Thanks for all the input. The best answer that I can contribute to the original question, based on some of our answers, is as follows:
As the Skeptic
article points out, the challenges in achieving true AGI are enormous, suggesting that AGI will follow the course of space flight and fusion power, among many other technologies, which seemed so promising 50 years ago -- no one would have predicted that they would make so little progress.
[This is an argument by analogy, and therefore weak. Moreover, Kurzweil would answer by saying that The Law of Accelerating Returns applies to Information Technology (and not to other technologies).]
The Skeptic article was great (though I can also give counter-arguments to many of their points). I really want to see more of this stuff.
So, I'll still have to leave this challenge open. Until I can get more material on "Why a Singularity probably won't happen," I'll always have the nagging suspicion that most discussion of the Singularity is preaching to the converted.
Joshua
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