思考：未来计算机迈向新的里程碑

    现在，我们正朝着这个未来迈出第一步。我们正着手打造完全不同类型的计算机。假以时日，这些机器或将变得更接近人类。不过，它们能够无时不刻调动一切记忆，而且无所不知，在这点上，人类当然无法望其项背。

    人们所做的事情以及他们所创造的工具定义了人类。通过机器，我们极大地强化了自身：在许多领域，人力已经被机器所替代。我们能建造、开发更多的工具，能去到更多的地方。因为我们一手创造的工具，我们能更迅速地旅行到更遥远的地方。计算机和计算机设备就是我们工具之路的一个方面。计算机使我们能探索自身想法，表达创意，它给我们带来的帮助超越了其他所有发明。

    借助我们建造的这些机器，世界将变得更加“聪明”。在未来20到50年里，随着信息技术不断进步，持续取得突破性进展，我们有望看到新型的计算机，假以时日，我们将最终制造出真正能够感知和“思考”的机器。

    Meantime, we're taking the first steps in that journey now. We're starting to build very different types of machines. Over time, these machines will become ever closer to being like us. They will even be able to think of everything and know everything all the time, which, of course, no human brain can do.

    Human beings are defined by the things that they do and the tools they create. We've made ourselves stronger through machinery: in many places, muscle power has been substituted with machine power. We can build more things, make more things and go more places. We can travel faster and farther because of the machines that we build. Computers and computing devices are another step on that path. They let us explore our ideas and express creativity in ways that take us beyond all of our other inventions.

    The world is going to get even "smarter" as a result of the machines we build. Over the next 20 to 50 years, we'll see new types of machines and over time, we may finally have cognitive devices that can actually "think" as advances in information technology continue to build upon the breakthroughs of the past.