Also, if we’re talking about him in general, and not just his Singularity-related writings, Wikipedia reports that:
Kurzweil received the 1999 National Medal of Technology and Innovation, America’s highest honor in technology, from President Clinton in a White House ceremony. He was the recipient of the $500,000 Lemelson-MIT Prize for 2001,[6] the world’s largest for innovation. And in 2002 he was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame, established by the U.S. Patent Office. He has received nineteen honorary doctorates, and honors from three U.S. presidents. Kurzweil has been described as a “restless genius”[7] by The Wall Street Journal and “the ultimate thinking machine”[8] by Forbes. PBS included Kurzweil as one of 16 “revolutionaries who made America”[9] along with other inventors of the past two centuries. Inc. magazine ranked him #8 among the “most fascinating” entrepreneurs in the United States and called him “Edison’s rightful heir”.[10]
That was the point—he already had a lot of credibility from his earlier achievements, which might cause people to also take his futurist claims more seriously than if the same books had been written by random nobodies.
I wasn’t aware Kurzweil was ever taken seriously in the first place.
At least he’s been cited: Google Scholar reports 1600+ citations for The Singularity is Near as well as for The Age of Spiritual Machines, his earlier book on the same theme.
Also, if we’re talking about him in general, and not just his Singularity-related writings, Wikipedia reports that:
I’d point out that much of the above is not (at least not entirely) related to his futurism—Kurweil has done a lot of other things.
That was the point—he already had a lot of credibility from his earlier achievements, which might cause people to also take his futurist claims more seriously than if the same books had been written by random nobodies.
Wow—reading comprehension fail, retracted.
Director of Engineering at Google. I’m pretty sure that some very smart people are taking him seriously.