Age of Spiritual Machines
The Age of Spiritual Machines presents a history of computers, lookingat how past trends in computing have led to today's personal machines.Author Ray Kurzweil then goes beyond history to look towards the future.Most audiences are familiar with the notion that computers will one daythink faster and better than humans. However, Kurzweil goes beyond suchfamiliar ground, making specific predictions regarding how "spiritualmachines" will blur the line between thinking humans and technological In the first part of the book, "Probing the Past," Kurweil presents anexcellent survey of how computational knowledge evolved throughout history. A gifted technological historian, Kurzweil sets the stage in this chapterby showing how these past developments have both changed the way peoplelive and how this knowledge laid the foundations for his future Towards this, Kurzweil draws heavily from the work of heavyweights inthe field -- such as Carl Sagan, Sherry Turkle, Marvin Minsky, Alan Turingand Eric Drexler. While Kurzweil does not actually present anything new inthis part, he presents a good synthesis of the work of these importanttechnological writers and philosophers.
The more immediate questionfor economists, however, is how these changes will affect the market,exchange and production. Towards this, Kurzweil then posits that firms likeVolvo, General Electric, General Motors and Microsoft will contribute tothis new digital and information revolution. The Internet, for example, has given disparate and scatteredgrassroots groups a platform for organizing. Already, humans have seen the advent of the personalcomputer, which has made digital and computer technology more affordableand brought it into the home. Furthermore, while a less cybernetically-inclined individual would findsuch changes as threatening, Kurweil locates advantages to such changes. At times, Kurzweil goes almost into hyperbole, stating that humanswill eventually achieve a virtual immortality. He alsoaccurately predicted when a machine would defeat the human chess champion,an event which occurred when Gary Kasparov lost to IBM's Deep Blue. Kurzweil's predictions have significant implications, when viewed froman economic perspective. However, activists are profiting from computer technology aswell. The author writes, for example, thatby providing more intense and pleasurable sensations, virtual sex will soonbe better than conventional sex. The flip side to this equation, that one human brain wouldbe able to do only $1 worth of thinking, is a bit unsettling. Given hisprescience, The Age of Spiritual Machines is mostly reliable as a forecastof where computer technologies are headed for the next decade. For those leery of the homogenizing effects of a global economy, technologyhas always been viewed as a double-edged sword. Thisphenomenon has been constantly observed since 1964. By 2100, Kurweilpredicts that we will have machines that pray and worship, spiritualmachines whose interactions will be virtually indistinguishable from thoseof humans.
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Acceptance Essays
