Rhetorical Analysis “2045: The Year Man Becomes Immortal”
Lev Grossman writes of a topic anybody can relate to, it sparks the interest of children and adults alike… The future. With the help of Raymond Kurzweil, a world renowned technologist, Grossman illustrates the future in a way that might shock some people. His approaches vary from delivering scientific fact, historical evidence, and scientific predictions. He brings in Kurzweil to lend a voice of professionalism and bring experience to the table. He also stirs up a wide variety of emotions during the article, by illustrating a radically different future including the continuity of the human race as we know it. He doesn’t try to keep the entire article from being entirely dull and formal, and he does include some humor and references to science fiction media.
The article focuses on an event called “The Singularity”, a hypothetical event in technological development where the rate at which new technology is created and intelligence is increased, is so rapid that it is very difficult to comprehend. Grossman presents a great deal of evidence to show that the singularity is coming. He shows that the rate of improved technology production is increasing exponentially, meaning that not only are engineers creating better things, but they are creating these improvements at faster and faster rates, improvement is accelerating. Kurzweil uses two examples of laws used in the development process to logically suggest that the singularity is about 35 years away. Engineers use something called Moore’s Law to decide how to create their new products; they need to synchronize the computing powers of their new product with the predicted power at the date it would be completed. In other words manufacturers need to look into the future to design their products.
Grossman constantly stimulates the imaginations of the reader by illustrating a drastically different future. He uses a variance of the phrase “The end of human civilization” several times in the article. While insinuating about the demise of the human race, or at least the transformation of it, he also suggests that the future developments will open the door to essentially perpetual youth. He quotes Kurzweil as saying “Indefinite life extension becomes a reality; people die only if they choose to. Death loses its sting once and for all”
Because this is a largely hypothetical article, essentially trying to predict the future, it should be understood that the bulk of it uses hypothetical situations, the view of the world after the singularity can be considered either a good or a bad thing. Many people would be uncomfortable with immortality, Grossman writes “"There are people who can accept computers being more intelligent than people," he [Kurzweil] says.”But the idea of significant changes to human longevity — that seems to be particularly controversial.” The reader cannot help but imagine a world where humans live forever, living in a world where machines are unimaginably more intelligent than humans, where those machines create smarter and better machines, and where is would be difficult, if not impossible to tell the difference between a human and a machine.
After placing all this speculation into the minds of those reading the article, he lets is sit for a while and I would think that every reader would have their own version of Earth after the singularity. He then goes on to show the side of those who disagree with the notion of a singularity. Grossman cites biologist Dennis Bray, he says “Although biological components act in ways that are comparable to those in electronic circuits…they are set apart by the huge number of different states they can adopt. Multiple biochemical processes create chemical modifications of protein molecules, further diversified by association with distinct structures at defined locations of a cell. The resulting combinatorial explosion of states endows living systems with an almost infinite capacity to store information regarding past and present conditions and a unique capacity to prepare for future events” Amidst all the technical lingo, and jargon, Dr Bray is saying that a biological cell is far too complex to be replicated by a machine, in fact the current forms of digital processing is simply not compatible with the analog nature of biological processes. This means that no matter how advanced technology will become, it would be impossible to manufacture a cell that would be identical to an organic biological cell.
Grossman also shows us the rebuttal of Kurzweil in response to Dr. Bray. Kurzweil ways “the core of a disagreement I'll have with a critic is, they'll say, Oh, Kurzweil is underestimating the complexity of reverse-engineering of the human brain or the complexity of biology. But I don't believe I'm underestimating the challenge. I think they're underestimating the power of exponential growth." Grossman paints Kurzweil as a monolithic source of information; he uses a quote from Bill Gates saying Kurzweil is “the best person I know at predicting the future of artificial intelligence."
In a more general sense Lev Grossman presents the reader with enormous amounts of data and facts to show us proof of the coming of the singularity. He follows the keystone of the singularity movement, Raymond Kurzweil, and provides more information and opinion from the man who practically formulated the entire process. The Article as a whole is saturated with visions of the future, be it hyper-intelligent computers, androids, inconceivably advanced technology, or human immortality. He suggests repeatedly the downfall of humanity saying “You don't have to be a super-intelligent cyborg to understand that introducing a superior life-form into your own biosphere is a basic Darwinian error.” Overall this is a fun article to read, it allows one’s imagination wander. It could certainly be understood as sensationalist pseudo-science, but there is a good amount of evidence to suggest otherwise.
