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Anders Lustgarten, Ray Kurzweil, the Anglosphere

Rana Mitter talks to futurist Ray Kurzweil, whose book How to Create a Mind examines the next stage in human development: extending mind power to create 'super intelligence'.

With Rana Mitter.

Playwright Anders Lustgarten discusses his new play, 'If You Don't Let Us Dream, We Won't Let You Sleep', which explores how the privatization of crime could have disastrous consequences.

Renowned American inventor, thinker and futurist Ray Kurzweil tells Rana how recent progresses in Artificial Intelligence mean we are getting ever closer to being able to reverse engineer the brain; and discusses questions of consciousness and humanity, and the radical possibilities of a world where humans and intelligent machines live side by side.

And is Britain's relationships with her former dominions just a matter of language and cricket, or is there a distinct cultural, political and economic outlook that's shared across the English-speaking world? If so, what should that mean for the UK as it negotiates its relationship with Europe, and with the non-English speaking parts of the former British Empire? Rana discusses the idea of the Anglosphere with the historians John Darwin and Tim Stanley and the writer Yasmin Alibhai-Brown.

Available now

45 minutes

Last on

Wed 20 Feb 2013 22:00

Chapters

  • Ray Kurzweil

    An interview with renowned American inventor, thinker and futurist Ray Kurzweil.

    Duration: 16:08

  • The Anglosphere

    A discussion on the idea of the 'Anglosphere'.

    Duration: 15:42

  • Anders Lustgarten

    An interview with playwright Anders Lustgarten about his new production at the Royal Court

    Duration: 11:54

If You Don鈥檛 Let Us Dream

If You Don鈥檛 Let Us Dream, We Won鈥檛 Let You Sleep, by Anders Lustgarten,is on at the Royal Court theatre until 9th March.

How to Create a Mind

How to Create a Mind: The Secret of Human Thought Revealed by Ray Kurzweil is available now, published by Duckworth.

Neuroimaging

Episode image: a brain scan mapping the structure of neural connections, courtesy of the Laboratory of Neuro Imaging at UCLA and Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging at MGH.

Human Connectome Project

Broadcast

  • Wed 20 Feb 2013 22:00

Free Thinking

Free Thinking

Radio 3鈥檚 new home for arts and ideas.