| tim Josling 2008-01-12, 3:55 am |
| On Fri, 11 Jan 2008 20:26:36 +0100, Sebastian Hanigk wrote:
> "Charles Hottel" <chottel@earthlink.net> writes:
> I've brushed up on the author a bit and will get my hands on books, but
> regarding the singularity theory I have my doubts, especially regarding
> the often cited hypothesis of Moore. In my opinion we should expect a
> logistic growth model which will taper of on a certain niveau after a
> rapid growth phase.
> Sebastian
Any exponential growth must eventually taper off. The question is "when".
Kurzweil makes a strong case that the exponential reduction in cost per
calculation has been doing on for at least 130 years, across numerous
technologies: from memory - humans, mechanical, electro-machanical, valves,
transistors, ICs etc.
I would also argue that if the human brain can calculate at X calculations
per second, that suggests that it *is* possible to calculate at that rate.
It does give hope that at least that level of performance is feasible.
Even given current technology, custom circuits can provide a 100X speed-up
for specific tasks, if it comes to that.
Kurzweil's predictions have been quite good over a periof of nearly 20
years, though slightly optimistic on some things. I went over to the
library yesterday to have a look at some of his older books just to check.
The wikipedia article covers this issue to some extent.
On the issue of how to live long enough to live forever, he has change =d
his views on the optimal diet very radically. His initial theory was the
high carb Pritikin/Ornish diet, but lately he has been pushing low-carb
and lots of supplements.
Tim Josling
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