4 ms·

Ray Kurzweil: Humans will be hybrids by 2030

12 points by gibsonf1 11y ago

tim333 11y ago
hmm... I've always been a bit skeptical of the nanobots in our head thing
- colin_jack 11y ago
  They'll sort that our for you.
MrZongle2 11y ago
As the quarterly appearance of Ray Kurzweil to make a fantastic prediction of the future is upon us, perhaps a review of his previous predictions is in order: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predictions_made_by_Ray_Kurzweil http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predictions_made_by_Ray_Kurzwei...
- tim333 11y ago
  It's interesting we're getting near the computer hardware equivalence to a human brain point - Kurzweil suggesting 2019 for a $4000 computer. I think he may be a bit optimistic there. He has brain equivalence at about 10^16 flops. Hans Moravec who also did some calculations figured about 10^14. I see present tech is around 7*10^12 for the $999 Nvidia Titan X GPU. So 15 of those just now for the Moravec number I guess.
88e282102ae2e5b 11y ago
> He did admit on stage Wednesday that he thought we'd have self-driving cars by 2009. > "Now that's not completely wrong," he said. "If I had said 2015, I think it would've been correct, but they're still not in mainstream use. So even the [predictions] that were wrong were directionally correct." So if we're going to ignore the year, he might as well make all of his predictions just be "eventually, we'll accomplish X". The cognitive dissonance of Ray Kurzweil is impressive.
- kardos 11y ago
  > So if we're going to ignore the year, he might as well make all of his predictions just be "eventually, we'll accomplish X". The cognitive dissonance of Ray Kurzweil is impressive. So there's no value in being close? Being off by six years is the same as being off by eight centuries?
  - 88e282102ae2e5b 11y ago
    Well, where does he draw the line? Will he claim success when a prediction comes true, but ten years late? 15? What is the definition of a failed prediction, according to Ray Kurzweil? Here's a scenario: It's 2028, and my doctor says I'm in the early stages of Alzheimers. Do I sell everything and try to knock items off my bucket list, or do I keep working like everything's normal and wait for the advent of nanobots? If Kurzweil had a model (other than a linear regression, please) I could at least make some educated guesses. But he's basically just a science fiction author who has decided to tack years onto his stories. I don't know what I'm supposed to do with that.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
rafa2000 11y ago
I have not a good opinion of all RK related. One thing he did not predict correctly (by his own design) is that open source will be the main component (already is) of IA in all current and future developments. Check the index of his 'Singularity' book, no mention whatsoever of Open Source, Linux, Linus Torvalds, Richard Stallman or any of the OS giants. So anything RK says sounds to me like just another Microsoft advertisement.
- rafa2000 11y ago
  If you are going to post a negative value for my comment please state why. Nothing I said is untrue. Don't be a troll.
elcct 11y ago
Half human half iPhone

12 points by gibsonf1 11y ago

tim333 11y ago

hmm... I've always been a bit skeptical of the nanobots in our head thing

colin_jack 11y ago
They'll sort that our for you.

MrZongle2 11y ago

As the quarterly appearance of Ray Kurzweil to make a fantastic prediction of the future is upon us, perhaps a review of his previous predictions is in order: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predictions_made_by_Ray_Kurzweil http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predictions_made_by_Ray_Kurzwei...

tim333 11y ago
It's interesting we're getting near the computer hardware equivalence to a human brain point - Kurzweil suggesting 2019 for a $4000 computer. I think he may be a bit optimistic there. He has brain equivalence at about 10^16 flops. Hans Moravec who also did some calculations figured about 10^14. I see present tech is around 7*10^12 for the $999 Nvidia Titan X GPU. So 15 of those just now for the Moravec number I guess.

88e282102ae2e5b 11y ago

> He did admit on stage Wednesday that he thought we'd have self-driving cars by 2009. > "Now that's not completely wrong," he said. "If I had said 2015, I think it would've been correct, but they're still not in mainstream use. So even the [predictions] that were wrong were directionally correct." So if we're going to ignore the year, he might as well make all of his predictions just be "eventually, we'll accomplish X". The cognitive dissonance of Ray Kurzweil is impressive.

kardos 11y ago
> So if we're going to ignore the year, he might as well make all of his predictions just be "eventually, we'll accomplish X". The cognitive dissonance of Ray Kurzweil is impressive. So there's no value in being close? Being off by six years is the same as being off by eight centuries?
- 88e282102ae2e5b 11y ago
  Well, where does he draw the line? Will he claim success when a prediction comes true, but ten years late? 15? What is the definition of a failed prediction, according to Ray Kurzweil? Here's a scenario: It's 2028, and my doctor says I'm in the early stages of Alzheimers. Do I sell everything and try to knock items off my bucket list, or do I keep working like everything's normal and wait for the advent of nanobots? If Kurzweil had a model (other than a linear regression, please) I could at least make some educated guesses. But he's basically just a science fiction author who has decided to tack years onto his stories. I don't know what I'm supposed to do with that.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

rafa2000 11y ago

I have not a good opinion of all RK related. One thing he did not predict correctly (by his own design) is that open source will be the main component (already is) of IA in all current and future developments. Check the index of his 'Singularity' book, no mention whatsoever of Open Source, Linux, Linus Torvalds, Richard Stallman or any of the OS giants. So anything RK says sounds to me like just another Microsoft advertisement.

rafa2000 11y ago
If you are going to post a negative value for my comment please state why. Nothing I said is untrue. Don't be a troll.

elcct 11y ago

Half human half iPhone