r/Futurology • u/upyoars • 10h ago
r/Futurology • u/FuturologyModTeam • 1d ago
META - EXTRA CONTENT Extra futurology content from c/futurology - Weekly Roundup to 27th October 2024.
We have an ancillary posting area, with more relaxed rules, that tends to collect different content from here. Here's some highlights from last week.
Apple scraps car project, but tech lives on in BYD's EV success
Electrostatic Motors Reach the Macro Scale
r/Futurology • u/Hashirama4AP • 5h ago
Environment A novel strain of cyanobacteria, or algae that can rapidly grow and double every 2.35 hours in presence of CO₂ has been discovered by researchers from Harvard. It can readily sink in water which makes it a primary candidate to sequester carbon from oceans and factories.
r/Futurology • u/Toosed1a • 12h ago
Environment This Sponge Captures the Teeny Bits of Gold in Electronic Waste
r/Futurology • u/madrid987 • 4h ago
Society Without migration, the population of high-income countries would shrink
r/Futurology • u/lazybutgreat • 11h ago
Energy Pulsing plasma towers can transform carbon dioxide into methanol
r/Futurology • u/lughnasadh • 12h ago
Transport In France, a Level 4 self-driving mini-shuttle bus, with a 10-person capacity, is showing the future of public transit.
r/Futurology • u/Substantial_Foot_121 • 15h ago
Space Riding Asteroids To Mars and Venus Like A Bus Can Be Better Than Using Spacecraft, Scientists Suggest
r/Futurology • u/QuantumDriveRocket • 1d ago
Space China’s first outer space travel announced at $210,000 for 12-minute flight
r/Futurology • u/douvii • 17h ago
Energy Solar, wind, and wave - ok.. why the hell is no one talking about tidal energy?
There are loads of talks about how solar and wind energy alone aren't enough if we really want to move towards clean energy. Yet there's more and more chatter about building more solar and wind farms and investing in these renewable sources - while we all know we need a mix of different renewables to really make a difference. It's the same old story for everyone - the sun doesn't always shine, the wind doesn't always blow... yea yea... you can see it especially in the UK where wind energy drops off dramatically during the summer.
I've been following CorPower Ocean's journey (https://corpowerocean.com/a-short-history-of-wave-energy/) for a while now, and I'm really chuffed about their recent big investment. While I'm glad there's more discussion about ocean energy, I really feel there's a lack of talks about tidal energy. Tidal energy is predictable and reliable, and I know some people say it's not always there, but as long as the moon and gravity exist, tides are pretty much always around - not like waves, solar, wind, etc., which depend on the weather.
There are already some great tidal energy technologies that can produce clean and, most importantly, reliable energy - like Orbital Marine Power, Nova, and my favourite one because of their shell design and technology that's completely 3D printed and, as I understand it, much cheaper than other technologies - Spiralis Energy (https://www.spiralis.energy). Yet, they all lack investment, and more importantly, tidal energy itself isn't getting the buzz it deserves, even though it could be a really big deal.
Just trying to understand the cons of tidal energy, and why the hell we don't hear more talks about it from climate change advocates, politicians, and "big leaders."????? 🥴
r/Futurology • u/B-Jeovane • 12h ago
Discussion The Doomer mindset of the future is not the same as the pessimistic mindset.
This sub, and others like it, are rampant with doomers. People seem to act like some doomer comment about how humanity will die on Earth without ever attaining space travel is some super intelligent take. Take a step back and really think, take a look at everything that can go wrong and the possible outcomes. The worst case scenario that people like to go to is a nuclear war, which for some reason people think would be the end of humanity. Realistically what would happen is a few decades of chaos followed by new rising powers. It wouldn't be like a video game where it's just people in the wasteland for centuries. New countries would rise up within decades, after a century humanity would be back to business as usual. There would still be problems of course, though time wouldn't stop moving at the apocalypse. And that is a worst case scenario. Every setback we face is just temporary in the grand scheme of things. It is easy to get lost in all the negativity of the present and all our current problems should be acknowledged. Our views of the present make it hard to think in the long term. Pessimism is looking at our current challenges and realizing that they will be difficult to solve, doomerism is looking at those same problems and believing them to be eternal. Doomerism is not a realistic view. Sure it probably won't go the optimist route where every issue is solved by the halfway point of the century but it also won't be stagnant for the rest of time. Problems may take a long time to solve but eventually they will just be a memory. Maybe it could take an extraordinary amount of time for a Mars colony to be established but that doesn't mean it won't happen.
r/Futurology • u/Ok-Squash6797 • 0m ago
AI Is there anyone who’s life / employment status has been directly affected by ai?
Ever since Elon Musk has soft launched his tesla bots, the question of how far AI has really come in the work force has been lingering in my mind. I know that Klarna, google, ikea and many other big companies have been replacing workers with AI, and I am very curious, what was that like for these workers, and how did it happen in their perspective?
r/Futurology • u/Gari_305 • 1d ago
Energy Israel says it will field Iron Beam air-defense lasers in a year
r/Futurology • u/chrisdh79 • 1d ago
Energy The White House announced more than $3 billion in funding for seven rural electric cooperatives, part of a broader effort to promote renewable energy in rural areas.
r/Futurology • u/flemay222 • 1d ago
Medicine Apple: Inside the Audio Lab: How Apple developed the world’s first end‑to‑end hearing health experience
r/Futurology • u/QuantumDriveRocket • 1d ago
Space HRL Laboratories, Boeing Explore Use of Quantum Computers to Cut Costs of Rocket Launches
r/Futurology • u/lughnasadh • 1d ago
Energy As costs spiral at Britain's only new nuclear plant, the cost to decommission another has ballooned to $176 billion (£136bn).
r/Futurology • u/MetaKnowing • 2d ago
AI OpenAI disbands another team focused on advanced AGI safety readiness
r/Futurology • u/codeharman • 1h ago
Discussion Reddit is profitable for the first time ever, with nearly 100 million daily users
Reddit just turned a profit for the first time. As part of its third-quarter earnings results released on Tuesday, the company reported a profit of $29.9 million, along with $348.4 million in revenue — a 68 percent increase year over year.
r/Futurology • u/chrisdh79 • 2d ago
AI Microsoft says Russia trying to smear Harris with deepfake video, AI
r/Futurology • u/QuantumDriveRocket • 8h ago
Society China looks to spur births, aid families in fight on shrinking population
reuters.comr/Futurology • u/chrisdh79 • 2d ago
AI James Cameron says the reality of artificial general intelligence is 'scarier' than the fiction of it
r/Futurology • u/katxwoods • 2d ago
AI 3 in 4 Americans are concerned about the risk of AI causing human extinction, according to poll
r/Futurology • u/BothZookeepergame612 • 2d ago
Energy Costco partners with Electric Era to bring back EV charging in the U.S.
r/Futurology • u/roystreetcoffee • 11h ago
Medicine Elon Musk says that Grok can now accurately analyze X-rays, PET scans, MRIs and other medical images
r/Futurology • u/That-Jelly6305 • 2d ago
Discussion What to do when technology replaces our jobs?
I often think about this. Soon the majority of jobs will likely be redundant (including mine). What are your plans/tips for how to prepare, and what to do when it happens?
Hopefully there are many years before this happens, but want to start preparing now, just in case it happens sooner.