[Osmium]

I wouldn't put Elon Musk in that list. I think you're mixing up two distinct types of people there. There's a difference between a person having an unconventional idea, e.g. for a business, and an unconventional theory, which they claim has a sound scientific basis. These unconventional theories are often stated with an unjustifiable certainty by people like Kurzweil and I think that's what irritates people.

[rpm4321]

I don't think that's a very fair assessment of Kurzweil's role in technology.

He was on the ground getting his hands dirty with the first commercial applications of AI. He made quite a bit of money selling his various companies and technologies, and was awarded the presidential Medal of Technology from Clinton.

As I was growing up, there was a series of "Oh wow!" moments I had, associated with computers and what they were now capable of.

"Oh wow, computers can read printed documents and recognize the characters!"

"Oh wow, computers can read written text aloud!"

"Oh wow, computers can recognize speech!"

"Oh wow, computer synthesizers can sound just like pianos now!"

I didn't realize until much later that Kurzweil was heavily involved with all of those breakthroughs.

[Florin_Andrei]

The Kurzweil brand was, for a good long time, a very big name in the synthesizer industry.

I had the synth music bug for a while, and the K2xxx series was something that definitely made me drool. Couldn't afford it, though.

[confluence]

> There's a difference between a person having an unconventional idea, e.g. for a business, and an unconventional theory, which they claim has a sound scientific basis.

You sure about that? I thought most business plans were thrown out upon any contact with the customer and morphed in feedback to the customer, after a crazy idea was attempted.

Of course I could be wrong - but it feels like a false division between business and science. Most businesses when they do come out don't have a scientific basis as to why they succeed at the time - just like many theories. You can of course use hindsight bias to make it so.

It should be noted that Einstein was mostly ignored until he was verified by the Mercury orbit measurements.

[btilly]

You have your scientific history wrong. I'm fairly certain that you confused Mercury with the bending of light by the Sun, and you are confusing general public recognition with the attention paid by scientists. Here is a timeline.

- 1859: Mercury's precession is recognized as not fitting Newtonian predictions.

- 1887: The Michelson-Morley experiment shows the speed of light not varying as expected with motion.

- 1905: Einstein publishes several groundbreaking papers, including his special theory of relativity, and an explanation of the photo-voltaic effect (which he eventually received the Nobel for)

- 1908: Einstein becomes a professor, is widely recognized in scientific circles.

- 1911: Einstein comes up with his general theory, explains the precession of Mercury, and predicts gravitational lensing.

- 1916: Einstein appointed president of the German Physical Society.

- 1919: An Englishman, Eddington, confirms the gravitational lensing prediction during an eclipse, the press seizes on this sign of international cooperation in the aftermath of WW I, Einstein soon becomes a household name.

- 1921: Einstein receives the Nobel award in physics.

[confluence]

So when were Einstein's theories empirically supported. Was it 1919 or 1905 or 1908?

[btilly]

Depends on which theory.

In 1905 the theories published then all fit experiment.

1919 was special because it was the confirmation of a prediction that contradicted widely accepted theory. It was made more special because it came at an extremely fortuitous time for the news cycle.