Is Ray Kurzweil's prediction of future reliable?.
After I finished reading The Age of Spritual Machines, by Ray Kurzweil, I couldn't stop thinking if Kurzweil's prediction of the future is true, what the hell am I doing right now, studying, working, and trying to succeed in this life. If we are all to live in a world of virtual reality, without the need of our physical body, why do I bother working out and exercising? If a computer program can be a better lover and lifelong partner than a real human being, then what's the point of marrying someone? What is the point of having a family? There were so many questions, that it was simply mind-boggling. I had to calm myself down, and first see if his predictions really are reliable, because if it isn't, then there's really no point in worrying about it. But, if it is reliable, well then, I will think about that then. So is he reliable? Let's examine.
Ray Kurzweil is a scientist most famous for writing the The Age of Artificial Intelligence in the late 80's. He predicted many things back then, and surprisingly many of them came true, according to him. I haven't actually read the book, so I can't be sure that he's telling the truth, but I will give him the benefit of the doubt here, as if he were making stuff up, then I'm sure a lot of people would have raised that, and his credibility would have been shot down. Knowing prominent people such as Bill Gates are endorsing his book, gives a lot of credibility to Kurzweil. But were these predictions truly insightful predictions that only he could make? Let's see. .
He predicted that a computer will defeat a Chess champion around 1998, and he was darn close as computer beat him by 1997. It's amazing that he predicted he was only off by one year, but I think anyone would have guessed that this was just a matter of time. There are only set number of moves in chess, and if you have a computer foresee all the moves ahead, then it will win.