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Transcendence, a movie set to be released on April 18, stars Johnny Depp as an artificial intelligence researcher who strives to create a sentient machine.

The singularity sounds like a science fiction movie plot but there are academics who believe it could happen by 2045.

In 2008, Singularity University was founded by Google, Nokia and Cisco, among others, and supported by NASA. The school’s purpose is “to harness the power of exponential technologies to improve the lives of billions of people.”

The future is coming, maybe quicker than we expect, and Solez hopes he can make his students “street smart for the future.”

“I think we’re going to soon reach a point of getting rid of all diseases that we know of now. Either they won’t exist, or they’ll be easily treatable,” said Solez, 67, leaning back in a battered old chair in his office in the University Hospital building.

Predictions like this are made with a straight face when you’re talking about the singularity.

A “singularitarian” might tell you that he intends to live forever, matter-of-factly, the same way he would tell you he’s going to the theatre on the weekend. A transhumanist, someone who expects humans and machines to merge, hopes to have her mind or body enhanced by technology (imagine transplanting Wikipedia into your brain and being able to access it at any time, instantly).

Some enthusiasts imagine a world in which sentient robots are in charge of virtually everything, running the economy and engineering our cities.