The Edge annual ques­tion, 2009: What will change everything?

Nobody ever voted for print­ing. Nobody ever voted for elec­tric­ity. Nobody ever voted for radio, the tele­phone, the auto­mo­bile, the air­plane, tele­vi­sion. Nobody ever voted for peni­cillin, antibi­otics, the pill. Nobody ever voted for space travel, mas­sively par­al­lel com­put­ing, nuclear power, the per­sonal com­puter, the Inter­net, email, cell phones, the Web, Google, cloning, sequenc­ing the entire human genome. We are mov­ing towards the rede­f­i­n­i­tion of life, to the edge of cre­at­ing life itself. While sci­ence may or may not be the only news, it is the news that stays news.

As ever, the respon­dents cover every topic of sci­ence with answers that are as enlight­en­ing as they are wide-ranging.

Now I just need to trawl through the pre­vi­ous ques­tions at Edge’s World Ques­tion Cen­ter.

via Richard Holden