Issue link: https://cp.revolio.com/i/1138
8 summer 2009 8 summer 2009 8 I have tended to be a little less impressed with the rate of change than perhaps some other techno-progressives have been. Technology's best promises – for curing cancer, ending scarcity, insuring mental health – not to mention the more radical hopes for amplifying neurological function, expanding biological lifespan, and creating strong problem-solving AI… what have you – have at times seemed like chimera – the horizons recede just out of reach whenever we seem to get close. We've all heard those predictions from the optimists in various fields: "We will have (insert favorite breakthrough here) in five years." Five years later what do they say? "We will have this in five years." But I've been getting substantially more impressed lately. I'm not sure if it's just because I have the privilege of editing h+ (the magazine and the website), or if the rate of acceleration is really starting to get interesting, but I suspect that it's the latter. scanning through the news items we've covered on our website over the last couple of months we find (among many other astonishing items) that: Professor Nadrian seeman has created two-armed worker robots made of DNA. An international team has cracked the mammalian gene control code. scientists have used embryonic stem cells to make synthetic blood. British scientists have developed the world's first stem cell therapy to cure the most common cause of blindness. PrePare editor in Chief