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The Silicon Rapture: Close Encounters with Artificial Intelligence and The Singularity [Kindle Edition]

Adam Pez
3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)

Print List Price: $9.99
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Book Description

Will our children be ‘uploaded’ into digital immortality in the next 30 years? Could a rogue artificial intelligence burst into near-omniscience and take over the world?

According to some academics and Silicon Valley visionaries—among them artificial intelligence (AI) pioneer and Google director of engineering Ray Kurzweil—the answer is: maybe.

The Silicon Rapture follows author Adam Pez into the big, weird questions of the Singularity: a predicted and possibly inevitable future when humanity and AI fuse into an entity of godlike proportions.

What is Singularity University, and what is the Machine Intelligence Research Institute? Should we applaud the time and money both are pouring into their respective projects, or should we proclaim "war to the death" against intelligent machines, as Samuel Butler urged us 150 years ago?

In this captivating read Pez introduces the history (and potential future) of AI, meets with the inventor of RoboCup, and sifts visionaries from crackpots on his quest to understand the meaning and likelihood of a ‘silicon rapture.’


Product Details

  • File Size: 203 KB
  • Print Length: 66 pages
  • Publisher: Nonvella Publishing Inc. (May 11, 2014)
  • Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
  • Language: English
  • ASIN: B00KA1PIIS
  • Text-to-Speech: Enabled
  • X-Ray:
  • Lending: Enabled
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,277,840 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
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Customer Reviews

3.8 out of 5 stars
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3.8 out of 5 stars
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars Beginner's guide to the future June 23, 2014
Format:Kindle Edition
The existence of the Singularity movement is an obvious fact to those who run in Silicon Valley circles. Those of us on the outside, especially who deal with technology as an inevitable fact of modern life, would do well to heed the warnings and personalities presented in this book.

Adam Pez moves from technology to biology in an effort to illustrate how the intelligence explosion forecasted by Singularitarians (whether it in fact happens or not), is deeply embedded in all aspects of human existence as we know it. Pez is merciful with the uninitiated reader as well, treading the ground of recondite academia with lithe word painting and humorous asides.

It's worth the price of a McDonald's muffin to meet some of the ideas and personalities that are responsible for our collective desires and decisions as we enter into an uncertain accord with our technological future. Allow Pez to make the introduction.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Worthwhile June 11, 2014
By Meg M.
Format:Kindle Edition
Pez' Silicon Rapture is an entertaining deep dive into the personalities and peculiarities that make up the world of the Singularity disciple. Written from an outsider's perspective, with a healthy dose of skepticism, his intelligent and witty assessment of the movement and some of its key proponents (and opponents) is both humorous and thought-provoking.

An honest and searching introduction to the Singularity, its history and context, as well as a poetic exploration into the denial of death underlying this religion of technology. Well worth the modest fee of admission.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Kindle Edition
Informative,very well written. A complex subject that I've not read about before so appreciated the author's clarity.
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0 of 2 people found the following review helpful
1.0 out of 5 stars 1 star May 19, 2014
Format:Kindle Edition|Verified Purchase
Author had nothing new to say. Same old rehash of what I have read a hundred times. Not worth paying for.
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