Robot Invasion Imminent?

It sounds like something straight of a sci-fi novel. Humans can become stronger, faster, and smarter than ever before. But you just might need to relinquish your soul. (And undoubtedly a lot of money too.)

All this in the near future, promise futurists and transhumanists, or people who study how technology affects the lives and bodies of humans. One particularly eminent futurist, by the name of Ray Kurzweil, expects something called the Singularity. According to Kurzweil, the Singularity is the "culmination of the merger of our biological thinking and existence with our technology, resulting in a world that is still human but that transcends our biological roots."

Specifically, he claims that people will be more machine than human by the year 2030. It will even become possible to upload our minds to the Internet. Also being developed is a respirocyte, a robotic unit that can replace our red blood cells and let us hold our breath for 15 minutes. Special nanoparticles will possibly be able to locate malignant tumors and eradicate them.

It seems unbelievable, but even so, there's no denying that the future is upon us. At turns amazing and terrifying, it can elevate our minds and bodies to levels previously thought impossible, but also poses the threats of assimilation and obscurity.