Singularity Hub

Create an AI on Your Computer

Written on May 28, 2009 – 11:48 am | by Aaron Saenz |

If many hands make light work, then maybe many computers can make an artificial brain. That’s the basic reasoning behind Intelligence Realm’s Artificial Intelligence project. By reverse engineering the brain through a simulation spread out over many different personal computers, Intelligence Realm hopes to create an AI from the ground-up, one neuron at a time. The first waves of simulation are already proving successful, with over 14,000 computers used and 740 billion neurons modeled. Singularity Hub managed to snag the project’s leader, Ovidiu Anghelidi, for an interview: see the full text at the end of this article.

The ultimate goal of Intelligence Realm is to create an AI or multiple AIs, and use these intelligences in scientific endeavors. By focusing on the human brain as a prototype, they can create an intelligence that solves problems and “thinks” like a human. This is akin to the work done at FACETS that Singularity Hub highlighted some weeks ago. The largest difference between Intelligence Realm and FACETS is that Intelligence Realm is relying on a purely simulated/software approach.

Which sort of makes Intelligence Realm similar to the Blue Brain Project that Singularity Hub also discussed. Both are computer simulations of neurons in the brain, but Blue Brain’s ultimate goal is to better understand neurological functions, while Intelligence Realm is seeking to eventually create an AI. In either case, to successfully simulate the brain in software alone, you need a lot of computing power. Blue Brain runs off a high-tech supercomputer, a resource that’s pretty much exclusive to that project. Even with that impressive commodity, Blue Brain is hitting the limit of what it can simulate. There’s too much to model for just one computer alone, no matter how powerful. Intelligence Realm is using a distributed computing solution. Where one computer cluster alone may fail, many working together may succeed. Which is why Intelligence Realm is looking for help.

The AI system project is actively recruiting, with more than 6700 volunteers answering the call. Each volunteer runs a small portion of the larger simulation on their computer(s) and then ships the results back to the main server. BOINC, the Berkeley built distributed computing software that makes it all possible, manages the flow of data back and forth. It’s the same software used for SETI’s distributed computing processing. Joining the project is pretty simple: you just download BOINC, some other data files, and you’re good to go. You can run the simulation as an application, or as part of your screen saver.

Baby Steps

So, 6700 volunteers, 14,000 or so platforms, 740 billion neurons, but what is the simulated brain actually thinking? Not a lot at the moment. The same is true with the Blue Brain Project, or FACETS. Simulating a complex organ like the brain is a slow process, and the first steps are focused on understanding how the thing actually works. Inputs (Intelligence Realm is using text strings) are converted into neuronal signals, those signals are allowed to interact in the simulation and the end state is converted back to an output. It’s a time and labor (computation) intensive process. Right now, Intelligence Realm is just building towards simple arithmetic.

Which is definitely a baby step, but there are more steps ahead. Intelligence Realm plans on learning how to map numbers to neurons, understanding the kind of patterns of neurons in your brain that represent numbers, and figuring out basic mathematical operators (addition, subtraction, etc). From these humble beginnings, more complex reasoning will emerge. At least, that’s the plan.

Intelligence Realm isn’t just building some sort of biophysical calculator. Their brain is being designed so that it can change and grow, just like a human brain. They’ve focused on simulating all parts of the brain (including the lower reasoning sections) and increasing the plasticity of their model. Right now it’s stumbling towards knowing 1+1 = 2. Even with linear growth they hope that this same stumbling intelligence will evolve into a mental giant. It’s a monumental task, though, and there’s no guarantee it will work. Building artificial intelligence is probably one of the most difficult tasks to undertake, and this early in the game, it’s hard to see if the baby steps will develop into adult strides. The simulation process may not even be the right approach. It’s a valuable experiment for what it can teach us about the brain, but it may never create an AI. A larger question may be, do we want it to?

Knock, Knock…It’s Inevitability

With the newest Terminator movie out, it’s only natural to start worrying about the dangers of artificial intelligence again. Why build these things if they’re just going to hunt down Christian Bale? For many, the threats of artificial intelligence make it seem like an effort of self-destructive curiosity. After all, from Shelley’s Frankenstein Monster to Adam and Eve, Western civilization seems to believe that creations always end up turning on their creators.

AI, however, promises rewards as well as threats. Problems in chemistry, biology, physics, economics, engineering, and astronomy, even questions of philosophy could all be helped by the application of an advanced AI. What’s more, as we seek to upgrade ourselves through cybernetics and genetic engineering, we will become more artificial. In the end, the line between artificial and natural intelligence may be blurred to a point that AIs will seem like our equals, not our eventual oppressors. However, that’s not a path that everyone will necessarily want to walk down.

Will AI and Humans learn to co-exist?

The nature of distributed computing and BOINC allow you to effectively vote on whether or not this project will succeed. Intelligence Realm will eventually need hundred of thousands if not millions of computing platforms to run their simulations. If you believe that AI deserves a chance to exist, give them a hand and recruit others. If you think we’re building our own destroyers, then don’t run the program. In the end, the success or failure of this project may very well depend on how many volunteers are willing to serve as mid-wives to a new form of intelligence.

Before you make your decision though, make sure to read the following interview. As project leader, Ovidiu Anghelidi is one of the driving minds behind reverse engineering the brain and developing the eventual AI that Intelligence Realm hopes to build. He’s didn’t mean for this to be a recruiting speech, but he makes some good points:

SH: Hello. Could you please start by giving yourself and your project a brief introduction?

OA: Hi. My name is Ovidiu Anghelidi and I am working on a distributed computing project involving thousands of computers in the field of artificial intelligence. Our goal is to develop a system that can perform automated research.

What drew you to this project?

During my adolescence I tried understanding the nature of question. I used extensively questions as a learning tool. That drove me to search for better understanding methods. After looking at all kinds of methods, I kinda felt that understanding creativity is a worthier pursuit. Applying various methods of learning and understanding is a fine job, but finding outstanding solutions requires much more than that. For a short while I tried understanding how creativity is done and what exactly is it. I found out that there is not much work done on this subject, mainly because it is an overlapping concept. The search for creativity led me to the field of AI. Because one of the past presidents of the American Association of Artificial Intelligence dedicated an entire issue to this subject I started pursuing that direction. I looked into the field of artificial intelligence for a couple of years and at some point I was reading more and more papers that touched the subject of cognition and brain so I looked briefly into neuroscience. After I read an introductory book about neuroscience, I realized that understanding brain mechanisms is what I should have done all along, for the past 20 years. To this day I am pursuing this direction.

What’s your time table for success? How long till we have a distributed AI running around using your system?

I have been working on this project for about 3 years now, and I estimate that we will need another 7–8 years to finalize the project. Nonetheless we do not need that much time to be able to use some its features. I expect to have some basic features that work within a couple of months. Take for example the multiple simulations feature. If we want to pursue various directions in different fields (i.e. mathematics, biology, physics) we will need to set up a simulation for each field. But we do not need to get to the end of the project, to be able to run single simulations.

Do you think that Artificial Intelligence is a necessary step in the evolution of intelligence? If not, why pursue it? If so, does it have to happen at a given time?

I wouldn’t say necessary, because we don’t know what we are evolving towards. As long as we do not have the full picture from beginning to end, or cases from other species to compare our history to, we shouldn’t just assume that it is necessary.

We should pursue it with all our strength and understanding because soon enough it can give us a lot of answers about ourselves and this Universe. By soon I mean two or three decades. A very short time span, indeed. Artificial Intelligence will amplify a couple of orders of magnitude our research efforts across all disciplines.

In our case it is a natural extension. Any species that reaches a certain level of intelligence, at some point in time, they would start replicating and extending their natural capacities in order to control their environment. The human race did that for the last couple thousands of years, we tried to replicate and extend our capacity to run, see, smell and touch. Now it reached thinking. We invented vehicles, television sets, other devices and we are now close to have artificial intelligence.

What do you think are important short term and long term consequences of this project?

We hope that in short term we will create some awareness in regards to the benefits of artificial intelligence technology. Longer term it is hard to foresee.

How do you see Intelligence Realm interacting with more traditional research institutions? (Universities, peer reviewed Journals, etc)

Well…, we will not be able to provide full details about the entire project because we are pursuing a business model, so that we can support the project in the future, so there is little chance of a collaboration with a University or other research institution. Down the road, as we we will be in an advanced stage with the development, we will probably forge some collaborations. For the time being this doesn’t appear feasible. I am open to collaborations but I can’t see how that would happen.

I submitted some papers to a couple of journals in the past, but I usually receive suggestions that I should look at other journals, from other fields. Most of the work in artificial intelligence doesn’t have neuroscience elements and the work in neuroscience contains little or no artificial intelligence elements. Anyway, I need no recognition.

Why should someone join your project? Why is this work important?

If someone is interested in artificial intelligence it might help them having a different view on the subject and seeing what components are being developed over time. I can not tell how important is this for someone else. On a personal level, I can say that because my work is important to me and by having an AI system I will be able to get answers to many questions, I am working on that. Artificial Intelligence will provide exceptional benefits to the entire society.

What should someone do who is interested in joining the simulation? What can someone do if they can’t participate directly? (Is there a “write-your-congressman” sort of task they could help you with?)

If someone is interested in joining the project they need to download the Boinc client from the http://boinc.berkeley.edu site and then attach to the project using the master Url for this project, http://www.intelligencerealm.com/aisystem. We appreciate the support received from thousands of volunteers from all over the world.

If someone can’t participate directly I suggest to him/her to keep an open mind about what AI is and how it can benefit them. He or she should also try to understand its pitfalls.

There is no write-your-congressman type of task. Mass education is key for AI success. This project doesn’t need to be in the spotlight.

What is the latest news?

We reached 14,000 computers and we simulated over 740 billion neurons. We are working on implementing a basic hippocampal model for learning and memory.

Anything else you want to tell us?

If someone considers the development of artificial intelligence impossible or too far into the future to care about, I can only tell him or her, “Embrace the inevitable”. The advances in the field of neuroscience are increasing rapidly. Scientists are thorough.

Understanding its benefits and pitfalls is all that is needed.

Thank you for your time and we look forward to covering Intelligence Realm as it develops further.

Thank you for having me.

Over the next few months, these 6 events will bring together patients, researchers, doctors, and health enthusiasts. Discussions, partnerships, and innovations will emerge. Keep your eye on these, and attend if you can!

1. TEDMED — October 27–30, http://www.tedmed.com
The medical version of the legendary TED conferences. From the TEDMED site: “The fifth in a series created by Marc Hodosh and Richard Saul Wurman, TEDMED celebrates conversations that demonstrate the intersection and connections between all things medical and healthcare related: from personal health to public health, devices to design and Hollywood to the hospital.” This year’s speakers include Dean Kamen, Craig Venter, Sanjay Gupta and Goldie Hawn..

2. Transform — September 13–15, http://centerforinnovation.mayo.edu/transform
A collaborative symposium at The Mayo Clinic Center for Innovation. From the Transform site: “Transform brings together a dynamic group of speakers and participants from inside and outside the health care industry to explore the intersections between human experience, health care delivery and new business models. Join us to imagine and create innovative ways to deliver a better health care experience in a 21st century world.”

3. Health 2.0 — October 6–7, http://www.health2con.com
Next-generation health companies and patient advocates converge. From the Health 2.0 site: “With more than a hundred speakers and hundreds of new healthcare demos and technologies on display on stage and in the exhibit hall, you’ll get a sweeping overview of the ways that information technology and the web are changing healthcare in areas from online search to health focused online communities and social networks.”

4. Web Strategies for Health Communication — July 19–24, http://webstrategiesforhealth.com
A new course by Dr. Lisa Gualtieri at Tufts University School of Medicine. From the Web Strategies site: “The Summer Institute on Web Strategies for Health Communication covers how to develop and implement a Web strategy to drive a health organization’s online presence, specifically the processes for selecting, using, managing, and evaluating the effectiveness of Web technologies for health communication.”

5. Singularity University — July-August, http://singularityu.org
Graduate studies program started by Ray Kurzweil and Peter Diamandis. From the Singularity University site: “Singularity University aims to assemble, educate and inspire a cadre of leaders who strive to understand and facilitate the development of exponentially advancing technologies and apply, focus and guide these tools to address humanity’s grand challenges.” Biotechnology and Medicine are two of the tracks they offer..

6. Regenstrief Conference — Sept 23–35, http://www.regenstrief.org/conferences/2009
An invitation-only unconference, but one to watch. From the Regenstrief site: “The theme for this year’s conference is Open Health Methodologies. Participants include: Clay Shirky (open source), Dr. Roni Zeiger (Google Health), and Mark Surman (Mozilla).”

If you aren’t able to attend, let us know what you think are the most important issues in health today and we’ll make sure to represent your ideas. Good things will come from all the buzz — the future of health care and health research is bright.

BATON ROUGE, La.—Combining human and animal cells to create what are sometimes called “human-animal hybrids” would be a crime in Louisiana, punishable by up to 10 years in prison, under legislation approved Tuesday by a state Senate panel.

Scientific researchers in some areas have tried to create human embryonic stem cells, which scientists say could be used to develop treatment for a variety of human ailments, by placing human DNA into animal cells. But such practices are controversial for a number of reasons.

Sen. Danny Martiny’s bill, approved without objection by members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, was designed to outlaw such practices. It defines and criminalizes various ways of making human-animal hybrids, including combining human sperm and an animal egg, combining animal sperm with a human egg, and the use of human brain tissue or neural tissue to develop a human brain in an animal.

The bill by Martiny, R-Kenner, goes next to the full Senate.

Attorney Dorinda Bordlee, an anti-abortion activist and an opponent of human embryonic stem cell research, said the bill would not stop common medical practices such as the use of pig valves in human heart surgery; nor would it prohibit research in which human brain cells are grown in mouse brains. The growth of a few thousand cells in a mouse brain would not violate the bill’s prohibition of a “non-human life form engineered such that it contains a human brain or a brain derived wholly or predominantly from human neural tissues,” Bordlee said.

The idea of using animal-human “hybrid” embryos drew fire last year in Britain as authorities pondered whether to let scientists try it. Opponents objected to mixing human and animal material and worried that such research could lead to genetically modified babies.

Another element of the argument: Regardless of whether animal cells are used, the creation of embryonic stem cells for research is opposed by some because it destroys the embryo, considered by some to be a human life.

A report earlier this year by researchers with Advanced Cell Technology in Worcester, Mass., cast doubt on the effectiveness of using human DNA in animal eggs to make hybrid cloned embryos. The animal eggs don’t reprogram human DNA in the right way to generate stem cells, researchers reported.

30 April 2009 by Michael Brooks

Yes, if we play our cards right — or wrong, depending on your perspective.

In engineering terms, it is easy to see qualitative similarities between the human brain and the internet’s complex network of nodes, as they both hold, process, recall and transmit information. “The internet behaves a fair bit like a mind,” says Ben Goertzel, chair of the Artificial General Intelligence Research Institute, an organisation inevitably based in cyberspace. “It might already have a degree of consciousness”.

Not that it will necessarily have the same kind of consciousness as humans: it is unlikely to be wondering who it is, for instance. To Francis Heylighen, who studies consciousness and artificial intelligence at the Free University of Brussels (VUB) in Belgium, consciousness is merely a system of mechanisms for making information processing more efficient by adding a level of control over which of the brain’s processes get the most resources. “Adding consciousness is more a matter of fine-tuning and increasing control… than a jump to a wholly different level,” Heylighen says.

How might this manifest itself? Heylighen speculates that it might turn the internet into a self-aware network that constantly strives to become better at what it does, reorganising itself and filling gaps in its own knowledge and abilities.

If it is not already semiconscious, we could do various things to help wake it up, such as requiring the net to monitor its own knowledge gaps and do something about them. It shouldn’t be something to fear, says Goertzel: “The outlook for humanity is probably better in the case that an emergent, coherent and purposeful internet mind develops.”

Heylighen agrees, but warns that we might find it a little disappointing. “We probably would not notice a whole lot of a difference, initially,” he says.

And when might this begin? According to Heylighen, it all depends on internet fashion trends. If the effort that has gone into developing social networking sites goes into developing internet consciousness, it could happen within a decade, he says.

Update May 4: Confirmed cases of H1N1 virus now at 985 in 20 countries (Mexico: 590, 25 deaths) — WHO. In U.S.: 245 confirmed U.S. cases in 35 states. — CDC.

“We might be entering an Age of Pandemics… a broad array of dangerous emerging 21st-century diseases, man-made or natural, brand-new or old, newly resistant to our current vaccines and antiviral drugs…. Martin Rees bet $1,000 that bioterror or bioerror would unleash a catastrophic event claiming one million lives in the next two decades…. Why? Less forest, more contact with animals… more meat eating (Africans last year consumed nearly 700 million wild animals… numbers of chickens raised for food in China have increased 1,000-fold over the past few decades)… farmers cut down jungle, creating deforested areas that once served as barriers to the zoonotic viruses…” — Larry Brilliant, Wall Street Journal

Financial crisis which manifested in the 2008 (but started much earlier) has led to discussion in alarmists circles — is this crisis the beginning of the final sunset of mankind? In this article we will not consider the view that the crisis will suddenly disappear and everything returns to its own as trivial and in my opinion false. Transition of the crisis into the global catastrophe emerged the following perspective:
1) The crisis is the beginning of long slump (E. Yudkowsky term), which gradually lead mankind to a new Middle Ages. This point of view is supported by proponents of Peak Oil theory, who believe that recently was passed peak of production of liquid fuels, and since that time, the number of oil production begins to drop a few percent each year, according to bell curve, and that fossil fuel is a necessary resource for the existence of modern civilization, which will not be able to switch to alternative energy sources. They see the current financial crisis as a direct consequence of high oil prices, which brace immoderate consumption. The maintenance is the point of view is the of «The peak all theory», which shows that not only oil but also the other half of the required resources of modern civilization will be exhausted in the next quarter of century. (Note that the possibility of replacing some of resources with other leads to that peaks of each resource flag to one moment in time.) Finally, there is a theory of the «peak demand» — namely, that in circumstances where the goods produced more then effective demand, the production in general is not fit, which includes the deflationary spiral that could last indefinitely.
2) Another view is that the financial crisis will inevitably lead to a geopolitical crisis, and then to nuclear war. This view can be reinforced by the analogy between the Great Depression and novadays. The Great Depression ended with the start of the Second World War. But this view is considering nuclear war as the inevitable end of human existence, which is not necessarily true.
3) In the article “Scaling law of the biological evolution and the hypothesis of the self-consistent Galaxy origin of life”. (Advances in Space Research V.36 (2005), P.220–225” http://dec1.sinp.msu.ru/~panov/ASR_Panov_Life.pdf) Russian scientist A. D. Panov showed that the crises in the history of humanity became more frequent in curse of history. Each crisis is linked with the destruction of some old political system, and with the creation principle technological innovation at the exit from the crisis. 1830 technological revolution lead to industrial world (but peak of crisis was of course near 1815 – Waterloo, eruption of Tambora, Byron on the Geneva lake create new genre with Shelly and her Frankeshtain.) One such crisis happened in 1945 (dated 1950 in Panov’s paper – as a date of not the beginning of the crisis, but a date of exit from it and creation of new reality) when the collapse of fascism occurred and arose computers, rockets and atomic bomb, and bipolar world. An important feature of these crises is that they follow a simple law: namely, the next crisis is separated from the preceding interval of time to 2.67+/- 0.15 shorter. The last such crisis occurred in the vicinity of 1991 (1994 if use Panov’s formula from the article), when the USSR broke up and began the march of the Internet. However, the schedule of crisis lies on the hyperbole that comes to the singularity in the region in 2020 (Panov gave estimate 2004+/-15, but information about 1991 crisis allows to sharpen the estimate). If this trend continues to operate, the next crisis must come after 17 years from 1991 , in 2008, and another- even after 6.5 years in 2014 and then the next in 2016 and so on. Naturally it is desirable to compare the Panov’s forecast and the current financial crisis.
Current crisis seems to change world politically and technologically, so it fit to Panov’s theory which predict it with high accuracy long before. (At least at 2005 – but as I now Panov do not compare this crisis with his theory.) But if we agree with Panov’s theory we should not expect global catastrophe now, but only near 2020. So we have long way to it with many crisises which will be painful but not final.
The beginning of the current economic crisis is accompanied by talks about the need to reform the present political system, one line of these ideas is that this system should be more global (the idea of issuing the world money) and a «socialist» (i.e., with higher levels of state control, care about poor people and limits to the free market).
Another trend is the growth of creeping protectionism and hostility of all nations in all, and the loss of the role of sole superpower of United States. As a result, there may be a «multi-polar world», where all are against all, there is no single center, as the currency is gold, but a manifold of unstable blocks, each of whom claimed to be in the club of «poles» (and develops appropriate attributes – i.e. nuclear weapons: Iran, etc.) Some people think that the world looked such near the beginning of the World War I.
Finally, it could be a world in which interactions are not public, but networking.
Thus, you can see three future world orders: the socialist world, a world-anarchist (multipolar) and the network. You can also assume that if one of them is implemented now, the other will appear after 2018 Panov’s crisis or vice versa.
I have already expressed the view that the way out of this crisis is possible only through the growth of some new technologies and consumption. There is no sense in America to revive the construction and automobile – the amount of already built homes and cars is enough for next 10 years, even if completely halt production. That is why the old economy cannot be restarted.
New technologies mean new areas of consumption, that is, demand will start with them: it must be something in which there is a real need for and the production of which can take the whole industry. First of all, it should call the market of medical implants (eg, fully autonomous hearts Abiocor) and medicine in general — the health and lives of people is enormous pent-up demand. Necessary medical technology has matured, but is artificially constrained by long timelines and approval of new hardware devices and the lack of advertising. (But swine flu could change it.)
Another possible market is that market of household robot servants — but it is still more remote, because the AI system to control such robots are not yet quite mature.
Third market is arms market. In the case of aggravation of the situation in the world, especially in the transition to a multipolar world, the demand for weapons will increase. Finally, will appear market of new technologies of energy production. Their development depends on the will of Obama and oil prices.
From the perspective of a new technology that allows for this technological breakthrough, I expect from the crisis of 2010 the following emergence of pre-threshold artificial intelligence. These systems will not be able neither to self-evolving nor to pass Turing test, but they will be able to understand much of human speech and navigate in the outside world. Harbinger of such systems is Wolfram Alpha, the Laura from Microsoft, etc. In the field of nanotechnology, I look forward to creating microrobots with use of standard technology i.e. like manufacture of chips (lithograph) — but not able to self-replication, and having size of the order of less than 1 millimeter. In the medical field, you can expect a powerful system of diagnostic blood on a chip, equipped with powerful computer analysis, which can give an accurate diagnosis, regardless of the identity of the doctor, cheap genomes reading, primitive artificial life, autonomous artificial organs. There could be breakthroughs in non-traditional nuclear fusion.
More important is the question what will become a key technology that will become a banner of the era, and that will naturally evolve — as the internet has become the banner of the ages of 1990 and 2000. This should be something that could impress the imagination of people and open up fundamentally new opportunities. One such discovery could be a possible technology of recording night dreams from the brain, which will be of great importance in the entertainment industry, and the study of human psyche (for example, we could virtually explore different religious vision — that can have significant political consequences). Another option is a possible huge opening — confirmation of contacts with UFOs, or the explosive growth of quantum computers, the confirmation of human capabilities and animal telepathy.
So, if we follow the Panov’s model, the current economic crisis should be replaced by a new phase of growth (though, in terms of nominal GDP and the prices of homes the decline could continue) and even the relatively stable plateau on which civilization will stay for about 6 years.
New growth is possible in two cases – first is if the crisis peacefully reach its bottom, what should be destroyed, will burn, and the new needs and technologies will create new economy on the ruins of the old. This, of course, is the best scenario. It probably corresponds to the creation of «World Socialism» (but without truly world state), but only with the world economy regulations. But this socialism hamper rapid combustion of the crisis, as not allow bust of inherently unprofitable business.
Another scenario of growth I would call the «feverish growth». It is not a healthy recovery, but an increase in temperature, «reviving» a patient. It is linked with the growth of the military orders in a rapid deterioration in the foreign policy situation. A major terrorist attack or sudden accidental war, for example, in Korea or in Iran, could spill the world over to this side of development. Height differences over who should be blamed for the economic crisis and who should pay in case of large defaults, the easing of world trade, increasing fight for the role of world leader in case of clear weakening of the current leader, and the desire to manage financial flows through fomenting wars in strange lands — all this could lead to sharply increase the arms race. (And now we should add global fight with flu pandemic – race of creating vaccine, producing masks, antivirals etc.)
In doing so, I just want to reject a peaceful scenarios of world fading. Even if all the resources have been exhausted, someone they countries will have higher levels of them than the other, and that would be unfair. So, even the exhaustion of resources should lead to an arms race. And this race will consume resources that could be spent on the creation of renewable energy sources.
It is even possible that the crisis would lead to World War and even to nuclear war. However, I believe that even if this may be true, thus paving the way from the financial crisis to global catastrophe, the main source of danger is the arms race itself. The point is that the arms race is always ahead to it in the early goal. No one in the beginning of work on nuclear bomb strived to create Doomsday machine. However, the creation of the atomic bomb opened the way to hydrogen bomb, and then appeared clear opportunity to create cobalt bomb, capable to infect entire continents and even lead to contaminated of all the Earth. From the beginning of the crisis in 1929 to the explosion of the Tsar bomb in Russia in 1961 had passed 32 years.
Similarly, now advances in the creation of military nanotechnology — that is fighting microrobots — put the world on the brink of sustainability, since the nano arms race is fundamentally unstable: first mover has advantage, and the strike can be anonymous. This distinguishes the nano-race from the nuclear race, where was a factor of mutual assured destruction (MAD).
The only version of the implementation of the doctrine of MAD in the new era is the creation of Doomsday machine — a universal defensive weapon capable of destroying the entire planet, the technical realization of which is available on different principles (biological, for example – think about mix of weaponised birds flu – which said to be created in North Korea — and smallpox). No one will attack a country possessing such weapons, and moreover, it can dictate the terms to other countries if there is a will to take risks. But this creates the conditions for intractable conflicts, where there are several parties which have a Doomsday machine and make contradicting requirements.
Another version of events, which can lead to disaster, is that the arms race or even a civil progress make weapons of mass destruction available to small terrorist groups.
So, my conclusion is that we should not fear the depletion of resources and a new world war, but unintended consequences of deploying new arms race in the world of rapidly evolving technologies.
This present crisis is clearly a point of breakthrough in the development of civilization, not death, but the peak of its development, after which the destructive trends are beginning to take precedence over creative. But the destructive tendencies may take the form not of slowing down, but of the rapid growth (for example, the number of contaminated or hazardous technological breakthroughs with unknown consequences). All the same, I do not expect the final death in the next few years, although are possible horrific catastrophe like series* of pandemic influenza and nuclear war.

* We should not expect that there will be only one pandemic of flu (even within each there are a few waves of a pandemic, that is, different mutations of the virus with different characteristics). The number of pandemics of influenza in a sense is determined by simple combinatorics. It depends on the number of bioreactors in which the synthesis of new viruses is happen (ie, pigs — in this sense, the idea altogether slain all pigs on the planet seems reasonable), and the number of different sorts of viruses. From the latter dependence is factorial that is very fast growing. (And after each pandemic amount of sorts of viruses suitable for further recombination, IMHO, will become larger). The population of pigs is also growing very rapidly, as it is relatively cheap meat for the developing countries. (This is my opinion based on reading flutrackers forum.)

And visit my new site http://www.humanextinction.ru/