this post was submitted on 18 Aug 2023
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Asklemmy

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[–] scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech 69 points 1 year ago (1 children)

mRNA vaccines. You can literally code a vaccine now. That's just mind blowing to me.

[–] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 8 points 1 year ago

Especially impressive when you consider the etymology of the word "vaccine" and realize that a century ago vaccines were created by incubating them in a cow

[–] TheButtonJustSpins@infosec.pub 35 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I'm holding a small device in my hand that gives me access to all of humanity's knowledge.

Granted, I'm using it to dick around on Lemmy, but..

[–] kratoz29@lemm.ee 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

To be fair there's plenty of knowledge on Lemmy as of today... And porn, lots of porn.

[–] Gnorv@feddit.de 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I have yet to encounter any porn on lemmy.

[–] kratoz29@lemm.ee 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Do you have the NSFW filter off within your Lemmy or app's settings?

[–] erogenouswarzone@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

On behalf of Gnorv, yes. I have made sure multiple times that my NSFW filter is off. I have only seen an occasional NSFW - like One per month, and it's never porn - even when I browse by New.

Please Help.

[–] rabidpug@3t.au 2 points 1 year ago

If you go to the instances page of your lemmy instance (eg lemmy.ml/instances) you can scroll down to the β€œBlocked Instances” section and you’ll probably find the bigger nsfw instances are blocked.

[–] argv_minus_one 3 points 1 year ago

The Internet is for porn!

[–] Wanderer@lemm.ee 33 points 1 year ago

Every time I think about doing something illegal or hear about people from only a few generations ago doing something fun but slightly illegal.

Then I think. There is no way you could do that now the police would use all the surveillance that is everywhere and if I got caught their wouldn't be a slap on the wrist and grow up. But it would be a serious issue for my future jobs and going to other countries.

Makes me think I'm in a futuristic movie. Just not one of the happy ending ones.

[–] HenryWong327@lemmy.ml 29 points 1 year ago

The technology behind it isn't new, but The Thought Emporium is a Youtuber who:

1: DIY-d a genetically modified virus to cure his own lactose intolerance (successfully)

2: Is currently working on a biological computer that runs on animal neurons.

3: Has livestreams where the viewers submit ideas (like making tomatoes spicy) and he designs DNA to accomplish it.

Also he helped shut down a scam health product that contained radioactive material which isn't particularly futuristic (actually it reminds me of the "radiation is good for you" craze in the early 20th century) but I wanted to mention it anyways.

[–] vis4valentine@lemmy.ml 26 points 1 year ago

Being trans always was such a cyberpunk concept to me. When I was a kid was like "people can change their gender? Cool"

We can say that... it was a sign lol.

[–] GreenMario@lemm.ee 24 points 1 year ago

I listened to Mr. Krabs sing Billie Jean.

Meme technology is about to get SciFi.

[–] Bishma@discuss.tchncs.de 19 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Every time I hear about World Coin scanning people's retina's for $50, driver monitoring tech inside new cars, or Amazon asking people to pay for things with palm prints I feel a bit like I'm living in the Minority Report. Does that count?

[–] Dragster39@feddit.de 9 points 1 year ago

The future isn't necessarily positive I guess

[–] CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org 19 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Everything going on in biology, but the existence of of Nana and Lulu especially. The first genetically altered humans are starting school pretty soon.

[–] JetpackJackson@feddit.de 14 points 1 year ago

Say what now?

[–] gianni@lemmy.ml 18 points 1 year ago

Data compression. Something about "making less data out of ... The same data" is really mind blowing, & the math is sick

Turns out we can express most of proteins, some of the time, and then isolate them. This includes enzymes, when isolated these can do things like they naturally do but now in flask, but also they do things that aren't remotely natural but are useful for us. These things are pretty fragile usually so then some of these can be modified so that they are resistant to higher temperatures, detergents etc. This is not only the nerdy shit like advanced chemical synthesis - lots of dishwasher tablets and and washing powders contain enzymes that cut proteins into pieces (like subtilisin), so in some cosmic sense dishwasher digests your leftover food off plates

Enzymes are still proteins, and have all problems of proteins. Turns out, you can just take the most important part out of enzyme, make it, or something functionally similar out of completely synthetic parts, and it still works. Sure, it's not as active or selective, most of the time, but it's resistant to things that would absolutely shred proteins. This is called organocatalysis and it was subject of 2021 Nobel Prize

Sometimes you want to take an enzyme and make it not work. We also have a tool for that: first you have to get structure of that enzyme, or some receptor protein, and by looking how a small set of random molecules lodges in it you can make a very selective, very potent ligand, sculpting it atom by atom with no knowledge other than protein structure. If you have time and resources, this can be made to work for almost any protein (that can be crystallised)

[–] d3Xt3r@lemmy.nz 17 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Driverless cars, VR and the recent NASA experiment where four people started living in a simulated Mars environment for an year, even conducting VR space walks - all of this makes me feel we're living in the movie Total Recall.

[–] theforkofdamocles 5 points 1 year ago

Get your ass to Mars!

[–] Lemmylaugh@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 year ago

Usually total recall reminds people of something else

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[–] ToroidalX 14 points 1 year ago

We have phones as powerful as computers in our hands when 20 years ago that was impossible. The exponential growth of computers and smartphones is mind-blowing. And the amount of technology that has bloomed from all of that

[–] 7heo@lemmy.ml 13 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] Squids@sopuli.xyz 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I've had a 3d printer for years and I still can't really get over how nuts it is. Like it feels like one of those things you'd read about in science magazines as this amazing super scientific thing the scientists out in MIT have in their labs like a supercomputer or some expensive toy people who build stuff on YouTube have in their garage next to the lathe and big fancy CNC table, but no, it's just, here. On my desk. Being used to casually print stuff that I've designed myself on the computer like it's nothing.

My great grandad was a carpenter and I wish I could've shown him it. I wonder what he'd think, seeing something that was once only in the realm of handcrafted diagrammes and days of building now a few hours of modelling and printing away.

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[–] soullioness@lemmy.ca 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Modern cell phones. It's crazy that I basically never need a computer now. My phone is so diversely useful. I spend more money on phones than computers now. It's also the best camera I've ever had! Phones are just so cool lol.

[–] kratoz29@lemm.ee 4 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I know where you are coming from, but I can't see how a phone would be a replacement of a computer, not with Android nor iOS, maybe we need a better mobile OS πŸ˜‚

My Mac is on repair currently and one of my most uses for it was to manage my docker containers hosted in my NAS, while I can do some of that in my Android phone it is a pain in the ass to work with it, especially if it can retain many tabs opener as any modern browser lol.

The Samsung Dex thingy kinda gets close to this new future though.

[–] noogs@lemmy.noogs.me 3 points 1 year ago

I feel like the average person doesn't need a computer most of the time. Anyone who's a "power user", for lack of a better term, probably does. I run a VM with a desktop OS on my Proxmox setup that I remote into from my phone for things that I require a full OS for but don't want to break out my laptop. I often find myself remoting into it from my laptop anyway just for continuity.

[–] FredericChopin_@feddit.uk 3 points 1 year ago

Because most people don’t really need a computer nor do they know how to use them.

There was a sweet spot for my generation where you got good at computers but the generations either side are equally as poor with them.

I’m a software developer who just build a custom rig for at home and I can tell you I rarely use it, as I want to do anything but look at a computer after doing it all day at work. I can do everything I need from my phone.

I can be a computer nerd at weekends.

[–] argv_minus_one 2 points 1 year ago

We also need physical keyboards on phones. I want my Droid 3 back.

[–] Sharkwellington@lemmy.one 11 points 1 year ago

AI generated images/voices and deepfakes. I really am worried about it becoming difficult to figure out what is real on the internet in the next 10 years.

[–] eezeebee@lemmy.ca 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The LANDSAT program. Not exactly new since it's been going for about 50 years, but it's still fascinating and maybe more relevant than ever with concerns about climate change.

We can get different types of data about a landscape from the different parts of the light spectrum. For example, telling coniferous and deciduous trees apart based on how they reflect light. Imagine echolocation on steroids, using light.

https://youtu.be/DGE-N8_LQBo

[–] blindbunny@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 year ago

Thanks for sharing this I always wondered where they got those pictures.

[–] fossilesque@mander.xyz 10 points 1 year ago
[–] darkfiremp3 9 points 1 year ago

Micro SD cards, 1TB that tiny, for $50

[–] 5714@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 points 1 year ago

Vegan Feta cheese

CoViD mask usage

PV panel price reduction

IPCC cooperation and language

Gamified drone wars producing music videos

PrEP

[–] Nusm@lemm.ee 8 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

I walk into my house and start dictating to a speaker sphere what lights to turn on, what to set the thermostat to, and to turn on the tv. And she answers. Just like in sci fi movies.

[–] CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 1 year ago

Oh yeah, I forgot that that used to be a sci-fi thing, but it definitely was when I was a kid.

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[–] Cagi@lemmy.ca 8 points 1 year ago

The Internet, but I'm old.

[–] Julian_1_2_3_4_5@lemmy.ml 8 points 1 year ago (2 children)

The DNS it's so mind blowing to think about how we are able to map so many domains to so many ip adresses so smart and stable

[–] StarkillerX42@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

And that the service replies practically instantly every time no matter which domain you choose.

Edit: wtf is with these downvotes? DNS is without a doubt the fastest part of accessing the internet. In website load time, it's an almost unnoticable fraction of the total load time.

[–] argv_minus_one 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Funny you should say that. DNS is 40 years old. Definitely not futuristic tech. But yeah, it works surprisingly well.

[–] Julian_1_2_3_4_5@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 year ago

Yeah, still it feels futuristic

[–] Cobrachickenwing@lemmy.ca 8 points 1 year ago (4 children)

Lithium polymer batteries that make advanced computing portable. We wouldn't be able to create multi function cell phones without the battery power and longevity of those batteries. Star trek tricorders are going to be the next big tech coming to the generation after Gen z.

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[–] happyhippo@feddit.it 7 points 1 year ago

Voyager 2

Blows my mind every fucking time I read about it.

Props to the USA/NASA and their engineers for achieving something so long lasting with technology from ~50 years ago.

[–] randomguy2323@lemmy.kevitprojects.com 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

The Steam Deck , being able to play RD2 and GTA V with a handheld console in my opinion is great!

[–] Driftking@lemmy.ml 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)
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[–] kratoz29@lemm.ee 4 points 1 year ago

Someone else here mentioned the Steam Deck as a powerful handheld on the go, I want to do a similar approach.

Playing PS1 games with a Miyoo Mini, I swear my child's dream was to play PS1 games in a handheld sized similar to my Game Boy Advance from that time, now we can do it in even smaller devices! (And this one isn't even the tiniest lol).

Railguns on navy ships.

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