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Futurist Sees Machines, Humans Merging in 2045 (Ray Kurzweil alert)
LA Times ^ | 4/16/2006 | James Harkin

Posted on 04/22/2006 3:47:09 PM PDT by Dark Skies

Ray Kurzweil, an inventor and futurist, has stumbled on a discovery of earth-shattering importance. It is the arrival of "singularity," and according to him it will happen in 2045.

"Gradually," he writes at the beginning of "The Singularity Is Near," "I've become aware of a transforming event looming in the first half of the 21st century … the impending Singularity in our future is increasingly transforming every institution and aspect of human life, from sexuality to spirituality."

Singularity, Kurzweil says, is a development "representing a profound and disruptive transformation in human capability" and a "radical upgrading of our bodies' physical and mental systems."

(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Extended News; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: borg; collective; dilligaf; forgawdsakesjim; itsaborgjim; learnedfool; pagingartbell; quark; raykurzweil; scifi; startrek; trekkiealert; xenu
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To: Diana in Wisconsin
lol...well, thank goodness we're not Mayan.

But can you imagine an Osama bin Cyborg? Nah...not even a cyborg would fall for that hogwash.
21 posted on 04/22/2006 4:03:11 PM PDT by Dark Skies
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To: cll

I loved that song until the 999th time they played it on MTV.


22 posted on 04/22/2006 4:03:59 PM PDT by Perdogg (entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem)
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To: Gordongekko909
Where is my flying car?

Shhh! [glancing furtively about] the oil companies are sitting on it! [clears throat].

23 posted on 04/22/2006 4:04:59 PM PDT by the invisib1e hand (deletum est carthago)
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To: the invisib1e hand
kurzweil, noted genius, has been having megalomaniacal delusions for years.

Brilliant guy, but more optimistic than most. Possibly a hypochondriac... not a megalomaniac.

Suppose a select few were both fortunate enough to discover the secret for immortality and foolish enough to admit it. They'd be torn to pieces.

Only a secret society of long-lifers could hope to survive, especially if the secret was expensive to implement. You'd have life jealousy and wealth/class jealousy inflamed to the max, with predictable results.

24 posted on 04/22/2006 4:05:26 PM PDT by Pearls Before Swine (Is /sarc really needed?)
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To: Dark Skies

I'm planning to be there. - The Q & A periods should be quite a show.


25 posted on 04/22/2006 4:06:57 PM PDT by tpaine
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To: Dark Skies
transforming every institution and aspect of human life, from sexuality to spirituality."

Sounds like a very weird infomercial.
26 posted on 04/22/2006 4:08:10 PM PDT by HEY4QDEMS (Sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.)
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To: Pearls Before Swine
Suppose a select few were both fortunate enough to discover the secret for immortality and foolish enough to admit it.

uhmmmm...I'm sorry. I'm not really an art bell fan...

27 posted on 04/22/2006 4:08:43 PM PDT by the invisib1e hand (deletum est carthago)
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To: the invisib1e hand
Then you'll know Ramona (who IMO isn't much for someone with Kurweil's imagination). Most 13 y/o boys can do much better... :-)


28 posted on 04/22/2006 4:09:14 PM PDT by Dark Skies
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To: Gordongekko909

Flying car?
We have enough idiots in two dimensions.....
You really want all the nitwits on the road to have a third?


29 posted on 04/22/2006 4:09:56 PM PDT by RedStateRocker (Nuke Mecca, deport all illegals, abolish the IRS, ATF and DEA.)
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To: Pearls Before Swine
Good observation. Have to say that he seems to me to be very populist versus elitist. His repeated observation is that (religion aside and I am convinced of the resurrection through Christ) something approaching immortality in our present life is coming to all of us.
30 posted on 04/22/2006 4:10:17 PM PDT by Gulf War One
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To: tpaine

Please post a review and ping me!


31 posted on 04/22/2006 4:10:27 PM PDT by Dark Skies
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To: Dark Skies
Ray Kurzweil, an inventor and futurist

What has he invented? Hell, anyone can be a 'futurist'.

32 posted on 04/22/2006 4:11:45 PM PDT by layman (Card Carrying Infidel)
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To: HEY4QDEMS
Sounds like a very weird infomercial.

A new product co-invented by Dr Phil, Oprah...and John Wayne Bobbitt.

33 posted on 04/22/2006 4:12:03 PM PDT by Dark Skies
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To: Dark Skies
Sex with a robot? Maybe not yet, but ...
34 posted on 04/22/2006 4:12:56 PM PDT by AntiGuv (The 1967 UN Outer Space Treaty is bad for America and bad for humanity - DUMP IT!)
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To: AntiGuv

There's only one sure-fire way to stop sex with your robotic girlfriend...marry her.


35 posted on 04/22/2006 4:15:55 PM PDT by Dark Skies
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To: Diana in Wisconsin
Maybe Kurzwell and the Mayan calender dude can duke it out on Art Bell some time. Surely everyone would stay up to listen.
36 posted on 04/22/2006 4:16:03 PM PDT by isrul
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To: Dark Skies

I'd kind of like to merge with a computer. It's the only way I'm ever going to read everything that I want to read.


37 posted on 04/22/2006 4:16:47 PM PDT by Celtjew Libertarian
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To: Dark Skies

38 posted on 04/22/2006 4:17:10 PM PDT by the invisib1e hand (deletum est carthago)
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To: layman
In addition to inventing the sesame seed bagel...

Ray Kurzweil was the principal developer of the first omni-font optical character recognition, the first print-to-speech reading machine for the blind, the first CCD flat-bed scanner, the first text-to-speech synthesizer, the first music synthesizer capable of recreating the grand piano and other orchestral instruments, and the first commercially marketed large-vocabulary speech recognition. Ray has successfully founded and developed nine businesses in OCR, music synthesis, speech recognition, reading technology, virtual reality, financial investment, cybernetic art, and other areas of artificial intelligence . All of these technologies continue today as market leaders. Ray's Web site, KurzweilAI.net, is a leading resource on artificial intelligence.

Ray Kurzweil was inducted in 2002 into the National Inventors Hall of Fame, established by the U.S. Patent Office.

Source:http://www.kurzweiltech.com/aboutray.html


39 posted on 04/22/2006 4:18:29 PM PDT by Dark Skies
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To: Dark Skies

Yup. Then, a human-machine hybrid will invent the perpetual motion machine. He/it will use it to power the time machine that helps him finally and absolutely find Atlantis.

What a crouton. What the hell is the list of job requirements for the "Futurist" position? Being able to randomly make ridiculous guesses?

Don't any of these folks have real jobs?


40 posted on 04/22/2006 4:18:52 PM PDT by djf (Bedtime story: Once upon a time, they snuck on the boat and threw the tea over. In a land far away..)
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