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A predictive technology picture of the decade
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[QUOTE="TeethWhitener, post: 6165336, member: 511972"] Welp, it's been about a decade, so let's see how you did. Internet access has certainly jumped: [URL]https://www.internetworldstats.com/emarketing.htm[/URL] OP posted in mid-2010, when just under 2 billion people had internet access. That number has jumped to 4.3 billion, or in terms of population, in nine years, we've gone from 28.6% of people having internet access to 56.1%, over half the world's population. While there has been some work done on smart contact lenses, they're still in early research stages, and probably won't be commercially available for at least another 10 years. This article: [URL]https://insideevs.com/longest-range-electric-cars-2019/[/URL] claims that at least 8 electric cars on the market have a range of greater than 200 miles. The market: [URL]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plug-in_electric_vehicles_in_the_United_States#/media/File:US_PEV_Sales_2010_by_PHEV_vs_BEV.png[/URL] has indeed grown. According to that same wikipedia article, electric cars have gone from 0.14% of the market in 2011 to over 2% in 2018, and there's not much sign that the growth is going to slow down soon. This was pretty spot on as well. High-speed rail has made some inroads in developing countries, but commercial transportation technology hasn't really gotten any speedier. I don't know how far along Elon Musk's Hyperloop proposal has gotten. Haha, not even close. For those of us in the materials game, the (over)promise of carbon nanotubes has always been a bit of a pipe dream. There are a few research programs on building strong carbon nanotube cables (in particular, for Naval towing applications), but no macroscopic strong CNT cables are available commercially, as far as I'm aware. No life on Mars yet, but a ton of research by the rovers has been done in the last decade. In particular, Curiosity (as part of the Mars Science Laboratory) has been exploring the surface of Mars since 2012. A few companies: [URL]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asteroid_mining#Proposed_mining_projects[/URL] have been formed in the last decade to examine the feasibility of asteroid mining. NASA's OSIRIS-REx and Japan's Hayabusa 2, missions to return samples from an asteroid's surface, are both in progress. There have certainly been dramatic cultural changes in the last decade, and I think one could make a strong case for the central role that the internet has played in that (for good and bad). The maximum energy conversion efficiency of solar cells has not changed very much (from about 40% in 2010 to about 45% in 2019. However, the prevalence of photovoltaics is increasing exponentially: [URL]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photovoltaics#/media/File:PV_cume_semi_log_chart_2014_estimate.svg[/URL] from about 40GW in 2010 to over 500GW in 2018. This is partly due to the price of solar panel systems falling from over $7 per watt in 2010 to under $3 per watt in 2018: [URL]https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy17osti/68925.pdf[/URL] So how did you do? Out of the 9 broad claims, you definitely got 4 right (increased internet access, electric car performance, transportation speed, and culture shifts). I can give you partial credit for solar cell efficiency and mining asteroids. And you missed on CNT's, life on Mars, and smart contact lenses. So let's call it about 50% accuracy. Not bad; I'm not sure professional futurists could do much better. Plus, you still have a year for the misses to pan out. :smile: [/QUOTE]
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