Transcription
We may be able to alter ourselves to
create ourselves to populate the
universe. The question [music] of
immortality
is on the table. We may exist in a world
where artificial intelligence is [music]
the norm. It will be able to manipulate
matter, manipulate energy, manipulate
life itself in a way that we would
consider to be magic. Instead of trying
to readapt Mars, why not readapt
ourselves? This is science fiction, but
it's possible.
>> The This is World Channel is partnered
with IQM, one of the world's largest
quantum computing companies. Let's say
that one day you allowed to meet your
ancestor. Your ancestor who lived a few
hundred years from now and you were to
talk to your ancestor about airplanes,
about rockets, about computers, what
would your ancestor think? Your ancestor
would think you're crazy. What? Images
from the ether? What? Journeying to the
moon? What? Computers that can calculate
a million times faster than the human
brain. What are you talking about? So
our ancestors would think that we live
in a world of science fiction. We live
in a world of trains and rockets and and
atomic bombs that our ancestors would
think is impossible. So if we were to
visit one of our children, our great
great great grandchildren a few hundred
years from now, what would we think of
them?
You see, our answers would think of us
being wizards. Wizards that can create
images out of nowhere. Image wizards
that can communicate around the world
instantaneously.
That's what our ancestor would think of
us, that we are wizards. What would we
think of our children's children's
children?
We would think of them as being gods.
And so, in other words, the world of the
future is a world similar to mythology,
a world of the gods.
So, our great great great grandkids,
they will live in a world where we can
control life. where we can control
matter and energy, things that are
impossible today, but is the play thing
of God's
>> uncontrolled reality. That's our future.
>> That could be it. That we would be able
to control reality, control life,
control matter. We would think of that
today as the world of magicians and and
voodoo artists, but that could be the
world of our great great grandkids. I
think a 100 years from now, our
descendants will live like the Greek
gods of the ancient times. They will be
able to manipulate matter, manipulate
energy, manipulate life itself in a way
that we would consider to be magic. we
would be able to manipulate our genome.
Today we can manipulate our genome one
gene at a time. In the future, we'll be
able to manipulate our genome perhaps as
an entire quantity, not just one gene at
a time and able therefore to alter the
course of life itself. So in other
words, instead of using this technology
to heal, to be able to cure diseases, we
may be able to alter ourselves
to create ourselves to populate the
universe. In other words, we may
ultimately change the destiny of the
human race itself. For example, if we
colonize Mars,
realize that Mars has a different
gravitational field, different
atmosphere, different temperature.
Instead of trying to readapt Mars, why
not readapt ourselves
to remodify ourselves so that we can
survive in these environments around the
universe? And so instead of looking at
planets with hostile environments, why
not alter ourselves so that we can
survive in these? This is science
fiction, but it's possible. One of the
great frontiers is the human brain.
Throughout history, the human brain was
basically a black box. And just
recently, we're beginning to understand
that there are mechanical analoges to
the thinking process. And eventually
we'll realize that the brain is in part
quantum mechanical and this is where
quantum computers come in. Quantum
computers already exist and they in some
sense compute somewhat similar to what
the human brain would compute if it's
quantum mechanical. The digital world is
deterministic. The digital world is
Newtonian.
But a quantum computer
exists in a world of quantum mechanics.
It exists in a world of infinite states.
And these already exist. We have quantum
computers. They're not ready for prime
time yet. But the ones that we've built
so far are millions of times more
powerful than any digital computer
today. The problem is they can only work
on one problem at a time. They're not
allpurpose like a digital computer
today. Can add, subtract, do many things
simultaneously. A quantum computer can
only do one quantum mechanical operation
at a given time. But they are in
principle millions of times more
powerful than any digital computer. And
many people think that could be the
future. The future is when we have
quantum computers that are millions of
times more powerful than anything on
your desktop today. And so we're talking
about a new era where we can change
ourselves. Now this means that the
question of immortality
is on the table. There are two kinds of
immortality.
One is digital immortality and one is
organic immortality.
Digital immortality is when you create a
clone of yourself that is mechanical
that has basically many of your
memories, thought patterns and looks
like you. And the first generation of
these digital immortals has already
existed.
What we do is we create a a image of
yourself
that moves and talks and you talk to
this image and this image is accessed as
a tape recorder that has interview you
and got your entire biography.
This was done with William Shatner of
Star Trek fame. For several days, he was
interviewed about his life, his ideas,
his thoughts, his history, and it was
put into an image of him that will live
forever. So this is digital immortality.
Something which is attainable today in
fact rather primitive today but it's
possible to attain digital immortality
so that you can have a conversation with
your great great great great great
grandkids about life in the 21st
century. Digital immortality is when you
can keep your secrets to yourself
because what you do is you speak in
front of a tape recorder that creates an
image of you talking in real time and
people asking you questions and you
answering them. So digital immortality
is something that is attainable today
and it would make your thoughts visible
forever and you would be able to have a
conversation with your great great great
great great grandkids. Okay. But if you
have secrets, you can keep your secrets
to yourself. So your secrets will die
with you. The other kind of immortality
is much more difficult and that is
organic immortality that your physical
being lives forever. And there have been
several proposals for this. One proposal
is to basically digitize the brain
itself.
You take a brain of a mosquito or a fly
and you can clone it and you can create
a copy of it and dissect it. This has
been done already. The world's record
for for uh dissecting the brain of an
insect is 100,000. A 100,000 neurons
will allow you to dissect neuron for
neuron the brain of an insect. Our brain
has a 100 billion neurons, not just a
100,000 neurons. But it's only a matter
of time before we can digitize the human
brain itself.
Not just a 100,000 neurons, but a 100
billion neurons. That's one way to do
it. Another way to do it is to place
yourself on a stretcher
and sitting next to you is a robot.
>> Mhm. When the brain is then exposed
neuron for neuron, another duplicate is
created inside the robot.
And then these neurons are then hooked
up to each other one by one. Now of
course this is possible but not
practical with today's technology. We
cannot manipulate neuron for neuron the
architecture of the human brain. But
that's a technical problem.
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>> So we're talking about putting the
putting the brain into a computer or a
computer into a brain and so the two
become the same. Basically this is all
possible and it's been looked at. Of
course, it would take centuries for us
to be able to do this process, but it's
possible. We can now connect the human
brain to a laptop computer and have the
laptop computer execute many, many
patterns that are considered to be
humanlike. This has been done because
there have been so many GIs wounded in
Afghanistan and Iraq that the United
States military has made it a priority
to have these heroes of warfare
uh be able to control a computer
>> so they can walk, they can talk, they
can they can perform many human
functions even though they are
functionally paralyzed. And so this is
this is progress today that using
computers it's possible to interface the
human brain with the laptop computer
which in turn can control your
movements. Quick heads up. The tech Mio
is describing is being built right now
by Paradmics, the company we just
hosted. Here's a short excerpt.
Perodomics builds high data rate brain
computer interfaces which are
essentially modems that connect brains
to computers. So I have one in my pocket
today. This is an example of a high data
rate brain computer interface. You can
place it on the surface of the brain. It
has 421 platinum micro wires and these
wires can record from individual
neurons. So why is that interesting?
Well, for someone who's lost the ability
to speak, lost the ability to move, uh
they have signals in their brain that
are trying to tell their body what to
do. They're trying to direct their
mouth, their tongue, and their larynx to
produce speech, or they're trying to
direct the hands to move, but the
signals don't make it from the brain to
the body, but they're still there. So,
if you take a device like this and you
place it in an area of the brain called
the motor cortex, you can allow people
who have lost the ability to speak to
speak again through a computer. Watch
the full interview with Matt Angel on
our channel.
>> This was done for the Olympics. The
Olympics that took place in S. Paulo,
Brazil a few years ago was initiated by
a man who was totally paralyzed. Here
was a man totally paralyzed. He was put
into a skeleton, a digital skeleton that
was connected to his brain. Therefore,
he was able to stand up and walk. He was
totally paralyzed. But by thinking he
was able to control the exoskeleton
which would allow him to walk and he
initiated the World Cup soccer games in
S. Paulo, Brazil, even though he was
totally paralyzed. Now that's today. In
the future, we could become Supermen or
Superwomen. Well, right now we're at the
early stages of this. uh all we can do
is take paralyzed people and give them
back the gift of movement. That's today.
In the future, we may be able to give
them super movements. That is the
ability to create to move things that
only a a robot could create. In other
words, these people would be superhuman.
And one possibility is that these
superhumans would then colonize Mars and
begin to colonize the universe because
they are superhuman in their physique.
>> Upgraded version of us.
>> That's right. Now this is possible I
think within a 100 years or so. Now
let's take it to a thousand years.
How could we then explore the universe a
thousand years from now?
I think it's possible that at that point
we'll be able to digitize ourselves,
put our thinking process into software,
put the software into a rocket and shoot
the rocket throughout the universe.
Once the rocket lands on the moon, it
then hooks up to an exoskeleton
and thereby allowing you to control an
exoskeleton
on the moon.
You can also shoot these exoskeletons
throughout the universe
and therefore be able to explore the
universe mentally by shooting your
consciousness throughout the universe.
Now this of course is not possible for a
few hundred years
>> and living forever.
>> Your biological body may have a finite
lifespan unless of course we can figure
out organic immortality in which case we
can replace organs as they wear out. So
organs as they wear out may be replaced
to give you organic immortality.
And this organic immortality may allow
you to control a robot that could then
be shot throughout the universe
and you could then begin to colonize the
universe
perhaps near near the speed of light.
All of this is well within the laws of
physics beyond our capabilities today
but I think possible.
>> Do you believe that we can ever create a
consciousness machine? It depends on how
you define consciousness.
There's no unified theory of
consciousness at the present time.
However, I do think it's possible to
create an object that can size up its
position, understand its location,
understand its position in the universe
and initiate conversations with you. Is
that consciousness? I don't know.
There's no definition of consciousness
that is universally accepted. Get a
dictionary, look up the word
consciousness, and you realize that
there's no uniform agreement as to what
it is. But I think in the future, it may
be possible to create a machine that is
aware, aware of itself, aware of its
surroundings, aware of who is out there,
and communicate, ask questions, interact
with other beings. I think that is
possible.
>> How this ordinary day could look like
>> a day when what time period?
>> In 2050.
>> The question that is often asked is
okay, if you're a scientist, then
predict the future. Tell me what the
future is going to look like. Well,
first of all, I don't know what the
future's going to look like. But what I
can say is I think that we can make
educated guesses. educated guesses
because we know the trajectory of
physics and chemistry. You see, our
ancestors lived in a world of magic, a
world of witchcraft. There were no
rules. There was no equations, no
principles to guide them. Today, we have
the principles, we have the equations,
we have the framework. That doesn't mean
we can accurately predict the future,
but we can make intelligent guesses. So
for example computers we would know that
computers will be quantum mechanical
and as a consequence they would be
millions of times more powerful than
what we have today and therefore
artificial intelligence could become a
of a reality in which case we may exist
in a world where artificial intelligence
is the norm. The This is World Channel
is partnered with IQM, one of the
world's largest quantum computing
companies.