Ray Kurzweil On IT And The Future of Technology

Roland Piquepaille writes "In this interview with CIO Magazine, Ray Kurzweil says that one day, software and computers will reside inside us. He adds that by 2020, "we will be placing millions or billions of nanobots -- blood cell-size devices -- inside our bloodstream to travel into our brains and interact with our neurons." He also says that if we're not enhanced by machines, they will surpass us. But he doesn't think it will happen. According to him, machines and humans will merge. In the mean time, he's pursuing his anti-aging quest and takes about 250 supplements to his diet every day! With this regime, he says his biological age is 40 while he's 56 years old. By 2030, there will be very little difference between 30-year-old and 120-year-old people, says Kurzweil. He's certainly a bright person, but I'm not sure that I agree with someone taking daily such an amount of pills. What do you think? This summary contains some selected -- and biased -- excerpts to help you forge your opinion."

You might also be interested to see his

website [kurzweilai.net]

Re:the nut

this guy sounds like a nut

He is. He's also wrong on a lot of his "facts". Here's one of them:

You can make only about 100 trillion connections in there. That may seem like a big number, but the way in which we store information is inefficient, so

so that a master of an area of knowledge can really remember only about 100,000 chunks of knowledge

The human brain is not a binary device, and our consciousness is not limited to the "100,000" chunks he talks about.

Just look at any autistic person who can memorize a whole phone book - there's orders more than 100,000 chunks there.

Another thing - the brain is incredibly efficient at random-access information stuff - think about how many times you read something, and immediately, you go "bullshit". You KNOW it's wrong, within a fraction of a second, without even having the time to sort out the whole thing "logically". You then check, and find out that your "instincts" were right.

No computer can act as fast, sorting through a lifetime of experience in a fraction of a second and coming to a correct conclusion. Hell, no computer can even have an opinion. And that's probably not going to change even with nanotech, because the consciousness seems to "inhabit" the quantum world, way smaller than your nanobots.

2030?

Maybe 2100 so we'll know if this anti-aging shit actually works. In 2030 the 120 year old would have been near 100 years old today.

Re:1900 versus 2000 versus 2100

I think the numbers you're using include infant deaths. The huge decrease in infant deaths affects the final number a great deal without extending anyone's ability to go deeper into "old age."

People weren't just keeling over at age 30.

Concrete example: The direct paternal line of my ancestors, of which I have complete birth/death detail back to 1634, all lived into their 70's, a good number of them into their 80's and 90's until the middle of the last century, when my father broke the record by dying of lung cancer at age 54. He was a heavy smoker, so I don't consider this a significant statistical factor as compared to the rest of the paternal line. If you factor in all the dead babies and dead young children, the average numbers come out low for my family as well - even though just about every one who made it to 21 also made it way past 60. This isn't lifespan extension, so much as it is the puffing up of a somewhat vaguely named average number.

No question there have been health care improvements; lifespan extension into old age is happening, but it has not doubled by any means. 90 year olds, somewhat exceptional in the 1700's and 1800's in my family, are still just somewhat exceptional. And no one is living to 180, I assure you.

Your longevity stats are also affected by amelioration of disease effects. For instance, if you get cancer, you're still probably going to die. You will quite probably live a few more years if it is caught early, but the odds are very much against your living more than an additional five to ten. If you catch a flu, we can do a lot more, you probably won't die, though we still lose thousands to it every year in the US. Sanitation is also better, and that has a very large effect upon the general ability of many diseases to take hold.

What I'm trying to say here is that "lifespan extension" appears to me to be somewhat of an illusion. YMMV, and in fact, I hope it does. :)

Resistance is futile

You will be assimilated. Seriously, though... It it really such a bad thing? A couple of nanobots could cure a lot of diseases. Then again, we risk the possibility that there will be haves and have nots. Perhaps the poor will get nanobot version 1.0, and the rich get nanobot version XP. I certainly don't want to be the guy running nanobots that crash or get h4x0red. Then again, even without bots, we have similar problems. Clean water, clean air... No matter what happens the little guy gets screwed, so we might as well sign up for this too. It sounds cool anyway.

Re:Resistance is futile

We'll be waiting a lot longer than 20 years for nanobots that we have to worry about crashing or being hacked, at least on a widespread basis. When you think of nanobots in the short term, you'd be better off thinking of protiens than little submarine robots. They will be dumb machines that will handle one or two tasks - closing certain receptors, opening others, or just bonding to them and waiting for outside activation by light or radiation. They certainly won't be able to be reprogrammed or crash because of software bugs. The first ones won't be there to cure diseases, either. They'll be diagnostic tools, help with drug delivery, or perhaps treat symptoms of said diseases by halting or taking over various activities encouraged or disabled by the disease.

Personally, I think Kurzweil's 20 year estimates are overly optimistic, although the general principles of what he talks about do hold up...

Re:Life extension w/o nanobots

The above suggestions will only allow you to live maybe a few years more than the average human lifespan.

Kurzweil is looking to life extension of centuries and thousands of years, quite a difference. That's way he gets headlines.

Uh huh...

...just like we were going to have intelligent robots by 2001.

"Bright" in What Sense?

By 2030, there will be very little difference between 30-year-old and 120-year-old people, says Kurzweil. He's certainly a bright person...

So, either 94-year-olds today have a surprisingly youthful future to look forward to, or today's 4-year-olds are going to age awfully fast!

Vision of the future

He seems to have a good vision of the future. I read his book "The Age of Spiritual Machines" and it's clear he's not a 'nut' he's a smart and succesfull programmer and businessman. I think he has a lot more vision about the direction things are going in then most people. Many of his previous predictions have come true.

My only beef with him is that his timeline is pretty radical. His whole premise is based on his 'Law of Accelerating Returns' which basically states that the pace of technological growth is increasing exponentially and we're at the point where the pace of growth is about to shoot straight up. The reason I think his timeline for all these predictions is too optimistic is because of considerations outside of his realm of thinking. Things like politics, buearocracy and social concerns can really slow down the adoption of new technology. What good is the latest nerve regeneration treatment when stem cells are illegal in the US. What good is the latest disease fighting nano-bots when their FDA approval is pending. What good is the latest wearable computer when all your friends will make fun of you when you wear it. These are the types of issues he never really deals with.

Re:Vision of the future

Usually the speed of progress is measured by the amount of papers that are published in journals. A few guys at the Physical review letters at one point extrapolated the trend from the last 30 years and obtained the prediction that with current progress in science, in 2030 the speed with which shelf-space would be filled with the journal pages would exceed the speed of light. However, they could safely concluded that this wasn't a violation of general relativity as no actual information is transmitted in these pages.

Met with Ray Kurzweil

I had an opportunity to meet Ray at a Distinguished Guest lecture he delivered at my company last week.

I also managed to ask him about his views (in his capacity as an established innovator/inventor) on aggressive Patenting and Copyright laws by corporations (for example SCO vs IBM, and the Record Industry lawsuits).

It was gratifying to know that he was well aware of these problems, and even commended the "Open Source movement" and stressed on it's importance to encourage free flow of information and it's significance in the fight against the evergrowing stifling of innovation.

It was an interesting lecture, where he covered quite a few of the topics in this article. Apparently, he treats his body as a "biological experiment" to try out different drugs (he's a diabetic) on himself.

An interesting guy to say the least.

Kurtzweil is overoptimistic

Much of what he's predicting now he was predicting, in 1980, for 2000.

If we get life extension that really works, it will probably work only for genetically modified humans. The genome, and the species, will have to be changed. The new models probably won't interbreed with the old ones. It will take a few generations to get these new species thoroughly debugged. But it will be really great for people a few centuries downstream.

If you thought race and religion were problems, wait until we have multiple species of humans.

Ray's timing is out there

We are just begining to scratch the surface of what's out there in Molecular Biology. We are just beginning to understand the signifigance of glycoproteins in cellular systems. We are still trying to figure out some of the basics of single celled organism's internal signaling. There are a huge amount of genes that we dont have the slightest clue about their function, we know what they build now, but we need to figure out what it's for.

Imagine in 1776 you had a portable gas generator, and a truckload of computer parts from the last 20 years. Could you assemble a computer? sure. But what If you had 18th century knowlege. Your not really going to understand what the generator is for. Your probably going to try and make the peices into some sort of clock arrangement, marveling that you got the PCI card properly inserted into an ISA port.

I'm not ragging on Biological Scientists, but right now were at the stage where we have found the pile of computer parts, and we know how a few of them fit, but It might be a while before we notice that seam on the back of the palm pilot for batteries. Because it doesn't look important.

It might be a while before we really figure out how cellular life works. 10 years seems optomistic for just that. Ageing is a way larger issue. I dont think that immortality is around the bend.

Either way, I hope Ray keeps up the good fight.

Storm

the *real* secret to long life

A French woman named Jeanne Calment [google.com] lived to the ripe old age of 122. Her secret to longevity - chocolate, port wine, olive oil, quitting smoking at the age of 120, bicycling, etc. Basically, living life to the fullest and enjoying life rather than fearing old age. Unlike this anal-retentive pill-pushing twat. What good is living forever when you're stuck on a diet of pills and powder along with an otherwise boring lifestyle?

I think Kurzweil is a freaking idiot

and I don't mean that as Flamebait or Trolling - I think Kurzweil's recent career has been one of a flaming Troll. I've read his books and they're little more than materialist New Age guru crap. Before you go modding me down, hear this out.

1. great statements require great proof.
2. predictions should follow patterns of substructure

He offers no proof - he simply says : look what's happened so far, by (x) date (which will likely be after I'm dead) the world will be SO different and it will be like (THIS).

His claims of AI are floundering on simple facts like Intel scrapping 4gHz chips [slashdot.org] and any number of other signs that Moore's Law, on which Kurzweil's argument rests, is being scrapped as we speak.

another example: stick a blank floppy in your fancy pants XP machine and start the computer up. Computers are SO far from being "intelligent" in even the most rudimentary way, it's absurd. The basic flaw in Kurzweil's notions are that he believes that intelligence is a disembodied effect, when (if the likes of Ramachandran are correct) intelligence is an embodied effect and specifically dependent on wetware. So, the pattern doesn't hold, and he has no real proof. He's selling snake oil to technodweebs.

Then there's the entire issue of social class, and Kurzweil has no interest in serving the greater masses of humanity. He is interested in pushing a technological vanguard that will be open only to the rich, who, once properly enabled/enhanced with have no need or desire to accomodate a working class. Why bring on board the middle classes, when you can replace them all with machines? And if you think this doesn't mean you, you're an idiot.

But beyond all that his fantasy is just that: a fantasy.Technology is a means, not an end in itself, and the likes of Kurzweil seek to put the managers of technology in a position of power above and beyond democratic principles, and for that he and his ilk must be opposed and revealed for what they are: techno-fascists.

Now, for full disclosure: I do think we need a robust space program, I do think we need faster and better computers, I do think we can and should use technology to solve the world's ills where technology is a legitimate solution. I *even agree* that we can make humans more disease resistant and longer lived, and I also believe that that is a good thing. However:

I do not see technology as Kurzweil does: in some kind of Messianic Eschatology. It's not like that, and I feel that he and his ilk are perpetrating a fraud on the public, but mostly on the people they advocate the most: technologists. I think the Really Hard Nut To Crack is not going to be technological, but sociological and political.

Jaron Lanier wrote an interesting opposition paper [edge.org] that also opposes Kurzweil, but in more polite language than myself. I guess Lanier doesn't consider Kurzweil to be the charlatan I see him as.

RS

Re:I think Kurzweil is a freaking idiot

1. His claims of AI are floundering on simple facts like Intel scrapping 4gHz chips and any number of other signs that Moore's Law, on which Kurzweil's argument rests, is being scrapped as we speak.

Moore's law [wikipedia.org] does not deal with clock speed. It deals with complexity. Intel did say they were working on making the processors more efficient (per cycle). That is typically achieved by adding more hardware; increased complexity.

from my blog

Machine Dreams [blogspot.com]:: Ray Kurzweil spoke at RI25. Well, when I say "at", I mean that he was projected onto a transparent screen, in what was perhaps the highest quality tele-presence I've seen.

But still, he lacked situational awareness, and it was awkward at times. I wanted to ask questions, but there wasn't an option.

The interview linked above is a lot like his talk. He talked about the numerous exponential growths in recent technology, and not just Moore's Law.

He figures that he should try to be healthy until 2020, then a biomedical revolution will keep him healthy for another 20 years, and then a nano-technology revolution will kick in to keep him alive forever.

By "alive", he means that his intelligence propagates in the cold, soul-less heart of a machine. But considering that I agree with him that there is no ghost in the shell, this soulless form doesn't seem that bad. At least you're still sentient!

I agree with the principle, that there is nothing to stop this, that all technology is pushing us in this direction, and that it would prove to be a very positive experience. I do not necessarily agree about the time frame. I can't really trust the curves that he fits with so much confidence. Then again, I'm 32 years younger than him, so if he is off by 32 years, I guess I shouldn't complain :)

Last night at a party, drunk enough to make the discussion interesting, some folks objected to the extrapolation of the increasing rate of expansion of scientific knowledge. What guarantee is there, after all, to find all the secrets in that time? I would say first that the rate of growth in the number of researchers alone could do it. Also, increases in productivity, have always been accompanied with "this pace can't continue" claims, which have always been wrong.

Also brought up was the notion that life is defined by death. That is a very defeatist thought, which I will fight, err, to my grave. In addition, some thought they would get bored if they lived forever. I would say that I could never complain about there being "more books than i could ever read", which is a great thing. Also, I've always wanted to get really good at GO.

Finally, the notion of replication of machine intelligence was introduced. Someone claimed that I shouldn't discount the important sociological and physical implications of being born from a human whom. I agreed, only to realize that the first few moments of any existence will have a huge implication on the formation of the individual intelligence. So if I copy myself, I'll have to think of a few appropriate words to introduce the other me into this world. So far, all I can come up with is "hi".

Re:I dont like pills but...

I think it is even funnier to think that you would print out of your butt

Re:I dont like pills but...

You already can. They are stored in a random access file system (known as the BFS), using a pulpy grey mass as the recording medium. I hear you can even store moving pics and sound as well. You can play them back internally, and you can output the sound portion at will.

The printing mechanism is still a bit rudimentary, using a mechanism similar to a large format plotter (moving a pen in X/Y coordinates). Some models do this better than others. Some are even extraordinary at this. A few work well in 3D space. Unfortunately, if you are saddled with a lower performing output module, you cannot yet buy an upgrade for it, nor install a new one. You are stuck with it as delivered.

Re:Kurzweil is a genius

He may be a genius, but history is replete with examples of genius going hand-in-hand with mental instability. I'm not saying Kurzweil is crazy, but I do think that sometimes people like him project their desires into their predictions while discounting superfluous things like politics, social mores, and economics.

Re:Supplements might not be a good idea...

I don't bother with most supplements. I take a few vitamins (like vitamin C), but I stopped taking ALL medication about 3-4 years ago, and stopped all caffiene a year after that.

I've found that I no longer get sick and am in much better health overall than I was before. My guess is because I let my body do what it should, and not get used to artificial aids that are often not as good as what the body can do anyway. I'm 42, and am often told I look 30. When I have my backpack on my shoulder, as I do frequently, I am still mistaken for a student at one of the local universities. I've had gray hairs -- they show up during stress, then fade a few months after the stressful events. My barber has noticed this, too.

I'm not saying I've found a fountain of youth, but I have noticed dropping out of the 9 to 5 world, running my own business on my own terms, and not letting meds fix everything in my body seems to have made a HUGE difference in how I feel, how much energy I have, and (according to others) in how I don't look anywhere near my age.

Limitations of the study

I stopped taking supplements after reading this article a few weeks ago.

I agree too many people think vitamins and herbal supplements are the magical solution to simple problems so thanks for sharing the link. But I think it's important to consider the serious limitations of that study and what one can justifiably conclude from it.

1. The study did not include 'healthy' people. All participants had cancer of the gullet, stomach and intestine, bowel, pancreas or liver. Conclusions about any supplement's effect on a person without those cancers is not supported by this study. It would have been interesting to include a group of healthy patients in the study to see if the supplements were accelerating the existing cancer or causing some other form of death. The cause(s) of death is not stated in the article but probably is in the study itself. (Link to the study, anyone?)

2. The supplements studied were limited to beta-carotene, vitamins A, C, and E, and selenium, alone or in combination. The premature death increases were connected to taking both beta-carotene and either A or E. Conclusions about supplements other than beta-carotene and A or E aren't supported by this study.

I'm not saying you can't extrapolate in your own mind about what other supplements might do to healthy people. Maybe that's a safe thing to do. But it isn't something the study is suggesting.

Re:what do I think?

Not a nut, just not very well informed. See, one of the fun things happening now in molecular biology is that we are starting to see the contours of the agin g process. And it looks like it is actually three processes in one:
1. There's a sensor in your cells that measures the amount of oxidative damage done. Beyond a certain limit it kicks in the senescence program, and BAM! your cells go into G2 meaning a slow coast to death (can't go into much detail on this one)
2. Stem cell maintenance. You need telomerase for that, an enzyme composed of RNA and protein. It keeps the length of the ends of your chromosomes more or less constant. People without functional telomerase (a disease called dyskeratosis congenita) die at a young age of anemia, leukemia and other disorders associated with aging. They also have bowel problems and their skin looks like it's 80 years old when they're 30
3. Genome integrity. A whole bunch of enzymes is busy keeping your chromosomes from breaking, effecting all kinds of different repairs needed for all sorts of damage that a genome (an organism's DNA) can suffer. Various diseases result from a lack of one of these enzymes and they all mimick an aspect of ageing (Werner's, Bloom's, Xeroderma Pigmentosum, Fanconi anemia etc etc).
So, preventing ageing will not be the result of tackling oxidation or whatever on its own (which is what all the supplements are doing). IF we are ever going to be able to offer any kind of athanatic treatment (term borrowed from Dan Simson) it is going to be a complex one.

Re:I have no problem with this, but....

What's wrong with existing as a human? Why do we have to constantly "improve" upon our existence? My take on any modifications to humanity are such that it's basically pointless. We might be smarter, but will we be happier? That's what life is about.

Ask my mother, who had to care for my father during his descent into Alzheimer's, and whose dream of going places and doing things during retirement turned into a nightmare of losing her lifelong companion followed by bleak widowhood. If you survive her response, I'll be sorely tempted to finish the job for her.

Long ago, I read a book written by a doctor, who bloviated on about what he considered the "bright side" of what was then called senile dementia. He spouted BS about a "Puzzled Angel" whose attentions took the aged into a supposedly better world of reliving their youth and childhood. I'm glad I never met the [expletive] who wrote that. To give up is to be less than human. I'm with Dylan Thomas in this issue, thank you very much.