A groundbreaking program has now made it possible to preserve your life stories and wisdom, allowing you to speak to loved ones decades into the future. StoryFile, an innovative AI company, has developed lifelike, interactive 3D avatars that allow people to'live on' after death, sharing memories and answering questions in the same natural and conversational manner of a real person. Individuals like philanthropist Michael Staenberg, 71, and Star Trek star William Shatner, 94, have used StoryFile to immortalize both their experiences and personalities. Staenberg, a property developer and philanthropist who has given away more than 850 million, said: 'I hope to pass my knowledge on, and the good I've created.' The technology captures video interviews, transforming them into hologram-style avatars that use generative AI, similar to ChatGPT, to respond dynamically to questions.

By 2030, rapid technological advancements are expected to reshape humanity, unlocking abilities once confined to science fiction--from superhuman strength to enhanced senses. Robotic exoskeletons may soon allow people to lift heavy objects with ease, while AI-powered wearables, such as smart glasses and earbuds, could provide real-time information and immersive augmented reality experiences. Healthcare may be revolutionized by microscopic nanobots capable of repairing tissue and fighting disease from within the bloodstream, potentially extending human lifespans. Developers are also working on contact lenses with infrared vision and devices that allow users to "feel" digital objects, paving the way for entirely new ways to experience the world. Tech pioneers like former Google engineer Ray Kurzweil believe these innovations are early steps toward the merging of humans and machines, with brain-computer interfaces offering direct access to digital intelligence.

A leading futurist who accurately predicted the rise of the iPhone has now set the date for humanity's most phenomenal breakthrough yet, the ability to cheat death. Ray Kurzweil, a former Google engineering director, has long been known for his bold predictions about the future of technology and humanity. His forecasts often focus on the convergence of biotech, AI, and nanotechnology to radically extend human capabilities. Now, Kurzweil claims humanity is just four years away from its most transformative leap yet, achieving'longevity escape velocity' by 2029. While some experts remain skeptical, Kurzweil's influence in Silicon Valley ensures his predictions continue to shape the broader conversation around life extension and the future of human health.

What if you could live forever, staying healthy and young for centuries? Scientists and tech pioneers now believe this dream could become reality. In Silicon Valley, entrepreneurs like Bryan Johnson follow intense routines, like his'Blueprint' plan, to slow or reverse aging, and companies like Altos Labs are testing treatments that have already extended the lives of mice. Experts say we're on the cusp of technologies that could make immortality possible, and they've even set dates for when this future might arrive. Three visionaries stand out in this quest: futurologist Dr. Ian Pearson, Google's Ray Kurzweil, and biomedical researcher Aubrey de Grey.

Cutaway view of a fictional space colony concept painted by artist Rick Guidice as part of a NASA art program in the 1970s. This story was originally published by Undark and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Elon Musk once joked: "I would like to die on Mars. Musk is, in fact, deadly serious about colonizing the Red Planet. Part of his motivation is the idea of having a "back-up" planet in case some future catastrophe renders the Earth uninhabitable. Musk has suggested that a million people may be calling Mars home by 2050 -- and he's hardly alone in his enthusiasm. Venture capitalist Marc Andreessen believes the world can easily support 50 billion people, and more than that once we settle other planets. And Jeff Bezos has spoken of exploiting the resources of the moon and the asteroids to build giant space stations. "I would love to see a trillion humans living in the solar system," he has said. Not so fast, cautions science journalist Adam Becker.

What's new: Roblox has announced plans to roll out a generative AI tool that will let creators make whole 3D scenes just using text prompts. Users will also be able to modify scenes or expand their scope--say, to change a daytime scene to night or switch the desert for a forest. How it works: Once it's up and running, developers on the hugely popular online game platform will be able to simply write "Generate a race track in the desert," for example, and the AI will spin one up. Why it's a big deal: Although developers can already create similar scenes like this manually in the platform's creator studio, Roblox claims its new generative AI model will make the changes happen in a fraction of the time. It also claims that it will give developers with minimal 3D art skills the ability to craft more compelling environments.

By the end of this decade, AI will likely surpass humans at all cognitive tasks, igniting the scientific revolution that futurists have long imagined. Digital scientists will have perfect memory of every research paper ever published and think a million times faster than we can. Our plodding progress in fields like robotics, nanotechnology, and genomics will become a sprint. Within the lifetimes of most people alive today, society will achieve radical material abundance, and medicine will conquer aging itself. By freeing us from the struggle to meet the most basic needs, technology will serve our deepest human aspirations to learn, create, and connect.

In early 2023, following an international conference that included dialogue with China, the United States released a "Political Declaration on Responsible Military Use of Artificial Intelligence and Autonomy," urging states to adopt sensible policies that include ensuring ultimate human control over nuclear weapons. Yet the notion of "human control" itself is hazier than it might seem. If humans authorized a future AI system to "stop an incoming nuclear attack," how much discretion should it have over how to do so? The challenge is that an AI general enough to successfully thwart such an attack could also be used for offensive purposes. We need to recognize the fact that AI technologies are inherently dual-use.

The 76-year-old scientist and engineer has spent much of his time on earth arguing that humans can not only take advantage of yet-to-be-invented medical advances to live longer, but also ultimately merge with machines, become hyperintelligent, and stick around indefinitely. Just minutes before we met, we both learned that Daniel Kahneman, the Nobel Prize–winning psychologist and one of Kurzweil's intellectual jousting partners, had suffered that fate. A few days before that, the science fiction author Vernor Vinge had also passed. Vinge's novels first described the singularity, that moment when superintelligent AI surpasses what humans can do and mere mortals need high-tech augmentation themselves to remain relevant. Kurzweil embraced the name for his own grand vision, and in 2005 wrote a best-selling book called The Singularity Is Near.

Can artificial intelligence really summon dead relatives back from beyond the grave? A growing number of people are trying to find out, with pioneers such as inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil using artificial intelligence to recreate lost relatives. Kurzweil's attempts to'bring back' his father - who died when Kurzweil was 22 - using AI began more than 10 years ago and are chronicled this year in a comic book by Kurzweil's daughter Amy. Kurzweil created a'replicant' of his father by feeding an artificial intelligence system with his father's letters, essays and musical compositions. He now has even more ambitious plans to bring his father back to life using nanotechnology and DNA from his father's buried bones.