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Google's Ray Kurzweil Wants To Live Forever, and He Thinks It Includes Nanobots (playboy.com)
Reader Esther Schindler writes: Whatever else he is (author, computer scientist, inventor, futurist, Google employee), Ray Kurzweil is undeniably fascinating, with intriguing predictions about the future -- some of which might be accurate. In an interview, he discusses life extension and technology, as well as how he thinks they'll be connected. "When people talk about the future of technology, especially artificial intelligence, they very often have the common dystopian Hollywood-movie model of us versus the machines. My view is that we will use these tools as we've used all other tools -- to broaden our reach. And in this case, we'll be extending the most important attribute we have, which is our intelligence." Part of what I like is that he sees ways to use technology for good and not for evil. "By the 2030s we will have nanobots that can go into a brain non-invasively through the capillaries, connect to our neocortex and basically connect it to a synthetic neocortex that works the same way in the cloud. So we'll have an additional neocortex, just like we developed an additional neocortex 2 million years ago, and we'll use it just as we used the frontal cortex: to add additional levels of abstraction. We'll create more profound forms of communication than we're familiar with today, more profound music and funnier jokes. We'll be funnier. We'll be sexier. We'll be more adept at expressing loving sentiments."Kurzweil also thinks his diet can help him live forever. Kurzweil claims that he spends "a few thousand dollars per day" (or roughly a million dollar a year) on diet pills and eating right. According to a Financial Times report from last year, Kurzweil's breakfast includes:Berries (85 calories for a cup), Dark chocolate infused with espresso (170 calories for an ounce), Smoked salmon and mackerel (100 calories for a 3-ounce serving), Vanilla soy milk (100 calories for a cup)
Stevia (zero calories), Porridge (150 to 350 calories for half a cup, depending on ingredients and cooking method), and Green tea (zero calories). Kurzweil takes 100 pills a day (down from 250 a few years ago, technology has advanced, you see) for "heart health" to "eye health, sexual health, and brain health."
Whatever else he is, Kurzweil is undeniably a self-promoting hack who is almost always completely wrong about everything.
Sorry. He's going to die just like the rest of us.
>> Kurzweil claims that he spends "a few thousand dollars per day" (or roughly a million dollar a year) on diet pills and eating right. Kurzweil takes 100 pills a day (down from 250 a few years ago...
Typical American "Money is the answer to everything" mindset. The obvious proof that it doesn't work is that he still actually looks his age.
It seems to me that the best thing you can do for yourself is eat simply and regularly exercise, avoid drugs, live a happy stress-free life (which includes not worrying about things you can't change, such as aging/death and the insane belief that there's a pill for everything).
I think he's entertaining, and he has some interesting, creative ideas.
But I think his stuff is interesting proportionally with how far away in time he's referring to. Distant future? Fun speculative ideas. Right now? Pseudo-science speculative nonsense.
Let's not stir that bag of worms...
I get up early when the sleeping pill wakes me ...
I take a wake up pill and fill with energy
I power on hard and I check my messages
But I don't have any messages
I take a driving pill and head to my car
I drive around a bit 'cause work isn't very far
Work is over but I can't stay to work late
Got to leave and get ready for my second date
With a pretty girl that I met at the pharmacy
Right in the prescription line
I take a pill for my social anxiety
I get a table and a nice bottle of chablis
Now it's getting late and there's still no sign of her
I have another glass of wine
All I know is the wine lasts longer when you don't gotta share it with someone
All I know is the steak tastes better when I take my steak tastes better pill
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
When and if he does die, hopefully he has a clause donating his body to science so we can see the effect of all those pills
To be fair, 50 of those are laxatives, to dislodge the log-jam from the other 50 pills.
Ray never responded to the Slashdot interview that was begun in December. https://features.slashdot.org/...
What good is living forever if you can't enjoy a bacon cheeseburger from time to time?
"Remember, there never were pineapple-almond cookies here."
Kurzweil claims that he spends "a few thousand dollars per day" (or roughly a million dollar a year) on diet pills and eating right. According to a Financial Times report from last year, Kurzweil's breakfast includes: Berries (85 calories for a cup)
If my diet consisted largely of diet pills and "berries"--just "berries", no particular kind--I'm pretty sure I would be making wild predictions about the future too. That doesn't mean you should listen to them.
After he retired, he took a long walk in the desert every morning for 40 years!
He could have lived longer. Unfortunately, he moved into a bad retirement community that grumbled about every little thing.
Recently saw Kurzweil speak at TECHBC and have read one of his books. The advancement in life expectancy he is referring to is derived from the advancement of nanobot technologies that will allow us to better address the limitations we have today based on the natural evolution of our DNA. The idea is that as medicine becomes understood by big data, we can remove the trial and error approach that largely drives it today, with tailor made technology solutions to promote and fix our natural biological deficiencies. The pills alone will not prevent death, yet his intent is to remain as healthy as possible while medical technologies evolve to the point where we can promote and maintain long-term health. Here are a couple interesting Slashdot articles speaking to nanobot technology. https://hardware.slashdot.org/... https://science.slashdot.org/s...
I particularly like the "sexual health" pills, considering that one of the few verified ways we know of to considerably extend mammalian life is complete sterilization (verified in humans by analyzing church documents containing the lifespans of choir castratos versus the unmodified monks they lived alongside)
The only other verified means of extending life I can think of offhand is extreme calorie restriction, and to look at him he doesn't practice that either.
So, available evidence is he's just another wishful thinker hoping for a magical quick fix. Worse, he may actually believe that immortality is on the horizon, but is clearly unwilling to make the sacrifices we actually know would give him a much better chance of living long enough to benefit from further discoveries.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
But why would you want to wait to retire until you're to ill or feeble to enjoy it?
Besides, life expectancy in the US is ~79 years - just to live an expected 30 years beyond your day of retirement would require retiring at 49.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
I expect this trend to continue at least another several hundred years, assuming humanity actually makes it that long and doesn't slide back into another dark ages along the way. The body is the most complex system we've ever encountered, and we're still just poking at it without completely understanding what we're doing.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?