Yeah. About 30 km/h.

In Switzerland, such projects and ideas have been around since the 1970s, e.g. Swiss Metro.

We do have our share of enlightened innovators too. However, our DNA ae a whole loves being technically conservative. That's why "Hyperloop" projects have never been given any priorities.

However, the cargo thing this article is talking about isn't exactly what one would call a "Hyperloop", actually very far from it. It's just a very slow subway for cargo, that gets anywhere in the country in less than 24 hours...

Source: am Swiss.

Fair point.

They are the same everywhere. They are not gods, thus can only have myopic views, anything else is almost impossible.

However, in the 90s and 2000s, Nordic countries, Switzerland and Germany chose instead to keep jobs at home and heavily automate their industries instead. While their industry leaders, elites and consultants were pushing for outsourcing to Asia, just like America.

And that's not because they are smarter, but because their unions and workers are free. They have their "myopic" views too (e.g. wages, jobs, mouths to feed, etc.). So they resisted (e.g. general strikes). Thus forced renegotiatons and found good compromises (e.g. huge investments in automatization, in up-training workers, in updating education, and in social safety net for those that can't keep up).

Nobody is a god. We need each other to find good solutions, that work for everybody. Unfortunately however, it's illegal in America to organize general strikes and solidarity strikes (also piquetting, joining a union outside your company, and having unions represent whole industries, instead of branch levels.)

US capitalists have shut down certain nerves and almost all pain receptors (e.g. 1947 Taft-Hartley act, that strips US unions of their fundamental rights and freedoms that Europeans take for granted). While in Europe, in general, the elites still get horrible "headaches", whenever they "blink wrong".

Some say the Jetsons are the elites in a post apocalyptic world, with the Flintstones living on the surface of earth.

But there were an episode or two actually showing the surface: hobos, birds always walking (too much traffic in the sky), and no nature but only paved/cemented surfaces.

The Jetsons are indeed in the top 0.1% (the father's job is 2nd only to the owner and CEO of the biggest or 2nd biggest tech conglomerate in that universe)

Genuinely curious, can the Roomba handle corners, around the feet of chairs, of tables, and at the edge of walls meeting flours? What about behind furnitures?

I feel nervous at the idea of having to vacuum manually again anyways, because of patches of unvacuumed areas... That's why I haven't bought into the automated vacuum cleaners yet.

> No need to go to restaurant and pay a lot of money for decent food

If that becomes reality. It's gonna be a future where, like musicians, 3 stars and other star Chefs will write, perform and upload their recipes with cooking techniques included. We will buy and download those "recipes", which would automatically give your robot not only new recipes, but also new skills.

Restaurants will still exist, but the vast majority of them automated. And cooks will be like musicians. Only a very small minority will make a living. While the rest will do it as a side gig, a hobby.

How absurdly complacent must the West be to find itself in a space-race against a country who's first crewed space flight was only in 2003???

IMHO, more like automated and coordinated conscious subroutines (e.g. a lion suddenly appears in front of you, fear kicks in and automatically gives you everything your body's got to survive: all non priority tasks are shut down (e.g. digestion stops, and you may literally shit your pants), chemicals are pumped into your system to enhance performance (e.g. adrenaline, cortisol, etc.), etc. etc.

And those emotions can be retrained (e.g. somebody fearful of spiders can be "brain-washed" into feeling comfortable with them)... So they are tools. If a trigger isn't adequate anymore, or new triggers are created, one can retrain oneself.

That's why I argue computers already have emotions. They only lack consciousness to feel them.

Funny enough, the Bible specifically bans it (you shall make nothing in the image of anything). But, the Bible goes on to say that mankind will disobey and continue creating things in the image of God's creations. Until one day, in the end times, mankind will succeed in creating life: so that the "image" can speak, make great miracles, rule and subjugate humanity (known as the Anti-Christ)

It will force humanity to take its mark on the right hand or on the forehead (without which you can't buy nor sell anything) and worship it as a god for 3.5 years, killing all those that reject it., At which point God will intervene to put a stop to the madness.

That's an almost 2000 years old science fiction... lol