What are examples of technologies that were expected to have huge impacts but didn't because they never got cheap? Civilian nuclear power the obvious one, what are some others?
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I recommend this: “From an engineer and futurist, an impassioned account of technological stagnation since the 1970s and an imaginative blueprint for a richer, more abundant future.”
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Modular construction. For the last thirty years, every architecture student has written a thesis on how this will solve housing affordability and all of them have been wrong. It's a daily headline at .
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Switchgrass ethanol, space stations (hopefully changing soon), personal rapid transit on tracks
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What was promising about the basic biology or ag properties of switchgrass ethanol? (Looking for something analogous to “the basic physics of nuclear power means it has high energy density: low land and fuel mass requirements”.)
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Fracking has transformed the global energy markets. Bizarre to have it on this list.
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Hydroponics, for sure
Maybe DIY repairs of consumer electronics (through modularity)
But also: raising children in a box (Skinner-style) or in a barrel (Mark Twain-style)
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Supersonic airliners we’re killed by a two-fer - competition from wide-body jets and high oil prices.
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