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/sci/ - Science & Math

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3989764 No.3989764 [Reply] [Original]

I feel like our technology has stopped advancing rapidly after the invention of the internet and cellphones, but that's probably because those are major things I use every day. What are some big inventions in the last 1-3 decades (preferably more recent) that are worth mentioning? Or perhaps to make it more personal, what do you believe to be the most important invention to date in the last 3 decades (other than the internet\cellphone)

>> No.3989772

Last 20 years? Thousands of new medicines, gene therapy, dozens of vaccines, cloth weaves that are waterproof so that when you spill your beer you don't get wet, novel methods of synthesizing all sorts of stuff, plastics that are stronger than steel, new semiconductors.... Then there are advances in cosmetics, and in automobiles, aeronautics, and power generation (clean coal tech, nuclear materials tech). Major advances in smelting and refining procedures. Mathematical methods for brewing alcohols more efficiently and with better flavours. Sports gear is not even comparable. Modern paper lasts much longer, looks much better, and is much cheaper... then there is e-ink technology. DVDs. The compressor in your refrigerator uses a completely different design. So does your hot water tank.

20 years ago, we had eight channels on TV. Eight. We'd just upgraded to cable, giving us four extra channels. Buying shelves for your house was a major expense... you couldn't just drop $10 at IKEA. Our car was a monstrous hunk of steel that got boiling hot inside in the summer, and had frost on the inside all winter. The rear windshield was held onto the frame by a sort of tar, which would melt and drip in the heat.

You just take all this stuff for granted. Almost everything you wear, eat, sleep on, and masturbate to has been revolutionized in the last 20 years.

>> No.3989773

The Fleshlight.

>> No.3989779

>>3989772

Have you said this before? Sounds incredibly familiar, especially the rear-window part.

>> No.3989780
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3989780

Chloe Moretz

>> No.3989782

The dogpenis.

>> No.3989783
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3989783

>>3989772
Yeah some of those I was aware of, but most I guess i never really thought of.

What do you think will be the most important inventions in the future? I think any kind of technological synchronicity\uniformity is going to be coming in the near future, but that's if companies would be able to work together to let their products co-operate.

>> No.3989804
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3989804

>>3989783
>What do you think will be the most important inventions in the future?
1) Human-level AI automatons for production facilities and services
2) Liquid fluoride thorium reactors (that's sort of a 1960's invention, so probably doesn't apply.)
3) Brain-computer interface.
4) Flying cars, propulsion either provided by onboard nuclear reactor or someone found a way to create a room-temperature superconductor.

>> No.3989806

>>3989782
...and the butdik

>> No.3989817

>>3989806
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHH....

and the vagenis.

>> No.3989879

All significant major advancements continue to be small scale systems. Large scale projects are simply better tuned. For example, the modern automobile is 19th century technology constantly improved Rockets will continue to be used and improved. That's what the future will continue to look like, only with minor improvements. Technological progress is an illusion.

>> No.3989897
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3989897

>>3989764
self-replicating robots. It could do for machinery what agriculture did for hunger. Think if we had the ability to grow solar panels, microchips, or cars from dirt...

>> No.3989908
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3989908

>>3989897

>> No.3989922

>what do you believe to be the most important invention to date in the last 3 decades (other than the internet\cellphone)

Neither of those was invented in the last 3 decades.

>> No.3989953

>>3989897
This. I think the main problem we have to day is the lack of a solid (and constructive) theory of how complex systems can arise and organize themselves. If we'll invent some crazy-ass robots first and then watch them or make up some crazy theory and them implement it, I don't. But both will fall into the same period of time. And with this understanding of self-organization will inevitably come a giant leap on AI and genome research (also social sciences, but who gives a fuck).

>> No.3989964

3D printing

>> No.3989969

>>3989922
cool story bro, you're probably right but I feel like the internet and cellphones didn't get big (or widely available) until the 90s...maybe late 80s

>> No.3989989

Apple revolutionized the electronics industry with their iPhone, iPod, iPad, etc. Back then computers and cellphones were clunky and hard too use.

>> No.3990003

>>3989969
The internet is an improved version of the Telephone Switchboard, routing messages over long distance. The first hackers were phone hackers.

>> No.3990005

>>3989989
No, sorry. That was the porn industry. Apple just made things shiny.