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Ray Kurzweil 2001-2003 essays Available as a PDF

Posted by Hemos on from the a-little-something-to-read-on-the-holiday-weekend dept.

prostoalex writes "The Ray Kurzweil Reader is a collection of essays by Ray Kurzweil on virtual reality, artificial intelligence, radical life extension, conscious machines, the promise and peril of technology, and other aspects of our future world. These essays, all published on KurzweilAI.net from 2001 to 2003, are now available as a PDF document for convenient downloading and offline reading. The 30 essays, organized in seven memes (such as "How to Build a Brain"), cover subjects ranging from a review of Matrix Reloaded to "The Coming Merging of Mind and Machine" and "Human Body Version 2.0.""

12 of 175 comments (clear)

  1. Memes? by delta_avi_delta · · Score: 5, Informative

    Meme is definately not synonymous with "theme", meme being defined as a piece of information passed on through the generations. I wouldn't say "How to build a brain" is a very memetic idea. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meme

    1. Re:Memes? by HiThere · · Score: 2, Informative

      Sorry, but Wikipedia is the wrong source here. You should instead look at the (final?) chapter of Richard Dawkins "The Selfish Gene".

      He coined the word meme on the analog of the word gene, and the intention was that it should mean a *SMALL* piece of information that reproduced itself. It's not a meromosome, it's a meme. It's typically the size of an ad jingle...the really obnoxious kind that you can't forget, no matter how you try. One of his points is that it isn't necessarily true or beneficial to it's host.

      --

      I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
  2. Kurzweil is one of those geniuses by ReformedExCon · · Score: 2, Informative

    Of the little I've read of Raymond Kurzweil, he seems like a pure genius. From his ability to program computers at only 12 years old, to his AI and nanobot research, he is a modern day "Renaissance man" with his hand in many different aspects of technology.

    His immortality stuff is a little out-there, but we all have our little quirks :-)

    I can't wait to read some of these essays.

    --
    Jesus saved me from my past. He can save you as well.
  3. A Must Read For Anybody Interested In Future Tech by DanielMarkham · · Score: 4, Informative

    Ray has got it nailed. It's interesting how much agreement there is anymore on future technology predictions. Only a few decades ago, predictions were all over the place: flying cars, nuclear power plants in every home, etc. But lately it seems that most people agree on the basics: man and machine will merge in some fashion, biotech will begin to cure aging, etc. The details are still very fuzzy, but it's interesting that Ray can bring these pieces together in a way that is not that far away from mainstream thought.

    What's the Other Slashdot Effect?

  4. Re:Kurzweil by davesag · · Score: 4, Informative

    Ray Kurzweil invented the Kurzweil Reader and loads of other cool things. The first true piano synth too - the Kurzweil Keyboard. He's got laurels as long as your arm.

    --
    I used to have a better sig than this, but I got tired of it
  5. Re: Extremely geeky Pink Floyd reference by joebutton · · Score: 3, Informative

    If you saw Pink Floyd's rather marvellous performance at Live 8 the other day, you'll have seen Rick Wright playing a Kurzweil keyboard. That's the same Kurzweil too.

    --
    http://savingiceland.org
  6. Re:Futurists... feh by Dylan+Zimmerman · · Score: 4, Informative
    You realize that Kurzweil doesn't really need a job anymore, right? He made the Kurzweil reader (reads books aloud) from which flatbed scanners and omnifont OCR came and the Kurzweil synthesizer (the first to accurately reproduce the sounds of orchestral instruments). He's founded nine companies spanning everything from music and assistive technologies to cybernetic art to financial investment. From his site:

    Ray Kurzweil was inducted in 2002 into the National Inventors Hall of Fame, established by the U.S. Patent Office. He received the $500,000 Lemelson-MIT Prize, the nation's largest award in invention and innovation. He also received the 1999 National Medal of Technology, the nation's highest honor in technology, from President Clinton in a White House ceremony. He has also received scores of other national and international awards, including the 1994 Dickson Prize (Carnegie Mellon University's top science prize), Engineer of the Year from Design News, Inventor of the Year from MIT, and the Grace Murray Hopper Award from the Association for Computing Machinery. He has received twelve honorary Doctorates and honors from three U.S. presidents. He has received seven national and international film awards. His book, The Age of Intelligent Machines, was named Best Computer Science Book of 1990. His best-selling book, The Age of Spiritual Machines, When Computers Exceed Human Intelligence, has been published in nine languages and achieved the #1 best selling book on Amazon.com in the categories of "Science" and "Artificial Intelligence."

    So it isn't exactly his job to make these hypotheses, more like his hobby. ;)
  7. Re:No mirrors, at least try Coral... the PDF by pdkrocul · · Score: 2, Informative

    http://www.kurzweilai.net.nyud.net:8090/RayKurzwei lReader.pdf

  8. Re:No mirrors, at least try archive.org... the PDF by pdkrocul · · Score: 4, Informative

    Good thing the essays are 2yrs old: http://web.archive.org/web/20031002224057/http://w ww.kurzweilai.net/RayKurzweilReader.pdf

  9. Mirror by dimator · · Score: 2, Informative

    Via the wayback machine:

    http://web.archive.org/web/20041010162025/http://w ww.kurzweilai.net/meme/frame.html?main=/articles/a rt0588.html

    --
    python -c "x='python -c %sx=%s; print x%%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))%s'; print x%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))"
  10. Re:Mirrors by prisonblues · · Score: 2, Informative

    Hmm, "Use the preview button! Check those urls!"

    http://www.greylodge.org.nyud.net:8090/occultrevie w/glor_015/Ray_Kurzweil_Reader.zip http://www.kurzweilai.net.nyud.net:8090/RayKurzwei lReader.pdf

  11. HERE'S A 30-DAY MIRROR! by GuyMannDude · · Score: 4, Informative

    With all the free web servies out there, I don't understand why nobody bothered to upload this PDF to one of them. I've uploaded it to rapidshare. Follow the directions:

    1. Click on this link
    2. Click on the "Free" button at the bottom of the screen
    3. Wait for the "download ticket" counter to reach zero. When it does, you'll be presented with a link that you can right-click and save to your hard drive.

    That should be good for at least 30 days.

    GMD

    --
    watch this