A while ago I wrote briefly on why the Singularity might not be near and my estimates badly off. I saw it linked the other day, and realized that pessimism seemed to be trendy lately, which meant I ought to work on why one might be optimistic instead: http://www.gwern.net/Mistakes#counter-point
(Summary: long-sought AI goals have been recently achieved, global economic growth & political stability continues, and some resource crunches have turned into surpluses - all contrary to long-standing pessimistic forecasts.)
Why could you be optimistic that the Singularity is Near?
Or pessimistic that the singularity is near, depending on whether you expect it to be friendly and whether a near singularity is more likely to be friendly than a late one.
A while ago I wrote briefly on why the Singularity might not be near and my estimates badly off. I saw it linked the other day, and realized that pessimism seemed to be trendy lately, which meant I ought to work on why one might be optimistic instead: http://www.gwern.net/Mistakes#counter-point
(Summary: long-sought AI goals have been recently achieved, global economic growth & political stability continues, and some resource crunches have turned into surpluses - all contrary to long-standing pessimistic forecasts.)