Ben Goertzel, the Brazilian-born, U.S.-trained mathematician, is an academic and entrepreneur focused on the big thoughts of our age: intelligent machines, life extension, uploading brain content, etc. He guesses the Singularity will happen this century (I would bet the over), but in general speaks of amazing things that are theoretically possible without stamping an overly aggressive ETA on them. He’s certainly right in saying that AI is going to be developed no matter what, so it’s best as many conscientious people as possible are involved in that process.

Goertzel lives part of the time in Hong Kong, and here’s a piece of a South China Morning Post Magazine article by Sarah Lazarus in which he discusses his ideas:

MANUFACTURING EVIL All new technologies come with potential risks and rewards. Since the beginning of humanity, we have pushed forwards regardless. When we switched from hunter-gathering to agriculture, when we created the industrial revolution, we had no idea whether these transformations would bring danger. It’s the same with AI. The worst possible outcomes are extremely dark. This does worry me – I don’t want to see my kids disassembled so their molecules can be used to make more hard-drive space for machines. The best possible outcomes are utopic and amazing. I have a research team called iCog Labs, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. When I visit, it seems like half the people live on the street, suffering from hunger and disease. If we can resolve these problems with AI, by making it so cheap to create material wealth that, even with our perverted economic system, everyone has enough to get by and be happy, that’s a big plus. AI will be created whether I’m involved or not. I hope to have a positive impact on how it’s used – to my mind it’s better that the work’s done by people who want to benefit the planet, than by people in a top-secret military project.

ACHIEVING IMMORTALITY I work on AI for various companies. The range of applications is huge. I’m collaborating with Hanson Robotics to create robots that look and think like humans, and with investment management firm Aidyia Holdings, which uses AI to outperform human traders on the stock market. I’m also interested in life extension. I remember realising, at a very young age, that everyone was going to die one day. I couldn’t understand why others just accepted this. It seemed like a really bad idea to me. I’ve signed up to have my body transported to a facility in Arizona and frozen, if I die. When the technology’s ready, I will be brought back to life. Ideally, though, we’ll find a cure for ageing before I die. The best way would be to build a superhuman thinking machine and let it solve all the hard science problems.

I can’t resist seeing what the current technology can do. I’m working with a team to compare the DNA of supercentenarians – people who have lived to 110 years or more – with the DNA of people who lived to 80. We’ve found specific genes we think are responsible for their longevity and we’re applying for patents. The question is, can you edit the DNA of an adult human to give them that capability?•