Kmguru has stated that he can’t see uploading taking place for perhaps another 150 years. I think it will occur much much sooner than that, within then next 20 possibly but certainly within the next 50.
The first step is to create the machinery that has at least the same processing power of the human brain. When we can do that and push that technology beyond human intelligence then surely the problems of uploading will be resolved at a rapidly increasing non linear rate.
Human processing power equivalence by 2012.
Moore’s law says that computing power approximately doubles every 18 months. This has held up almost perfectly since 1940.
A human neuron fires at around 200 times a second (200Hz), and there are 100 billion of them in the human brain operating in parallel. A powerful PC at present can operate at 2GHz, or the equivalent of 10 million neurons. That means we would have to link 10,000 PCs together to achieve human brain equivalence. Well we can’t quite do that yet. But in 10 years we should have a computing chip of around 200GHz, and at that point we only have to couple 100 of them together to achieve human brainpower. And that we can easily achieve, i.e. by 2012 we will have computing power to rival the human brain.
The Software.
But computing power alone will not be enough; we also need the software. And that should also not be a problem. As CPUs have become increasingly powerful recently we have seen a corresponding increase in the interest in AI software. The best approach, I still believe, is to emulate the neural networks of the human brain, and that is actively being pursued.
A few years ago it was difficult to find any books on AI in regular bookstores. Several weeks ago I checked again (9/2002), and not only are there more books there was a whole rack dedicated to AI.
It seems inevitable that human equivalent machine intelligence will be with us within the next 10 to 20 years. Assuming their intelligence is based on human neural networks then it seems very likely that they will be self-aware and our equals.
And Beyond.
But technology will not be standing still. If Moore’s law continues to hold then within a further two years their intelligence will be double that of humans. And at that point we have no way to imagine what will happen next. The emergence of super-intelligence means humans will cease to be the dominant intelligence on the planet.
The first step is to create the machinery that has at least the same processing power of the human brain. When we can do that and push that technology beyond human intelligence then surely the problems of uploading will be resolved at a rapidly increasing non linear rate.
Human processing power equivalence by 2012.
Moore’s law says that computing power approximately doubles every 18 months. This has held up almost perfectly since 1940.
A human neuron fires at around 200 times a second (200Hz), and there are 100 billion of them in the human brain operating in parallel. A powerful PC at present can operate at 2GHz, or the equivalent of 10 million neurons. That means we would have to link 10,000 PCs together to achieve human brain equivalence. Well we can’t quite do that yet. But in 10 years we should have a computing chip of around 200GHz, and at that point we only have to couple 100 of them together to achieve human brainpower. And that we can easily achieve, i.e. by 2012 we will have computing power to rival the human brain.
The Software.
But computing power alone will not be enough; we also need the software. And that should also not be a problem. As CPUs have become increasingly powerful recently we have seen a corresponding increase in the interest in AI software. The best approach, I still believe, is to emulate the neural networks of the human brain, and that is actively being pursued.
A few years ago it was difficult to find any books on AI in regular bookstores. Several weeks ago I checked again (9/2002), and not only are there more books there was a whole rack dedicated to AI.
It seems inevitable that human equivalent machine intelligence will be with us within the next 10 to 20 years. Assuming their intelligence is based on human neural networks then it seems very likely that they will be self-aware and our equals.
And Beyond.
But technology will not be standing still. If Moore’s law continues to hold then within a further two years their intelligence will be double that of humans. And at that point we have no way to imagine what will happen next. The emergence of super-intelligence means humans will cease to be the dominant intelligence on the planet.
