Ben Goertzel
Ben Goertzel (born December 8, 1966) is an American computer scientist, artificial intelligence researcher, and entrepreneur specializing in artificial general intelligence (AGI).[1][2] Born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to American parents, he earned a bachelor's degree in mathematics from Simon's Rock College in 1985 and a PhD in mathematics from Temple University in 1989.[2] Goertzel has authored influential works on cognitive architectures and intelligence, including The Structure of Intelligence in 1993, and popularized the term AGI through his 2005 edited volume Artificial General Intelligence, which focused on engineering systems with broad generalization capabilities akin to human cognition.[2][3] He founded companies such as Webmind Inc. in 1997 and Novamente LLC in 2001 to pursue AGI development, and in 2008 launched OpenCog, an open-source framework for distributed AGI research integrating probabilistic logic, pattern recognition, and evolutionary learning.[2] As CEO of SingularityNET, established in 2017, Goertzel advances a blockchain-based platform for decentralized AI services, aiming to democratize access to AGI and foster beneficial superintelligence through collaborative, censorship-resistant ecosystems.[4][5] Goertzel also served as chief scientist at Hanson Robotics, contributing to humanoid robots like Sophia, and organizes the annual AGI conference via the AGI Society.[6] His work emphasizes ethical, open-source paths to AGI, contrasting with centralized corporate approaches, amid predictions of human-level AI emerging by the late 2020s.[7][3]