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Essays on Infinite Lifespans
Marvin L. Minsky
we will build a state of perfect health. Some people expressed
a sounder concern that the old ones must die because young
ones are needed to weed out their worn-out ideas. However,
if it is true, as I fear, that we are approaching our intellectual
limits, then that response is not a good answer. We would
still be cut off from the larger ideas in those oceans of wisdom
beyond our grasp. [2]
References
1) Landauer, TK; How Much Do People Remember? Some
Estimates of the Quantity of Learned Information in Long-
term Memory, in Cognitive Science (1986) pg.10, 477493
2) This article first appeared in Scientific American, October
1994 with some minor revisions.