For me it’s Open Source AGI not controlled by the enshittifying power of capital
FTL travel and human/animal hybrid genetic engineering to make cat boys and girls real.
Hyper compact batteries, that would change everything overnight
I want a bigger penis.
I’d like to see fusion power (or some other good power source) become a thing. It’d be nice to live in a society where energy usage was basically safe and free.
If we’re being unrealistic, easy access to ftl spacecraft for everyone would be nice. Exploring the galaxy sounds fun.
Sure it’ll be safe, but free is a pipe dream under our current system
The last time I checked fusion was …check notes… just about fifty years away.
For the last 40 years it’s been down to 20 years away.
Well, that was mostly right— until we actually built one. Now we’ve built 3 fusion reactors. It’s no longer theoretical.
Now comes the phase of overcoming certain limitations wrt scaling up the tech to make commercially-viable reactors, and estimating that at about another 15-20 years (considering the rapid advances of the last few years) isn’t unrealistic.
Before it was a question of, “can we even do this?” We’re finally past that milestone. Now it just a matter of the very achievable goal of scaling up the reactors. The timeline for that is much more predictable.
Those scaling issues have always been the issues. We’ve had working reactors for over 65 years.
“The first experiment to achieve controlled thermonuclear fusion was accomplished using Scylla at LANL in 1958.”
And don’t think that the NIF ignition results are the kind of breakthrough that headlines make it out to be - that project is weapons research, and is not designed to produce power, nor is it anywhere close to doing so when the power to the lasers is measured and not just what the pellet absorbs.
However, what’s new in the last few years is commercial investment in fusion, and I do think that it will make the difference that the last 65 years haven’t. Maybe even in the next 20 years™
we attained net-positive over a year ago: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/12/13/nuclear-fusion-passes-major-milestone-net-energy.html
as for scaling issues, we have just been able to tolerate 100 million degree reaction for a record amount of time, a breakthrough that sets a new milestone. a pretty big step beyond, ahem, 1958.
You’ve been taken in by intentionally deceptive headlines.
The energy absorbed by the pellet (what they are measuring as the “input”) is something like 1/20th or worse of the energy used to power the lasers. The output is greater than that “input” by a little, but again, nowhere near the actual energy used, and it won’t ever be at that experiment because it’s not designed for it, it’s designed so we can simulate H-bombs without setting off real ones.
The next major goal is still overall energy-positive output, right? We’ve only breached the threshold of output > input naively, without considering any external energy costs. I hope we get there though, it would be very neat!
Oh, no, we’ve managed net positive! That was the most critical achievement, and we finally did it last year! Not a whole lot, but we have. The problems we’re encountering now is dealing with the massive heat produced. But we just hit a new milestone in dealing with that, too!
Progress is being made, and that’s (the heat) is one of the biggest factors now in scaling up. But it’s an achievable goal. The more heat we can handle during the reaction, the bigger reactors we can build.
We did?? I thought it was just net energy gain from the impulse itself!
yeah, over a year ago
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/12/13/nuclear-fusion-passes-major-milestone-net-energy.html
it’s been replicated twice since then
What’s funny is that we DO have access to fairly clean energy already! Nuclear and renewables (not as much solar, until we solve the rare earth metals problem) are pretty darn clean. I mean… have you looked up Thoroum reactors? Those things are really neat, much safer and better for the environment, etc., but came just a bit too late combined with the nuclear scare.
Net zero carbon emissions worldwide
He said “technological” advancement, not “political”. I think the greed and slow politics is what is holding us back here, not technology.
Mass market availability of true self-driving vehicles and humans on Mars. Both seem possible if not likely in my lifetime, but there’s still lots of room for capitalism to eff them up.
Cure for cancer
🤞
The problem is that there is not one cancer. But a myriad of cancers. That is the actual problem.
Yeah. Cancer is more of a name for a condition than it is a specific disease. There will never be a single cure for this entire category of diseases.
“Cures for cancers” then
Same goes for the common cold…
That god is a chemically sustained illusion, and the dismantling of religion.
devils advocate: if the technology is not […or quickly become] affordable. then sometimes, some of these hopes, are unrealistic.
Is it considered a technological advancement to remove something which exists now and actively makes life worse? I’d like to remove “health insurance” as a concept
Large scale terraforming. We’re gonna need it here on Earth if we don’t get climate change under control… and we’re not gonna get climate change under control the easy way cuz it’s not profitable.
But if we do get a hold on planet-scale, controlled climate manipulation here, that’ll give us a gold mine of data for extraterrestrial use.
We’re gonna need it here on Earth
But we are way too stupid for it.
Alzheimer/Dementia cure. That would be so nice.
Defeating aging.
Read the book Ending Aging by Aubrey de Grey…
Limitless Peace
Me too bro
so no more inheritance? no more younger generations getting their turn to control things? sounds like a nightmare scenario.
lol this guy thinks everyone gets inheritance
The previous poster spoke about defeating aging, not death.
I mean if we kept the same lifespan as we have today, but everyone basically stopped aging at 35, you keep the energy and clarity of mind all throughout your life, but still die at 82 or whatever, I’d call that a win.
Maybe think more creatively and not with a scarcity oriented pro-aging mindset. Limitless peace.
A technology advance species invades hearth peacefully and solves all our bad problems.
But the rest of the house is destroyed!? Seems unfair
Room temperature superconductors. Not for any of the particular uses per se, but just because the world would go nuts and it would be interesting to see.
