Given how far the human race has come technologically, there has to be certain accomplishments we should have made by now, but didn’t. I submit two things: putting a man on Mars and fully-functional mind-controlled prostheses. What do you think?
They’ve been predicting a cure for Type 1 Diabetes “in 5-10 years” for going on 30 years now. I’m ready for it to really happen.
Fusion power.
Better battery technology and better power distribution infrastructure.
Flying cars! I was promised flying cars.
You knew someone was going to say it.
It’s easy to overlook because the process is do gradual, but we’ve gone from having a 16 Mhz Cellphone that needs a battery swap part way thought the day (in 1995) to a 3G device that gets 4 or 5 days use without a recharge (the Nook, in this case)
In a like for like comparison, my iPhone can go a couple of days with normal use, which includes not only phone conversations, but also Angry Birds.
Battery density has improved (and no memory, like NiCd), and what we do with each Watt is much more efficient.
it’s just what, when you compare a 2.5% improvement in battery tech, year after year, it just can’t compete with a doubling of computer bits in a given space every 18 months (Moore’s law ALSO states that it’s double the components at half the price which is often overlooked)
Sorry I don’t have better details but a friend of mine just had an operation whereby they transplanted parts of a healthy liver into his. This was about two weeks ago. He is still recovering of course but he no longer needs his insulin. He was a serious diabetic (blind in one eye, etc).
Where is my robot maid?
OK, I know they have them in Japan.
Apparently, we here in the good old USA are afraid of robots.
Or maybe we have a really great maid’s union that I know nothing about.
Or maybe those pictures of robot maids in Japan are all some sort of sinister plot to make us all want to move to Japan.
Yeah, that must be it.
Some progress has been slowed by politics. Stem cell research, for example.
I think we should terraforming Mars by now.
Fusion Power is the big one.
Our Moon Base and orbital factories are notably missing.
Yes, where is my flying cars and Robot Maid.
Also I thought we would be off the internal combustion engines by now and we are just beginning to move off them instead.
I would be content if we could master the technology to allow a computer to turn “on” and “off” like any other electronic appliance instead of taking 20 minutes to “boot up”.
This is actually a point of focus on the next generation of computing devices.
Think 5 seconds from off to ready.
The next OS from Microsoft is supposed to be able to handle this.
Bet Apple will beat them to the punch.
And mobile devices already can boot up in a matter of seconds (except Blackberry since they use Java for the OS and it has to JIT everything on boot).
Oh they do transplants, but that’s not a cure. He probably had a beta cell transplant, where they take healthy beta cells (the bits of the pancreas that produce insulin) and put 'em on the liver.
From what I gather, they only do this for diabetics with very severe side effects, because the drug/therapy regimen to keep a transplant healthy is way more of a hassle than insulin is. At least, for a majority of diabetics, where insulin works pretty well. I’m sorry it didn’t for your friend.
What I want is a cure. As in, take these drugs or go through this procedure and BLAM! no more diabetes, no drugs, no insulin.
Do I really have to go through my patented “a flying car isn’t a flying car, it’s really a shitty airplane that you can drive down the street” rant?
Because I will if I have to.
You don’t want a flying car, because the concept of a flying car is incoherent. A vehicle that flies is not a car, it’s an aircraft. And you can get an pretty inexpensive decent aircraft today. Except, any aircraft that is specially modified to allow you do drive it down your street and park it in your garage is going to be a shitty aircraft. And when you’re flying that shitty aircraft, the second you have some trouble, you’re going to wish you had a decent aircraft instead. When’s the last time you were piloting your light aircraft, and mused to yourself, “You know, this airplane is pretty sweet, but what would make it totally awesome is if I could drive it on the ground, too!”?
What you describe is the problem! We want good aircraft that are also good ground vehicles, and that don’t need FAA licenses, flight physicals, or any intelligence to operate. Basically, like cars, except that they fly. We could call them flying cars. 
200-year life span.
Perfectly secure electronic voting.
And thank god for that! To paraphrase a wise man;
“Death … is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new.”
Screw the little whippersnappers! I want my couple of centuries.
Greater automation all the way around.
Things like optometrists and pharmacists should not exist because they should have been automated long ago. There should just be a machine that looks at your eyes or that dispenses your drugs and tells you whether there are any precautions or side effects to watch out for.
The same goes for all the other “fill out this form and stand in this line” type jobs out there. If I have to fill out a form, and your job is to look it over, make sure it is right, collect my money, and then stamp it, your job shouldn’t exist. I’m looking at your Permitting offices and DMV…
I blame unions for the majority of these issues. I get the whole ‘working wage’ thing that unions provide for some industries, but when they stand in the way of obvious progress, especially the aforementioned healthcare, where prices have been spiraling out of control for years, we have a problem.