요약

The late writer and futurist Arthur C. Clarke once remarked that the best proof for intelligent life in the universe is that it hasn’t come here. He was also fond of paraphrasing the polymath J. B. S. Haldane by reminding his audience that the universe is not only stranger than we imagine, but also stranger  than we can imagine. Presumably the inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil, who is currently director of engineering at Google, would accept the latter of Clarke’s propositions, but not necessarily the former. Not only is he working to apply his theory of intelligence to Google’s search engine to render its current algorithms obsolete, but he also believes the time is approaching when humans will create artificial intelligence with vastly greater intelligence than our own, with aims beyond mere mortal power to understand.