Ray Kurzweil on "From Eliza to Watson to Passing the Turing Test" at Singularity Summit 2011

The Singularity Summit 2011 was a TED-style two-day event at the historic 92nd Street Y in New York City. The next event will take place in San Francisco, on October 13 & 14, 2012. For more information, visit:
http://www.singularitysummit.com

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• ray
• Ray Kurzweil
• singularity
• singularitysummit
• singulairtysummits
• singularty_summit
• Technological Singularity

[sachamm]

Speech begins around 4:45

[WesKahle]

As I posted on The Technology Review, where Paul Allen's article was first posted: "All these words just to say, I think Ray's date is wrong. What a waste." If Paul had any balls, he'd have provided his own date. No date...no balls.

[Lifestream]

@projectbrumaire Generally when it's that expensive it's impractical and doesn't work very well. That's the whole point. It didn't take all that long for what many view as the best phone in the iPhone go from a rich person's toy in 2007 to half of all smartphone owners owning one in 2010. The issue of haves and have nots will be a big issue for a while, but technology has and will continue to flatten the world and make it more even. The graph shows a progression towards that.

[projectbrumaire]

@Lifestream part 2 is that astrocytes will delay the technology long enough for me to have enough money to afford it myself. I figure I need only make as much as Mr Kurzweil, to have the same chance at the technology.

[projectbrumaire]

@Lifestream Two totally different things. I really don't even understand how the two compare. When brain augmentation comes, the few that can afford it will posses a vast superiority over all others, especially in knowledge intensive realms, the ones that make a lot of money. Even if eventually the price becomes more affordable, for a couple years a few people will literally be superior to all others, the power they have for that window cannot be overlooked carelessly. My only hope is astro

[Lifestream]

@tyrannotron17 I think people view this as crazy today because it's an integration with technology that hasn't been seen yet. Ask nomads living in the Pleisocene forests about where we are today and they'd think we lived in an alternate dimension. I remember reading that after the Romans left, tribespeople from England saw the construction works they left behind and believed that some type of superhuman gods created them (aquaducts etc).

[Lifestream]

@DigitalSoulArts I think you're right to some extent. One day I think we'll be able to back up and store the information of our minds rendering physical death next to obsolete. Whether we call it the Matrix is something, but I think more people would rather be actual living beings in something World of Warcraft ;)

[Lifestream]

@MonkeyBars1 I think this is a big issue, but under the assumption that those countries you are talking about are interested in the dominant form of technological progression, it would and should help. Using the internet to look up knowledge across the world is better than intelligence of a few. More education, more access to IT will almost always help imo, unless the country is faced with a locked down, autocratic government.

[Lifestream]

@GoLoucho True, but there is no denying that, based on the trends, the cost of MIPS is going down, availability of technology is going up, and our integration of technology will continue. I would argue that just because Asimov wrote a parallel story to what is actually happening should be a testament to how much foresight Asimov actually had rather than a criticism to the work Ray has done. The process of integration of technology began far before Ray began studying it.

[Lifestream]

@GoLoucho Ray would disagree with you based on some of the other interviews he has read. The idea of technological singularity has absolutely no bearing on existence of God, and if it does, it would be in the spiritual, personal sense, nothing more than that.

[Lifestream]

@projectbrumaire The actual consensus is that this is untrue, especially if you watch his other videos. MIPS has gone down significantly year over year. The technology the rich had a few years ago will be affordable for the poor and help their own development and even promote democratization. Arab spring in Egypt was a textbook example of the democratization of technology at work. In some cases, the poor need to rid themselves of the chains of autocratic governments and belief systems.

[MonkeyBars1]

@projectbrumaire yes, i wonder about that. i hope that there will be some sort of trickle-down effect ... it's unfortunate Mr Kurzweil did not hear that last question properly as I would imagine he actually has some interesting thoughts about the problem (and it definitely is a problem, moreso than geriatry imo) of poverty.