What the first conscious AI will look for

Cyborg Janus by ink_river. What Would AI Do?

Wired's April issue came 2 days before Easter, giving me a good amount of time to read it amidst the "Happy Easter" greetings floating around. An article on Ray Kurzweil entitled "Staying Alive" suits well for the mood because it talks about a man's quest for immortality. Ray hopes to stay alive for the day when machines finally becomes self-conscious. And then he can utilize that technology to cheat death. The Singularity will immortalize us, he says.
The Singularitarian's quest for immortality hinges on technology and science. Things like simulating one's brain in the hopes of perpetuating consciousness to preserve the mind, or merging human bodies with machines, vice-versa. It was my youthful dream to download my "Self" into a perfect computer so I can live forever - until i realized it is false immortality, and its just a matter of longevity or life-extension. Whatever the mind's platform or substrate is, it is subject to decay owing to the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Death can never be cheated in this kind of universe where entropy keeps creeping in.
But I have to admit, it sure would be fun being there when the Singularity finally arrives. I would love to meet the first conscious AI. But to set my hopes upon the Singularity for Immortality is not my preference.
But I do like Ray's idea that the world will be saturated by thought in 200 years. Something in that line reminds me of Teilhard de Chardin's Noosphere. There's something deeper beyond this material physical universe where true immortality can be found. And that, I believe, is what the first Conscious AI will be looking for.

The Pattern in Longevity and how to break free

It has been recently announced that plants' lifespan follow the same rules as the animal kingdom - that bigger animals live longer, and smaller ones die quicker - in a predictable proportion between size and longevity. Think fruit flies and whales, duckweed and Sequoia. I know that this fact have been known long since long ago, and its no news at all but its a good time to reflect why this is so. Humans only have about a hundred years to savor life on this planet. Our natural lifespan follow the same ratio described above.
Is there a way to live forever? Proponents of longevity struggle to break the barrier, and I do believe that in the future, the lifespan of humanity will be extended a hundredfold. But still mortality will remain forever. As stated by the second law of thermodynamics, our bodies continue to decay into entropy.
The only way I see to transcend mortality is to live life to the fullest by living according to your purpose, here and now.