If you haven't heard of the singularity, this link at Wikipedia is a great place to start. The basic concept is that technology is constantly moving faster, and at some point humans won't be able to keep up with it. We'll enter a new era where human brains aren't sufficient to deal with the world, and mankind will merge into man-created thinking technologies. Many believe this will happen relatively soon, like in 30 to 50 years.

I've been a big believer in the concept for over a decade and every year it seems more obvious. A fantastic book on the subject is Ray Kurzweil's The Singularity is Near.

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