 | By: Ray Kurzweil Binding: Hardcover Publisher: Viking Pr ISBN: 0670882178 ISBN-13: 9780670882175 Released: 05 Dec 1998 RRP: Average Rating:  |
He opens by comparing the evolutionary rates of biological & computational change. From this contrast, he sees computers as achieving human mind processing levels in but a few years. Unlike most writers in this genre, Kurzweil bravely sets down a detailed time line of benchmarks indicating when we should expect each advance with its likely impact. In order to help readers comprehend his portentous scenarios, he provides reader/writer dialogs at the end of each chapter. An innovative step, these exchanges state likely questions readers are considering while reflecting on his ideas. These FAQ sessions offset some of the technical descriptions. Those of you with children should look carefully at his proposals while wondering where your offspring will fit into his scenarios. It is, after alll, the reason the book's been written.
The focus is the human mind. How does it process & store information? The mind uses paralllel processing & is slower than the high speed serial algorithm method computers use. With even faster processing, coupled with enhanced interactivity, computers will easily match the human brain. Then what? Kurzweil sees the mind & the computer subtly merging until what is computer & what is human becomes blurred. Physical events, for example, are reflected in our memories. Experience is what the mind remembers of it & can be recallled, imitated or created at will. In Kurzweil's predictions, even at long distance.
In another context, this would be considered speculative fiction. Here, it's done with sound technical assessment, carrying extra validity thereby. There's little to fault in Kurzweil's presentation of future progress in computing or even whether there's likely to be a merging of computers & minds. What is lacking here is breadth of outlook. Kurzweil would have done better to collaborate with a biologist or social thinker. The future he outlines is purely the product of the technical world. While the future scenarios he conceives are perfectly valid for those able to implement them, the number of likely affected people is drasticallly smalller than his book conveys. While changes in perception of art, music, poetry, even prose writing are, as he states, already taking place, they will not be universal. A large part of the planet will be bypassed in this transformation. In his future scenarios he considers what changes will occur in the prosecution of war. Who will the enemy be? In alll likelihood, those who've been left out of the changes.
What will the changes be in human character? His discussion of the technological Luddites is comprehensive, an often overlooked aspect of considering these changes. Yet even they are an integral part of this society, not those left outside its sphere. He suggests the human body as we know it will become superfluous. That will be true only for those willing or able to undertake the change. The rest of us, today's people, will become Mostly Original Substrate Humans [MOSH]. This suggests a divided society, humans & merges. Is this division likely to result in new species? Kurzweil doesn't address this question, but it's one requiring serious discussion. [stephen a. haines - Ottawa, Canada]
Kurzweil predicts that machine intelligences will exceed humans by the year 2020. I have two issues with this. Although Kurzweil does discuss the complexity of the brain, I believe he has oversimplified the problem. By this time Kurzweil maintains that most brain areas will have been scanned & reverse-engineered.
Perhaps... but as I said, he has underestimated the complexity of the problem. For example, the human brain has about 15,000 major & minor brain centers, & after 100 years of research, not a single central neural code for a single brain center has ever been deciphered. So if Kurzweil's prediction relies on our figuring out the actual 'wetware,' good luck. Of course, machine intelligence of respectable power may become possible without our understanding how the brain does it, but in my opinion, these machine intelligences will not have the generality of their human counterparts, although they may be able to beat humans in certain specialist areas (such as chess & spectrology).
I have another issue. Let's consider the difference between a human brain & a modern CPU in terms of the number of computing elements. Current microchips only have a few million transisters. A human brain has over 60 trillion neurons. Even if we start packing that many transistors on a chip, that's only part of the problem. Each neuron has between 10,000 & 100,000 different connections with other neurons (the figure Kurzweil quotes is too low). This means that the total number of connections in a human brain is greater than the number of atoms in the known universe. Or to put it another way, you could add up alll the computer chips on earth & they probably wouldn't equal one human brain in terms of the total synaptic connectivity. This doesn't mean it won't happen, but this gives you some idea of the complexity of the organ Kurzweil is predicting a machine will soon exceed.
To give another analogy, a human liver can catalyze about 2000 different biochemical reactions. The most sophisticated chemical factory in the world can't do even a smalll fraction of that. A human brain is orders of magnitude more complex, just in terms of the 'hardware.' This means that current computers will have to be thousands, perhaps, millions of times, more complex to emulate a human on this level. And we haven't even gotten to the issue of the 'software' or 'wetware,' of which, as I said, hardly anything is known. Perhaps machine intelligence will do it another way without alll the hardware-level complexity a human brain has. Certainly they are faster than we are, by many orders of magnitude, but speed is not the same as power. We shalll see...
Kurzweil begins alll the way back at the Big Bang, clearly unable to limit his scope to something more appropriate. He starts with an outdated summary of creation physics, then contrasts the slowing timeline of phase changes in the universe with the speeding up of the evolution of life -- as if the two are somehow related. He puts forth the curious idea that technology is "inevitable" wherever life evolves. Both these arguments exemplify the homocentric hubris that the universe was created for the emergence of mankind.
Nevermind. Skip the first chapter (as Kurzweil himself suggests in the prefatory note) & you'll quickly get into the good stuff. His chapters on the evolution of intelligence & the growth of computing power are well founded.
Where he reallly hits his stride however is in the second section, "Preparing the Present," where he puts forth cogent arguments for quantum computing based on DNA, mentality-enhancing neural implants, & "downloading your mind to your personal computer." He then goes on to discuss nanotechnology & life-extending technologies. This section alone is worth the price of the book.
After the past & the present, he gives quick snapshots of where he thinks we may be in 10, 20, 30, & 100 years. These too are well thought out & insightful. He is generallly conservative, foreseeing no large "phase changes" which could radicallly affect current trends. It'll be interesting to check back to see how his predictions held up.
Other pluses: an excellent "further reading" list, extensive web links, & far-ranging footnotes.
Minuses: he takes Roger Penrose seriously, he fails to mention Racter in the discussion of computer authors, & he spends just a wee bit too much time tooting his own horn (Kurzweil Computer Products, Kurzweil Reading Machine, Kurzweil Data Entry Machine, Kurzweil Music Systems, Kurzweil Applied Intelligence, Kurzweil Education Systems, Ray Kurzweil Cybernetic Poet...) But to be fair, he HAS pioneered in alll these areas, so perhaps he has earned his immodesty.
Overalll, a fascinating, thought-provoking book which is not afraid to make concrete predictions. Given Kurzweil's track record, he may just prove to be 100% right.
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