Immortality and Other Aggravations

Having recently attended Jody’s Georgetown lecture on death and politics , I was primed for this Wired piece on Ray Kurzweil, who believes in AI, the singularity, and immortality.

There’s all sorts of Skynet-ish goodness in the piece, but the most interesting (by which I mean disturbing) passage is this one, where Kurzweil and his anti-aging doctor, Terry Grossman, outline how immortality is going to be achieved:

According to Grossman and other singularitarians, immortality will arrive in stages. First, lifestyle and aggressive antiaging therapies will allow more people to approach the 125-year limit of the natural human lifespan. This is bridge one. Meanwhile, advanced medical technology will begin to fix some of the underlying biological causes of aging, allowing this natural limit to be surpassed. This is bridge two. Finally, computers become so powerful that they can model human consciousness. This will permit us to download our personalities into nonbiological substrates. When we cross this third bridge, we become information. And then, as long as we maintain multiple copies of ourselves to protect against a system crash, we won’t die.

I’ve watched enough Battlestar Galactica to be suspicious of any scheme relies on robotic self-awarness, even if it comes in the form of Tricia Helfer. (Actually, if our robot overlords wind up looking like Tricia Helfer, I might pull a Kent Brockman . . . )

Obviously, I have no deep thoughts the subject, but I’m sure Jody does and perhaps he’ll read the Wired piece over the weekend and share them with us on Monday? It would give me something to look forward to next week.