10-05-2021, 01:52 PM | #41 | |||||
Join Date: Dec 2012
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Re: First TL-9 items
Some minor quibbles, but I think the-red-scare is on the right track:
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Yeah. The parts are there, it's been at the stage of 'technically feasible if we put enough money into it' since maybe late TL7/the 1970s, but we're getting close, now. I'm optimistic about Elon Musk's ideas, just not as optimistic as he seems to be. Quote:
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I'd rate that as 'not yet.' Enough work is being done in the area that we can say that the early stages have been accomplished. Quote:
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Yeah.
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Warning, I have the Distractible and Imaginative quirks in real life. "The more corrupt a government, the more it legislates." -- Tacitus Five Earths, All in a Row. Updated 12/17/2022: Apocrypha: Bridges out of Time, Part I has been posted. |
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10-06-2021, 03:54 AM | #42 |
Join Date: Sep 2019
Location: UK
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Re: First TL-9 items
I'm not sure that the ethics problems with the self-driving cars (though there may be other problems) and the lack of large-scale uses for virtual or augmented reality really stop them from counting. If the TL9 technology is there, it doesn't make it any less TL9 that nobody wants it.
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10-06-2021, 05:30 AM | #43 |
Join Date: Sep 2013
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Re: First TL-9 items
Just to add my 0.04 €:
- Keep in mind that it is a game, not a forecast of real life. - The future is not what it used to be. My Gurps Ultra-Tech came out in 2007. That was 14 (fourteen) years ago. AFAIK, this was before Bitcoin, just for one example how technology can surprises us. - And how do we classify the unbelievable speed at which the Covid-19 Vaccines have been developed? Mature TL 8 or early TL 9 biotech? - For those it may concern, the source of all wisdom has a list of emerging technologies.
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""The origin of everything good is due to games." - Friedrich August Wilhelm Froebel, creator of the kindergarten. |
10-06-2021, 06:27 AM | #44 | |
Join Date: Jun 2013
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Re: First TL-9 items
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Of course, we would need better vehicular AI to get to the point where it won't make a mistake, but I was specifically referring to Opellulo's assertation that self-driving cars basically can't be a thing because of the Trolley Problem such could inevitably run into (to which there is no technological solution, because if there were an option that would avoid a collision, it wouldn't be a Trolley Problem). It was indeed fairly new technology that I wouldn't object to calling early TL 9 (note technology from a later TL can be available early, generally on an experimental basis), but from what I understand the rapidity of development and implementation had more to do with social aspects than technological ones. There was a huge push for such to be developed (resulting in basically every biotechnology company that could attempt it doing so, and putting a large amount of capital into it), liability was greatly reduced (basically, one can't sue the company making it - or the FDA for approving it, or an employer for mandating it - if issues crop up unless willful misconduct can be demonstrated), and the approval process was fast-tracked to avoid a lot of the bureaucratic red tape that normally delays things (there's literally an industry whose whole raison d'ętre is guiding companies through said red tape). I realize some of that has some political fallout associated with it, but let's please avoid that aspect - I'd rather not see this thread locked.
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GURPS Overhaul |
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10-06-2021, 02:29 PM | #45 | |
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: Central Europe
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Re: First TL-9 items
If there is ever a GURPS 5e, it will almost certainly define its date of publication as TL 9 and redefine the TL 7 / 8 / 9 boundaries in a way that makes sense then.
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Drug discovery has been getting slower and more expensive for decades, but I would be interested in hearing from biochemists whether the ability to make vaccines is improving in general, or whether this was just luck / giving up cheap to get quick. When ?six? different labs create vaccines in one year, that does seem like it reflects a general trend.
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"It is easier to banish a habit of thought than a piece of knowledge." H. Beam Piper This forum got less aggravating when I started using the ignore feature |
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10-06-2021, 06:03 PM | #46 | |
Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: Sydney, Australia
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Re: First TL-9 items
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With COVID, you had governments pre-ordering vaccines and injecting funding in other ways, at a global level. You had a rapidly growing numebr of suitable cohort candidates who were rapidly eager to participate. As a result, all the normal trial phases were undertaken, but with less "down time" gaps in between because they had the money and the people to just run them. In fact, the cohorts were huge compared to most trials. Additionally, research into coronavirus vaccines already existed, but just hadn't had much impetus because outbreaks had been controlled. Timing as also lucky with regard to mRNA vaccines as that technology was ripe for deployment, and the funding and trial cohorts were suddenly available. It's not unlike technological advancement during war. Virtually unlimited funding, labour, and test subjects.
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10-06-2021, 08:27 PM | #47 |
Join Date: Aug 2007
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Re: First TL-9 items
Something used in the creation of digital curencies might qualify as an invention (althugh possibly a small one) but digital curencies themselves look more like a meme to me.
They are worth something because people believe they are and are willing to buy them. If people stopped believing in digital currencies tomorrow they'd crash. Airplanes don't crash if people stop believing in them. Just for the record my own willingnes to accept a digital currency as payment would depend on how fast I could turn around and sell it.
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Fred Brackin |
10-06-2021, 11:46 PM | #48 | |
Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: Sydney, Australia
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Re: First TL-9 items
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So, I agree that digital currencies are the same. Their value is certain more tenuous than most soverign backed currencies but...probably better than a few (how many KPWs would you accept outside of North Korea, for example)?
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Farmer Mortal Wombat "But if the while I think on thee, dear friend All losses are restored and sorrows end." |
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10-07-2021, 02:30 AM | #49 |
Join Date: Sep 2019
Location: UK
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Re: First TL-9 items
The invention, I suppose, is the "blockchain" system that made it possible to have such a currency without everyone hacking and forging it like there was no tomorrow.
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10-07-2021, 03:43 AM | #50 |
Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: Sydney, Australia
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Re: First TL-9 items
Yes, and blockhain is being used for other purposes, too (afterall, what it does is record transactions and track digital assets).
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Farmer Mortal Wombat "But if the while I think on thee, dear friend All losses are restored and sorrows end." |
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