Human v2.0 - tonight 9pm BBC2 - woof

Examining predictions that computers will grow as intelligent as humans by 2029, a prophecy known as “the Singularity”. The notion divides the scientific community, who disagree over whether the advance will prove to have a beneficial effect on society, or will spell the destruction of the human race.


I expect all UK Blitzers to watch this tonight. I shall be asking questions later.

I don't have a TV.

Well, I rather suggest you go around to a neighbour and ask if you can sit with them and watch it.

Personally, I have 5 televisons and a PC with with a TV card. I also have 2 tin openers.

It will Probably end up like the Terminator movies but with no time travel.
Optimistic eh?

For those who have not already, you may all now proceed to BBC2.

This is really exciting stuff!

csi, Just found a body under the sand, I think Ill watch that rather than "Daily Mirror" Science of Horizon

Remote control rats for real!!!

This is really quite Frankenstein-like. Very interesting though - I will need volunteers for my own research.

As the monkey showed, future military strikes will be made by robots controlled, from a safe place, by humans.

It amazed me when the monkey realised that it didn't have to move it's arm to control the robotic hand.

This stuff is gripping. Glad I watched it.

"Amon" - you shall be my first 'chimp'. "ENAY" will be my rat - as he already resembles a large rodent.

Is this in America too? Ive heard the theory, and to be honest, its freaks me out. I betcha it could happen. Maybe to many sci-fi shows for me. But if we have it here, I'm checking it out.

Yeh, everything we are watching is US - apart from the Spanish bloke who remote controlled a bull.

That was the only genuinely interesting thing in the program. That and a vaguely interesting, but not really relevant bit of history on the unabomber that I (as a 31 year old Brit) knew virtually nothing about.

Most of it was typical alarmist / hyped nonsense. As with most horizon programs, it could have been covered in about 5 minutes.

Oh, and that quantum computing guy - woah! Where'd they dredge him up from?!? He's watched way too much Beavis and butthead. (For those that haven't seen it, he had a freakish laugh that the program did a rather good job of taking the piss out of).

Dave? Is that you?

"The Age of Spiritual Machines" by Ray Kurzweil pretty much sums up whats going to happen to us in the future...

I'm so glad my life expectancy does not seem likely to extend that far. It was fully chilling, albeit a little fanciful too.

Anyone know where "Amon" and "ENAY" live - I have a rather large can opener for their heads.

Oops, doesn't matter - I know where they live.

pop science = 1 hour programme could be condensed into a 5-10 info download but is fully of scientists cycling to work with "discovery"-type music playing and double helix/universe animations playing with narrator repeating what the scientist just said.

Isn't that the same as Pop Science is in the magazine?

To be honest:
"Examining predictions that humans will grow as
intelligent as computers by 2029"...would make more sense.

As with most horizon programs, it could have been covered in about 5 minutes.'

Agree - once you've taken out the pretty CGI sequences, the shots of the narrator tramping around, the exciting scene transitions with the swooshing, thunderous soundfx, the ad breaks and what you already knew as a relatively well educated human being, you might only learn one of two new things in an hour.

Where as CSI was really good.

Puki,

Yeah? and by 2001 we'll all be living on the moon!

The falacy that any computer/prgoramme will be designed which is as intelligent as a human has been a dream for sdome scientists for many a decade.

Fortunately, as no one knows what intellignece is within the human, no one will be able to solve this. The premise is that a human can devise something which thinks or actas as intelligently as a human is just plain wrong.

It has taken one company something like 10-15 years of research and development to 'teach' (programme) a robot to step up a few stairs, which is really good, don't get me wrong.


IPete2.

yeah I have loads of classic Sci-fi from the 50s and they all believed in super computers that were intelligent etc but it just plain hasn't happened as it really isn't that easy to do...Anyone ever used a speech recognition program that's as good as a 5 year old kid? ... thought so.

Who do you think created the computer in the first place? They can only know what we teach them. Did you mean ALL human beings as an entire race?

I am still waiting on my flying car... by 2001 we will all be flying to work... Where is my flying car? (Moeller does not count!)

I saw something that may have been in a similar vein... SciFi channel had a fluff piece on HOW THE WORLD WILL END... which predicted many ways our world will die... Alarmist nonsense... Though I am still hoping for ROBOT REBELLION as the final solution...

There is no single event that could totally wipe out mankind that mankind could bring onto itself without warning.... and that is it. The only things that could end all human life are things out of this world. Like giant comets and the sun exploding. Even if we detonated all the nukes on earth, small pockets of people would survive and rebuild society... might take thousands of years, it might even restart humanity from the early days... but it wouldn't end all human life.

All these end times predictions are just a replacement for the same old religious ones. They are the modern mythology. They are the warnings we tell our kids to keep them in line.... Nothing more.

I think the funniest thing I saw about stuff like this is a program that was talking about the very same thing. They asked a robotics expert about the chances of machines rebelling and he laughed because he's in his lab trying to get an arm to pick up a ball on it's own without screwing up EVERY TIME!!!

'detonated all the nukes on earth'

I don't know about that - the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists estimates there's about 27,000 intact nuclear warheads, of which 97 percent are in U.S. and Russian stockpiles.

If all those went, I'm not at all sure the planet would still be survivable for humans or become survivable in a timeframe that would allow people ti survive long enough in shelters.