The Singularity Is Near
When Humans Transcend Biology
(Sprache: Englisch)
A controversial scientific vision by the author of The Age of Spiritual Machines predicts a time in which humans and machines will merge and create a new form of non-biological intelligence, explaining how the occurrence will solve such issues as pollution, hunger, and aging.
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A controversial scientific vision by the author of The Age of Spiritual Machines predicts a time in which humans and machines will merge and create a new form of non-biological intelligence, explaining how the occurrence will solve such issues as pollution, hunger, and aging.
Klappentext zu „The Singularity Is Near “
Startling in scope and bravado. Janet Maslin, The New York TimesArtfully envisions a breathtakingly better world. Los Angeles Times
Elaborate, smart and persuasive. The Boston Globe
A pleasure to read. The Wall Street Journal
One of CBS News s Best Fall Books of 2005 Among St Louis Post-Dispatch s Best Nonfiction Books of 2005 One of Amazon.com s Best Science Books of 2005
A radical and optimistic view of the future course of human development from the bestselling author of How to Create a Mind and The Singularity is Nearer who Bill Gates calls the best person I know at predicting the future of artificial intelligence
For over three decades, Ray Kurzweil has been one of the most respected and provocative advocates of the role of technology in our future. In his classic The Age of Spiritual Machines, he argued that computers would soon rival the full range of human intelligence at its best. Now he examines the next step in this inexorable evolutionary process: the union of human and machine, in which the knowledge and skills embedded in our brains will be combined with the vastly greater capacity, speed, and knowledge-sharing ability of our creations.
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RAY KURZWEILThe Singularity Is Near
WHEN HUMANS TRANSCEND BIOLOGY
PENGUIN BOOKS
PROLOGUE
The Power of Ideas
I do not think there is any thrill that can go through the human heart like that felt by the inventor as he sees some creation of the brain unfolding to success.
NIKOLA TESLA, 1896, INVENTOR OF ALTERNATING CURRENT
At the age of five, I had the idea that I would become an inventor. I had the notion that inventions could change the world. When other kids were wondering aloud what they wanted to be, I already had the conceit that I knew what I was going to be. The rocket ship to the moon that I was then building (almost a decade before President Kennedy s challenge to the nation) did not work out. But at around the time I turned eight, my inventions became a little more realistic, such as a robotic theater with mechanical linkages that could move scenery and characters in and out of view, and virtual baseball games.
Having fled the Holocaust, my parents, both artists, wanted a more worldly, less provincial, religious upbringing for me.1 My spiritual education, as a result, took place in a Unitarian church. We would spend six months studying one religion going to its services, reading its books, having dialogues with its leaders and then move on to the next. The theme was many paths to the truth. I noticed, of course, many parallels among the world s religious traditions, but even the inconsistencies were illuminating. It became clear to me that the basic truths were profound enough to transcend apparent contradictions.
At the age of eight, I discovered the Tom Swift Jr. series of books. The plots of all of the thirty-three books (only nine of which had been published when I started to read them in 1956) were always the same: Tom would get himself into a terrible predicament, in which his fate and that of his
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friends, and often the rest of the human race, hung in the balance. Tom would retreat to his basement lab and think about how to solve the problem. This, then, was the dramatic tension in each book in the series: what ingenious idea would Tom and his friends come up with to save the day?2 The moral of these tales was simple: the right idea had the power to overcome a seemingly overwhelming challenge.
To this day, I remain convinced of this basic philosophy: no matter what quandaries we face business problems, health issues, relationship difficulties, as well as the great scientific, social, and cultural challenges of our time there is an idea that can enable us to prevail. Furthermore, we can find that idea. And when we find it, we need to implement it. My life has been shaped by this imperative. The power of an idea this is itself an idea.
Around the same time that I was reading the Tom Swift Jr. series, I recall my grandfather, who had also fled Europe with my mother, coming back from his first return visit to Europe with two key memories. One was the gracious treatment he received from the Austrians and Germans, the same people who had forced him to flee in 1938. The other was a rare opportunity he had been given to touch with his own hands some original manuscripts of Leonardo da Vinci. Both recollections influenced me, but the latter is one I ve returned to many times. He described the experience with reverence, as if he had touched the work of God himself. This, then, was the religion that I was raised with: veneration for human creativity and the power of ideas.
In 1960, at the age of twelve, I discovered the computer and became fascinated with its ability to model and re-create the world. I hung around the surplus electronics stores on Canal Street in Manhattan (they re still there!) and gathered parts to build my own computational devices. During the 1960s, I was as absorbed in the contemporary musical, cu
To this day, I remain convinced of this basic philosophy: no matter what quandaries we face business problems, health issues, relationship difficulties, as well as the great scientific, social, and cultural challenges of our time there is an idea that can enable us to prevail. Furthermore, we can find that idea. And when we find it, we need to implement it. My life has been shaped by this imperative. The power of an idea this is itself an idea.
Around the same time that I was reading the Tom Swift Jr. series, I recall my grandfather, who had also fled Europe with my mother, coming back from his first return visit to Europe with two key memories. One was the gracious treatment he received from the Austrians and Germans, the same people who had forced him to flee in 1938. The other was a rare opportunity he had been given to touch with his own hands some original manuscripts of Leonardo da Vinci. Both recollections influenced me, but the latter is one I ve returned to many times. He described the experience with reverence, as if he had touched the work of God himself. This, then, was the religion that I was raised with: veneration for human creativity and the power of ideas.
In 1960, at the age of twelve, I discovered the computer and became fascinated with its ability to model and re-create the world. I hung around the surplus electronics stores on Canal Street in Manhattan (they re still there!) and gathered parts to build my own computational devices. During the 1960s, I was as absorbed in the contemporary musical, cu
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Autoren-Porträt von Ray Kurzweil
Ray Kurzweil is the author of the New York Times bestseller The Singularity Is Near and the national bestseller The Age of Spiritual Machines, among others. One of the leading inventors of our time, he won a Grammy Award for outstanding achievements in music technology in 2015 and was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 2002. He is the recipient of many honors, including the National Medal of Technology and Innovation, the nation's highest honor in technology. He lives in Boston.
Bibliographische Angaben
- Autor: Ray Kurzweil
- 2005, XVII, 672 Seiten, mit Schwarz-Weiß-Abbildungen, Maße: 23,114 cm, Kartoniert (TB), Englisch
- Verlag: Penguin US
- ISBN-10: 0143037889
- ISBN-13: 9780143037880
Sprache:
Englisch
Pressezitat
Anyone can grasp Mr. Kurzweil s main idea: that mankind s technological knowledge has been snowballing, with dizzying prospects for the future. The basics are clearly expressed. But for those more knowledgeable and inquisitive, the author argues his case in fascinating detail . . . . The Singularity Is Near is startling in scope and bravado. Janet Maslin, The New York Times
Filled with imaginative, scientifically grounded speculation . . . . The Singularity Is Near is worth reading just for its wealth of information, all lucidly presented . . . . [It s] an important book. Not everything that Kurzweil predicts may come to pass, but a lot of it will, and even if you don t agree with everything he says, it s all worth paying attention to.
The Philadelphia Inquirer
[An] exhilarating and terrifyingly deep look at where we are headed as a species . . . . Mr. Kurzweil is a brilliant scientist and futurist, and he makes a compelling and, indeed, a very moving case for his view of the future.
The New York Sun
Compelling.
San Jose Mercury News
Kurzweil links a projected ascendance of artificial intelligence to the future of the evolutionary process itself. The result is both frightening and enlightening . . . . The Singularity Is Near is a kind of encyclopedic map of what Bill Gates once called the road ahead.
The Oregonian
A clear-eyed, sharply-focused vision of the not-so-distant future.
The Baltimore Sun
This book offers three things that will make it a seminal document. 1) It brokers a new idea, not widely known, 2) The idea is about as big as you can get: the Singularity all the change in the last million years will be superceded by the change in the next five minutes, and 3) It is an idea that demands informed response. The book s claims are so footnoted, documented, graphed, argued, and plausible in small detail, that it requires the equal in response.
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Yet its claims are so outrageous that if true, it would mean . . . well . . . the end of the world as we know it, and the beginning of utopia. Ray Kurzweil has taken all the strands of the Singularity meme circulating in the last decades and has united them into a single tome which he has nailed on our front door. I suspect this will be one of the most cited books of the decade. Like Paul Ehrlich s upsetting 1972 book Population Bomb, fan or foe, it s the wave at epicenter you have to start with.
Kevin Kelly, founder of Wired
Really, really out there. Delightfully so.
Businessweek.com
Stunning, utopian vision of the near future when machine intelligence outpaces the biological brain and what things may look like when that happens . . . . Approachable and engaging.
the unofficial Microsoft blog
One of the most important thinkers of our time, Kurzweil has followed up his earlier works . . . with a work of startling breadth and audacious scope.
newmediamusings.com
An attractive picture of a plausible future.
Kirkus Reviews
Kurzweil is a true scientist a large-minded one at that . . . . What s arresting isn t the degree to which Kurzweil s heady and bracing vision fails to convince given the scope of his projections, that s inevitable but the degree to which it seems downright plausible.
Publishers Weekly (starred review)
[T]hroughout this tour de force of boundless technological optimism, one is impressed by the author s adamantine intellectual integrity . . . . If you are at all interested in the evolution of technology in this century and its consequences for the humans who are creating it, this is certainly a book you should read.
John Walker, inventor of Autodesk, in Fourmilab Change Log
Ray Kurzweil is the best person I know at predicting the future of artificial intelligence. His intriguing new book envisions a future in which information technologies have advanced so far and fast that they enable humanity to transcend its biological limitations transforming our lives in ways we can t yet imagine.
Bill Gates
If you have ever wondered about the nature and impact of the next profound discontinuities that will fundamentally change the way we live, work, and perceive our world, read this book. Kurzweil s Singularity is a tour de force, imagining the unimaginable and eloquently exploring the coming disruptive events that will alter our fundamental perspectives as significantly as did electricity and the computer.
Dean Kamen, recipient of the National Medal of Technology, physicist, and inventor of the first wearable insulin pump, the HomeChoice portable dialysis machine, the IBOT Mobility System, and the Segway Human Transporter
One of our leading AI practitioners, Ray Kurzweil, has once again created a must read book for anyone interested in the future of science, the social impact of technology, and indeed the future of our species. His thought-provoking book envisages a future in which we transcend our biological limitations, while making a compelling case that a human civilization with superhuman capabilities is closer at hand than most people realize.
Raj Reddy, founding director of the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University and recipient of the Turing Award from the Association for Computing Machinery
Ray s optimistic book well merits both reading and thoughtful response. For those like myself whose views differ from Ray s on the balance of promise and peril, The Singularity Is Near is a clear call for a continuing dialogue to address the greater concerns arising from these accelerating possibilities.
Bill Joy, cofounder and former chief scientist, Sun Microsystems
Kevin Kelly, founder of Wired
Really, really out there. Delightfully so.
Businessweek.com
Stunning, utopian vision of the near future when machine intelligence outpaces the biological brain and what things may look like when that happens . . . . Approachable and engaging.
the unofficial Microsoft blog
One of the most important thinkers of our time, Kurzweil has followed up his earlier works . . . with a work of startling breadth and audacious scope.
newmediamusings.com
An attractive picture of a plausible future.
Kirkus Reviews
Kurzweil is a true scientist a large-minded one at that . . . . What s arresting isn t the degree to which Kurzweil s heady and bracing vision fails to convince given the scope of his projections, that s inevitable but the degree to which it seems downright plausible.
Publishers Weekly (starred review)
[T]hroughout this tour de force of boundless technological optimism, one is impressed by the author s adamantine intellectual integrity . . . . If you are at all interested in the evolution of technology in this century and its consequences for the humans who are creating it, this is certainly a book you should read.
John Walker, inventor of Autodesk, in Fourmilab Change Log
Ray Kurzweil is the best person I know at predicting the future of artificial intelligence. His intriguing new book envisions a future in which information technologies have advanced so far and fast that they enable humanity to transcend its biological limitations transforming our lives in ways we can t yet imagine.
Bill Gates
If you have ever wondered about the nature and impact of the next profound discontinuities that will fundamentally change the way we live, work, and perceive our world, read this book. Kurzweil s Singularity is a tour de force, imagining the unimaginable and eloquently exploring the coming disruptive events that will alter our fundamental perspectives as significantly as did electricity and the computer.
Dean Kamen, recipient of the National Medal of Technology, physicist, and inventor of the first wearable insulin pump, the HomeChoice portable dialysis machine, the IBOT Mobility System, and the Segway Human Transporter
One of our leading AI practitioners, Ray Kurzweil, has once again created a must read book for anyone interested in the future of science, the social impact of technology, and indeed the future of our species. His thought-provoking book envisages a future in which we transcend our biological limitations, while making a compelling case that a human civilization with superhuman capabilities is closer at hand than most people realize.
Raj Reddy, founding director of the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University and recipient of the Turing Award from the Association for Computing Machinery
Ray s optimistic book well merits both reading and thoughtful response. For those like myself whose views differ from Ray s on the balance of promise and peril, The Singularity Is Near is a clear call for a continuing dialogue to address the greater concerns arising from these accelerating possibilities.
Bill Joy, cofounder and former chief scientist, Sun Microsystems
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