Inventor, author, and futurist Ray Kurzweil discussed his recent book, Fantastic Voyage (co-authored with past C2C guest Terry Grossman, which suggests those alive today can slow down the aging process long enough to reap the rewards of future life-extending technologies.
Kurzweil believes technological and biological advancements will allow people to arrest the aging process within 20 years, and perhaps even reverse it within 30 years. He said scientists have already discovered that by manipulating a gene related to aging, they can cause worms to live 5 times longer than avearge. Kurzweil pointed out that humans are much more complex than worms, but a similar technique could be used to increase human life expectancy.
Kurzweil also talked about his work with Artificial Intelligence (AI). He said we are presently in the era of narrow AI, where computers can only perform niche tasks that people used to do. Kurzweil estimates that machines with the full-range of human-like intelligence will be built by 2029.