Computers will soon be able to learn from experience, tell jokes and even flirt, according to Ray Kurzweil, the company’s artificial intelligence expert.

The 66-year-old entrepreneur and futureologist, who predicted the rise of the internet and that a world chess champion would one day be beaten by a computer, has said machines will outsmart their makers by 2029.

In an interview with The Observer, he said, “My project is ultimately to base search on really understanding what the language means.

“When you write an article, you’re not creating an interesting collection of words. You have something to say and Google is devoted to intelligently organizing and processing the world’s information.

“We want computers to read everything on the web and every page of every book, then be able to engage in intelligent dialogue with the user to be able to answer their questions.” […]