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On November 3, Dongsheng Wang, Chairman of ESWIN Technology Group, was invited to participate in the Xi'an 2023 Global Key & Core Technology Conference, and delivered a keynote speech entitled The Fourth Industrial Revolution: Silicon Carbon and Convergence Trends based on his insights and thoughts from years of entrepreneurial practice.

Wang Dongsheng, Chairman of ESWIN Technology Group, delivered a speech

Chairman Wang Dongsheng said that we are in the outbreak period of the fourth industrial revolution, and we are facing the economic downturn in the post-epidemic era, the complex international geopolitical environment, the opportunities and challenges brought by the new industrial revolution, and the uncertainty of world economic development. At this time, it is more necessary for the global industry to work together to inject vitality and positive energy into the development of the world economy and industry.

Drivers of industrial development: demand and technology

Wang Dongsheng believes that industrial development is driven by demand and technology. Scientific and technological progress leads to demand upgrading, and demand upgrading drives scientific and technological progress. The two promote each other and work together to drive industrial development.

Human needs can be expressed in many ways, but they are essentially rooted in the relationship between man and nature, man and man, and man and himself. From the First Industrial Revolution to the current Fourth Industrial Revolution, the relationship between one pair and the other two pairs has been driven by focusing on improving the relationship between one pair.

For example, the first and second industrial revolutions are mainly through a series of technological and industrial breakthroughs related to man and nature, which will lead to the improvement of the relationship between man and man, and between man and himself, and lead mankind into an industrial society. The third industrial revolution is mainly through a series of breakthroughs in science and technology and industry related to people, leading mankind to enter the information society. Marked by the AlphaGo incident in 2016, humanity ushered in the fourth industrial revolution. This industrial revolution will mainly lead to the further improvement of the relationship between man and nature, and between man and man, mainly through a series of technological and industrial breakthroughs between man and himself, and lead mankind into an intelligent society.

Every industrial revolution is triggered by the accumulation, collision, and combination of one or several groups of key technologies to breed new technologies, that is, trigger point technology. These trigger point technologies are rapidly iterative and progressive, widely used and developed under the stimulation of demand, and detonate a new industrial revolution.

In particular, he mentioned that the technology and demand energy levels bred by the Third Industrial Revolution have promoted the development of artificial intelligence, life science and nanotechnology, making them the engine of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. The continuous progress and demand stimulation of the above three trigger technologies will continue to promote machine intelligence in silicon-based life forms, biological intelligence in carbon-based life forms, and hybrid intelligence in silicon-carbon fusion forms, which will inevitably give birth to new species, new organisms, and new civilizations.

The fourth industrial revolution: silicon carbon fusion

Silicon-based life systems refer to machine intelligence in silicon-based life forms. From the perspective of the four dimensions of computing and consciousness, matter and energy, silicon-based life systems are divided into four stages of development: the primary stage characterized by “semiconductor + radio waves”, the weak artificial intelligence (ANI) stage characterized by “robot + deep learning algorithm”, the strong artificial intelligence (AGI) stage characterized by “robot + GPT”, and the super artificial intelligence (ASI) stage characterized by “silicon carbon life + artificial consciousness”. He pointed out that after ChatGPT comes out, strong artificial intelligence may arrive sooner than expected.

Silicon-based life systems and development trends

Carbon-based life systems, mainly talking about humans, 50,000 years ago, ancient humans basically completed their evolution and became the most powerful creatures on earth. From the formation of the ancient medical system of the East and the West, to the rapid development of the modern medical system and life science and technology, especially during the third industrial revolution, the rapid progress of information technology has been applied in the field of medicine, which has greatly promoted the development of life science and technology with gene science and technology as the core.

With the continuous progress of medicine and life science and technology in the future, the development of gene editing and regenerative medicine technology, life expectancy of more than 100 years or even higher will become a common reality. In addition, with the rapid advancement of digital human technology, analog avatars will soon become a reality, and digital immortality is no longer a dream.

Wang Dongsheng mentioned, “Silicon-based and carbon-based have their own irreplaceable advantages, therefore, the core purpose of promoting silicon-carbon integration is to let silicon-based life and carbon-based life learn from each other's strengths, complement each other's advantages, and integrate with each other, so as to cultivate new life forms and achieve the evolution and breakthrough of science and technology and industry.” He pointed out that through the three silicon-carbon fusion methods of mode integration, functional integration, and material integration, new life forms, new industrial ecology and new three-pair relationships will emerge in the future.

Silicon-carbon fusion method

Managing risks for the benefit of humanity

Technology is a double-edged sword, especially artificial intelligence and genetic technology, if used well for the benefit of mankind, if used poorly, it will bring about loss of control and even disaster. Wang Dongsheng appealed, “Controlling the risks that may be brought about by science and technology requires the cooperation of governments, academia, business circles, people and other parties around the world to make science and technology truly benefit mankind. We look forward to working with our industry partners to seize the opportunity of the Fourth Industrial Revolution and create a better future together!”

*For more information about Mr. Wang Dongsheng's thoughts on the Fourth Industrial Revolution and Silicon-Carbon Fusion, please see New Time and Space: The Industrial Revolution of Silicon-Carbon Fusion (by Wang Dongsheng).

* Semiconductor devices with silicon-based materials as the main body, especially integrated circuits, are the common technical basis of the third and fourth industrial revolutions, and Beijing ESWIN Technology Group is a company based on silicon-based materials, devices and biologicals.