Comment by consider on Disappointment in the Future · 2008-12-04T01:52:48.000Z · LW · GW

Kurzweil predicted good machine language by 2004/2005 on NPR in 1999. This is close (I predicted by 2006 back in 1996 by just throwing ten years of computational power on top of what I saw that the internet could do) If you look at MT for many languages, he was a few years off - yet the vast majority thought 25 years or never. I think these predictions will look good by 2011 or 2012, and that isn't so far off since he made them in 1999.

Same for a possible luddite movement. So far, top social scientists are almost completely ignoring technological change as one sees with the health care projections out to 2025 or 2040, the GAO social security scare of 2040, etc.

I'm not sure if this criticism is correct, but the most opposed seem to be cocky baby boomers in their 50s like John Horgan who imply they know there won't be much change because it didn't land exacctly on 2001 as they expected.

By the way, many deaths from disease have been in decline for decades including heart disease and stroke. Death from cancer is also likely to see a sharp decline from 2010.