Expert: Chuck Cosby - 7/28/2011

Question
Hello,

I have been reading up on Ray Kurzweil's claims re the Singularity occurring sometime  by 2050(whereby AI becomes superintelligent etc.), plus there are others, such as Huebner and Modis who have suggested that, instead, our rate of technological change will eventually grind to a halt without any technological singularity occurring. I was wondering what your opinion was re the above5intelligent AI coming to pass etc.), and what solid data you may have come across which supports your conclusion, in your own opinion.

Thanks,
Geoff

Answer
I don't agree with Ray at all.  he has no basis to predict this.  it's just a wild guess.  if you look at the history of AI - prgress has been painfully slow.  His prediction requires a major breakthrough that is complelty not here yet.  maybe it will happen.  This is similar to getting Nuclear Fusion to work as an enery generation system.  They have been saying it'll take 50 years to do, and they have saying this for that last 50 years.  there simply is no technolgy today that can be 'improved' to get to this point.  maybe Quantum Computing - but that is also very very far off in the future.  I'd say maybe 100 to 200 years for a full AI.