Cool future tech graph for nerds - and a philosophical question

[Josquius]

The big hurdles to a space elevator aren't with the actual technology itself whatever they may or may not be.
The sheer political hurdles of such a mammoth undertaking....I just don't see those being overcome till the end of the century at the least.
The idea of a floating island with a cable into space and the potential horror if it should fall (even if recent ideas prove true and it wouldn't be that bad- people will believe the worst case) and bringing an asteroid into orbit....it just couldn't happen in today's world.

Not all matter.  Hell, not even all baryons.

My problem with fusion power is that they've been saying that it's ten or twenty years away for the last fifty years.  We're not any closer to economical fusion power than we were when I was a boy.

True.
However....people have been talking up the rise of China and Brazil since forever and it never happened.
Until now....
Such situations can change.

[Tonitrus]

Not gonna happen.

I agree.  Why bother building smokestacks onto a spaceship?

[Ideologue]

The big hurdles to a space elevator aren't with the actual technology itself whatever they may or may not be.
The sheer political hurdles of such a mammoth undertaking....I just don't see those being overcome till the end of the century at the least.
The idea of a floating island with a cable into space and the potential horror if it should fall (even if recent ideas prove true and it wouldn't be that bad- people will believe the worst case) and bringing an asteroid into orbit....it just couldn't happen in today's world.

Disagree.  Materials science is definitely a big hurdle.  Also I don't think a nanotube tether would involve much horror even if things went catastrophically wrong (anyone on it might die, but the individal tethers would burn in the atmosphere, after their anti-corrosion/anti-radiation jackets melted).