The Singularity is Near

okay so this past few days i have been noticing more and more info on microsoft’s Origami, the so called “ultra-mobile pc” designed to aide you anywhere and everywhere…

all the time… always…

cool.

so in the course of reading more about what the plans are for this device i stumbled on a left-handed reference to “The Singularity”… an term i had stumbled upon some years ago whilst still blissfully in my interment in academia that predicts an upcoming ‘event horizon” or major paradigm shift in the course of human evolution so drastic that no currently available model of the future will be able to predict what happens next…

intrigued, i sought out more info.

this in turn led me to one of the greatest minds of our time, Raymond Kurzweil. this man’s list of accolades and achievements are too long to list here but suffice to say he is more than a just a genius(he has eleven doctorates for god’s sake! eleven! now granted some of them are honorary, but still! eleven!!). his ideas and theories in regards to the exponential growth of technology as it relates to human evolution is unfathomably interesting/exciting whilst being simultaneously (and equally) scary…. i have not been more excited ever, to read anything as i am to read this man’s books.

anyways i just got up to chapter 3 in his 3rd book “The Age of Spiritual Machines” literally can put it down… he is a gifted author, not only capable of expressing his ideas and thoughts in a meaningful and easily understandable manner but also does so by truly engaging the reader with playful, albeit sometimes left-handed, use of humor and dry wit.

i am urging everyone who has any interest in computers or technology on any level to go out and grab it. definitely a more than a worth-while endeavor. i got the book from Borders for about sixteen bucks. hey if you can’t spare that, i am sure your local library will carry a copy of works form such a prolific and influential author.

i'll comment more on his writings as I finish more chapters so please go read it…

mel out-