A loop where solar is converted to fertiliser using similar process , probably generating hydrogen as a side effect with some mechanism to probably capture some carbon for economically useful use when it reaches say an LCOE of 0.01 $/kwh and done on mind boggling scale might actually be the holy grail solution to a lot of problems at the same time. Might need quite a few breakthroughs in the material science scheme of things though. There are good reasons why hydrogen has never really taken off by itself even with so much scale, innovation thrown at it so far. The best hope is China doing to hydrogen now what it did to solar in 2010s.
Well I am an Indian who lived in US and worked for top companies for 10 years and left back to my home country as I did not want to be beholden to the Green card waiting time or take some unethical pathways (I see a lot of abuse of O1 now). I find coworkers from smaller and friendlier countries sail through and become Americans.
The point is that immigration can never really become a true meritocracy and even I recognised the privileges I had to reach to US in the first place. The country's ethos, ideas are grandfathered into the law alongwith numerous loopholes or sneaky ways. There is never a social compact where I did X , I deserve Y coming true. I suspect globally we are at the tail end of this type of immigration from Global South to Global North as well
It means in the long term there might be more efficient ways to ship 'energy'. If you ship containers full of solar PVs, batteries and use it over their lifetime the amount of 'total energy' transported for a given unit of energy to transport the materials might be an order of magnitude or more higher
If I was getting 8 $ burritos with clearly marked ingredients and total automation end to end, I would gladly work with such a variant of Chipotle as well, even if it cuts workforce by 80% in such a scenario.
Frivolous employment maximisation with words like human connection do not make sense for survival necessities. It works better with discretionary spending
Well one hobby I had when young was collecting these matchboxes. It was rumored that collecting 1000 unique ones would unlock something and gave rise to a rat race, this is pre Indian internet and no one really knew what it would unlock. I would look into the dirtiest of places against my family's protests.
A variant of the iconic 'Ship' called 'Shib', probably a misprint was the most prized possession. When I rethink this, it seems the poor man's version of baseball cards or other collectibles but as fun, a jugaad fun activity in times of extreme scarcity
I do agree that FDA was quite risk averse before especially in areas where the risk - reward would be better for terminally ill or other patients. Having said that this is a different kind of risk reward treatment where the patient might themselves like to try it even if the risks were elevated compared to other post Phase 3 solutions.
AFAIK critics pointed this to be a form of regulatory capture as well.
Fingers crossed. I thought the same when I had heard Stefan Heller at Stanford give a talk 15+ years back. I am sure progress is happening but Biology is hard and the hope is AI and other developments are giving it a push
Very positive news. I have something similar but in a much more difficult gene with different manifestation, but at least this gives me hope that something might come up in 1-2 decades.
Also when discussing Mughals the most important elephant in the room is ignored. Their intention to totally Islamise India. But this is more about Indian history being editorialised by few communists and others as they hate the notion of a caste system filled India and prefer the Mughal & British rule in their sanitised version. The historic animosity in different groups exists and persists to this day and is reflected in these perspectives. The atrocities of Mughals are not only glossed over, they are completely whitewashed, especially their demolition of 1000s of temples, subjugation of native population and many other crimes are painted as something normal in their time when reality is much more complicated. This is to not even speak of the over romanticisation of Taj Mahal as something 'Indian' while ignoring numerous other architecture that still survives to this day. When pointed out that many mosques were built on top of temples whose basement still survives to this day that part of history is conveniently ignored.
Actually there are many more interesting people in Indian history. From Chandragupta Maurya, Kanishka to even Shivaji and others. Mughals are overglorified if anything and their own primary texts are ignored in this process.
I am sure people said the same 100 years back when they probably thought living beyond say 60 was too much. I know that in poorer countries due to high infant mortality rate and other issues just reaching 60 was a big milestone for the average person. The bigger question is how will the existing financial system adapt for such a scenario if even 10% of the population manages to extend from 82 to 100+
In a well designed urban environment where cars have space for 2-3 modular batteries with swapping capabilities, I see no reason why taxis etc. need to carry battery payload > 150 km of range needed for local use, which would mean better fuel efficiency as well. Battery swapping done right is integral to this
WE do have self driving cars with Waymo data showing it is clearly better than human drivers in certain markets like Phoenix. It is human regulations, laws and the general societal unease that is preventing a total rapid change. In fact a Robotaxis only urban area which is continuously mapped might be feasible today and probably could even reduce the no of cars needed for the population making it accessible to many more.
The good thing that happened seems to be that China has essentially 10xed the Japan railways template. I wonder how bad a car centric China would've had been.
Well a lot of Eastern religions do talk about sustainability 1000s of years back. Just because it was never part of Abrahamic faiths and their offshoot cultures which took over the world, does not mean that humans did not think this way