Kurzweil: Yes, there’s Bill McKibben -- have you ever heard about this phenomenon called global warming? Well, he coined the term. He has a book called Enough, where he says we should not pursue more GNR – that’s genetics, nanotech, robotics. He argues for the relinquishment view, and says, “Let’s relinquish these new technologies, they’re too dangerous.”
That’s not a view I can accept, for three reasons. One, it would deprive us of all the benefits, like curing cancer. One of the questions I ask him is, “If you really want to stop global warming and wean us from fossil fuels, and (technological progress) is the only way to do it, would you give it up?” Second, it would require an authoritarian system to implement such a drastic change. Third, it wouldn’t work, it would just drive the technology underground.
WN: OK, that’s the A-line. What’s the narrative you use for a B-line?
Kurzweil: The narrative story is an outgrowth of the Ramona Project, which I started in the year 2000. I gave a presentation at TED 2001 (the Technology Entertainment Design conference) -- the theme was that in virtual reality you can be someone else.
I turned myself into a computer avatar named Ramona. I had magnetic sensors in my clothing, picking up all my motions and sending the data to Ramona, who followed my movements in real time. My voice was turned into Ramona's voice, so it looked like she was giving the presentation. I was standing next to the screen, so people could see what was happening. A band came onstage, and I sang two songs: “White Rabbit,” and a song I wrote called “Come Out and Play.” Then my daughter came out, who was 14 at the time, and she was turned into a male backup dancer. Her avatar was in the form of Richard Saul Wurman, the impresario of the conference. He’s kind of a heavyset gentleman, not known for his hip-hop kicks, so it was quite a show.
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