Singularity Is Near

The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology (Viking Penguin, ISBN 0-670-03384-7) is a 2005 update of Raymond Kurzweil's 1999 book, The Age of Spiritual Machines and his 1987 book The Age of Intelligent Machines. In it, as in the two previous versions, Kurzweil attempts to give us a glimpse into what awaits us in the near future. His reasoning rests on the combination of four postulates:

1. That a technological-evolutionary jump known as "the singularity" exists as an achievable goal for humanity.
2. That through a law of accelerating returns, technology is progressing toward the singularity at an exponential rate.
3. That the functionality of the human brain is quantifiable in terms of technology that we can build in the near future.
4. That medical advancements will keep his generation (Baby Boomers) alive long enough for the exponential growth of technology to intersect and surpass the processing of the human brain.