to make accurate predictions about the future, and most interesting to me is his prediction of what he calls the Singularity, which he says will happen by 2045.  

The Singularity is the merging of humans and machines.  According to his predictions, in the 2030's, nanobots will course through our bloodstreams, eliminating disease and reversing aging.  They will be able to scan a person's brain and transfer it to a robot, so that if something happens to the body, the mind can live on.  After 2045, nanobots will replicate and spread throughout matter, stones, trees-- turning them into computers.  To quote Kurzweil, "the universe is not conscious, yet, but it will be."  

This "Singularity" is a very controversial topic.  There is fear that if computers become smarter than humans, they could get out of control.  Kurzweil says that an "out-of-control replicating nanobot" could destroy the Earth's biomass in only a couple of months.  

Many scientists are skeptical about Kurzweil's prediction, calling it a "new religion" (Kurzweil refers to believers as Singularitarians) and saying it is not likely to happen.  It does certainly seem quite a far cry from where we are right now.  Kurzweil refers to the exponential power of technology, saying that it is developing faster than we can imagine, but one virtual-reality pioneer says "the Singularity won't happen because software sucks."

Also interesting to note is the fact that after the Singularity comes into effect, Kurzweil plans to use technology to bring his dead father back to life.  He has been known for his amazingly accurate predictions in the past, but to me this one seems a little too far out there.  I don't know how anyone could say they know what life will be like that far down the road.  But it's definitely fun to think about.