Peter Diamandis - MEGA X Prizes

[SALSN]

I think it is brilliant, areas I think should be looked at is:

Stopping aging/curing the diseases that is caused by aging.

Colonizing other planets/mons/L5 and so on...

Faster than light communication (for these outposts)

Faster than light "travel" perhaps "just" a chunk of metal, or a proton for the first try.

Serious artificial intelligence perhaps combined with a robot, that could start taking care of the jobs that humans don't want. Not a welding robot, but far more advanced.

[RomaniaTricolor]

TELOMERES...HAYFLICK LIMIT...Immortality

[HosteDenis]

Continued:

Simply because I do not agree with you saying: "Ending aging unlocks a lot of human potential".

I don't think humans of age 80+ in general are capable of contributing to society... They lose memory, abilities, quickness of thinking (I'm not an English native speaker, so forgive me the fact that I don't know the word), ...

Cheers,

Denis

[Atevra]

HosteDenis, all of the things you have listed occur as a result of aging.

Anyway... The planet is overpopulated enough as it is, and under resourced. We need to start bioengineering Mars- for our future generations.

[HosteDenis]

I'm sorry, but now you just sound like a dreamer... And don't get me wrong, we need dreamers, to come up with ideas and work on those ideas, but we need realists too... And as a realist I know that won't happen for another 200 year or so. And even then, we will populate Mars at a very slow rate, as I see it as hugely expensive, hostile, difficult, ... And who would want to give up his home here for that? Overpopulation remains a problem!

[thewebmaster93]

nono-bots COULD be made to fix our neurons keeping us in the best mental capacity(around 21 years old)

[thewebmaster93]

nano-bots^

[MikDonsen]

@HosteDenis @HosteDenis are you out to space lunch? Most anti aging research is about keeping the old people in good shape, it's generally excepted 120 years is the mmax lifespan scientists are mostly trying to spread working years from 20-65 closer to 120

[HosteDenis]

Continued:

From high ages onwards, people tend to lose memories and problemsolving abilities in general, making it less usefull (for society, not for the individual, that is) to let people become immortal.

I'm not saying you're wrong, and I'm right. I'm saying we clearly have differing opinions, and while I do think immortality (or living longer as I do not think true immortality can be reached) sounds appealing, I would not want it.

Why? See next post...

[thewebmaster93]

well...you could give 500million $ for the first non government human EVA on the moon. And perhaps...$5000 to me for being the first 15 year old who designed&built a jet engine ( just a few more weeks to go!)

[Atevra]

How do you know your the first?

[thewebmaster93]

well...I did not find a single thing on a 15 year old designing and building a working jet engine from scratch independently. (not the turbo type! but centrifugal compression non the less)

[tooosweeet]

Stop the aging process. It doesn't seam impossible. I mean, if you could learn exactly what the aging process is... and how to stop it, or reverse it... Why do we need to age (biologically speaking)?

[DTHRocket]

I think it's a not-so-great idea.

[cutis1000]

Hi Peter,

I believe there should be mega X prizes for groundbreaking developments in science, above all else. The United States is on the cusp of economic and fiscal disaster and we need BIG IDEAS that can spark human ingenuity and propel the American mind through the 21st century and beyond.

[chris6770]

If you can map out with x-prizes the radical steps to a mega breakthrough, such as 'faster than light' travel for example (artificial gravity, folding spacetime, new super materials, portable fusion, whatever it may be...) then a mega x-prize is a great notion. Like rungs on a ladder to a new height. People only have to imagine something is possible to focus on it, to aspire, and be inspired.

[Viereoonline]

In my opinion teletransport would change the world. We think we are a virtual community but food and goods travel 100s of KMs to arrive to our hands. The social dynamics would also change since we could live in North pole and work at south Pole. But I am guessing that might need a very cheap and green source of energy to power it ... or might be solved via grid powering? My guess is as good as yours ... tell us your idea !!

[Keylimedelight]

Biological immortality, the economic benefits alone are incredible, not to mention the whole not having to die thing.

[Atevra]

there's not enough room/food/energy on earth. unless everybody is willing to stop reproducing.

[Keylimedelight]

actually if biological aging and age related disease wernt an issue, the average age of death would level out at about 160 simply from other causes. Not to mention that people in the first world with access to contaseptives efectivly HAVE elected to stop reproducing, hence the negative population growth Malthus never predicted.

Think about the benefits, 90% of all disease gone, no more hospice centers, time enough for everyone to get a real education and see the world.

[HosteDenis]

I see immortality as a bad thing!

[HosteDenis]

I see immortality as a bad thing... Just look up /watch?v=F-QA2rkpBSY

[Keylimedelight]

I wached the first vidio in this seris and i think that its based on some flawed asumptions. my first reply is in my responce above and also its important to note that ending aging unlocks a lot of human potential. that professor in the video for instance is most likely dead right now by aging, but if he did not have to check out he could go on using all the experience and knowledge gleaned over the better part of a century to try and solve the problems he was talking about.

[HosteDenis]

Well, first, let me thank you for watching the the first part. It is indeed only from the second part on that the professor discusses exponential growth as in population growth. And well, Earth will soon become too small. It is a major problem, already! And too few is done about it. If we do not establish a negative growth before the end of the century, Earth will be too small. So while I see medical breakthorugh such as less diseases as a good thing, immortality would be bad in my opinion...

[DanFrederiksen]

those hardcore 'holy grail' type basic research goal like FTL or teleportation could be interesting to have as billion dollar prizes but it's one of those things that takes the right guy thinking hard enough in his armchair and can't necessarily be nurtured. a cold fusion or compact fusion could work I think. that's so plausible that it might actually pay off. but the first I'd suggest is to offer a huge prize for anyone who can prove ufos are real without any doubt. I'm deadly serious

[Equanimous]

What would you consider a proof ?

ufo means unidentified flying object!

proof:

1) ufo means unidentified flying object!

2) All observed flying objects is unidentified until they are identified.

3) Flying objects objects exist.

Therefor ufos exists.

Now pay up.

[shingshing01]

FTL communication over interplanetary distances.

[joshatkins94]

Or 1 yottabit per second wireless Internet the world over, with 100% coverage, cheaper than broadband today.

IMHO, if you do no other mega X Prizes, you must do a human lunar tourism X Prize. Burt Rutan's amazing but I disagree with his opinion that we "can't fly the public to orbit because there aren't adequate safety solutions": no problem, just invent them.

[joshatkins94]

Whole world running on renewable energy - satellite solar power stations like suggested by GLXP.

[joshatkins94]

Another idea, kind of linked to thoughtwaretv's: how about ap prize for 1 terabit/second Internet across the solar system. It would probably require data to be synchronized between multiple server farms in different planetary orbits - it's only about 15 hours I believe to get data from Pluto's distance a t light speed - so we have huge satellite server farms where data was duplicated on each one, meaning instant access throughout the solar system. A bit crazy, but it would be pointless if not.

[joshatkins94]

Speed of light/faster than light travel. Imagine an eight and a half year mission at the speed of light to Proxima Centauri then all the way back to Earth, with IMAX and HD cameras, and tons of science instruments. It's not impossible. It could be only a few decades way. Or less. Or a sample - rock and soil - Earth return mission to Gliese 581 c/d. Imagine having rocks from an exoplanet in a museum on Earth. The Mars mission is an incredible idea too.

[Emesee3]

* and as physically able, dexterous, and agile

[Emesee3]

anthropomorphic robots that would have unextraordinary economic costs and could function at the level of about a human of average intelligence

[Emesee3]

* non invasive matrix like technology

[Emesee3]

faster than light travel

matrix-like technology

[Emesee3]

Cold fusion

[bizguide]

Yep! Definitely. Why? Because you will be setting a good example for all business everywhere. The example will be one of long term goals, long term growth, long term commitment, and sustainable business models that are meant to produce results long term. This is in stark contrast to the thinking we have used to dig the the hole in the ozone we are in. Anyway, Yes! Go long term, go bigger and we will be setting an example for the 7th generation out.

[thoughtwaretv]

You want a huge challenge though....

aim for what will take us beyond the stars Peter...aim for Peace.

[thoughtwaretv]

Cyber Telepathy

[thoughtwaretv]

Peter, we met back in Transvision 2008. I think this is a wonderful idea. I would propose the following, a Mega X-prize for:

a. Defeating Aging

b. Mind Uploading and the Reverse Engineering of the Brain

d. Molecular Manufacturing

c. And I would suggest considering some big software xprize aimed at something extremely challenging for the Web.