"...in 2002, there was once a primitive "website" called The Free Republic.."
Posted on 05/05/2002 12:57:54 PM PDT by inquest
I just started reading this book by Ray Kurzweil, The Age of Spiritual Machines, and I'm finding it a little disturbing. It doesn't really tell me anything I don't already know, or that anyone else shouldn't already know; but seeing it in authoritative form (Kurzweil is himself an entrepreneur in the IT field) certainly had a discomfiting effect on me. Basically, the book tells of what to expect in the coming decades. Quoting from the online table of contents, his predictions are summed up as follows (all emphasis mine):
2009: "A $1,000 personal computer can perform about a trillion calculations per second. Computers are imbedded in clothing and jewelry. Most routine business transactions take place between a human and a virtual personality. Translating telephones are commonly used. Human musicians routinely jam with cybernetic musicians. The neo-Luddite movement is growing."
2019: "A $1,000 computing device is now approximately equal to the computational ability of the human brain. Computers are now largely invisible and are embedded everywhere. Three-dimensional virtual-reality displays, embedded in glasses and contact lenses, provide the primary interface for communication with other persons, the Web, and virtual reality. Most interaction with computing is through gestures and two-way natural-language spoken communication. Realistic all-encompassing visual, auditory, and tactile environments enable people to do virtually anything with anybody, regardless of physical proximity. People are beginning to have relationships with automated personalities as companions, teachers, caretakers, and lovers.
2029: "A $1,000 unit of computation has the computing capacity of approximately one thousand human brains. Direct neural pathways have been perfected for high-bandwidth connection to the human brain. A range of neural implants is becoming available to enhance visual and auditory perception and interpretation, memory, and reasoning. Computers have read all available human- and machine-generated literature and multimedia material. There is growing discussion about the legal rights of computers and what constitutes being human. Machines claim to be conscious and these claims are largely accepted.
And 2099: "There is a strong trend toward a merger of human thinking with the world of machine intelligence that the human species initially created. There is no longer any clear distinction between humans and computers. Most conscious entities do not have a permanent physical presence. Machine-based intelligences derived from extended models of human intelligence claim to be human. Most of these intelligences are not tied to a specific computational processing unit. The number of software-based humans vastly exceeds those still using native neuron-cell-based computation. Even among those human intelligences still using carbon-based neurons, there is ubiquitous use of neural-implant technology that provides enormous augmentation of human perceptual and cognitive abilities. Humans who do not utilize such implants are unable to meaningfully participate in dialogues with those who do. Life expectancy is no longer a viable term in relation to intelligent beings."
Kurzweil's book is suffused with the language of mathematical inevitability: prominently figured throughout is his "Law of Accelerating Returns", which basically states that new innovations will accelerate newer innovations, and the whole thing will proceed along an exponential curve. He relates to us the (proverbial) story of the inventor of chess and the Emperor of China. The Emperor is so pleased with the invention that he offers the inventor whatever he names. The inventor states that he would like one bushel of grain for the first square on the chessboard, two for the second, four for the third, doubled with each square for the entire 64 squares. By the time they get to 32 squares, it's certainly a large sum (equivalent to about one especially large field of grain), but not enough to cost the emperor his domain. It's when they get to the second half of the chessboard - what Kurzweil calls the knee of the curve - that things really start getting wild. He says we're at that point now. There've been about 32 doublings of processing capability since the first mechanical computers were invented, and like the emperor, we're starting to really notice, but it hasn't completely changed us. But we're now going into the second half of the chessboard, he says, and nothing about us will be the same.
Kurzweil doesn't seem terribly concerned by all of this. I am. He believes this will all be inevitable. I do not. To those who truly believe it will be a good thing for technology to metastasize to such levels, I don't intend to argue with you here. I'm writing this to those who don't like the idea, but somehow believe that there is nothing that can be done about it, that resistance is futile. It is not. Kurzweil predicts the rise of a "neo-Luddite" movement, which is primarily concerned with the "skill ladder" that would leave some laborers behind; but I'm advocating a much more principled objection. For far too long we've told ourselves this myth that "progress" must continue, and that we can't stand in its way. What started out as something humans consciously did in order to improve their lives, has taken on an occult quality akin to the ancient Greek Fate myths. Kurzweil, like many others, says it's simply an inevitable cosmic progression (citing biological evolution as justification). It's sad that I should have to issue this reminder, but we're human beings, dammit! We're not just another part of some "process". Nowhere is it written that we have to be victims of unseen forces that we created. Technology is fine when it works for us, but when it doesn't we have every right to say no. It gives me pleasure to now quote from a much more enlightened writer, G.K. Chesterton, who had this to say about this mentality (and I do apologize for the length of the quote, but it simply must be done):
"We often read nowadays of the valor or audacity with which some rebel attacks a hoary tyranny or an antiquated superstition. There is not really any courage at all in attacking hoary or antiquated things, any more than in offering to fight one's grandmother. The really courageous man is he who defies tyrannies young as the morning and superstitions fresh as the first flowers. The only true free-thinker is he whose intellect is as much free from the future as from the past. He cares as little for what will be as for what has been; he cares only for what ought to be. And for my present purpose I specially insist on this abstract independence. If I am to discuss what is wrong, one of the first things that are wrong is this: the deep and silent modern assumption that past things have become impossible. There is one metaphor of which the moderns are very fond; they are always saying, "You can't put the clock back." The simple and obvious answer is "You can." A clock, being a piece of human construction, can be restored by the human finger to any figure or hour. In the same way society, being a piece of human construction, can be reconstructed upon any plan that has ever existed.
There is another proverb, "As you have made your bed, so you must lie on it"; which again is simply a lie. If I have made my bed uncomfortable, please God I will make it again. We could restore the Heptarchy or the stage coaches if we chose. It might take some time to do, and it might be very inadvisable to do it; but certainly it is not impossible as bringing back last Friday is impossible. This is, as I say, the first freedom that I claim: the freedom to restore."
It's unfortunate that Chesterton's common sense is still sorely lacking nearly a hundred years later. But it's needed now more than ever. I'm not advocating being blindly anti-technology any more than I'm advocating being blindly devoted to it. I say that technology was invented to serve us, and we must claim the independence of thought necessary to keep it that way. I guess I've ranted long enough. Time to open the floor to comments.
Another trend is that technology is rapidly expanding the power of illusion. When we get to the point where we can no longer trust what we see in front of us, rational thought will go out the door, with sanity following very close behind.
So anyway, I guess rather than the issue being one of machines "exceeding" human "intelligence", it's more one of machines subsuming human consciousness. Sorry for the confusion.
This "Rage against the machine" arguement it getting old and boring to listen to.
I love it! Thanks.
In one sense that may be, but in another, we're not hearing enough of it. What we're certainly hearing plenty of, are mere lamentations about how "technology is changing everything" and nostalgic yearnings for "simpler times"; and I agree, that's getting old. What we're not hearing enough of is the realization that we can actually do something about it. We don't have to sit around writing epitaphs for ages gone by. If we don't like how it is, then it's time to change it. If we can do that, then that would be the most profound progress that the human race has truly made, at least since the American Revolution.
"...in 2002, there was once a primitive "website" called The Free Republic.."
Most people actually in the trenches tend to disagree with Kurzweil, both in the timeline (his is too slow, believe it or not) and in the sequence of events and technologies. He is entitled to his opinions, but it is fairly well known that most of those on the bleeding edge find his view odd and inconsistent with the current state of things. He also has a strange (and likely incorrect) view of the architecture of such things, for reasons that are inexplicable since Ray is a fairly bright guy and should know better. (Actually, he does know better; many people have argued with him over this very issue, but he believes what he believes.) *shrug*
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Here is the flaw in your logic, there have NEVER been 'simpler times". The rise of technology has merely change around the hardships. But for the most part, 'human nature' has stated the SAME for the better part of 5000 years.
Would you prefer that we all live in caves?
Indeed, what most people do not realize is that memory latency and bandwidth is THE bottleneck for performance in the general case these days. Performance scales much more closely with memory bandwidth and latency than with clock speed, and has for a couple years now. Unfortunately, only hardcore geeks even take this into consideration when they buy a system, so there isn't a lot of market pressure to improve the situation at breakneck speed (unlike increasing clock speed, which sells more systems).
There are two major factors: hardware and software. By the best estimates of people qualified to make such determinations, the hardware is pretty much here now on the high-end, and if not now, "next year". The software has had a lot of problems, but there have been a number of very substantial and important advances recently that are far more promising than the much hyped failures of previous decades. If these fundamentally new directions pan out (and they look MUCH stronger and fundamentally more sound than any previous attempts), then we should have something approximating real machine intelligence by the end of the decade. Having been burned in the past, no one wants to oversell it these days. Of course, the what's, how's, and why's are a lengthy and complex topic.
Yes, but it will remain crude. GP is really only useful for a small domain of problems. While technically you could get something interesting from this, hardly anyone thinks this is the likely pathway. The fundamental problem with GP is the computational requirements to find solutions to even moderately complicated problems become obscenely high on our computational hardware.
Of course, it is important for people to realize that there are a number of legitimate pathways competing; there isn't just one right way to do it.
There is an entire subculture of folks called "transhumanists" (with their own books and websites) that are looking forward to what we both consider to be a nightmare scenario.
These transhumanists believe that we will be able to supercharge our minds, bodies, emotions, and spirituality by uploading our minds into transformer-like robotic bodies or onto a more robust version of the internet.
They believe that we will be smarter, stronger, have more intense emotional and sexual experience, write better music, create better art, etc.
However, as anyone who has played C-robots can attest, if your robot spends any time composing music or getting a bit of the old "in-out in-out" then it will quickly get destroyed by a competing C-robot.
It would be creepy but somewhat acceptable if we were able to slough off our carbon-based bodies and put ourselves into super-immortal nuclear-hardened bodies that could withstand centuries of space travel, thousands of dates with Racquel Welch, and decade long Philip Glass concerts.
However, those "transhumans" (whether computationally, mechanically, or genetically enhanced) who choose to live full lives will be outstripped by those who focus their efforts on accumulation of wealth, power, and control.
In the long run, the most highly evolved uber-robot might ultimately be undone by a very simple nanobot whose only purpose is to replicate itself by digesting and reordering matter: the gray goo problem.
In the short term, we have the following things to concern ourselves with:
1. Perfect Capitalism leading to monopolies and oligopolies: With enough brainpower and access to info, complete access to pricing/business information will allow a few to have a significant edge in economic competition. By the time this technology reaches the masses, a few will already control a considerable amount of the wealth (and future wealth generating capacity) thus keeping the masses at economic bay.
You and I will be able to have intelligent agents constantly scanning the net for the best phone rates and automatically switching our service and paying our bills to minimize the cost and maximize the service. However, the folks that own the few phone companies from which we can choose will not be worrying about saving a few bucks on long distance calls.
2. Pansexuality and Androgyny: If virtual reality really starts to look and feel like reality, then people can start experimenting at home with a variety of sexual behaviors and sexual identities. It is currently a joke that most of the 16 yr old girls in chat rooms are actually 40 yr old guys. But in the future more and more people might explore these things virtually in privacy, and then later be emboldened to adopt these lifestyles in reality. This could lead to a truly brave-new-world like future where marriage is denegrated and marginalized, sex exists primarily as a form of recreation, and angst & ennui reign as the wonder and mystery is taken out of human relationships.
3. Police State Technology: Some of us imagine that there is a God that can see everything we do. In the near future it may be possible for the state to approximate this view of God. Imagine that the world is so populated with satellites and cameras that once a month you receive a bill that lists every traffic violation you made with the corresponding fines. For convenience you will be able to have the bill automatically deducted from your bank account!
Also, the house of the future will be filled with security cameras to protect us from our potentially evil baby-sitters, maids, and the police that might barge through our doors. These cameras will either be hacked or subpoenaed and our private lives will be as exposed as our public ones.
I got a great idea for you. First read the book, then write about it.
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