The Singularity Is Near

A new book by Ray Kurzweil, the guy behind the legendary essay The Law Of Accelerating Returns, is coming out.

After The Age Of Spiritual Machines: When Computers Exceed Human Intelligence, we can now look forward to The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology.

In this book, Ray writes some more about his already wellknown views about how humanity is about to merge with its own technology, thereby transcending our biological limits and launching ourselves into a transhuman / posthuman era.

Here's what Bill Gates has to say about Ray Kurzweil:

Ray Kurzweil is the best person I know at predicting the future of artificial intelligence. His intriguing new book envisions a future in which information technologies have advanced so far and fast that they enable humanity to transcend its biological limitations--transforming our lives in ways we can't yet imagine.

- Bill Gates

I'm thinking about getting it. Even though Ray's views are, in my opinion, nowhere near as realistic as those of the Singularity Institute for AI (who predict the Singularity will occur way sooner than 2045), I still find his writings to be inspiring.