Poll of the Day > Feels like we're due for a big technical breakthrough. What do you hope/think we

(+) Yeah! (+)

will see in the 2020s?

Hope:
Something that enables us to accelerate renewable energy development

Think:
More electric vehicles
Some kind of spooky AI/ML shit
Continued rapid development/mRNA vaccines (I mean not just for covid)

I know none of my predictions are really going out on a limb but if it really was a true breakthrough I'm not sure how anyone could guess what it is

Elon Musk fleshlight

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I predict that one of the leading brands of hotdog manufacturers will begin producing their largest variety hotdog yet. There will be a TikTok trend of a quick/easy method to harden the hotdogs for other uses, until ultimately this short lived super omega jumbo sized dog is discontinued due to a string user error injuries.

I think and hope that our next major breakthrough will be the development of a battery using new technology. I think that's probably our biggest hurdle right now when it comes to most electric issues. That's the biggest issue we have with renewable resources like solar and wind - they're inconsistent. They potentially can generate all the power we need, but as soon as the sun goes down or the wind stops we effectively have nothing.

Not to mention the manufacturing and disposal of current batteries is awful for the environment.

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Predictions

2020-2030:
3-D printing becomes increasingly mainstream.
Return to the moon.
Major strides in electric cars and green energy.
Increasing automation.

2030-2040
Manned mission to mars.
3-D printed food will become mainstream.
Massive medical breakthroughs due to printing in increasingly smaller sizes. Possible cures for many common diseases as a result.
Obsoletion of gasoline cars in 1st and some 2nd world nations.
Ash Ketchum becomes 11.

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Robot sex dolls being more advanced and perhaps more affordable is what I'm hoping for.

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Nintendo enters the PC market.

I wouldn't be surprised if AI hit the singularity, what happens after that is anyone's guess though

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wwinterj25 posted...

Robot sex dolls being more advanced and perhaps more affordable is what I'm hoping for.

Your people already cornered that market anyway.
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HUD tech is underrated. Google had a good thing going with Glass, but it freaked too many people out.

But if I could leave my phone in my pocket while it was tethered to something like a Sayian scouter and responded reliably to gesture control, that would be incredible.

I expect to see it in my lifetime since something as simple as a Kindle Paperwhite was inconceivable 20 years ago.

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LuciferSage posted...

HUD tech is underrated. Google had a good thing going with Glass, but it freaked too many people out.

But if I could leave my phone in my pocket while it was tethered to something like a Sayian scouter and responded reliably to gesture control, that would be incredible.

I expect to see it in my lifetime since something as simple as a Kindle Paperwhite was inconceivable 20 years ago.

What kind of power levels do you want to read?
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fusion power "should" be getting off the ground eventually, and if/when that happens it will be major. but I wouldn't bet on it happening this decade.

Smarkil posted...

the development of a battery using new technology

while better battery tech is definitely something important to have, there's kind of a limit on how much energy density you can achieve, and even if you increase the energy density, it means that you have even more volatile substances.

Smarkil posted...

That's the biggest issue we have with renewable resources like solar and wind - they're inconsistent. They potentially can generate all the power we need, but as soon as the sun goes down or the wind stops we effectively have nothing.

rather than "batteries" there are forms of large-scale energy storage. pumping entire lakes of water up into a reservior that can then flow back down later running hydro generators, or lifting heavy weights. (one energy storage plant just lifts and stacks concrete blocks into a tower, and then lowers them one by one when energy is needed.)

(supposedly almost all of the world's energy storage uses the pumped hydro idea, but you need the right terrain to make it possible. the stacked blocks idea is new and hopefully something that can be more widely used.)

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Frasier 2

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Pizza on a bagel

Revelation34 posted...

What kind of power levels do you want to read?

Lol meme, but you're really missing the point. We're already halfway to being cyborgs with supercomputers in our pockets. Why not just have the visual as an overlay?

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More plant-based meats?
:D

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SpeedDemon20 posted...

More plant-based meats?
:D

As someone who still eats meat, this would be cool. I tell myself that it doesn't really matter unless we have large scale dietary changes, cause it helps me justify still doing it.

I feel like we're actually pretty good with this already, though. I think it's more of a cultural/social obstacle than a technical one. But a lot of it technically speaking is just about masking it with the right seasonings/accessories. If you want stuff like steak or fried chicken where it's basically a hunk of meat only, then yeah that isn't at as great of a place right now.

SpeedDemon20 posted...

More plant-based meats?
:D

That's an oxymoron.
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Could we please not with this shit? Everyone knows what it means, everyone know what it is (and isn't), there is no need to have weird hangups over it.

I have no faith in anything. It doesn't matter if we invent the Star Trek replicator tomorrow, it won't be used for anyone's benefit.

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Smarter phones

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wwinterj25 posted...

Robot sex dolls being more advanced and perhaps more affordable is what I'm hoping for.

I was thinking virtual reality sex that you can engage with either an AI or another person online. Great for long distance relationships. Would require a robot like you want your vision would be seeing the person you wanna see.

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More brainwave-based technologies

I know they have that stuff where you can like, think of something and the thing can interpret what you're thinking of as a control mechanism... However that works

But I'm talking about taking it to an advanced / mainstream level

Telepathic headbands even, maybe, so that you don't actually have to talk to people, you can think with them

Suck at drawing? Music? Cut out the composition parts and use your imagination to draft something

Just more input/output technology to interface directly with one's senses

Here's an example: you have this catgirl, right

But she can't twitch her ears or move her tail

But if she could think about it, she could

I mean that's how we move our regular limbs, somewhat, but those are built in (and not prone to error unless you have a motor control disfunction)

Basically, just, having stuff directly interface with you (Think Google Glass but without glasses)

This is definitely an area that I have no knowledge in, but the uses for such would be cool

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We need electric cars that can go farther on one charge. I dont know how we can fully get rid of gas stations unless we find a different fuel for generators, lawn tractors, and big tractors.

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GrabASnickers posted...

Could we please not with this shit? Everyone knows what it means, everyone know what it is (and isn't), there is no need to have weird hangups over it.

Thank you!

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I think scientists were able to time travel a quantum particle recently... or something, I can't remmeber

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Our robot overlords will probably take over soon...
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Also, why the hell don't we have working Throrium/MSR nuclear up and running yet?

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sexdolls that work with vr

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I don't see any breakthrough in the near future given that the world has been derailed by COVID, unless the technology is something that facilitates remote work or something else inspired by COVID.

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SpeedDemon20 posted...

More plant-based meats?
:D

What I expect is that we'll see 3-D printed food that gets flavored like, well, 'flavor ink' for lack of a better way to put it. That is to say you'll order, say, a steak and your printer will use a nutrient paste to print out a steak while several different flavor jets add in the flavor. So you could have steak for one person, chicken for the next, foei gras for the next, and round it off with a fourth person who wants baby back ribs and you all either couldn't tell or it would be close enough that you wouldn't care.

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mooreandrew58 posted...

I was thinking virtual reality sex that you can engage with either an AI or another person online. Great for long distance relationships. Would require a robot like you want your vision would be seeing the person you wanna see.

Could work. I hear they already have sex devices for VR interactions.

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i would really like a pill that will give me an hour long erection, otherwise it requires focus, ok?

i'm in my mid 30's, so i've done almost everything, making it difficult to try something new, ok?

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Probably (Think): Fascism governed by robot security manufactured by Boston Tech.

Hope: Not.

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Unbridled9 posted...

What I expect is that we'll see 3-D printed food that gets flavored like, well, 'flavor ink' for lack of a better way to put it. That is to say you'll order, say, a steak and your printer will use a nutrient paste to print out a steak while several different flavor jets add in the flavor. So you could have steak for one person, chicken for the next, foei gras for the next, and round it off with a fourth person who wants baby back ribs and you all either couldn't tell or it would be close enough that you wouldn't care.

fuck that

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wwinterj25 posted...

mooreandrew58 posted...
I was thinking virtual reality sex that you can engage with either an AI or another person online. Great for long distance relationships. Would require a robot like you want your vision would be seeing the person you wanna see.
Could work. I hear they already have sex devices for VR interactions.

You know what's hilarious about that?

People would be less likely to be slut shamed in that scenario

They'd be all "Yup, I did this person, I did this person, I did this person, and this person..."

But all they really did was their robot being controlled by those persons

I don't know, I just find it hilarious

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GrabASnickers posted...

Something that enables us to accelerate renewable energy development

Nuclear fusion is actively on the way within the next decade.

Doesn't matter in countries like the US that have billionaires with too much money invested in oil, as well as a people that refuses to adopt it.

Actually, we already have the solution to a clean environment, free unlimited sustainable energy, and it's been around for the last century. Scientists all agree that the answer is nuclear fission. It's a (relatively) perfect energy source with nearly no downsides but no one cares. Scary radiation boogieman.

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We'd rather pump the atmosphere full of uncontained CO2 than have highly concentrated nuclear waste that lasts for aeons and is easily stored in a central location for...reasons.

And half the reason nuclear is "unsafe" is there haven't been any real major upgrades to the tech in 50 years. The "unsafe plants" with positive fail-safes instead of negative ones are a majorly bone headed choice to begin with, and we're looking at reactors built in the 50s 60s and 70s.

We could have had Thorium/MSR tech up and running nationwide by now if the Clinton administration hadn't shut the research down in the 90's.

We don't even have to go mining the Thorium. There's something like a 130 year supply of it just sitting in slag piles at every mine and foundry in the world. It's sitting around like the barrels of gasoline were a waste product before the internal combustion engine.

It infuriates me that we haven't persued this technology as if our lives depended on it when we started freaking out about global warming, but shut down the very technology that would have solved most of the problem by now when we started freaking out.

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I think the single most important thing to dump research money and effort into is better medical scanning technology. The way we approach medicine is so roundabout and ineffective but it's all we have because we can't actually see what is really happening.

Right now diagnosis is almost entirely made off of symptoms and history and then scans are used to confirm. This is awful. Would be much better if we had a thorough comprehensive scan that would analyze the whole body and tell us whats wrong with it. An important example would be reading and computing the signals traveling through the spinal chord. Instead of using something unreliable like a pain scale you could measure the exact signal strength and location of the pain signal and create profile of exactly what the body is trying to do which compared against norms should show whats wrong.

If we could easily see the ways cells and chemicals interact in every part of the body easily, we could probably cure every medical problem in a short amount of time.

Sadly I'm not sure anyone is really working all that hard at it so I'm not sure any breakthrough will happen in the next 10 years.

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GrabASnickers posted...

As someone who still eats meat, this would be cool. I tell myself that it doesn't really matter unless we have large scale dietary changes, cause it helps me justify still doing it.

I feel like we're actually pretty good with this already, though. I think it's more of a cultural/social obstacle than a technical one. But a lot of it technically speaking is just about masking it with the right seasonings/accessories. If you want stuff like steak or fried chicken where it's basically a hunk of meat only, then yeah that isn't at as great of a place right now.

I think we're only at the beginning stages of plant-based meats. The production rate is nowhere near traditional meats and we've only touched a few types of foods (mostly burgers AFAIK). I hope we can see plant-based meats as an additional option (i.e.: instead of chicken, carne asada, or lengua burritos, you can also choose plant-based chicken, plant-based beef, or plant-based lengua). The most important point to reach is making it the cheaper option.

Unbridled9 posted...

What I expect is that we'll see 3-D printed food that gets flavored like, well, 'flavor ink' for lack of a better way to put it. That is to say you'll order, say, a steak and your printer will use a nutrient paste to print out a steak while several different flavor jets add in the flavor. So you could have steak for one person, chicken for the next, foei gras for the next, and round it off with a fourth person who wants baby back ribs and you all either couldn't tell or it would be close enough that you wouldn't care.

That sounds like a nightmare based on my experiences with printing black and white and the printer demanding magenta before doing anything. CAN YOU IMAGINE?!

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Fully automated everything. 75% less total jobs. The elimination of the middle class.

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There are a lot of other plant based meats, though a lot of them are not great and don't have a big name like Beyond and Impossible do now. I think a lot of the reason it's more expensive is all the subsidies that the meat industry gets, but I don't know, maybe it also is just more expensive to make.

3D printed food doesn't make sense to me at all and sounds gross. Where would the nutrient paste come from? If it was food to begin with then the idea of adding steps to that process seems counterproductive. Also, the reason we have 3D printers for plastic is because there isn't an easy way to mold something into a hard piece by hand. But people don't like to eat hard food so I don't understand why a nutrient paste wouldn't be more of a hand malleable thing like dough. I have no idea if this is a real research area or the person predicting it just totally made it up

YoukaiSlayer posted...

I think the single most important thing to dump research money and effort into is better medical scanning technology. The way we approach medicine is so roundabout and ineffective but it's all we have because we can't actually see what is really happening.

Right now diagnosis is almost entirely made off of symptoms and history and then scans are used to confirm. This is awful. Would be much better if we had a thorough comprehensive scan that would analyze the whole body and tell us whats wrong with it. An important example would be reading and computing the signals traveling through the spinal chord. Instead of using something unreliable like a pain scale you could measure the exact signal strength and location of the pain signal and create profile of exactly what the body is trying to do which compared against norms should show whats wrong.

If we could easily see the ways cells and chemicals interact in every part of the body easily, we could probably cure every medical problem in a short amount of time.

Sadly I'm not sure anyone is really working all that hard at it so I'm not sure any breakthrough will happen in the next 10 years.

It would cost too much. Then only rich people would have that scan because of shitty health insurance companies.
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Zareth posted...

Fully automated everything. 75% less total jobs. The elimination of the middle class.

Nah, keep the middle class - eliminate the poor and poverty class.

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Revelation34 posted...

It would cost too much. Then only rich people would have that scan because of shitty health insurance companies.

Unless it was cheaper for insurance companies to keep track of that stuff and take care of it before it got too bad

Lokarin posted...

Nah, keep the middle class - eliminate the poor and poverty class.

But then the middle class would be the new poor

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Muscles posted...

But then the middle class would be the new poor

Even the poor right now have conveniences that old school Rockefellers and Carnegies could only dream of.

Even a poor person in America has an overall quality of life above that of royals and emperors of a few centuries ago.

Just sayin.

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Muscles posted...

But then the middle class would be the new poor

If you wipe out the upper class the middle class doesn't become the new upper class

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GM produces the first full scale fusion reactor, likely in secret, but, by the summer of next year hopefully it's patented.

a next gen iPhone probably

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Revelation34 posted...

It would cost too much. Then only rich people would have that scan because of shitty health insurance companies.

It may be made to cost too much but theres no reason it needs to. The price of current scans aren't related to how much the machines cost to make so if you can afford an MRI now, you could likely afford any scan they come up with. If the government funded the science and owned the patent like they should, then scans could be cheap as hell. Current scans are price gouged to hell.

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