Other than AI ideally. I’ve long been fascinated by CRISPR.
Wanna hear about niche tech or anything y’all find fascinating
Fusion power and small modular reactors.
Big one!
Zero knowledge proofs. I’ve worked in the industry for a couple years now, and I’ve got a lot of hope it will actually help us fix the internet, stop spam bots, and allow for people to interact with better control over their data.
Blockchain cryptogrpaphy thingy?
It’s very useful in a lot of areas, blockchain being one, privacy being another, provable computation being a big one
Ah. Thats interesting
It’s AI but a specific use case of AI: an android at home to take care of the housework. Cleaning my dishes, doing the laundry, vaccuming and putting stuff away where it belongs are obvious use cases. But also:
- Go through your fridge and throw away everything that has expired or gone bad.
- Take care of your cat while you’re away on vacation.
- It’s your personal fire fighter.
- It paints your house or does any kind of house maintenance.
- Let’s say you’re in the middle of playing a board game on your dinner table but need to put it away for the night. Ask the android to memorize everything and put it away. The next time your friends come around to play, it can place everything in exactly the same spot.
Possibilities are endless.
Yeah! I’ve been asking chat gpt to take care of my daughter every day and I’ve not heard her cry in months!
That is anything but specific!
Maser drills: https://newatlas.com/energy/geothermal-energy-drilling-deepest-hole-quaise/
In a nutshell, it’s a economically brilliant idea: take hand-me-down microwave(ish) spectrum lasers from fusion research, drill holes deep into the crust (leaning on the fossil fuel industry), then hook up the resulting steam to existing coal plants, so you don’t have to build anything else. The coal plant gets free geothermal fuel, they move onto the next site: everyone wins.
It’s taking a worryingly long time though. I hope it gets enough funding.
Oh now THIS is the kimd of answer I was looking for. Great explanation and a great topic. Thanks for that
Good!
At risk of sounding like a shill, NewAtlas is a great source for exciting upcoming tech. I find myself reading it more these days.
Gonna go take a look
Just was in a talk of Jennifer Doudna. Thank CRISPER will cure many cancers in about ten years is incredible. Too bad it will be too late for my parents, but still.
To answer your question: phones and medical devices are incredible. Due to my moms pancreatic cancer she is a diabetic now. Her fingers can’t feel anything anymore due to all the piercing. But now she gets a new sensor on her arm and has continuous glucose readings. And she can apply that by herself. And I get warned if she has low sugar. This bus amazing.
Shootout to GlucoDataHandler, which does a better job than Abbott’s own app.
I feel it. At this point I just want revenge on the cancer that got my mom.
Jennifer Doudna talks about it sooo well. Check out her episode on the Ezra Klein show (podcast). https://pca.st/episode/12135fc7-b935-4daa-92c9-8b998cafae37
Sorry about your parents.
Oh wow my mom actually got diagnosed as diabetic just a few months ago herself. That sounds like a really useful tool to have.
Also check the pancreas if possible. It almost always is found too late. And my mom started with ‘just’ diabetics too.
Edit, I hope it’s nothing.
RISC-v
trains. i know it isn’t particularly new technology, but i am still excited about it.
Nuclear Fusion
This is the key to so much. Worried about Nestlé monopolizing freshwater? With nuclear fusion we can just take any old seawater and remove the salt. Worried about the war with Russia? With nuclear fusion we can become independent of all gas from Russia and cut off one of their biggest income sources. Lots of special materials are expensive because electricity is expensive - with nuclear fusion electricity is practically free. Over time we can get rid of any coal plants etc. that produce CO2.
Free, except for the amortized R&D and construction costs.
with nuclear fusion electricity is practically free.
Like that’ll ever happen under capitalism.
Oh i recently read a bit about it but honestly. Not my field.
I just want energy to be transformed, I like solar but nuclear is where its truly at.
China has a lot of nuclear projects going on
In response to you, have you seen GATICA it’s a great movie that shows clearly why that tech scares me.
I think batteries are super interesting, and sodium solid state batteries are a pretty huge innovation, but graphene batteries will be utterly insane if we can get there. Very interesting stuff.
Graphine being a single atom think sheet of carbon, which is dope!
For anyone else searching, the movie is spelled “Gattaca”.
Thanks! It’s been about 20 years now 😅
You can remember it because it’s the letters from the four nitrogenous bases in DNA: adenine, cytosine, guanine and thymine.
Yeah, that is what I mean, 20 years since high school, figured the pairs were GA TI GA :p
I’m aware of the movie but havent yet seen it. Although I seem to remember someone else brought it up in conversation a while ago now that you mention it.
I’ve heard of innovation in batteries but don’t know what its about. I’m gonna have to research that!
Thanks for that.
I’m really nerdy about camping gear. The shit coming out every season is just insane.
I went down a rabbit hole of watching camping gear reviews a few months ago. I hear a good pillow is an issue.
I bring an actual pillow. It’s worth the weight
Staying dry is still an issue
Can’t you use some vacuumed sealer to keep it dry on the walk in? It would also reduce the bulky size.
Sorry I mean keeping yourself dry is still a problem and a huge debate in camping gear. Look up the goretex controversy for example haha
Any technology is cool if you look at it in isolation. I just can’t get terribly excited because I generally doubt they will be used in a sensible/humane manner.
Med tech is looking cool. It’s one of the few unambiguously good uses of AI. AI systems for reading scans, detecting disease, etc. seem like they could be used to make medicine faster, easier, and more affordable, but I have doubts that the tech won’t just be used to increase profit margins and somehow mess things up to benefit insurance company executives.
CRISPR/synthBio looks like it could do amazing things, but I have to wonder how long until things hit the sweet spot, intersecting democratization of powerful tools and destructive ideology, and lead some lunatic or group of lunatics to develop a society destroying bioweapon.
It’s hard to get excited about the development of a new power when you look at who’s likely to hold it.
One of my favourite modern writers is Ted Chiang. He has argued that the horror in science fiction tends to come not from the technology but the system that it exists in.
You might appreciate this: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/tedchiang/the-real-danger-to-civilization-isnt-ai-its-runaway#.nq4zaYNr6
Oh man, that first sentence, already…
This summer, Elon Musk spoke to the National Governors Association and told them that “AI is a fundamental risk to the existence of human civilization.”
I am excited for the tooth regrowing tech coming up. I’ve got some awful dental work that would be much better replaced by a real tooth
Likewise. I dread to think how expensive it’s going to be though.
Ain’t no way. Havent heard if this!
I’ve been loosely following this for years. Great to see it getting close to the deplorable state.
spoiler
Pun intended
Also the eventual stem cell treatment for replacing damaged Inner ear cells
That HMS article is wild. As someone with moderate hearing loss and raging tinnitus, this would be a dream come true if it ever happens.
I think you got autoincorrected from “deployable”
Nice catch! Autocorrect is a pain…
I used to be excited for ai, and, let’s just say, that excitement has dwindeled due to recent events.
I’m scared that the same happens to CRISPR honest
The issue with tech is the economic model its under. I can imagine a million dystopian changes to society.
The doctor in China for example.
Hey maybe China starts creating soldiers with four arms and the us does too and you have a new arms race.
Which recent events, out of curiosity?
well i guess it’s not too recent, but the A.I. boom kinda killed my interests I’ve had 7 years ago. i wish it would go back to its research phase.
I’m old enough to remember when using computers daily went from a dorky interest to something the cool kids were doing (MySpace etc). Obviously, how the two groups approached computers was quite different. Even how they approached social spaces on the internet.
Idk, haven’t thought about it much but I remember being pretty depleted about being interested back then. The things I was learning with basic coding and stuff could now be done in a couple of clicks, the resources were now more scarce, and the space became filled with money-people interested in promoting their brand
Ah, for sure. That’s how I feel about cell phones. Haha
That’s how I feel about cell phones.
Linux phones might be able to do something about that, assuming they become good enough soonish. Perhaps usable Hurd phones will become available first.
It’s too late.
I mean, I hate how pervasive cell phones are in the culture. I wish we had 90’s tech and used pay phones so people could disconnect.
I’m studying biology and CRISPR is a crucial tool for a ton of research. So it’s already really useful!
Aptera. A solar panel on the roof of an electric vehicle. They’re slashing the power needed per mile in half because of weight loss and aerodynamics. That helps increase the range, especially for highway driving 400-1000 claimed miles on a charge depending on the model (40, 60 or 100kwh). It would be nice if they integrated v2x technology so you could use it as a generator.
I’ve been burned before by these too good to be true projects that never see the light of day, so I’ll believe it when I start seeing them on the road.
I hear this wheel thing is pretty cool. Supposed to be, like, round. Rollin all day long.
Nothing bad could come from that, right? Right?!
