The Age of Spiritual Machines
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THE AGE OF SPIRITUAL MACHINES WHEN COMPUTERS EXCEED HUMAN INTELLIGENCE RAY KURZWEIL Page 1 U.S. $25.95 (continued from front flap) CANADA $36.99 out brains along direct neural pathways; computers, for their part, will have read all Imagine a world where the difference the world’s literature. The distinction between man and machine blurs, where the between us and computers will have difference between humanity and become sufficiently blurred that when the technology fades, where the soul and the machines claim to be conscious, we will silicon chip unite. This is not science fiction. believe them. This is the twenty-first century according to Ray Kurzweil, the “restless genius” (Wall In The Age Of Spiritual Machines, the Street Journal) and inventor of the most “ultimate thinking machine” (Forbes) forges innovative and compelling technology of our the ultimate road to the next century. era. In The Age of Spiritual Machines, the brains behind the Kurzweil Reading Machine, the Kurzweil Synthesizer, advanced speech recognition, and other technologies devises a framework for envisioning the next century. In his inspiring hands, life in the new millennium no longer seems daunting. Instead, Kurzweil’s twenty- first century promises to be age in which the marriage of human sensitivity and artificial Ray Kurzwe il intelligence fundamentally alters and is the author of The Age of Intelligent improves the way we live. Machines, which won the Association American Publishers’ Award for The Most The Age of Spiritual Machines is no mere list Outstanding Computer Science Book of of predictions but a prophetic blueprint for 1990. He was awarded the Dickson Prize, the future. Kurzweil guides us through the Carnegie Mellon’s top science prize, in 1994. inexorable advances that will results in The Massachusetts Institute of Technology computers exceeding the memory capacity named him the Inventor of the Year in 1988. and computational ability of the human He is the recipient of nine honorary brain. According to Kurzweil, machines will doctorates and honors from two U.S. achieve all this by 2020, with human presidents. Kurzweil lives in a suburb of attributes not far behind. We will begin to Boston. have relationships with automated JACKET DESIGN BY DAVID J. HIGH personalities and use them as teachers, AUTHOR PHOTOGRAPH BY JERRY BAUER companions, and lovers. A mere ten years later, information will be fed straight into A Member of Penguin Putnam Inc 375 Hudson Street, New York, N.Y. 10014 http://www.penguinputnam.com Printed in U.S.A. (continued on back flap) 0199 Page 2 NOTE: This document was formatted in Microsoft Word, and so looks best when viewed from there. In particular, the tables and charts may look goofy in other programs. ***************************************************** We are the last. The last generation to be unaugmented. The last generation to be intellectually alone. The last generation to be limited by our bodies. We are the first. The first generation to be augmented. The first generation to be intellectually together. The first generation to be limited only by our imaginations. We stand both before and after, balancing on the razor edge of the Event Horizon of the Singularity. That this sublime juxtapositional tautology has gone unnoticed until now is itself remarkable. We're so exquisitely privileged to be living in this time, to be born right on the precipice of the greatest paradigm shift in human history, the only thing that approaches the importance of that reality is finding like minds that realize the same, and being able to make some connection with them. If these books have influenced you the same way that they have us, we invite your contact at the email addresses listed below. Enjoy, Michael Beight, [email protected] Steven Reddell, [email protected] Page 3 Here are some new links that we’ve found interesting: KurzweilAI.net News articles, essays, and discussion on the latest topics in technology and accelerating intelligence. SingInst.org The Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence: A think tank devoted to increasing Humanity’s odds of experiencing a safe, beneficial Singularity. Many interesting articles on such topics as Friendly AI, Existential Risks. SingInst.org/Media Videos, audio, and PowerPoints from the Singularity Summits; and videos about SIAI’s purpose. blinkx.com/videos/kurzweil Videos on the internet in which the word “Kurzweil” is spoken. Great new resource! Page 4 [Index omitted] Page 5 THE AGE OF SPIRITUAL MACHINES Page 6 ALSO BY RAY KURZWEIL The 10% Solution for a Healthy Life The Age of Intelligent Machines Page 7 VIKING Published by the Penguin Group Penguin Putnam Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A. Penguin Books Ltd, 27 Wrights Lane, London W8 5TZ, England Penguin Books Australia Ltd., Ringwood, Victoria, Australia Penguin Books Canada Ltd., 10 Alcorn Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4V 3B2 Penguin Books (N.Z.) Ltd, 182–190 Wairau Road, Auckland 10, New Zealand Penguin India, 210 Chiranjiv Tower, 43 Nehru Place, New Delhi 11009, India Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England First Published in 1999 by Viking Penguin, a member of Penguin Books Inc. 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 Copyright © Ray Kurzweil, 1999 All rights reserved Illustrations credits Pages 24, 26–27, 104, 156: Concept and text by Ray Kurzweil. Illustration by Rose Russo and Robert Brun. Page 72: © 1977 by Sidney Harris Pages 167–168: Paintings by Aaron, a computerized robot built and programmed by Harold Cohen. Photographed by Becky Cohen. Page 188: Roz Chast © 1998. From The Cartoon Bank. All rights reserved. Page 194: Danny Shanahan © 1994. From The New Yorker Collection. All rights reserved. Page 219: Peter Steiner © 1997. From The New Yorker Collection. All rights reserved. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING IN PUBLICATION DATA Kurzweil, Ray. The age of spiritual machines / Ray Kurzweil. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-670-88217-8 1. Artificial Intelligence. 2. Computers. 3. Title. Q335.K88 1999 006.3—dc21 98–38804 This book is printed on acid-free paper. Printed in the United States of America Set in Berkeley Oldstyle Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book. Page 8 A NOTE TO THE READER As a photon wends its way through an arrangement of glass panes and mirrors, its path remains ambiguous. It essentially takes every possible path available to it (apparently these photons have not read Robert Frost's poem "The Road Not Taken"). This ambiguity remains until observation by a conscious observer forces the particle to decide which path it had taken. Then the uncertainty is resolved—retroactively—and it is as if the selected path had been taken all along. Like these quantum particles, you—the reader—have choices to make in your path through this book. You can read the chapters as I intended them to be read, in sequential order. Or, after reading the Prologue, you may decide that the future can't wait, and you wish to immediately jump to the chapters in Part III on the twenty-first century (the table of contents on the next pages offers a description of each chapter). You may then make your way back to the earlier chapters that describe the nature and origin of the trends and forces that will manifest themselves in this coming century. Or, perhaps, your course will remain ambiguous until the end. But when you come to the Epilogue, any remaining ambiguity will be resolved, and it will be as if you had always intended to read the book in the order that you selected. Page 9 CONTENTS A NOTE TO THE READER 9 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 13 PROLOGUE: AN INEXORABLE EMERGENCE 14 Before the next century is over, human beings will no longer be the most intelligent or capable type of entity on the planet. Actually, let me take that back. The truth of that last statement depends on how we define human. PART ONE: PROBING THE PAST CHAPTER ONE: THE LAW OF TIME AND CHAOS 19 For the past forty years, in accordance with Moore's Law, the power of transistor-based computing has been growing exponentially. But by the year 2020, transistor features will be just a few atoms thick, and Moore's Law will have run its course. What then? To answer this critical question, we need to understand the exponential nature of time. CHAPTER TWO: THE INTELLIGENCE OF THE UNIVERSE 40 Can an intelligence create another intelligence more intelligent than itself? Are we more intelligent than the evolutionary process that created us? In turn, will the intelligence that we are creating come to exceed that of its creator? CHAPTER THREE: OF MIND AND MACHINES 47 "I am lonely and bored, please keep me company." If your computer displayed this message on its screen, would that convince you that it is conscious and has feelings? Before you say no too quickly, we need to consider how such a plaintive message originated. CHAPTER FOUR: A NEW FORM OF INTELLIGENCE ON EARTH 56 Intelligence rapidly creates satisfying, sometimes surprising plans that meet an array of constraints. Clearly, no simple formula can emulate this most powerful of phenomena. Actually, that's wrong. All that is needed to solve a surprisingly wide range of intelligent problems is exactly this: simple methods combined with heavy doses of computation, itself a simple process. Page 10 CHAPTER FIVE: CONTEXT AND KNOWLEDGE 71 It is sensible to remember today's insights for tomorrow's challenges.