Ray Kurzweil: The Coming Singularity

http://bigthink.com

Futurist Ray Kurzweil details the technology timeline leading up to 2029 including the downsides to Singularity.

• Category

  News & Politics

[bullboombap]

Well, part of the reason scientists ask these questions is because not enough questions were asked when we split the atom. We almost immediately dropped atomic bombs on Japan, then had the Cuban missile crisis, nuclear threat during the cold war, and now it's plain to see that we are all in a precarious position due to the spread and availability of nuclear weapons. It's simply the most responsible thing to do to assess all the possible repercussions of major technological advancements.

[Richard JeanBaptiste]

our brains are controlled by logical,chemical, and biological processes but those processes give us a choice which is free will i.e. no brain process forced you to comment on youtube it was your choice

[DRUNKENRAMBLE]

Elysium .... I want to be there !!! Fuck these germ infested dummies !!!!

[MR3LIXR]

they were all doing that way before they started this project but people who watch terminator movies are thinking that this is going to be a Google =skynet BS. idk why are all hoping for the worst

[salasvalor01]

free will is as loosely used as the term god; we are free in the sense that a puppet can love its strings. If anyone means more free than that, go ahead and tell them they're begging Reality.

[verifymyageful]

There is no reason to believe in free will.. just because our choices are not obviously guided by external input doesn't mean that they aren't. You think that if he had work to do he would have been able to comment? You say it is as simple as him choosing whether or not to comment.. but when a decision is made it is either for future purposes or current relief of tension, and what is better for us is not under our control.. it is inherent.

[edtExodus]

Progress does not have a moral property. Responsibility goes both ways and as much as progress leads to tools to harm it leads to tools to benefit. I'm a geneticist and while I know that this field leads to new, terrible ways of harming people it's also the basis for modern medicine and will, in time, enable us to prevent most non-violent causes of death (including aging). In that sense lack of progress condemns people to death when they could otherwise have lived. Is that what you would prefer?

[edtExodus]

That's a very shortsighted statement. The brain is ultimately deterministic for all we know unless you want to assert some sort of metaphysical component. The level of complexity, which very likely causes consciousness and "free will", is hard to comprehend for us but that doesn't mean we can just assume non-deterministic properties when EVERYTHING else we know turned out to be entirely deterministic once thoroughly understood.

[GadtheFather]

the CIA made me do it!

[TheLordboki]

I disagree. What we choose to do is defined by our personality which is made by variations in our brain and body. Variations like memories and hormone levels.

[MR3LIXR]

if you are aware of your surroundings you are conscience its been proven its possible but how to do it that's the challenge

[degratia12]

also as for our "conscience"...newflash:we really dont have one to begin with judging by what i see in the news everyday.If anything we need betterment and technology can potentially offer that.