Virtually Human: the Promise and the Peril of Digital Immortality

Publisher Marketing:"Virtually Human" explores what the not-too-distant future will look like when cyberconsciousness simulation of the human brain via software and computer technology becomes part of our daily lives. Meet Bina48, the world's most sentient robot, commissioned by Martine Rothblatt and created by Hanson Robotics. Bina48 is a nascent Mindclone of Martine s wife that can engage in conversation, answer questions, and even have spontaneous thoughts that are derived from multimedia data in a Mindfile created by the real Bina. If you re active on Twitter or Facebook, share photos through Instagram, or blogging regularly, you re already on your way to creating a Mindfile a digital database of your thoughts, memories, feelings, and opinions that is essentially a back-up copy of your mind. Soon, this Mindfile can be made conscious with special software Mindware that mimics the way human brains organize information, create emotions and achieve self-awareness. This may sound like science-fiction, but the nascent technology already exists. Thousands of software engineers across the globe are working to create cyberconsciousness based on human consciousness and the Obama administration recently announced plans to invest in a decade-long Brain Activity Map project. "Virtually Human" is the only audiobook to examine the ethical issues relating to cyberconsciousness and Rothblatt, with a Ph. D. in medical ethics, is uniquely qualified to lead the dialogue." Review Citations: Kirkus Reviews 09/15/2014 (EAN 9781250046635, Hardcover) Choice 07/01/2015 (EAN 9781250046635, Hardcover) Contributor Bio:  Rothblatt, Martine Martine Rothblatt is a lawyer, technologist, and medical ethicist. In 1990 she created and served as chair and CEO of Sirius Satellite Radio. When her youngest child was diagnosed with a rare disease, Martine left Sirius to search for a cure. She started the biotechnology company United Therapeutics in 1996 and is its chair and CEO. Martine is also a leading legal advocate for human rights and has led the International Bar Association in presenting the United Nations with a draft treaty on the human genome. Contributor Bio:  Merlington, Laural Laural Merlington has recorded well over one hundred audiobooks and has received several AudioFile Earphones Awards, including one for Never Say Die by Susan Jacoby. Contributor Bio:  Kurzweil, Ray Ray Kurzweil is one of the world s leading inventors, thinkers, and futurists, with a thirty-year track record of accurate predictions. Called the restless genius by The Wall Street Journal and the ultimate thinking machine by Forbes magazine, Kurzweil was selected as one of the top entrepreneurs by Inc. magazine, which described him as the rightful heir to Thomas Edison. PBS selected him as one of the sixteen revolutionaries who made America. Kurzweil was the principal inventor of the first CCD flat-bed scanner, the first omni-font optical character recognition, the first print-to-speech reading machine for the blind, the first text-to-speech synthesizer, the first music synthesizer capable of recreating the grand piano and other orchestral instruments, and the first commercially marketed large-vocabulary speech recognition. A recipient of the National Medal of Technology, Kurzweil was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame and holds nineteen honorary doctorates, as well as honors from three U. S. presidents.