I believed candidate Barack Obama when he said about W, "I'm so tired of having a President who doesn't believe in science."
Our problems are not insurmountable if we just come up with some good old-fashioned technological breakthroughs.
I'm not sure solar roads are the answer - I think it's going to be a lot more amazing than that - but I'd never dissuade anyone from trying right now.
The best articles out there for me are about scientific advances. They're really our only hope. I saw one where they're close to a refrigerator-sized battery that could sit in your basement and power your whole home. If they can make that smaller and we can get some better solar panels, etc...we could actually charge it on windy or sunny days, then live the dream of getting off the grid.
But I think the real do-or-die technology will be anti-gravity or mining the energy that is always around us. That's why I look to these UFO stories. If UFOs are real, and we don't have the technology already, we've got to get it. It's not, "Wouldn't it be nice?" It's "We've GOT to have this." Are you following how close we are to 7 billion people? Another couple of years. Tops. And it was just 6 billion like yesterday.
Imagine getting past fossil fuels?
Wouldn't you love to call the Middle East and say, "We're canceling our order of oil"? "Which order?" "All of them." CLICK!

Bill,

I was with you until you went off on the UFO bit. Do you mean like in the recent movie District 9 when the main goal of the government agency managing the alien refugees was to figure out how their weapons worked? If you haven't seen this flick I highly recommend it.

Bill, we may have had this for a wile:

http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/black_triangle_020805.html

I know I am off in the weeds with this but it made me think about the possibilities.

Instead of the foulable corrupt, rich humans running the governments. How about a super computer to run our lives.

There would be no arguing, gridlock, bickering. No straying from the constitution(s).

There would be a balanced budget, no thievery, no (acorn) voting crimes. Think of the possibilities, and lack of sneaking underhanded, cheating, worthless humans we have now.

We all know that any computer system (currently)can be hacked, manipulated, and corrupted. But we can replace and fix them without having to wait for them to die before we get them out of office. It also would have an off switch.

It might be an improvement over the Adams-Leonard circlej@^# anyway.

[on Dave's return to the ship, after HAL has killed the rest of the crew]

HAL: Look Dave, I can see you're really upset about this. I honestly think you ought to sit down calmly, take a stress pill, and think things over.

****

HAL: I know I've made some very poor decisions recently, but I can give you my complete assurance that my work will be back to normal. I've still got the greatest enthusiasm and confidence in the mission. And I want to help you.

http://www.imdb.com/media/rm915773440/tt0062622

Welcome our new overlords.

$100,000 for a 12' x 12' section? Thats close to the cost of a nice studio loft in the pearl!

Hydro and wind are far more cost effective and if managed properly far more sensible. But someone will profit mightily from all of this, wonder whose stock prices will be jumping on this news?

We all (well, at least almost all of us) know, but sometimes refuse to admit that it's fanciful to talk about alternative energy sources without examining the underlying economics. Hydrogen fuel cells, for example, could be an answer on all counts if they didn't require batteries that used large quantities of an incredibly abundant (not) and inexpensive (not) metal like platinum.

Just a couple of years ago, DOT and DOE had their little fuel cell show vehicle demonstrations. Lately it's been solar powered vehicles clipping along at 12 miles per hour. I can't wait to see the road panels that will be displayed in the years to come.

"$100,000 for a 12' x 12' section? Thats close to the cost of a nice studio loft in the pearl!"

$6.03B for trying to cure cancer this year? Thats close to the cost of a boondoggle MAX project and a boondoggle 12-lane bridge!

See what I did there? Research is expensive, but if it pans out, can have a much larger return on investment. The trick is making sure that you're directing research dollars to projects that can actually make the ROI, and are worth doing.

My question about this, is what colorful language we can expect when someone hacks this, should it actually go into widespread use...