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Discussions about AI inevitably turn to the potential for disaster, but futurist Ray Kurzweil argues in his new book that focusing on the downsides will instead create "delays in overcoming human suffering." Out June 25, The Singularity is Nearer is a follow-up to 2005's The Singularity is Near, and offers updated data and new guidance on how humans can fully pursue AI without fear.
The book contains dozens of graphs intended to convince the naysayers that technology—including AI—has given us a far better life than our ancestors. Literacy rates are up while murder rates are down, democracy is more widespread, and the use of renewable energy is on the rise, according to Kurzweil, who warns against taking anti-AI sentiment too far.
“We need to take seriously the misguided and increasingly strident Luddite voices that advocate broad relinquishment of technological progress to avoid the genuine dangers of genetics, nanotechnology, and robots (GNR),” Kurzweil writes in The Singularity is Nearer.
This pushback creates "delays in overcoming human suffering" that are "still of great consequence—for example, the worsening of famine in Africa resulting from opposition to any food aid that might contain GMOs (genetically modified organisms)."
In the near term, Kurzweil expects AI to have the most profound impact on medicine, he says in an interview with PCMag. With "AI-driven biosimulations," researchers will be able to unlock new data for vaccines, tailor treatments to patients, and eventually cure cancer and Alzheimer's. The effects of aging are particularly interesting to Kurzweil, who recently built an AI chatbot of his late father with his daughter Amy for her new book.
As for when this will happen, Kurzweil doesn't get specific. Instead, he primarily reiterates two key dates from his previous book, which predicted that AI would reach human intelligence by 2029 and merge with machines by 2045, an event he calls "The Singularity."
"It has been almost 20 years since I predicted The Singularity will arrive by 2045 and I am sticking with that prediction," Kurzweil tells PCMag.
The Singularity is the "next step in human evolution," when humans merge with AI to "free ourselves [from] biological limitations," Kurzweil says.
This will happen primarily through brain-computer interfaces like the one Elon Musk is building with Neuralink, he says. Continued increases in computing power and price drops on chips and processors make this future all but inevitable.
(Credit: Ray Kurzweil)"Some people find this frightening," Kurzweil tells PCMag. "But I think it’s going to be beautiful and will expand our consciousness in ways we can barely imagine, like a person who is deaf hearing the most exquisite symphony for the first time."
Skeptics should look to the theory of exponential growth, Kurzweil argues. Advancements are not linear; rather, society makes great leaps in progress that far exceed the ones that came before. Case in point: ChatGPT's explosive debut.
“While it is amazing to see the incredible progress with large language models over the past year and a half, I am not surprised,” Kurzweil tells PCMag. “The exponential growth of technology has been smooth and steady for 85 years now, through wars, depression, recessions, and major world events and it will continue this way.”
Kurzweil only mentions OpenAI twice in his 300-page book, suggesting he sees it as a blip in the larger story of human history. To him, ChatGPT's incredible trajectory is another example of what he's been saying throughout his 61-year career about exponential leaps in technology—the lifeblood of a futurist whose reputation rests on the strength of his predictions.
At 76, Kurzweil isn't likely to see all his predictions come to fruition. "The most important approach we can take to keep AI safe is to protect and improve on our human governance and social institutions," he writes. "The best way to avoid destructive conflict in the future is to continue the advance of our ethical ideals," as the computer systems we build will reflect their creators.
The Singularity Is Nearer: When We Merge with AI arrives in bookstores on June 25.