Last week, Google announced the hiring of Ray Kurzweil, who will work to solve complex language processing problems, among other things. In an interview last year, Kurzweil pointed out that language processing issues are among the most difficult problems to solve. Kurzweil will join the same company that employs Franz Och, the mastermind behind Google Translate (both were interviewed for my new book, Found in Translation).… read more

Computers that truly understand language. New Google hire and accomplished inventor Ray Kurzweil recently described his “ambitious” current project at the search giant in an interview with Singularity Hub.

Kurzweil is hoping to leverage Google’s massive pool of resources and data to develop technology that would create truly intelligent computers that can understand human language on a deep level. He said that technology will answer our questions… read more

Ray Kurzweil will have implications far beyond the fun projects at Google. His machine learning knowhow could impact networks, data centers and algorithms too.

Google has brought on futurist and artificial intelligence expert Ray Kurzweil as director of engineering, and there could be some real returns on the company’s high-profile hire.In a statement, Kurzweil confirmed that he’d be joining Google. He noted that his interest in… read more

Shares of Google closed at $845.72 in New York today, up almost 2 percent. It’s been a pretty big week for the company. Google Now, a voice-activated search assistant, launched on iPhone this week. And the wearable computer Google Glass has been getting a lot of press.

Pretty much everything Google’s doing is changing the way we think about and get our information. What’s all that… read more

The setting: An intimate gathering at Singularity University’s NASA campus in Silicon Valley. This is the place founded by Dr. Peter Diamandis and Dr. Ray Kurzweil, pursuing the idea of a new university that could “leverage the power of exponential technologies to solve humanity’s grand challenges.” Speaking in an interview is artificial intelligence expert and Google’s new Director of Engineering, Ray Kurzweil.

Now you know this is worth… read more

World-renowned artificial intelligence expert andGoogle’s new Director of Engineering, Ray Kurzweil, wants to build a search engine so sophisticated that it could act like a ‘cybernetic friend,’ who knows users better than they know themselves.

“I envision in some years that the majority of search queries will be answered without you actually asking,” he said at an intimate gathering at Singularity University’s NASA campus. [...]

More positively, breakthroughs in biology, chemistry, physics, and psychology that will create or clone humans who live virtually forever, if they can afford and endure it. Humans who are more machine than human, as Ray Kurzweil explores in his book The Singularity Is Near.

Machines that outthink, outlive, and outmaneuver us at every turn. Siri, anyone? And other events too bizarre to even imagine, but

… read more

Our increasing knowledge of neuroscience may eventually allows us to replicate our brains online. Ronald Bailey reviews Jesse J. Prinz’s Beyond Human Nature and Ray Kurzweil’s How to Create a Mind.

Will our increased understanding of how our brains work allow us to transcend human nature? Yes indeed, say the authors of Beyond Human Nature and How to Create a Mind. In the first book, Jesse… read more

There are few voices in the scientific community that have looked so deep and so far into our humanity. Ray Kurzweil is certainly one of these visionaries.  He recently took the time to provide his perspective on digital health and the evolution of medicine.

From nanobots to life eternal, Kurzweil keeps us thinking and imagining a future that is poised to change with amazing speed and relevance to our everyday… read more