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posted by janrinok on Friday February 27 2015, @08:38AM   Printer-friendly
from the let-your-mind-go dept.

As the title states, what would you, personally, consider to be the most amazing technological breakthroughs if they were a) fully researched & ready for action and b) commercially available - this year - at a decent price-point?

Would it be a brand new single-core x86 or x64 CPU that crunches data/runs compiled code 10 - 30 times faster than, say, a current Core i7 or Xeon CPU can (perhaps a 3 dimensional chip of some description)? Or a hyper-advanced 3D graphics card that can really deliver "Hollywood-movie level photoreal realtime 3D graphics", with a visual fidelity virtually indistinguishable from what we see in the real world when we are out and about? Would it be a smartphone that can go 90 - 120 days without recharging and easily survive being run over by a fully loaded SUV? Or a smart software technology that takes older 3D games and "upgrades them graphically" to look just like current GFX quality games? Would it be resolution-independent digital images or video that scale to look razor-sharp on screen resolutions ranging from 640 x 480 to, say 16K or 32K? Would it be a small attachable motor + battery that let you bicycle to work in 1/3rd the time and only need recharging once a month? A production car with a brand new type of gearbox that gives you 500+ gear settings to choose from? A lightweight beverage mug that heats the beverage in it in 5 seconds? A word processor that can take a 250 word article summary and AI-magically expand it to 2,500 words with perfect quality writing/grammar/terminology, and also making logical sense? A t-shirt or pair of jeans that automagically clean themselves of any dirt when you run some current through the fabric? A smartphone that lets you, an English speaker in Boston, speak with a French speaker in Paris in realtime, with flawless simultaneous translation both ways and each person's voice sounding completely natural/authentic despite language translation? Perhaps a digital pocket camera that is also a high-def 3D scanner and lets you create accurate 3D models of anything - from plants to buildings to people - as simply as snapping a casual photo of it?

Now use your own imaginations, Soylentils. What would you, personally, consider to be an AMAZING technological breakthrough that you could - in an ideal world - BUY today (not in 15 - 20 years time). Thanks for participating, everybody!

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  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @08:47AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @08:47AM (#150328)

    A star trek replicator, capable of replacing everything (including food)

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:06AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:06AM (#150331)

      Shove someone's head in the replicator, press the recycle button.

      For some reason this never happened in an episode of Star Trek. They considered programming the replicators not to produce dangerous poisons or weapons, but they never considered the obvious danger of the replicators itself.

      • (Score: 2) by Immerman on Saturday February 28 2015, @04:48AM

        by Immerman (3985) on Saturday February 28 2015, @04:48AM (#150925)

        Well, the fact that you never see such a thing done suggests that there's probably safeguards against it that nobody bothers to mention. Given the technology routinely displayed it would probably be trivial to simply refuse to recycle any living tissue, or at least anything multi-cellular (don't want to have to constantly wash out the microbial film left behind from recycling food after all). Hey, it would even double as a quick and easy exfoliation device - just always make sure the safety hasn't been turned off first, and get used to going around bald.

    • (Score: 3, Interesting) by jbWolf on Friday February 27 2015, @09:50AM

      by jbWolf (2774) <jbNO@SPAMjb-wolf.com> on Friday February 27 2015, @09:50AM (#150349) Homepage

      I'd go for a different kind of replicator. I'd like to see a bunch of nanobots construct a pre-designed item at the sub-molecular level. It could construct food / drink or (given enough material and physics knowledge) a star ship with androids. The advantage would be that it could also fix something that broke from typical use (or abuse) because the design is already in memory and these little guys know what an item should be like. They could reproduce themselves so it could build something faster (if it were a large item that were needed) and consume themselves for material when the project is nearly finished. Want to add another story to your house with an additional bathroom? Not a problem. Enlarge your living room by two inches to fit that new, slightly wider sofa you want them to construct? Sure. Clogged drains, taking out the trash, and pollution are a thing of the past.

      They could also heal our bodies (no cancer) or augment our bodies with technology. (Space suits? How quaint.) They would render scarce material obsolete (asteroid sized bling would be possible) and get rid of dangerous materials (like things that are radioactive). If you don't want to augment your body to the extreme, terraforming would be possible with these little guys.

      Version two would be able to convert matter and energy back and forth freely. (E = m * c^2)

      These guys (in my mind) are the ultimate item when combining energy and material with knowledge and research.

      The only issue, of course, is some joker making up a recipe for gray goo.

      --
      www.jb-wolf.com [jb-wolf.com]
    • (Score: 3, Informative) by MrNemesis on Friday February 27 2015, @11:32AM

      by MrNemesis (1582) on Friday February 27 2015, @11:32AM (#150373)

      Just for those who haven't heard of it, Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age [tvtropes.org] is a (in my opinion a rather brilliant) book that centres around replicators (called matter-compilers) and other sundry nanotech developments.

      It's not just a good SF yarn about technology but I found the cultural commentary on how different folks reacted to magic-make-everything-machines utterly fascinating and The Young Lady's Illustrated Primer sounds like the best thing in the world.

      --
      "To paraphrase Nietzsche, I have looked into the abyss and been sick in it."
    • (Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday February 27 2015, @03:54PM

      by Grishnakh (2831) on Friday February 27 2015, @03:54PM (#150492)

      Maybe I'm missing something, but it appears to me that TFA is asking people to name technological breakthroughs which are actually feasible using current state-of-the-art technology and scientific knowledge, or are very close, and just aren't here yet mainly because of economics, political will, etc. Not Star Trek technologies which may or may not even be possible according to the laws of physics.

      • (Score: 1) by soylentsandor on Saturday February 28 2015, @11:01AM

        by soylentsandor (309) on Saturday February 28 2015, @11:01AM (#151014)

        It seems as if TFA is trying to imply that, yes. But it fails miserably at bringing that bit across, so we might as well completely ignore that and go all wild on the Star Trek tech.

  • (Score: 2) by TheLink on Friday February 27 2015, @08:52AM

    by TheLink (332) on Friday February 27 2015, @08:52AM (#150329) Journal
    Portable and efficient matter to electricity converter (where efficiency is not far from E=mc^2 - don't want too much waste heat )[1].

    Or one of the better Ironman suits (not the crappy ones that kept falling apart) with a working Jarvis AI.

    [1] But with 7 billion of these the world might soon start glowing hot.
  • (Score: 4, Interesting) by Hairyfeet on Friday February 27 2015, @09:06AM

    by Hairyfeet (75) <{bassbeast1968} {at} {gmail.com}> on Friday February 27 2015, @09:06AM (#150330) Journal

    Lets face it a LOT of our problems, overpopulation, lack of living space, lack of jobs compared to number of people, etc could be solved by giving people the companionship of a person without any chance of reproduction...a sexbot. Getting people to switch would be trivial, I mean who wouldn't want their ideal mate, perfect in every way and who never gets sick, or tired, or is in a bad mood, but instead cares about nothing but your happiness?

    Put out a perfect sexbot and within 2 generations you would have the population shrank down to completely sustainable levels that would allow them to live in luxury and peace, the air and water could be cleaned up easily as you just wouldn't need that much to keep up with a lower static population, you could end up with a utopia where everybody lived very well without all the brutality and hatred. Sounds like a "world changer" to me.

    --
    ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
    • (Score: 2) by sudo rm -rf on Friday February 27 2015, @09:20AM

      by sudo rm -rf (2357) on Friday February 27 2015, @09:20AM (#150340) Journal

      I mean who wouldn't want their ideal mate, perfect in every way and who never gets sick, or tired, or is in a bad mood, but instead cares about nothing but your happiness?

      I, for one, would get bored and unhappy quickly. I mean, how can one feel happiness without a frame of reference?

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:51AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:51AM (#150351)

        The world would still be full of people. People will always have conflicts. And you could always choose to have a human partner rather than a sexbot. Someone has to reproduce or the population will be gone pretty quick.

    • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:24AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:24AM (#150341)

      Wouldn't work. The only people who would be willing to use sexbots are already being denied any chance of reproduction. Overpopulation is still happening despite systematic efforts to stigmatize undesirable losers.

    • (Score: 2) by Thexalon on Friday February 27 2015, @04:04PM

      by Thexalon (636) on Friday February 27 2015, @04:04PM (#150499)

      What do you think "RealDoll" and their competitors are trying to do?

      The thing is, even with perfect sexbots you'd have plenty of overpopulation. A lot of the reasons for overpopulation have to do with cultural obligations and economics, not sexual desire.

      Cultural obligations in a lot of other countries are the same in the US: A lot of people in the US, particularly Catholics and Mormons, pressure their children to have lots of descendants. A lot of people in other countries do the same thing.

      The economics are also really very clear: What puts an end to it are a combination of economic prosperity for adults, a high cost of raising a child, and abolition of child labor so it takes longer for the child to contribute money to the family. The main economic reasons for overpopulation are that more kids means more helping hands and more workers for the family.

      Oh, and birth control helps too, because a lot of those kids aren't intentional. But don't think for a minute that most wives would be all that accepting of a husband who spent most of his nights with a sexbot rather than her.

      --
      The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @04:47PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @04:47PM (#150530)

      A lack of jobs is not solved by reducing the population. Even people who live in poverty still spend money, and that money contributes to other jobs. If those people didn't exist, the jobs created by their spending wouldn't exist, and so others would become unemployed.

      • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Nuke on Friday February 27 2015, @08:15PM

        by Nuke (3162) on Friday February 27 2015, @08:15PM (#150685)

        If [poor] people didn't exist, the jobs created by their spending wouldn't exist, and so others would become unemployed.

        No, because in a reduced population those others would not be unemployed - they would not exist either.

        Think for example if the population were halved. There would be half the shops, half the employment, half the poor, half the rich, half the cars, half the energy consumption. The thing would be similar to now, just scaled down to a half. But there would be advantages :- per person there would be twice the fertile land for food (actually even more because currently built-up land could be released), half the pollution, twice the minerals, twice the space on the beach, and so on. Economies of scale would not be affected because World economics is already way past the point of economies of scale being reached. You have only to see how many different models of phone are being manufactured to see that economy of scale was reached at a fraction of the present size of the market.

        OTOH, far from any further economies of scale being achievable, the world population has reached a saturation point where efficiency is being seriously impacted. A simple example is our running low on copper such that there is talk of aluminium cored cables being used for house wiring. Aluminium is more resistive so efficiency will be lost. When populations were smaller, people lived a short walk to their work or had a clear drive. Now most people waste two hours per day in traffic jams going to and from work.

        I believe the future will be an increasing struggle between people for dwindling resources, until something breaks.

        • (Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Saturday February 28 2015, @03:04PM

          by hendrikboom (1125) Subscriber Badge on Saturday February 28 2015, @03:04PM (#151068) Homepage Journal

          Aluminum is dangerous for wiring, it flexes easily but succumbs to metal fatigue; the cracks rust; its rust (responsible for aluminum's whitish colour) is physically strong and almost a perfect insulator so cracks don't close up, the wire gradually gets narrower and gets hot, possibly instigating fires.

          Maybe in environments where it never bent and was hermetically sealed away from oxygen, but no, I don't want it in my house.

  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by overtech on Friday February 27 2015, @09:07AM

    by overtech (2184) on Friday February 27 2015, @09:07AM (#150332)

    seems so simple but an effective method for continual glucose monitoring is elusive
     

    • (Score: 2) by nishi.b on Friday February 27 2015, @09:59AM

      by nishi.b (4243) on Friday February 27 2015, @09:59AM (#150353)

      In general artifical organs grown from your own cells (pancreas, liver, heart, kidney, stomach...) and a good way to reconnect them to the rest of the body. If you had liver disease, you could just grow a new one and replace completely the old organ...
      The hardest part still seems to be the nervous system : you grow a new leg how about linking it to the nervous system ? Scan et reprint a full brain structure including each and every synapse ?
      If we could just be made from spare parts !

  • (Score: 1) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:13AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:13AM (#150336)

    The Most AMAZING because it breaks the law! of physics.

  • (Score: 2) by mtrycz on Friday February 27 2015, @09:33AM

    by mtrycz (60) on Friday February 27 2015, @09:33AM (#150342)

    Sadly, not gonna happen soon.

    --
    In capitalist America, ads view YOU!
  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by dltaylor on Friday February 27 2015, @09:36AM

    by dltaylor (4693) on Friday February 27 2015, @09:36AM (#150343)

    The world could use a cheap. clean energy source, sure, but what it REALLY needs is a better human.

    For starters, how 'bout people who are not only capable of seeing through the BS, but are also willing to do so. I'm not talking Vulcans, although, finally, the myth that Vulcans are emotionless should be dissipating. I am talking about people that can make a rational decision , when one is needed. It will not eliminate conflict, including war (there can be rational reasons for violence), but the belief-driven (Manifest Destiny, anti-* "witch hunts", such as McCarthyism, 100 Years War, the US war Viet Nam (the French had a rational, economic reason to try to own the country), but fewer would be willing to kill millions to enrich a few or to subject them to fantasies about the "right way" to live.

    What we need is a good plague that spreads a combination of functional intelligence and compassion.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:42AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:42AM (#150346)

      How dare you question the wisdom of the obedient herd? Dislike, mod down, I WILL DESTROY YOU!

    • (Score: 2) by SpockLogic on Friday February 27 2015, @01:12PM

      by SpockLogic (2762) on Friday February 27 2015, @01:12PM (#150395)

      Better humans - not going to happen.

      I'll settle for levitating slippers to make for an easier journey from sofa to bed at the end of the day.

      --
      Overreacting is one thing, sticking your head up your ass hoping the problem goes away is another - edIII
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:39AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:39AM (#150345)

    The White Rabbit wouldn't be late for a very important date, if he didn't need to walk.

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by NickFortune on Friday February 27 2015, @09:50AM

    by NickFortune (3267) on Friday February 27 2015, @09:50AM (#150350)

    Immortality, invulnerability in fact, almost any thing from the superhero books.

    Unlimited free energy for everyone, forever.

    Travel to parallel worlds

    Magic

    Common Sense.

    Time Travel (with optional DeLorian)

    I could go on an on. Why are we doing this, exactly?

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:58AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:58AM (#150352)

    medical nanobots
    focus fusion [lawrencevilleplasmaphysics.com]
    10x energy density battery
    optical supercomputer [optalysys.com]
    crossbar rram [crossbar-inc.com]
    hoverboard duh

    • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Friday February 27 2015, @10:13AM

      by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Friday February 27 2015, @10:13AM (#150355) Journal

      10x energy density battery

      Ummm... "To call a Shipstone an improved storage battery would be to call an atom bomb an improved firecracker"

      --
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
      • (Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Saturday February 28 2015, @12:26AM

        by NotSanguine (285) <NotSanguineNO@SPAMSoylentNews.Org> on Saturday February 28 2015, @12:26AM (#150836) Homepage Journal

        10x energy density battery

        Ummm... "To call a Shipstone an improved storage battery would be to call an atom bomb an improved firecracker"

        Thanks, c0lo! I just re-read Friday a couple of weeks ago, so that made me smile.

        --
        No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
  • (Score: 5, Funny) by c0lo on Friday February 27 2015, @10:10AM

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Friday February 27 2015, @10:10AM (#150354) Journal
    with no doubt: the year of Linux on/as desktop.
    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
    • (Score: 1) by Nesh on Friday February 27 2015, @01:24PM

      by Nesh (269) on Friday February 27 2015, @01:24PM (#150401)

      that's indeed an easy and a funny one because it's already happened; that's 2000 for me; AMAZING isn't it? I still find it amazing after all those years.

      Even my kids prefer it. For years I left all desktops dual-boot, but (Gnu)Linux is the one they always turn too.
      So now we got linux-only desktops next to a few dual-boots for some games.
      And it just keeps growing and growing. We've got 7 desktops, 4 servers and a Pi running (Gnu)Linux.

  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by nishi.b on Friday February 27 2015, @10:14AM

    by nishi.b (4243) on Friday February 27 2015, @10:14AM (#150356)

    Long-term high density storage. For example a small cube that would be burned like a CD/DVD, contain hundreds of TB and would sit unchanged on my desk for hundreds of years. And cheap of course.
    Tired of copying data all the time, failing hard disks, small capacity and short-lived optical media (Blu-Ray M-Disc might be better, but 25 GB only), and current-leaking flash disk (10 years ?).

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @10:15AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @10:15AM (#150357)

    a HUMONGUOSLY PARALLEL processor+chipset combo on a single chip in a dip package with an assload (over 10^10^10) cores, preferrably no bigger then 1 cm2.
    , that can be connected in series. Cores would be somewhat simple, (get, send, boolean operations and arithmetic operations and 26 registers, oh and some sort of bus with at least 6 bus interconnects per chip...with enough width that all cores can communicate at same time at full speed)

    like a transputer cpu, except one can just buy a bunch of them, solder some wires input to output in a hypertorus pattern or something and scale the fuck out

    afaik, nothing like this exists on the market (parallella is kinda a step in the right direction)
    one could probably make such a thing of fpga's or atmel microcontrollers (with alot less cores then 10^10^10 per BOARD) :(

      thish would be shooo cooool *drool*

    with such a machine, id rule the silly societies of organics with an iron fist! Or maybe an iron claw, havent decided yet

    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by MozeeToby on Friday February 27 2015, @02:31PM

      by MozeeToby (1118) on Friday February 27 2015, @02:31PM (#150430)

      So... a GPU? I kid, I kid, but the similarities between what you want and a modern GPU are certainly worth looking at.

  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Covalent on Friday February 27 2015, @10:30AM

    by Covalent (43) on Friday February 27 2015, @10:30AM (#150361) Journal

    Maybe it's warp drive or wormholes or something even more exotic, but travelling faster than light would change everything.

    --
    You can't rationally argue somebody out of a position they didn't rationally get into.
  • (Score: 2) by CirclesInSand on Friday February 27 2015, @11:05AM

    by CirclesInSand (2899) on Friday February 27 2015, @11:05AM (#150365)

    A truly peer to peer physical layer networking protocol. Something that doesn't require eminent domain. Copper requires land to be dug up, cellular requires cell towers and auction of the Emag spectrum.

    Something like a cell phone that shoots particles through the earth's crust to the recipient cell phone. Or some sort of quantum entanglement between two cell phones that allows a person to communicate without any 3rd party negotiation. No monopolies, no central powers, no natural restrictions on competition. Would be nice.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @04:16AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @04:16AM (#150915)

      There is a lot of perfectly good EM spectrum for that. The problem is that governments have decided that it is against the law to use it, except when paying a large sum of money. Money that the majority of people do not have, or would even earn in their lifetimes.

      I almost had the same idea. Cell phones would no longer only depend on cell towers but there would be a large mesh network of them. This requires much better battery and RF technology - and a lot more bandwidth. There will still be conventional cell towers, connecting to the internet or other nodes not in the mesh via conventional means. But these would no longer be monopolized by telco's and everyone could set one up.

      • (Score: 2) by CirclesInSand on Saturday February 28 2015, @05:31AM

        by CirclesInSand (2899) on Saturday February 28 2015, @05:31AM (#150943)

        No matter what protocol you use, the EM spectrum has to be rationed. Some protocol has to exist for preventing 1 individual (a not well defined concept) from using more than their "share" of the EM spectrum, and someone has to bring violence to him/them if he/they try.

        I totally agree that EM communications could be done much better by simply defining a better protocol, and auctioning the spectrum to be resold is ridiculous. But I was trying to suggest a manifestation of physics that makes the rationing logic unnecessary.

  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Aiwendil on Friday February 27 2015, @11:20AM

    by Aiwendil (531) on Friday February 27 2015, @11:20AM (#150368) Journal

    Quite frankly I can't think of a single invention that wouldn't be more than an incremental advance in technology..

    But this comes from the simple fact that almost all amazing technological breakthroughs are that simply because they open up new and unexpected fields - if a field is expected it mainly is an incremental breakthrough.

    For instance... consider the case of the nuclear power plant and how it's inception would have been considered by someone up to date with the related research.
    1939 - "Pretty much obvious/unavoidable" (splitting of the atom)
    1932 - "So that is one way to use the neutron radiation" (discovery of neutron radiation)
    1932 - "Oh, so it is scales?" (First human made nuclear chain reaction)
    1911/1913 - "So Rutherford/Bohr had it right." (Modern model of the atom) <-- from here it is pretty much within the mindset of people.
    1895 - "You can do that with X-rays?" (X-rays discovered)
    1887 - "Those radiowaves are intense energy?" (Radiowaves discovered)
    1801 - "Radiation doesn't only cause discolouration?" (UV discovered)
    Before 1800 - "This is magic and should be impossible" <-- here it would have been a truly amazing breakthrough.

    After 1895 it would be a major (but not amazing) breakthrough to split the atom (since it basically would explain another phenomena), and after 1913 it was pretty much expected.

    But to answer the question - What I would consider to be an amazing technological breakthrough would be something that I couldn't even currently imagine.
    (A good example here are the new HVDC-breakers that came last year - they are a major technological breakthrough, but are in no way amazing since they where fully expected to arrive sooner or later)

    • (Score: 2) by tynin on Saturday February 28 2015, @02:35PM

      by tynin (2013) on Saturday February 28 2015, @02:35PM (#151054) Journal

      When I was younger I had an idea for an invention that would be a device that could take in and quantify all the characteristics of all materials known to man (and that are accessible currently). It would further analyze how we use these materials to make tools, objects, and everything. It would then extrapolate out alternative structures, designs, and solutions and would then test these new creations in a simulator to try and gauge if it is of a higher efficiency than what we humans are currently using. Once it finds something potentially new and better it would promote that for further review to be made and tested in the real world.

      As I get older, the more I think our universe is such a device.

      • (Score: 3, Interesting) by Aiwendil on Saturday February 28 2015, @03:25PM

        by Aiwendil (531) on Saturday February 28 2015, @03:25PM (#151075) Journal

        You mean something akin to an extreme form of the automated material testing with an option to consider cost* as used in finding new chemical mixtures for batteries (more focus on batch-testing) and new superconductors (more focus on the theory)?

        There also are software that uses a good physics engine to find out new loadbearing structures.

        * = cost is a decent measure for how available something is when talking industrial uses.

        We pretty much have devices that are a good way there.. However, quite frankly availability (i.e cost) sets the bar.
        But I agree on that further incremental improvements are needed.

  • (Score: 2) by Jaruzel on Friday February 27 2015, @11:24AM

    by Jaruzel (812) on Friday February 27 2015, @11:24AM (#150369) Homepage Journal

    1. Global pandemic wipes out 70% of the population (typically the poor, and under-developed)
    2. The remaining population realise this was a massive wake up call about how fucked up humans are.
    3. Countries bury their differences, as there's less demand for the natural resources.
    4. Due to the dawn of a new enlightened collaborative peaceful human race, massive advances in all aspects of life are made.

    This is my roadmap, and I don't even claim to be a survivor of the pandemic. However if something radical like a global plague or mass partial-extinction doesn't happen in the next 200 years to make the human race re-think everything, we'll be well and truly fucked.

    --
    This is my opinion, there are many others, but this one is mine.
    • (Score: 1) by OwMyBrain on Friday February 27 2015, @02:52PM

      by OwMyBrain (5044) on Friday February 27 2015, @02:52PM (#150448)

      However if something radical like a global plague or mass partial-extinction doesn't happen in the next 200 years to make the human race re-think everything, we'll be well and truly fucked.

      In what manner will we be fucked? A mass partial-extinction event?

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by Thexalon on Friday February 27 2015, @04:17PM

      by Thexalon (636) on Friday February 27 2015, @04:17PM (#150510)

      The last time something like that happened, humanity did the exact opposite of what you seem to think would happen. Some of the reactions to the original Black Death:
      - Increased religious fervor, including people whipping themselves
      - Persecution of anyone perceived as being different and thus dangerous, including but not limited to Jews, herbal healers, and the educated
      - Constant warfare and political instability, mostly directed at innocent non-political people
      - A loss of scientific knowledge and thought that took centuries to recover from (to get an idea, one of the largest libraries in Europe had about 200 books)

      --
      The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
  • (Score: 2, Disagree) by WizardFusion on Friday February 27 2015, @11:58AM

    by WizardFusion (498) Subscriber Badge on Friday February 27 2015, @11:58AM (#150377) Journal

    Technology that removes all religion from the planet. It's the only reason we fight as a people.
    We will never have world peace when we have religion. I am not just talking about the radical Islamic. Even Christianity had it's "holy wars"
    Every single religion on the planet must go for us to even start to think about world peace.

    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Squidious on Friday February 27 2015, @01:14PM

      by Squidious (4327) on Friday February 27 2015, @01:14PM (#150396)

      Religion is just a tool that greed wields to get others to do the dirty work. Religion isn't the only tool in that box - consider the more animal drivers like fear, hunger, ignorance, lust, and envy.

      --
      The terrorists have won, game, set, match. They've scared the people into electing authoritarian regimes.
    • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Nuke on Friday February 27 2015, @01:47PM

      by Nuke (3162) on Friday February 27 2015, @01:47PM (#150409)

      [Religion is] the only reason we fight as a people

      You need to read some history books.

      Basically, the psychology of fighting wars is the same as that of supporting football teams. People find a pretext for grouping together as a crowd to go against other crowds. I have seen it on the school playground, and you see it in wars. Eg, in 15th century England, the Wars of the Roses consisted of warlords and their employed permanent men-at-arms, typically less than 100, marching through the countryside and recruiting an army of several thousand as they went. The local squires would go along either because they already owed a favour to the warlord, or they hoped for reward if the warlord won. The squires brought their peasants with them, who mostly came gladly for the excitement and prospect of loot, bringing their bows, odd bits of armour and a short sword with them. A similar thing applied when preparing to cross the Channel to fight in France.

      Then two armies would meet for a battle, which mostly looked like a modern day riot but with more serious weapons. Afterwards the recruited men would disperse home, if they survived.

      The warlords were fighting for political power, the squires out of obligation, and the foot soldiers for the hell of it. Religion had nothing to do with it.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @03:37PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @03:37PM (#150481)

        The warlords were fighting for political power, the squires out of obligation, and the foot soldiers for the hell of it. Religion had nothing to do with it.

        Take for example the American civil war. There is no way you got some poor dirt farmer to give two craps about what the rich dude who owned 10k acres could or could not own slaves. And what some dude 1500 miles away said they could or could not do. What were they going to do about it? They were 1500 miles away... Most wanted to fight. The north thought it would be over in 2 days. The south wanted to throw down and have it out.

        You pretty much nailed why people fight.

    • (Score: 1) by Valvar on Friday February 27 2015, @03:15PM

      by Valvar (4932) on Friday February 27 2015, @03:15PM (#150461)

      Oh yeah, I agree. The greatest wars throughout history were all started because of evil religion. I mean, just look at WW1 and WW2... Totally religious wars, right? By the way, I'm selling these fine nylon fedoras...

    • (Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday February 27 2015, @04:00PM

      by Grishnakh (2831) on Friday February 27 2015, @04:00PM (#150496)

      This is dumb. I'm no fan of organized religion, but Russia isn't attacking and annexing parts of Ukraine right now because of religion, it's because of greed and power. It's the same reason the US is constantly involved in the Middle East basically: hegemony, power, and control of natural resources.

      A new ultra-cheap energy source, or something that changes the equation so we get our energy from someplace other than oil, would change global politics to an enormous degree.

  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by PizzaRollPlinkett on Friday February 27 2015, @12:01PM

    by PizzaRollPlinkett (4512) on Friday February 27 2015, @12:01PM (#150378)

    What we need is the AA battery for new devices. Every single device I've seen in the past few years has had the battery glued inside of it. Once the battery goes, the entire device has to be trashed. Tremendous waste of money. What we need is a standard battery (or several of them with different power output) for new devices that does what the AA battery did for radios. When the battery goes kaput, you just replace it and keep using the device.

    Just shows how far backwards things have gotten that it's impossible for something like the AA battery to become standard these days.

    --
    (E-mail me if you want a pizza roll!)
    • (Score: 2) by quacking duck on Friday February 27 2015, @02:59PM

      by quacking duck (1395) on Friday February 27 2015, @02:59PM (#150451)

      Although I am all for some standard sizes and replaceable batteries for larger things like electric cars, it starts becoming impractical for small devices that are cramming more and more into a limited volume with micrometer tolerances. If rumours are true, even the upcoming Samsung Galaxy S6 won't have a removable battery. One can argue that's a design decision and they don't have to make devices that thin, of course.

      That said, a device does *not* "have to be trashed" once a glued battery goes. I just had my iPhone 5 battery replaced for free, out of warranty as part of a different repair program (it's not a refurb, and charge capacity and cycle counts prove it's a new battery). People *choose* to trash it for any of three main reasons:

      1) Cost: They don't want to pay the full cost to officially replace it. For iPhones it's $80 USD [apple.com]
      2) Risk: They don't want to chance a third party battery or replacement service for much cheaper. Considering some improper replacements have resulted in fires, it's a valid concern
      3) New hotness: They've had the current device for so long they want a new device anyway

      • (Score: 2) by Nuke on Friday February 27 2015, @08:38PM

        by Nuke (3162) on Friday February 27 2015, @08:38PM (#150716)

        It was a bit OTT for the GP to ask for AA batteries in everything, and that is probably not what he meant. Clearly a mobile phone battery needs to be smaller than AA.

        However, I see no earthly reason why there could not be a standard size of battery for mobile phones and similar small devices. In the several phones I have had the batteries have all been a similar shape and size - just sufficiently different to prevent them being interchangeable.

        I have the full CPC (UK on-line seller of tech items) catalogue right here and the pages for batteries are absolutely ridiculous. There are 60 pages of them, many in long lists of fine print. There are hundreds of camera batteries alone, even for the same manufacturer.

        One problem is the Far Eastern origin of much stuff these days. I have a Chinese friend who has lived in East and West, and he tells me that the Oriental mind has no concept of standardisation. It used to be, and maybe still is, that Japan has two different mains electrical frequencies for example, and each major manufacturer has its own screw threads.

    • (Score: 5, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Friday February 27 2015, @04:35PM

      by Grishnakh (2831) on Friday February 27 2015, @04:35PM (#150519)

      Then stop buying Apple iDevices, you moron!

      My phone has a removable battery. Some other phones do too. But the non-replaceable battery thing has caught on because people are stupid and have bought into it because Apple told them to. It's entirely in the mfgr's interest to have non-replaceable batteries so that people will buy new devices when the battery goes bad, and even if they do have a replaceable battery, it's not in their interest to have a standard because then they can't make a ton of money selling overpriced replacements, so you're not going to get them to accept a standard-size battery without legislation. That's the only reason all our devices now use MicroUSB connectors: the European Union mandated it. If you want standardized batteries, you need to get the government (probably the EU, since the US government sucks at regulation) to mandate it. Corporations will not do it willingly.

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by mhajicek on Friday February 27 2015, @12:36PM

    by mhajicek (51) on Friday February 27 2015, @12:36PM (#150388)

    Strong, friendly AI, capable of rapid self improvement without becoming unfriendly.

    --
    The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
  • (Score: 2) by mechanicjay on Friday February 27 2015, @02:25PM

    Free, cheap, zero-environmental impact energy.

    Global CO2 scrubbers that plug into the above.

    --
    My VMS box beat up your Windows box.
  • (Score: 2) by Geezer on Friday February 27 2015, @02:30PM

    by Geezer (511) on Friday February 27 2015, @02:30PM (#150429)

    Perpetual motion.

    Solves all conservation of energy problems, including stamina between the sheets.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @02:58PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @02:58PM (#150449)

    Robot butler and inverse human 3D modeling (from pictures, videos)

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @03:34AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @03:34AM (#150895)

      Or, perhaps, robot maids endowed with the right combination of physical and psychological characteristics (aka Stepford Wives).

  • (Score: 2) by richtopia on Friday February 27 2015, @04:36PM

    by richtopia (3160) on Friday February 27 2015, @04:36PM (#150521) Homepage Journal

    In high school I dreamed up the scenario:

    1. Fusion becomes viable, and we migrate to it as an energy source
    2. We now have an over abundance of helium
    3. Everything is transported via airship, thanks to extra helium

    Don't bring me down with logic, I want a fusion powered - steampunk world!

  • (Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Friday February 27 2015, @04:42PM

    by Grishnakh (2831) on Friday February 27 2015, @04:42PM (#150527)

    One thing which is entirely doable with current tech, and which would change our lives immensely, is SkyTran personal rapid transit systems. Instead of needing to own a car, or pay $$$ for a taxi, and risk your life on the roads with idiot human drivers who kill 250,000 people every year worldwide (50,000 in the US) due to their incompetence, and having to sit in rush-hour traffic for countless hours of your short life, you could just walk to the nearest SkyTran station a 1/4 mile away or less, get in a car (which you called up using a smartphone app), and it'll take you to wherever you want to go at 100-150mph, nonstop, on an elevated maglev rail system. You don't have to wait around for the next bus, you don't have to sit next to some smelly weird stranger, you don't have to stop at every station along the way, and it moves in a grid fashion instead of along a fixed linear route like normal public transit systems. And, it does all this using about 3kW of electricity, about 2 hair-dryers' worth, instead of needing to burn tons of fossil fuel, so it can be powered by the electric grid using solar, wind, or nuclear power, freeing us from dependence on foreign oil. No, it won't be helpful to rural dwellers (yet), but by getting most urban/suburban commuters out of their cars and off the roads, we'll radically reduce the amount of oil we need nationally and the amount of traffic on the roads, massively reducing the number of traffic casualties and deaths. The main problem is that law enforcement agencies and municipal courts won't like it because people who drink alcohol will be able to use it to conveniently and cheaply get home instead of driving, so they won't be getting all that money from DUI convictions.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @04:58PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @04:58PM (#150540)

    cheap and fast internet.
    bicycle w/ battery and motor + solar charger.
    a gigabit switch and HTPC making a baby.
    LPG + Fuel cell + battery + electric motor/generator + 4 wheels.
    cheap and fast internet.
    artificial gills and/or cheap and sturdy re-breather for diving.
    cheap and fast internet.
    portal 3.

    • (Score: 1) by soylentsandor on Saturday February 28 2015, @11:34AM

      by soylentsandor (309) on Saturday February 28 2015, @11:34AM (#151019)

      bicycle w/ battery and motor + solar charger

      Electric bicycles are available today [wikipedia.org].

      And as for that solar charger: put solar panels on your roof, they'd do more good there than they ever could on a bike.

      a gigabit switch and HTPC making a baby.

      What's that supposed to achieve?

  • (Score: 1) by Qlaras on Friday February 27 2015, @05:11PM

    by Qlaras (3198) on Friday February 27 2015, @05:11PM (#150549)

    That I could buy today?

    Transportation: Self-driving capable electric car that costs $25k. Would put it within range of (most) middle-income folks, and the price would only go down as time went on, letting us focus on other polluters next.

    Energy: Modern nuclear power plants (fail-safe) that use all the waste we've generated, being built to replace all the existing old unsafe nuclear plants (fail-bad), coal plants and natural gas plants. (That way we can save these resources for other things, or just not use them at all)

    Portable Energy: Solar panels that are efficient yet cheap, and aren't made with limited-resource materials. Put them on every surface; cut the need to have dedicated power plants (except for very high-power needs - welding, etc)

    Computing: The ability to have all my compute in my phone (Or similar device). I can dock it into a laptop shell, and it gains 'external hardware' (discrete GPU, perhaps faster cores, storage) - same with a dock on a multiple monitor set for gaming, and have it all be one cohesive system.

    3D Printers: One that isn't limited to its rail size (maybe a robot that can crawl over what its making? - 3D PrintBot?) - that can both do additive and subtractive manufacturing with at least metal and plastics, and the same or a partner device that I can feed leftover food containers (tin cans, aluminum cans, plastic/glass bottles) to so I don't have to buy premade pellets. I'd even be fine walking down the block to a 'community' printer to pick up my creations, if I needed access to a larger one. (Or have it automatically delivered via a robot - wheeled or flying)

    Housing: The ability to use perhaps a scaled-up version of the 3DPrintBot to 'make' an efficient house - self-sustaining energy-wise (high insulation, good airflow) - that isn't oversized for my needs - but I can toss the 3D PrintBot at it to expand when I need a new room.

    Healthcare: The ability to have new organs or teeth grown to replace failing ones.

    Cybernetics: Better-than-OEM bodyparts (Limbs, mostly - but ultimately everything).

    Starting to diverge from 'Could buy today' - so I'll stop there.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @05:31PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @05:31PM (#150562)

    Using an exercycle is such a drag. I want an easy way to stay fit in the winter so I can enjoy cycling in the summer. Should also help to control winter weight gain to avoid having to lose 5-10 pounds in the spring. Maybe five minutes a day wired to a box or something. Longer time is OK if I can do it while seated (and reading SN...)

    • (Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Saturday February 28 2015, @03:35PM

      by hendrikboom (1125) Subscriber Badge on Saturday February 28 2015, @03:35PM (#151076) Homepage Journal

      I once saw an exercycle that was connected to a computer, which displayed some scenery you could cycle through. The exercycle had a functional steering bar that you could use to steer through that landscape. And difficulty of pedalling depended on the hills you were climbing.

      It seems an exercycle could be an awesome game controller for some kinds of games.

      I saw it in a computer museum. As far as I know nothing like it has ever been mass-produced.

  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by PapayaSF on Saturday February 28 2015, @03:05AM

    by PapayaSF (1183) on Saturday February 28 2015, @03:05AM (#150884)
    • Room-temperature superconductor
    • Cheap desalinization
    • Cheap trips to orbit
    • Vastly improved electricity storage
    • Medical nanobots that cured cancer, dementia, heart disease, etc.
    • Something that could pull enough CO2 out of the air to counteract climate change. GMO trees?
  • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @12:15PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @12:15PM (#151022)

    And even dumber comments. :)