Kevin Kelly’s discourse on the future
of technology at Ted.com left me with some reservations about open-source
software and the progression of technology in our lives. Some of his comments stood out more than others.
At one point he talks about the next 5,000 days on the web culminating in
construction of “a single global machine” that works the same as a brain. “The difference is the machine is doubling
every two years. However your brain isn’t doubling every two years.”
He goes on to say, “If
we say this machine right now that we made is about 1 HB (human brain) and if
we look at the rate this is increasing, in 30 years from there will be 6
billion HB’s. So by the year 2040 the total processing of this machine will
exceed the total processing power of humanity in raw bits and such.”
Kelly states three consequences of this. “We are giving it a
body. We are re-structuring its
architecture and thirdly we are going to become completely co-dependent on it.”
There is so much he said before and after those few quotes
I have written here and each point resonates.
But it was at this point I began to wonder if he was talking about a concept
I had just heard a bit about – singularity.
Singularity is described as “the
technological creation of smarter-than-human intelligence” at the Singularity Institute
website. Other words used to
describe Singularity on the Institute's website are as follows: “Artificial Intelligence, direct
brain-computer interfaces, biological augmentation of the brain, genetic
engineering, ultra-high-resolution scans of the brain followed by computer
emulation.”
Then I went searching for more on Kevin Kelly and found that
he "dismisses singularity."
He sees it as only one scenario according to a 2010 Singularity Institute interview listed on
YouTube and on the Singularity
Institute weblog. Right at the start
Kelly notes that he has one side of himself “that likes to keep technology at
arm’s length.” He goes on to say that
“we really do not know what intelligence is.”
Kelly also talks about his past experiences in this interview.
Just watching the video at Ted.com does not give a total
view of Kelly and the more I found about his ideas the more interesting and
less ominous they became. The 2010 Singularity Institute interview certainly helped
made more clear what he meant by become “co-dependent” as a consequence in the scope of
thought about a single global machine with links or “portals” to it that need
no storage because everything will be in the cloud.
Resources
Oh good for you, you're a real active learner, doing all your own due diligence on Kelly and his work, I love your post!
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