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The Ai seems to lack an effective coherent strategy. (I did have the AI set to "hard") I just played a game were I got off to an exceptionally bad start. It also didn't help that I didn't get credit for the Hanging Gardens. A bug in the program?

Anyway, I was in last place in virtually every category, until I got up-to Industrialization. The AI had possession of nearly all the world wonders. I had gotten the Pyramids, but didn't get another World Wonder till Hoover Dam. Even then the AI, if I recall correctly, was researching Space Flight by then. Soon the AI was researching future tech. That left me wondering as to why the AI never got around to obtaining SETI, the Apollo Program, United Nations, Statue of Liberty, Woman's Suffrage, and the Cure for Cancer, which I was surprisingly able to get.

With the AI being that far ahead of me, it was astonishing that the AI didn't start building the spaceship. Even when I started to build the spaceship, I received the terse message from the AI that if I didn't stop, that I would have negative repercussions. But nothing happened!!! So I was able to complete the spaceship and win a game that I should never have won.

Yes, there is some bug about AI and spaceship; something was done in the latest releases to make it desire space victory more and hate space race leader more, but actually it seems to me now is often even worse.

Did you play against 1 AI nation? If there were several ones, they probably got into endless wars with each other and forgot about your humble land. If you have built some military units per city in the beginning, AIs would probably target an easier game, and you have to attack them yourself to get into some action.

Between 2.5 and 2.6 AI's space race handling got much worse, as seen by my autogame testing (some other people report that they don't see such a big difference), for the classic ruleset (default in these versions). Those changes Ignatus mentioned have tried to restore situation, but effect has not been that impressive.
I recently did my first autogame testing focused on investigating space race on civ2civ3 ruleset (default in S3_0). It's much worse than classic ruleset case.

There were five (5) AIs. The one AI that was way way way ahead were the Vikings. Got a laugh out of @Ignatus comment: "they probably got into endless wars with each other and forgot about your humble land".

Besides the space race concern, it is also questionable as to why the AIs did not soak-up the SETI, the Apollo Program, United Nations, Statue of Liberty, Woman's Suffrage, and the Cure for Cancer while they were ahead.
The responses reminded me of another irritant. It seems that if you attempt to negotiate with an AI, they flat-out refuse. Of course it is possible that I am not offering them enough incentive to accept a cease-fire.

Steve R. wrote:The responses reminded me of another irritant. It seems that if you attempt to negotiate with an AI, they flat-out refuse. Of course it is possible that I am not offering them enough incentive to accept a cease-fire.

You could track their attitude towards you in F3 pad. If they don't like you, their demands will be absurdly big. Even if they like you a bit, AI is suspicious about trading cities.

Steve R. wrote: Besides the space race concern, it is also questionable as to why the AIs did not soak-up the SETI, the Apollo Program, United Nations, Statue of Liberty, Woman's Suffrage, and the Cure for Cancer while they were ahead.

As per cazfi's previous comment there does appear to be some dependency on the ruleset. My experience in civ1 is that SETI is a key objective for the AI's - sometimes even starting it before 1AD. WS is also popular but that could be due to their obsession with Democracy - a key exploit that even the barbs know. When it comes to the space race they are erratic, no, make that ERRATIC.