Read Online The Age of Spiritual Machines: When Computers Exceed Human Intelligence by Ray Kurzweil - Free Book Online
Authors: Ray Kurzweil
SUBJECTIVELY FIND TIME SLOWING DOWN AS IT OBJECTIVELY SPEEDS UP, DO I HAVE THAT STRAIGHT?
Yes, if evolution were conscious.
WELL, IS IT?
There’s no way to really tell, but evolution has its time spiral going in the opposite direction from entities we generally consider to be conscious, such as humans. In other words, evolution starts out slow and speeds up over time, whereas the development of a person starts out fast and then slows down. The Universe, however, does have its time spiral going in the same direction as us organisms, so it would make more sense to say that the Universe is conscious. And come to think of it, that does shed some light on what happened before the big bang.
I WAS JUST WONDERING ABOUT THAT.
As we look back in time and get closer to the event of the big bang, chaos is shrinking to zero. Thus from the subjective perspective, time is stretching out. Indeed, as we go back in time and approach the big bang, subjective time approaches infinity. Thus it is not possible to go back past a subjective infinity of time.
THAT’S A LOAD OFF MY MIND. NOW YOU SAID THAT THE EXPONENTIAL PROGRESS OF AN EVOLUTIONARY PROCESS GOES ON FOREVER. IS THERE ANYTHING THAT CAN STOP IT?
Only a catastrophe that wipes out the entire process.
SUCH AS AN ALL-OUT NUCLEAR WAR?
That’s one scenario, but in the next century, we will encounter a plethora of other “failure modes.” We’ll talk about this in later chapters.
I CAN’T WAIT. NOW TELL ME THIS, WHAT DOES THE LAW OF ACCELERATING RETURNS HAVE TO DO WITH THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY?
Exponential trends are immensely powerful but deceptive. They linger for eons with very little effect. But once they reach the “knee of the curve,” they explode with unrelenting fury. With regard to computer technology and its impact on human society, that knee is approaching with the new millennium. Now I have a question for you.
SHOOT.
Just who are you anyway?
WHY, I’M THE READER.
Of course. Well, it’s good to have you contributing to the book while there’s still time to do something about it.
GLAD TO. Now, YOU NEVER DID GIVE THE ENDING TO THE EMPEROR STORY. SO DOES THE EMPEROR LOSE HIS EMPIRE, OR DOES THE INVENTOR LOSE HIS HEAD?
I have two endings, so I just can’t say.
MAYBE THEY REACH A COMPROMISE SOLUTION. THE INVENTOR MIGHT BE HAPPY TO SETTLE FOR, SAY, JUST ONE PROVINCE OF CHINA.
Yes, that would be a good result. And maybe an even better parable for the twenty-first century.
CHAPTER TWO
THE INTELLIGENCE OF EVOLUTION
Here’s another critical question for understanding the twenty-first century: Can an intelligence create another intelligence more intelligent than itself?
Let’s first consider the intelligent process that created us: evolution.
Evolution is a master programmer. It has been prolific, designing millions of species of breathtaking diversity and ingenuity And that’s just here on Earth. The software programs have been all written down, recorded as digital data in the chemical structure of an ingenious molecule called deoxyribonucleic acid, or DNA. DNA was first described by J. D. Watson and E H. C. Crick in 1953 as a double helix consisting of a twisting pair of strands of polynucleotides with two bits of information encoded at each ledge of a spiral staircase, encoded by the choice of nucleotides. 1 This master “read only” memory controls the vast machinery of life.
Supported by a twisting sugar-phosphate backbone, the DNA molecule consists of between several dozen and several million rungs, each of which is coded with one nucleotide letter drawn from a four-letter alphabet of base pairs (adenine-thymine, thymine-adenine, cytosine-guanine, and guanine-cytosine). Human DNA is a long molecule—it would measure up to six feet in length if stretched out—but it is packed into an elaborate coil onlyof an inch across.
The mechanism to peel off copies of the DNA
Yes, if evolution were conscious.
WELL, IS IT?
There’s no way to really tell, but evolution has its time spiral going in the opposite direction from entities we generally consider to be conscious, such as humans. In other words, evolution starts out slow and speeds up over time, whereas the development of a person starts out fast and then slows down. The Universe, however, does have its time spiral going in the same direction as us organisms, so it would make more sense to say that the Universe is conscious. And come to think of it, that does shed some light on what happened before the big bang.
I WAS JUST WONDERING ABOUT THAT.
As we look back in time and get closer to the event of the big bang, chaos is shrinking to zero. Thus from the subjective perspective, time is stretching out. Indeed, as we go back in time and approach the big bang, subjective time approaches infinity. Thus it is not possible to go back past a subjective infinity of time.
THAT’S A LOAD OFF MY MIND. NOW YOU SAID THAT THE EXPONENTIAL PROGRESS OF AN EVOLUTIONARY PROCESS GOES ON FOREVER. IS THERE ANYTHING THAT CAN STOP IT?
Only a catastrophe that wipes out the entire process.
SUCH AS AN ALL-OUT NUCLEAR WAR?
That’s one scenario, but in the next century, we will encounter a plethora of other “failure modes.” We’ll talk about this in later chapters.
I CAN’T WAIT. NOW TELL ME THIS, WHAT DOES THE LAW OF ACCELERATING RETURNS HAVE TO DO WITH THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY?
Exponential trends are immensely powerful but deceptive. They linger for eons with very little effect. But once they reach the “knee of the curve,” they explode with unrelenting fury. With regard to computer technology and its impact on human society, that knee is approaching with the new millennium. Now I have a question for you.
SHOOT.
Just who are you anyway?
WHY, I’M THE READER.
Of course. Well, it’s good to have you contributing to the book while there’s still time to do something about it.
GLAD TO. Now, YOU NEVER DID GIVE THE ENDING TO THE EMPEROR STORY. SO DOES THE EMPEROR LOSE HIS EMPIRE, OR DOES THE INVENTOR LOSE HIS HEAD?
I have two endings, so I just can’t say.
MAYBE THEY REACH A COMPROMISE SOLUTION. THE INVENTOR MIGHT BE HAPPY TO SETTLE FOR, SAY, JUST ONE PROVINCE OF CHINA.
Yes, that would be a good result. And maybe an even better parable for the twenty-first century.
CHAPTER TWO
THE INTELLIGENCE OF EVOLUTION
Here’s another critical question for understanding the twenty-first century: Can an intelligence create another intelligence more intelligent than itself?
Let’s first consider the intelligent process that created us: evolution.
Evolution is a master programmer. It has been prolific, designing millions of species of breathtaking diversity and ingenuity And that’s just here on Earth. The software programs have been all written down, recorded as digital data in the chemical structure of an ingenious molecule called deoxyribonucleic acid, or DNA. DNA was first described by J. D. Watson and E H. C. Crick in 1953 as a double helix consisting of a twisting pair of strands of polynucleotides with two bits of information encoded at each ledge of a spiral staircase, encoded by the choice of nucleotides. 1 This master “read only” memory controls the vast machinery of life.
Supported by a twisting sugar-phosphate backbone, the DNA molecule consists of between several dozen and several million rungs, each of which is coded with one nucleotide letter drawn from a four-letter alphabet of base pairs (adenine-thymine, thymine-adenine, cytosine-guanine, and guanine-cytosine). Human DNA is a long molecule—it would measure up to six feet in length if stretched out—but it is packed into an elaborate coil onlyof an inch across.
The mechanism to peel off copies of the DNA
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