This is the funniest goddam thing I have heard in a week. And I watch the political talk shows!
For my part, I predict: videoconferencing that actually works for a whole hour.
Silent Velcro.
Restore hearing to the deaf and sight to the blind. I really can’t figure why tons of money is not spent on hearing restoration research. Virtually every old fart needs help with that.
By God man, we aren’t miracle workers! Why not ask for efficient government while you’re at it!?
I’d like to see the US, Canada and Mexico adopt a common currency. I’d love to drive from Yukon to Panama and back with a pocketful of Ameros.
But I don’t think that’s as likely as a worldwide common electronic currency.
I’m optimistic on cheap access to space within my lifetime. Most likely via a Space Elevator, but there are a few other ideas that just might work too.
Practical fusion power generation, I’m a bit iffier on. There are plans that could get it within about 50 years… if the funding situation remains stable.
In biology, I wouldn’t be surprised if all of the disease-causing and most of the disease risk-factor genes were identified in my lifetime. It’ll become routine for every baby, shortly after birth, to get a full sequence done, so the parents will know exactly what’s coming. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised to see something like that in 15 years or so.
Another genetic advance I expect to see is DNA-based forensic descriptions. If a criminal leaves any traces at the crime scene, forensics will be able to give the beat cops an accurate reconstructed picture that’s good enough to recognize the guy out of all the people in the city.
A living wooly mammoth.
I came here to post about this.
There was a bit on NPR about de-extinction - basically, some people are trying to recreate extinct species by modifying their closest living relatives. This isn’t the piece I heard, but it’s a transcript from an interview with the same guy.
This may be the worst thing possible to happen to war. With no significant battlefield consequences, civilian casualties could be viewed as the only way to “hit them where it hurts”. Hopefully, mutually assured destruction and the globalization of economics will be enough to keep full scale war at bay.
Interesting that you’re optimistic for the funding of space but not fusion. It seems the only benefit of space access would be either tourist-based, or scientific in nature whereas fusion has much far reaching economic implications.
Seems to me that the research that would lead to the bigger payday would attract more dollars.
And imagine how much more effective it’d be if we didn’t have to rely on pictures but rather just have a repository of everyone’s DNA on file.
I oppose it. If you want to do it and be forever Cog-3155, that’s your choice. But are you really arguing against my right to have the choice of saying No?
We already know how to get to space.
We don’t yet know how to control/sustain fusion.
I believe we will see the creation of honest politicians.
A.K.A. . . . Androids but they will be programmed to destroy lobbyists.
I’m sorry to say this, but you didn’t read what I wrote upthread- implanted ID should be an option, not a requirement.
But the post you replied to isn’t about that, but rather a biometric database to ID anybody instantly.
You already are required to have ID- what’s your objection to having that required ID be biometric in nature?
IOW, what’s the difference between being required to carry a card, and being ID’d by camera?
An implementation of what you suggest is going on in India using cloud computing. 1/3rd of the population (~ 400 million) has been registered so far. Fingerprints and retina scans are used to provide unique identity to each person.
This will be useful for disbursal of social security benefits and made mandatory and sufficient identity proof for various KYC(know your customer) forms like for opening bank a/c, getting SIM card, registering vehicles, immovable property etc.
Check their website and this section for the stats(updated daily).
Colorado requires a fingerprint scan to get an ID- but you can’t use your fingerprint to replace a lost card.
And you can only have one state ID at a time. Which means a lost ID card can be huuuuge PITA
Here, one can just take print out of the card from their website which is as good as the lost card. My card wasn’t even delivered to home, it was lost by postal department, I just took a print out from their website which as per the Government, serves all purposes.
Only the card number is important, all your information (name, address, photo, biometric data) is associated with the number.
Also, its a national scheme in here, the card is applicable in all states.
Fully immersive VR - with direct neural connections so that it will be theoretically indistinguishable from reality. Practically, of course, it will be somewhat limited, at least at first, in scope and depth, and probably legislated to have some features that would tell you you’re not in real world.
Sigh… so logical, so reasonable. So foreign to my countrymen…
Funny, Its actually applicable in reverse way. Here its one of only a few things which is or potentially(depending of registering the remaining 2/3rd pop.) is logical/reasonable.
USA is just so much better than India for their average citizen that that’s not even needed to be said.
Actually, I should have thought of this earlier, and arguably it isn’t purely a “technological advance”, but:
Receiving unambiguous signals from extraterrestrial civilizations!
I don’t mean communicating with them, because back-and-forth signal travel times would be longer than I’m likely to live. But I think there’s a pretty good chance we will see something that everybody agrees originated with intelligent beings and not a simpler inanimate natural process.
The Drake equation speaks to how common intelligent civilizations are out there. It has loads of uncertainty, but various parts of the equation (which all multiply together) keep getting less uncertain. Some of the estimates have gotten way bigger. Thus lower estimates of the number of planets that are astronomically and geologically compatible with life as we know it have steadily gone up.
Also, our sensitivity to whatever intelligent communications may be flying around is growing exponentially and rapidly, because of computer and other electronic technology.
It’s pretty hard to know what to expect, but I am optimistic that something will turn up within the roughly 3 decades I have left.