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| Jaron Lanier
is one of America's cyber-gurus, a player in the new intellectual scene
which Europe has still barely discovered. Yet this discovery will be essential
if Europe is to wake up to the new century. Years ago, Lanier invented
the term "virtual reality" and built a reputation on spectacular software
programs. Now, he is reconstructing ancient Egyptian music. "We will make
something audible as it was once heard by the Pharaohs — a classical
case of reverse engineering." Lanier is convinced that technical evolution is in the process of creating artificial intelligence. But such an intelligence will never stop despairing over programming errors. Immanuel Kant, Arthur Schopenhauer and Friedrich Nietzsche are no more than bug-infested versions of human consciousness. "Philosophers," he says, "have subjected humankind to constant beta-testing of their software." It is amazing to what extent the new century's technological elite reaches back into the distant past. Bill Gates collects Leonardo da Vinci and copyrighted art, telling us something about how he sees himself. J. Craig Venter, who cracked the genome, imitates Christopher Columbus' voyage of discovery in a one-man yacht. Ray Kurzweil, the technological revolution's influential commentator (and owner of countless patents) lets his computer invent new Shakespeare poems for him. Daniel Hillis, who created the super computers, is constructing a mechanical watch designed to run for 10,000 years, which he refers to as "my own little Stonehenge." And finally, there is Nathan Myhrvold, "the brain of Gates," who coordinates comprehensive expeditions on the life of the dinosaurs. "Since 1970," Myhrvold explains, "computers have increased their performance by a factor of one million," a development he expects to continue at the same speed for another 20 years. To make that quite clear: a factor of one million means the difference between a year and 30 seconds. In other words, today's new computer requires 30 seconds for a task which would have taken a year with an older model. In the year 2010, computers will require 30 seconds for a task which would take a 1970s computer one million years. Maybe this explains his journeys to the land of the dinosaurs.
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