The 4004, which was about the size of a small fingernail, delivered the same computing power as the ENIAC, the first electronic computer built in 1946 that filled an entire room.
Just as engines powered the industrial revolution, Faggin sees the microprocessor as the core element that continues to drive the information age.
"The engine extended the muscular power of human beings, thus enabling the industrial revolution," said Faggin. "The microprocessor extends the intellectual capacities, the brain power of human beings, thus extending the human reach into areas that an engine cannot."
Faggin says the microprocessor allowed the creation of thousands of different types of products, all powered by what he calls "a speck of intelligence." And these devices are now connecting with one another and connecting people through the Internet.
"I think [the] Internet represents the collection of all the power of this engine, and it's the defining capacity of microprocessors," said Faggin. "It connects people at a planetary scale. It connects things and provides flows of information, which are useful for communication, control and computation."
The future is sure to bring faster, cheaper, more power-efficient computers, says Faggin. However, even if quantum computers become a reality, which Faggin says could bring capabilities beyond today's mechanical versions, computers will not match the complex intelligence of human consciousness.
"I think that human intelligence, especially in the lower manifestations of it, will be aided tremendously by computers, but there are aspects of human capacities that we don't define as intelligence, which have to do with intuition, will, intention, imagination and creativity," he said.
Although logic is a term the computer industry uses when referring to central processing units, or microprocessors, Faggin says human consciousness entails more than logical thought processes and the ability to rationalize. The human brain, he contends, gives a person keen awareness of oneself and one's surroundings. It is motivated by powerful subconscious and emotional processes that work beneath or alongside logical thinking.
"Consciousness is the ability that human beings have to experience, to think, to know that they know, or to know that they don't know," said Faggin. "A machine cannot do that."
Faggin, born and educated in Italy, spent a career turning complex ideas and blueprints for real-world computing. In November 2010, he joined Hoff and Mazur in receiving the U.S. National Medal of Technology and Innovation from President Barack Obama.
"I grew up in Vicenza, which is near Venice in Italy," said Faggin. "When I was a child, I was interested in machines."
His first love was airplanes. He remembers wanting to become an aeronautical engineer so he could design and build large model planes.