Jun 17, 20 some futurists predict humans will be able to upload their consciousness to computers in the near future. Never mind the singularity, heres the science wired. And even though how to create a mind doesnt state anything new of this sort, every futurist and curious sf thinker has already bought this book by now. When humans transcend biology is a 2005 nonfiction book about artificial intelligence and the future of humanity by inventor and futurist ray kurzweil. Ray has written five national bestselling books, including new york times best sellers the singularity is near 2005 and how to create a mind 2012. Brain uploading will be familiar to readers of ray kurzweils books or other. According to searle, kurzweil confuses a computers seeming to be conscious with it actually being conscious, something we should worry about if we are proposing to download ourselves into it.
Ray kurzweil s predictions comprise the wettest of futurists dreams. Dormehl starts with the 1964 worlds fair held only miles from where i lived as a high school student in queens evoking the anticipation of a nation working on sending a man to the moon. Google futurist claims we will be uploading our entire. Ray kurzweil, one of the worlds leading inventors, thinkers, and futurists, with a thirtyyear track record of accurate predictions and called the restless genius by the wall street journaland the ultimate thinking machine by forbes magazine, spoke at. Should my brain be downloaded into a computer, my consciousness would not follow along. Kurzweil kept all of his fathers records, notes, and pictures in order to maintain as much of his father as he could. Ray kurzweil says that by 2020 there will be a world. The conference, which is the brainchild of russian multimillionaire dmitry itskov, fell somewhere between hardcore science and science fiction. This is one book worth multiple listens due to the theories laid out by ray kurzweil. How to create a mind pdf summary ray kurzweil 12min blog. Kurzweil s ideas about the human brain and artificial intelligence. Some have also asserted that consciousness is a part of an extrabiological system that is yet to be discovered and cannot be fully understood under the present constraints of neurobiology.
Without the transference of consciousness, true mindupload or perpetual immortality cannot be practically achieved. Science versus philosophy in the singularity ray kurzweil journal of consciousness studies, vol. Currently, there are two main types of barriers to realizing downloaded consciousness. The accelerating pace of technological progress means that our intelligent creations will soon eclipse us. But, in both cases, even if downloading our consciousness becomes. Ray kurzweils mindboggling predictions for the next 25 years. Kurzweil predicts a merging of our consciousness with the digital world with the option of uploading and downloading ourselves. Below is a partial transcript from a recording of that talk. It featured a diverse cast of speakers, from scientific luminaries like ray kurzweil, peter diamandis and marvin minsky, to swamis and other spiritual leaders. As british psychologist and writer stuart sutherland 19271998 wrote in the international dictionary of psychology, consciousness is a fascinating but elusive phenomenon. The secret of human thought revealed by ray kurzweil how to create a mind is a very interesting book that presents the pattern recognition theory of mind prtm, which describes the basic algorithm of the neocortex the region of the brain. Would you listen to the age of spiritual machines again.
Ray kurzweil is the inventor of the most innovative and compelling technology of our era, an international authority on artificial intelligence, and one of our greatest living visionaries. How does it come to be that brains generate inner subjective experience, the movies of our minds. It featured a diverse cast of speakers, from scientific luminaries like ray kurzweil, peter. Garry mcleod many computer scientists take it on faith that one day machines will become conscious. Exponential artificial intelligence can immortalize human. Weve looked at what the brain does, and we can also look inside the brain and see if we can find anything comparable to quantum computing. Ive had the idea of being an inventor since i was five years old, and i quickly realized that you had to have a good idea of the future if youre going to succeed as an inventor. Raymond ray kurzweil born february 12, 1948 is an american computer scientist and inventor in the fields of recognition technology and artificial intelligence. Called the restless genius by the wall street journal and the ultimate thinking machine by forbes magazine, ray was selected as one of the top entrepreneurs by inc. Dec 06, 2006 transcript by mit computer science and artificial intelligence laboratory csail, published with permission on december 6, 2006. So, for a biospheric environment, the person would use a biological or cybernetic body, for the. Just as a computer simulation of digestion cannot eat pizza, so too a computer simulation of consciousness.
The concept of bigc consciousness raises the questions of how it is related to matter, and how matter and mind mutually influence each other. According to futurist ray kurzweil, by 2020 well have computers. Of his 147 predictions since the 1990s, kurzweil claims an 86. Citeseerx document details isaac councill, lee giles, pradeep teregowda.
Dear ray, should my brain be downloaded into a computer, my consciousness would not follow along. It comprises part of a journal of consciousness volume devoted to the singularity. I used to view the problem of ai consciousness as having an easy solution. This talk was presented at an official ted conference, and was featured by our editors on the home page. The singularity is near download ebook pdf, epub, tuebl, mobi. Speaking recently at the council on foreign relations, futurist ray kurzweil reaffirmed his predictions that humanlevel artificial intelligence is only 12 years away2029 to be precise. From the beginning of ai development in the mid50s, researchers defined a litmus test for ai to match human intelligence. Kurzweil an inventor, futurist and now director of engineering at. Without the transference of consciousness, true mindupload or perpetual immortality. Yale professor of computer science david gelernter, ray kurzweil, and csail director rodney brooks, acting as moderator, with questions from the audience. According to ray kurzweil, 89 out of 108 predictions he made were entirely correct by the end of 2009.
By contradiction, i meant in the case that i my conscious self became two separate but conscious minds under the same consciousness as one person, me, so that i in effect become two people, but you seem to have thought through the possibilities and answered all rational objections, and perhaps you have foreseen that possible future too and can reason that. However, i can see the potential and each of the steps provide a set of ethics to chew over. Ray kurzweil on how well end up merging with our technology. Supercomputers will achieve one human brain capacity by 2010, and personal computers will do so by about 2020. Ray kurzweil predicts machines will reach humanlike. Individual philosophical assumptions about the nature and source of consciousness underlie disagreements on issues ranging from animal rights to abortion. The arguments about the nature of consciousness are interesting, although kurzweil has presented many of them before.
The role of technology in the evolution of human consciousness. In addition to everything else, ray kurzweil is the founder of fat kat, a company that claims to use patternrecognition techniques to predict, recognise and create strategies for investment opportunities, and to apply evolutionary algorithms to stock market decisions, with the goal of creating an artificially intelligent financial analyst. The singularity, virtual immortality and the trouble with. The accelerating pace of technological progress means that our intelligent creations will soon eclipse usand that their creations will eventually eclipse them. Human consciousness is rapidly evolving and with it so is technology. From the invention of the wheel to the industrial revolution and beyond, technology has always been a.
Some futurists predict humans will be able to upload their consciousness to computers in the near future. His recipe for creating a mind, then, is to build something that can learn and. Downloading consciousness stanford computer science. If the machines kurzweil describes say theyre conscious, does that mean they actually are.
We also recommend you download or enable the zoom application. Were adept at describing the physical world, but when it comes to our inner experience, language is found lacking. This is the point at which artificial intelligence machines already above the level of human intelligence start to produce an indefinite increase in. In a recent streaming broadcast with peter diamandis for singularity university, ray kurzweil predicted that ai will reach human intelligence by the end of the next decade. The coming merging of mind and machine 87 ray kurzweil predicts a future with direct braintocomputer access and conscious machines. The singularity is near download ebook pdf, epub, tuebl. Having consciousness and being a person are not the same. Im a neuroscientistintraining, so im not completely qualified to answer this question as it is phrased, but i want to anyway because the idea of mind uploading was one thing that sparked my passion for neuroscience. Visions of the future 93 science fiction becoming fact. Nov, 2014 his dubious premise to quote the small print in your question that exponential advances will continue are only dubious if you think, as almost everyone did for almost all of history.
Singularity summit ray kurzweil on quantum computing in. Mcdonald patheos explore the worlds faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality. In respect of consciousness, kurzweil s main argument is that computer technology will progress fast enough for himself and others to download themselves into computers before the middle of the 21 st century. Ray kurzweil ponders the issues of identity and consciousness in an age when we can make digital copies of ourselves. Disease, reality, and brain interaction october 14, 2019 october 14, 2019 frank diana trends and predictions brain, disease, predictions, ray kurzweil, virtual reality ray kurzwiel has always been very good at predicting. The singularity is near by ray kurzweil james williams has a singularily good time. Note the logarithmic scale and exponential trendline, which assumes the computational capacity doubles every 1. There are many barriers to achieving the path he foresees for the human race and the path may meander. Google futurist claims we will be uploading our entire minds. Ray kurzweil is a pioneering inventor, futurist, and bestselling author. Ray kurzweil is one of the world leading inventors, thinkers, and futurists, with a thirtyyear track record of accurate predictions. Inventor and futurist extraordinaire ray kurzweil believes that we will get to a. The singularity is triggered by the tremendous growth of human and computing intelligence that is.
He ponders the questions of consciousness, free will, and identity, in order to convince us that, whatever shape or form ai takes when it arrives, it is not going to be fundamentally different from what we are now just smarter, more efficient, and more durable. The secret of human thought revealed by ray kurzweil how to create a mind is a very interesting book that presents the pattern recognition theory of mind prtm, which describes the basic algorithm of the neocortex the region of the brain responsible for perception, memory, and critical thinking. Time would become meaningless if there were too much of it. Oct 16, 2015 consciousness is the great mystery of inner awareness. At age 12 i discovered the computer, which was not as ubiquitous as it is today, but i had opportunity through my uncle to get access to a computer affiliated with new york university, and then discovered the ability of computers to kind of model reality. The singularity, virtual immortality and the trouble with consciousness oped.
The secret of thought is therefore mechanical pattern recognition, with hierarchical structure and suitable weightings for constituent features. Aside from futurology, he is involved in fields such as optical character recognition ocr, texttospeech synthesis, speech recognition technology, and electronic keyboard instruments. By the 2040s, nonbiological intelligence will be a billion times more capable than biological intelligence a. Gelernter, kurzweil debate machine consciousness kurzweil. Displays will be built into our eyeglasses and contact lenses and images projected directly onto our retinas.
In this essay i critically examine two influential evolutionary visions of the cosmosthose of eric chaisson and ray kurzweilfocusing on their explanations of consciousness within their evolutionary theoretical frameworks, and how they conceptualize the significance of consciousness within their respective views. Ray kurzweil spoke at length with the audience saturday evening. Do you think ray kurzweils predictions are accurate. The rest should read it to find what all the fuss is about. Since if it did, i the conscious i that i know and love would be in two different places at once, both in my body and in the computer, presumably a. Cognitive science holds that the brain is an informationprocessing system and that all mental functions are computations. Under these conditions, our only option will be to upgrade our consciousness and capabilities using technology. Kurzweil later released a more detailed analysis of the accuracy of his predictions up to 2009, arguing that most were correct. This quote fits in with the establishment of the 5g communication system. Whole brain emulation wbe, mind upload or brain upload is the hypothetical futuristic process. Click here for more interviews with ray kurzweil click here for more interviews. Philosopher warns we are creating a world without consciousness. Together with british quantum physicist sir roger penrose, hameroff is the coauthor of the controversial orch or model of consciousness.
Those stemming from the limitations of current technology. Consciousness alone cannot make physical changes to the world, but perhaps it can change the probabilities in the evolution of quantum processes. Lets analyze some ray kurzweils predictions in the singularity is near published in 2005. A startup is pitching a minduploading service that is 100 percent. Consciousness is the great mystery of inner awareness. When you talk to a human in 2035, youll be talking to someone thats a combination of biological and nonbiological intelligence. Ray kurzwiel has always been very good at predicting. Asi should not have personal protections such as the bill of rights, because.
Ray kurzweils most exciting predictions about the future. Stuart hameroff is a professor of anesthesiology and psychology, and director of the center for consciousness studies at the university of arizona. Mar 23, 2009 the coming merging of mind and machine. Given this, it would seem that ais can be conscious, for ais have the same kind of minds as we do. In ray kurzweils new york times bestseller the singularity is near, the futurist and entrepreneur describes the singularity, a likely future utterly different than anything we can imagine. Humans will have cloudconnected hybrid brains by 2030, ray. Kurzweil believes that mind uploading will be possible at neural simulation, while the sandberg, bostrom report is less certain about where consciousness arises. Now he offers a framework for envisioning the twentyfirst centuryan age in which the marriage of human sensitivity and artificial intelligence. Ray kurzweil explains the coming singularity big think. Neuroscientists what do you think about the ability to. Kurzweil claims that the singularity will happen by 2045.
This site is like a library, use search box in the widget to get ebook that you want. A danger we face right now is the ability for a bioterrorist to use our biological. Kurzweil was known for selling books predicting a weird future in which youll upload your consciousness into cyberspace, not for building ai systems for. How the human brain will download directly from a computer.
We will be able to upload our mind consciousness by the end of the decade. Click download or read online button to get the singularity is near book now. Ray kurzweil quotes author of the singularity is near. Googles ray kurzweil on the moment when computers will become conscious.
In are we spiritual machines kurzweil is therefore mainly concerned that penroses version of quantum consciousness should not get in the way of people being downloaded into. The coming merging of mind and machine scientific american. My interest in the future really stems from my interest in being an inventor. In the singularity, unless we can process information as fast as the machines, we will be left behind. Nanotech foglets will be able to make food out of thin air. Googles ray kurzweil on the moment when computers will.
Although technology has come a long way since the idea of mind uploading has come about, we may not actually be much closer to realize it than. Perhaps a more relevant question at this juncture is. Although technology has come a long way since the idea of mind uploading has come about, we may not actually be much closer to realize it than we were back in the 50s. Led by futurist ray kurzweil, proponents of the socalled strongai school believe that a. Inventor, entrepreneur and visionary ray kurzweil explains in abundant, grounded detail why, by the 2020s, we will have reverseengineered the human brain and nanobots will be operating your consciousness. Although promoted as science, ray kurzweils writing will appeal to readers of philosophy as well. Just as a computer simulation of digestion cannot eat pizza, so too a computer simulation of consciousness is not conscious. Ask ray how can my consciousness survive indefinitely. Ray kurzweil is known for taking over 200 pills a day, meant to reprogram his biochemistry. These books would not be interesting in respect of consciousness theory, if it were not that susan blackmore, who is prominent in consciousness studies, turned to kurzweil to help refute penroses quantum consciousness theory.
Mar 26, 2019 even if it takes more than 10 years, though, is it really possible for machines to become conscious. Ive been very active in talking about the downside of technology, and there are dangers. Ray kurzweil says crazystupid things october 2, 2015 by thomas l. The book builds on the ideas introduced in kurzweil s previous books, the age of intelligent machines 1990 and the age of spiritual machines 1999. John searles critique of ray kurzweil reason and meaning. The age of spiritual machines audiobook by ray kurzweil. A technologydriven apocalypse which kurzweil dubs the singularity.