What technology would you want to see advanced?

I'd like to see the flying car happen. I'm not talking about that car with four jets on it that can fly, but would make a lot of noise. I'm also not talking about the flying car that just hovers over the ground and beneath, you see waves of heat, like the landspeeder from Star Wars. I'm talking about the honest-to-god flying car that travels on a three-dimensional roadway, with other cars moving underneath it, ala Fifth Element or the Jetsons.

I'm talking about this shit, right here.

Granted, it would probably begin as a total nightmare. The first time someone got in a fender bender, they'd come careening out of the sky, spinning uncontrollably, attached to what I imagine is a nuclear reactor nestled snugly behind them. It'd be like putting a bomb inside a weather balloon and then letting go of the mouth piece. More than likely, you'd end up embedded in the side of a Starbucks, after having set off a room-full-of-mousetraps reaction in the middle of a crowded city.

 "This just in: a man talking on his cellphone this afternoon gently knocked into another skycar driver, killing 7,000 people. Police are ruling out foul play. No word yet whether or not the driver was intoxicated."

That is, of course, if the cellphone still requires you to talk on it.

It's funny to look at what technologies ended up developing and which ones have fallen off. Past predictions of future technologies were way missed the mark by a damn sight. In Star Trek, they had a ship that could fly from star system to star system in the blink of an eye, an android that could store the entire compendium of human knowledge and play the violin, and a room that could recreate any scenario imaginable, and yet, every computer they had was bested by a cellphone from 1990. Seriously, take a look at this display:

"What the fuck? Are these buttons? Captain to the bridge, 

send Lieutenant Jobs down here, immediately,

 and tell him to bring Ensign Siri with him...fucking ridiculous."

And the tricorder? That handheld device the crew would keep in their hand to scan the area? And the communicator that could dial-up space? Yeah, not only are those things that happened, those are one device now. Being able to ring someone up on the other side of the planet is the least impressive thing that my iPhone can do. 

Here's the deal, scientists...

STOP WORKING ON THE TRICORDER/COMMUNICATOR THING UNTIL YOU'VE GOT THE FLYING CAR ON THE ASSEMBLY LINE!

I mean, I can see why interstellar travel isn't a thing yet. Turns out that was more complicated than just having a really big engine pushing you along, but you're so close to the flying car. You know how to make a car. You know how to make things that size fly. Put it all together, already. Maybe use magnet? I don't know, I'm not a scientist, so it's up to you. 

Wouldn't kill ya to get started on this little number, either.

Will there be mishaps?

Yes.

Will they result in death?

Probably.

But did that stop Ford from cranking out Model-T's like China cranks out plastic toys? No, it most certainly did not. Hell, you didn't even need a license to drive them, at first. Later, when you did have to get a license, it was like going and getting a fishing license. They were sending 14 year-olds out into the world with a piece of machinery that could kill people, and they didn't give half a fuck. Imagine doing that now. You're not even allowed operating a forklift until your 18, and it only goes 5 miles an hour, but we let 16 year-olds get behind the wheel of machines that weigh thousands of pounds and can tip the scale at a couple-hundred miles an hour. If we're real crazy, we let them get down to it on motorcycles.

"I can haz death machine."

Yet, somehow, the world doesn't come to an end.

So yeah, It'll cause some pretty spectacular headlines, but where would we be if we'd just said "eh, the horse ought to be able to do us just fine. I guess I don't mind taking a month to get to New York from Cleveland?"

We'd be in Cleveland, that's where.

And nobody wants to be in Cleveland.