Heaven or Hell?
David Brin has written a landmark article on the Technological Singularity:
Singularities and Nightmares:Extremes of Optimism and Pessimism About the Human Future
This one is a must-read whether you're Leon Kass, Ray Kurzweil or anyone in between. Brin has fairly and comprehensively defined the debate between Singularitarians and those who would renounce whole areas of "dangerous" technology. Joel Garreau did something similar within his book Radical Evolution, but Brin's article may be more important for future debate because it is concise and freely available. Also, I don't remember Garreau ever raising the interesting possibility that the grumpy pessimists may have a valuable role to play on the way to the Singularity.
I'll be responding to Brin's article with future posts. For now, it's plenty to absorb without additional commentary. Read the whole thing.