I've been indulging a bit of Godinesque subversion and keep coming back to "The Future Isn't What It Used To Be". I couldn't find it on his site; you'll just have buy his latest book?
While I think his point was that we've become masters of incremental perfectionism, he had some interesting "unreachables" in his riff that need a push or a counterpoint - a "raff".
1. Using changes in room temperature to generate electricity -- maybe build thermocouples near sea vents, or maybe massive (square kilometers) superconducting sheets in the Gulf Stream?
2. Efficient solar cells that generate "free" electricity -- I wonder how much solar energy ionizes sea water?
7. Antigravity -- maybe we can find a way not to push against Earth's gravity but perhaps amplify the gravity from the space above, or rig a bunch of gravity wells around Earth like a GPS grid.
8. Vaccines and cures for all chronic degenerative diseases -- I wonder if eliminating one source of death would somehow create another, or make others more common. If we are always really "too young to die", to what lengths would we go to stay alive?
12. Behavior mod for criminals -- Why stop there? I'm not sure any ethical threshold could withstand the temptation.
π (because it's irrational). A wireless device, costing $5, that gives you a free, fast Internet connection from anywhere.
Back to dreaming...or work?
