Innovative Science Fiction Novelist, Dies at 79

He conceived an early version of cyberspace and predicted the “technological singularity,” a tipping point at which machines would become smarter than humans.

Published NY Times, March 28, 2024

He conceived an early version of cyberspace and predicted the “technological singularity,” a tipping point at which machines would become smarter than humans.

Vernor Vinge in 2008 on the campus of the University of California, San Diego, where he received his Ph.D. He taught mathematics and computer science at San Diego State University before retiring in 2000 to focus on writing science fiction.  Sandy Huffaker for The New York Times

Vernor Vinge, a mathematician and prolific science fiction author who in the 1980s wrote a novella that offered an early glimpse of what became known as cyberspace, and who soon after that hypothesized that artificial intelligence would outstrip human intelligence, died on March 20 in the La Jolla area of San Diego. He was 79.

Thanks to John Turner '65 for this news.