[2ndDivisionVet]

Editor's note: Ray Kurzweil is one of the world's leading inventors, thinkers, and futurists, with a 30-year track record of accurate predictions. Called "the restless genius" by The Wall Street Journal and "the ultimate thinking machine" by Forbes magazine, Kurzweil was selected as one of the top entrepreneurs by Inc. magazine, which described him as the "rightful heir to Thomas Edison." Ray has written five national best-selling books. He is Director of Engineering at Google.

[The Working Man]

Oh, I get it now... Because of these new technologies becoming available to the masses, we need to ‘remove’ as many of them, (the masses), as we can before this technology does become available.

So they introduced Obamacare...

[prisoner6]

He claims that by 2030 solar energy will meet all our energy needs.

He is clueless.

[gattaca]

bump for later

[exDemMom]

It is always amusing to read speculations by someone whose entire knowledge of life science is limited to what he reads in heavily hyped mainstream media articles.

We are a *long* way from many of the things he is looking forward to—if they even become possible at some time.

And his pipe dream of immortality—I can see so many problems with that, both biological and societal, that I think it is as feasible as the utopia on earth that socialists are always trying to impose with their unworkable redistributionist schemes.

[Wolfie]

One question: WHEN DO I GET MY HAIR BACK?!?!

[TexasFreeper2009]

When I was young living forever sounded like a good idea. Now.. I am not so sure. I just want to live long enough to get to know my grandchildren before they grow up. Then I am done here.

[6ppc]

I’m ready for a full body rebuild...gonna go full cyborg!

[Pearls Before Swine]

My opinion... Ray is beyond brilliant, but beyond optimistic, too.

I think his timetable is too accelerated, his faith in government too great, and his appreciation of the dark, nihilistic tendencies of mankind lacking.

I could well imagine a science-fiction dystopia where some of these things—immortality, effectively— come to pass for some minority, but they have to be held secret because the masses at large would kill the beneficiaries in the name of fairness.

[barefoot_hiker]

Apparently Kurweil is on some crazy super-duper health diet, trying to live long enough for anti-aging breakthroughs to make him “immortal”. I doubt he makes it. If not, I assume he’ll have himself frozen in hopes of being revived later.

[TruthFactor]

For the most part I believe Kurzweil has the big picture right. His timing is a bit too optimistic on almost all categories of technology, and I think his solar prediction is way off. Solar may be un-necessary in 20 years because of other advances.

Most people will agree almost nothing that's complex gets deployed on schedule. And here, he's discussing the entire unfolding of the future of technology, a very complex process. This reminds me of William Gibson's quote, "The future is already here – it's just not evenly distributed". So, although it may be possible to create certain technologies in the future, economics will determine their adoption rate.

But, overall I agree with Kurzweil. The world will be a very different place in 20 years. And, it will probably be a bumpy ride. Medicine will change more in the next 20 years than in all previous years. In 10 years, robots will be everywhere, doing a significant portion of the labor that's done today by humans. In 10 years(2024), most new cars sold will have the capability to drive themselves. the list goes on and on.

[AllAmericanGirl44]

bkmk

[Paladin2]

"We'll be able to do that in the 2030s with nanobots traveling noninvasively into the brain through the capillaries and augmenting the signals coming from our real senses."

That's just a little too weird.