Good read, I'm fascinated by what I've learned of Kurzweil's work and this article dovetails nicely with your recent PBS Digital Studios video. You may recall that in the comments you and I talked a bit about how some of the embrace given to these theories stems out of a similar "fear of death" that spawned religions. You mentioned that you were: What's your take on Kurzweil's 2045 prediction? Is it rooted in solid thinking or is it wishful?in talks with a researcher at the Global Brain Institute to conduct a psychological survey of singularity/global brain theorists and their perspective on death, the idea of singularity as religion, and whether they feel there own fear of death effects extrapolations and predictions for a 2045 singularity.
-In your preliminary work, have you found that the younger the theorist, the later the date for the singularity?
So far what I think I'm going to find is that older theorists will be disappointed with the notion that they'll "just miss" immortality. That was the general sense I got from an interview I conducted two weeks ago with a 70 year-old physicist that was well aware of "singularity" and "global brain" theory. It's not just Kurzweil at this point. Most theory related to key aspects of the singularity (e.g., Internet, computers, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, etc.) converge on interesting possibilities in the 2040s. Even Robin Hanson's analysis of human economic growth modes suggests big changes in the 2040s. In my own work I am interested in understanding the energy aspect of our next system (as it relates to the Human Metasystem Transition Theory I proposed at the Global Brain Institute). From my perspective the next system is dependent on the exploitation of a new energy source and most projections indicate (to me at least) that this should be realized in the 2030s (enough time to support the transition to a post-singularity humanity in the 2040s). The fact that so many different people have constructed models on so many different aspects of human evolution and technological change, and that so many suggest an interesting 2040s... it definitely increases my confidence. I remember being most convinced when I was doing the research for developing Human Metasystem Transition Theory. When I compared the Moore's Law Growth Curve with the Economic Exponential Growth Model they both converged on a system change in the 2040s.In your preliminary work, have you found that the younger the theorist, the later the date for the singularity?
What's your take on Kurzweil's 2045 prediction? Is it rooted in solid thinking or is it wishful?
That's very interesting. Does that mean that the driving force behind all of those theories converging in the 2040s is the discovery and exploitation of a new energy source? I wonder what the energy source will be, for some reason it seems doubtful that it will be anything that we are currently using unless a major nuclear, solar, or geothermal breakthrough occurs.
Well my theory is built around energy exploitation... so if my work is published that will be my contribution to this literature. From my perspective a new system requires a new energy. We can't have a singularity without new energy to power it. So if I'm right that a complete transfer should occur in the 2030s, that would be enough time to power a singularity in the 2040s. The initial speculation that the 2040s would be the "decade of the singularity" came from Kurzweil's work with Moore's Law extrapolation. Since then several other models related to other information technologies and communication systems (i.e., the Internet, nanotechnology, etc.) suggest interesting a quite sophisticated human technological system by this time.Does that mean that the driving force behind all of those theories converging in the 2040s is the discovery and exploitation of a new energy source?
I'm encouraged based on how quickly technology has changed in just the last ten years. I can't imagine what technologies will be afoot 30 years from now. Biology and technology seemingly converging. My question is this, do you think the ability to curb death will be universally available quickly or will it take many years for it to be available widely? In other words, by the 2040's should I be setting aside money now? My singularity savings account?
I think the emergence of our next system will take a mere decade to diffuse (I think this will include the system structures and technologies to keep all agents alive). My reasoning for a decade diffusion time of the next system is based on extrapolations of previous system transitions. The hunting transition took hundreds of thousands of years; the agricultural transition took tens of thousands of years; the industrial transition took centuries; and the global brain should emerge in a decade. It's a personal decision of course. I personally think that a global brain system will be one that is also post-scarcity (or even one of radical abundance) - so it may be a system that doesn't require such a thing as "retirement savings" (since I don't really know whether people would be retiring).My question is this, do you think the ability to curb death will be universally available quickly or will it take many years for it to be available widely?
In other words, by the 2040's should I be setting aside money now? My singularity savings account?