Book: Soonish

A 2017 book that superficially resembles "What If?" and "How To," being a science book with a cartoon on the cover. The subtitle is "Ten emerging technologies that'll improve and/or ruin everything."

There are chapters on the space elevator, asteroid mining, fusion power, augmented reality, gene-targeting drugs, printed human organs, a.o.

Unfortunately, the level of science--and frankly the level of humor--is no match for Russell Munroe. Here's an example:

Kelly and Zach Weinersmith wrote:

And even if you did find a giant asteroid made of gold, diamonds and Mickey Mantle rookie cards, it's not entirely clear what would happen when you brought it all home.

The chapter on augmented reality mentions the failure of Google Glass, and how wearing one would most likely get you punched in the face.

Glad I didn’t get one.

The chapter on augmented reality has a section on “smart books,” which have links to AR built into them. As a demonstration the authors created an app for this book that projects a sort of spacecraft/moon elevator out of the book’s cover.

In the chapter on targeted medicines, it's mentioned that the blood contains genomic markers for almost everything going on inside you, including diseases that may not manifest for years.

As the authors mention, when this data becomes accessible cheaply and easily, the health insurance industry will be upended.

Maybe Medicare For All will be the only answer.

The book did an interesting thing I've never seen before, there was an afterward of subjects they researched for the book but ultimately couldn't include for one reason or another.  Sort of like a "deleted scenes" reel.

• Quantum computing:  fascinating, but the explanation became too wonkish for a popular book.  The authors said they spent more time researching quantum computing than all the rest of the book put together, and in the end felt they JUST BARELY understood it, sort of.
  
  
• Orbiting solar panels: the economics just don't make sense
  
  
• Advanced prosthetics: again, fascinating but too technical to be entertaining
  
  
• Room-temperature superconducting: some really wild side effects and benefits, but the scientific consensus was that room-temperature superconduction is not "soonish" if ever
  
  
• Mirror biology: all genes fold in a particular direction (left) for no known reason.  It's possible to create identical proteins, genes, tissues, even animals that fold to the right.  Benefits would include immunity to all known diseases.  Disadvantages would include being unable to mate with a left-handed spouse, being inedible to a left-handed predator and being unable to eat left-handed food.  Turns out there ARE a few examples of mirror biology in the world -- for instance, the molecule that gives caraway seeds their distinctive smell and taste is identical, but a mirror image, of the one that gives spearmint its taste.  Weird, huh?