If it happens and it's interested in us, all our plans go out the window. If it doesn't happen, sitting around waiting for the AIs to save us from the rising sea level/oil shortage/intelligent bioengineered termites looks like being a Real Bad Idea.
–Charles Stross, on the Singularity
Singularity Syndrome: the derangement in public policy discussions that occurs when one rationally considers the possibilities of uncertain future developments happening all at once, rather than over time.
It bears a resemblance to phenomenon observed in the policy discussion regarding the "War On Terror", climate change, and, more recently, the Large Hadron Collider, wherein partisans make up for a lack of the probability that pet risk will occur by simply inflating the stakes.
When it comes to emerging technologies, one considers several possibilities: the possibility that a technical capability will emerge sooner, or later, by degrees. The further away in the futures some contingency is, not only is it that much less necessary to prepare for, but it is also that much less possible to prepare for.
Thus, the only reasonable output any policy discussion or think-tank can produce is in preparation for near-term contingencies, however unlikely they may be. Because little useful attention can be paid to likelier scenarios due to their distance from the present, no useful recommendations can be made. As a result, all of the attention is focused on unlikely outcomes, giving the work an absurd an alarmist character, regardless of how well-meaning, mature, or rational the process or practitioners used to undertake the assessment.
When confronted with parents anxious about their kids getting involved with playing Dungeons and Dragons, there's a turn of phrase that I have found succinct and useful: "Don't worry. Role playing games don't make kids weird; they just attract weird kids."
In this case, discussions of emerging technologies before the fact of their arrival actually seems to have the opposite effect. The singularity not only attracts weird people - but it actually actively deranges otherwise perfectly rational participants by forcing them to take highly uncertain possibilities seriously.
