I recently had the pleasure of participating in a discussion with
Ray Kurzweil about the democratization of innovation. The
event was hosted by the MIT Enterprise Forum, and the discussion was moderated by
Simeon Simeonov. This post provides some photos from the event, and some notes. I had a front row seat for the first part of the event, where Ray went through his discussion of exponential processes, and what they mean for humanity. These photos were all taken with an iPhone 3G.
The event began with a few remarks from a long time sponsor of the MIT Enterprise Forum,
Hamilton Brook Smith Reynolds He mentioned that his firm had just won the largest jury award in history on a patent, $1.67 billion. This was meant to impress, and it did. He then gave a shout-out to the patent lawyer who won the case.And here she is standing to take a bow. (I didn't get her name)
Sim Simeonov then gave the overview of the program, and introduced Ray Kurzweil.
A photo of the Eniac computer. These were not available by mail order. They had a significant carbon footprint.
I kinda jumped when this picture came up. I wasn't expecting it.
Ray used the reading machine for the blind as bookends for his talk. The original machine was the size of a washing machine. Later, he demonstrated a portable unit that is based on a cell phone.
Ray used a series of graphs plotted on a log scale. Any straight line means an exponential growth pattern. This phone industry graph is interesting because the growth in phone calls in 1890 was astronomical, and then "leveled off" to exponential growth, going from about 40 million per day in 1900 to about 400 billion calls per day in 2000. (as I read the graph from the photo)
This graph shows how many years of use it took for major innovations to be used by 1/4 of the US population. It shows that major innovations are spreading to the broad population in much less time than before.
This slide is Ray's "and then the world changes" slide, but he didn't focus on it heavily. In Ray's books, he postulates that advances in electronics, medical scanning, and nanotechnology are all moving on an inexorable exponential curve, and within 40 years technology will be so advanced that it can actually "host" a brain, and become a carrier and propagator of human spirit. In other words, in 40 years or so, the avalanche of technological change will mean that humans will have a choice of how they wish to propagate their spirit and their species. Personally, I believe that DNA has many, many tricks up its sleeve, and won't reveal nearly enough of its secrets to us in 40 years that we could ever consider replacing it. I believe that 40 years from now, stock in DNA-based creatures will be as strong as ever. At the same time, I also agree with Ray's point that exponential growth in multiple areas will lead to technological change that we can barely imagine today.
This graph was the second of two. I didn't capture the first. But they both show the rate of technological change. Ray plotted major paradigm shifts throughout history, and when they occurred. They came out linear on this log plot, which means it is an exponential curve. He then quietly mentioned that people criticized him that he might have picked the shifts that matched his desired curve. So he put up this slide that plots paradigm shifts from 15 sources. Ah, this was an MIT moment. It's a big lecture hall with blackboards, and here is the graph that seems really, really hard to refute. Edward Tufte would be proud.
This one is a really basic graph. We probably did this in 8th grade. Linear vs. exponential graphs. But I learned something new. Ray pointed out that early on in an exponential process, things can appear to be linear. But if you wait a while, the two curves diverge greatly. His point is that technology is usually on an exponential curve, and you need to plan for that, even in the early days. I don't think I'll forget that point.
Ray then pointed out that each individual technology levels off eventually, but then another technology takes its place. Taken together, the exponential growth continues over decades and centuries.
This is an example of a century of growth, but with many different technologies.
Costs drop exponentially.
Bits shipped grows exponentially. (Luckily they don't require any fixed volume, or we'd be in trouble!)
And here we have the computer beginning to match the power of a human brain, at 10 to the 26th calculations per second. (Well, we don't do that, but our brain architecture is so rich that Ray estimates how many raw cycles are needed to match our mental capabilities.)
Ray spoke for about an hour in a very gentle, persuasive tone. He makes his case step by step, and with lots of interesting data behind his points. As an engineer, though, it was fascinating and frightening at the same time. He basically said that we are going to make so much progress, so quickly, that it won't take long before we're faced with fundamental decisions about what does it mean to be alive. Frankly, I'm hoping it will all take way longer than that. Perhaps technology can be enjoyed, more like art, for centuries to come.
Ray ended his talk with a demonstration of his newest invention, a portable reader for the blind. The white device has a camera in it. He aimed it at the printed page. It captured the photo, recognized the text, and began speaking. This got the audience to applaud.
Then, it became clear that Ray likes to drive his point ALL the way home. He aimed it at some Spanish text. It recognized that and spoke it in Spanish. Then he asked it for an English translation, and it was instantly provided. More applause, and very well deserved. It was a very impressive talk, and a great technology demonstration.
After Ray's talk, Sim led a discussion between me, Ray, and the audience, about the future of technology and innovation. It was a very lively discussion. After the event, the discussion continued at the 4th floor bar in the Stata Center.
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