At the Cusp of a New Epoch
Photo by Aidin Geranrekab
Back in 2005, Ray Kurzweil announced to the world that we humans were hurtling toward the technological Singularity and that, in the two generations left in the current paradigm, we had best prepare for the merge with smart machines. He even wrote a book (The Singularity is Near) describing the brazen new future and detailing the best practices necessary to get there safely and expeditiously. Folks shrugged.
Kurzweil has a new book out now (The Singularity is Nearer) that gloats about how right he was in his earlier proclamations. He writes in his update, “For perspective, the moment you’re reading this is probably closer to the creation of the first superhuman AI than to the release of my last book, 2012’s How to Create a Mind…Babies born today will be just graduating college when the Singularity happens.” Not much time left until the Big Event, according to Kurzweil.
Just yesterday I read an article in The Byte, a tech mag, that saw Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, excited about 2025 – because, he said, that’s the year he expects Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) to be attained. AGI is that point where AI reaches then surpasses human intelligence. That makes 2025 they year of the singularity. Bummer, I’m thinking, I haven’t finished my dissertation on the future of human consciousness in the age of AI.
Who is this guy that he should prophesysuch things? Another nutter? A latter-day Cassandra? Kurzweil is a former engineer for Google, the “Don’t Do Evil” people. (Rolls eyes.) Following his critically acclaimed 2012 book that wowed global tech wonks, he was hired by Larry Page, co-founder of Google, “to bring natural language understanding to Google,” as Kurzweil put it. He is a pioneer in the ChatGPT revolution.
As Kurzweil sees it we are racing toward a new horizon in human meaning. He writes in Nearer, “There are several key areas of change that are continuing to accelerate simultaneously: computing power is becoming cheaper, human biology is becoming better understood, and engineering is becoming possible at far smaller scales.” Suddenly, some technologists sense the grand breakthrough of new consciousness, like astronaut Bowman through the StarGate in Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 epic, 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Then Kurweil hits the reader with an astonishing claim, now packed with the uncanny feeling he may be right and there’s nothing we can do about it. He writes, “As artificial intelligence (AI) grows in ability and information becomes more accessible, we are integrating these capabilities ever more closely with our natural biological intelligence.. Eventually nanotechnology will enable these trends to culminate in directly expanding our brains with layers of virtual neurons in the cloud. In this way we will merge with AI and augment ourselves with millions of times the computational power that our biology gave us.”
Kurzweil reminds us that in his previous book he laid out Six Epochs. Epoch One saw the birth of the laws of physics and the chemistry they make possible. Two brought life and DNA that introduced self-replication. Three saw brains develop. Four witnessed humans develop “their higher-level cognitive ability, along with their thumbs, to translate thoughts into complex actions.” In this, the Fifth Epoch, he writes, we have reached the point where we can directly merge biological human cognition with the speed and power of our digital technology by means of brain–computer interfaces (BCI). Indeed, BCI is here. One company is even planning to install ChatGPT, so a mind would be thinking to a Siri-like interlocutor Elon Musk hopes to soon frame a system of interconnected minds, which he calls Telepathy.
This possibility alone is breathtaking. But Kurzweil also stresses the imminence of the coming Übermensch. He predicts more confidently than ever that merged humans will know the Singularity and superintelligence by 2045. He blithely proclaims, “If we can meet the scientific, ethical, social, and political challenges posed by these advances, by 2045 we will transform life on earth profoundly for the better.”
But then, perhaps understanding how little humans have done to stop Climate Change or the threat of Nuclear War or the decline of democracy, he adds what seems like a cautionary note: “Revolutionary new systems in biotechnology, nanotechnology, or artificial intelligence could possibly lead to an existential catastrophe like a devastating pandemic or a chain reaction of self-replicating machines.” Oh, God, one thinks, no, not that.
It’s clear from this that Kurzweifor all his unquestioned genius, is no stalwart socialist. Don’t worry, while we elites are cloning around and merging with machines on the weekends, his ilk seems to say, the Have-Nots will abide. This raises the ago-old question of who the singularity is for and who is in charge of the production.
More than ten years ago I reviewed the Eric Schmidt tome Empire of the Mind: The Dawn of the Techno-Political Age. It was later re-titled The New Digital Age: Reshaping the Future of People, Nations and Business. In it he described a domestic situation in which everyone – everyone – owned a robot. He told the reader of holograph machines in the den, and of sending his unruly spoiled brat kids on a holo trip to the Mumbai slums for a couple of hours to see how the other half lives and to come back thankful for being elite. Reading this, I thought for a moment that I might be trippin’ myself.
There are a series of questions that many are beginning to ask with more urgency. Just today I read a piece in Futurism magazine telling me that some are worried that the tech revolution in progress will be for the elite and self-wonderful types. The headline reads: “AI Bros Terrified Singularity Will Hit While Trump Is President.” Last time he was in we were walloped with a pandemic he saw no need to treat. Then crazies with Viking hats were unleashed on Jan 6. in DC. Maybe an invasion of the mind snatchers this time? Ain’t no vaccine for that..
We just don’t know. And philosophy can only do so much.
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