Yea this. It’s the cigarettes of our generation. “I don’t know, everyone was doing it back then”, we’ll all say.

And our blind acceptance of it all, to the point of allowing it to replace journalism and politics, will be seen as dumb in the same way we now breath in some cigarette smoke and see it as obviously unhealthy.

I don't know about that. Younger millenials that grew up with social media are having kids and I see them posting about it.

For better or worse, I think social media is here to stay in some form or another. Maybe theyll fight harder to put some limits on it but I'm skeptical

It's just not sustainable. Lab-grown meat is here, it just needs to get to scale, get a bit cheaper and boom. Farming and killing animals for food will be obsolete.

This is the first thing that came to my mind, too. I'm a omnivore myself and admittedly love my meat, but it's very bad for the environment and I can't deny the ethical concerns are there. At the very least, I can see low key vegetarianism being the norm in 20 years, where the norm would simply be to not have meat products, and meat might instead be a more niche diet or simply not the norm.

If lab grown meat manages to become scalable enough, I can also see that nearly completely replacing "real" meat. Once it's at least as affordable, I think "real" meat's days would be numbered. It'd become a thing only for purists/elitists/exotic diners. I would even expect that lab grown meat would eventually become cheaper than "real" meat simply because it would be far faster to grow and take fewer resources than to grow an entire animal to adulthood.

As an aside, would labe grown meat be considered vegan? I think it would be since no animal is harmed in the making of it. I imagine many existing vegans wouldn't want to eat something that tastes like meat, but it would be the thing that converts practically everyone else. I sure don't see why I'd ever want to eat "real" meat again if I could get a comparable lab grown meat that doesn't harm animals and is better for the environment. That's just a win win.

This definitely. For ethical or cost-effective reasons. I think price is going to be the main incentive. If its a dollar less a pound for lab grown hamburger and options at fast food outlets - we'll definitely be there. Real meat will become the new "fancy food" - wasteful and indulgent spending.

Definitely don't hold your breath.

If you pass out and hit your head, do you know how much that would cost to go to urgent care?

Completely disagree, but if you haven't been around for at least a couple of sets of twenty years I can see why you would think this.

Someone else gave a great set of things that were different, but really, twenty years ago was almost completely different in nearly every dimension of life I can remember.

In 2003 not only was gay marriage not legal, gay sex and relationships were illegal where I live, and was punishable by prison time.

In 2003 most of the country wasn't online, pagers were more common than cell phones, and 3DFX VooDoo graphics cards were still a thing.

In 2003 I used to smoke inside my community college's cafeteria, where people ate because it was the designated smoking area.

In 2003 minimum wage was $5.15 nationwide, and gas was just a little over a dollar.

In 2003 people didn't use laptops in school and electronics were confiscated on site, sometimes teachers would 'lose' them and you never got it back, and somehow that was an expected outcome - I lost a laser pointer that way.

In 2003 casual homophobia was mainstream, all your friends, and probably you would be making gay jokes, and transphobia was not a concept. I thought transgender people were the same thing as intersex, I didn't know gender transition was possible.

American society was post 9/11 and highly patriotic, even liberal people were unusually patriotic, and politics were probably the most 'neutral' that I've ever seen, it was nothing like they are now, but in general things trended towards cultural conservatism.

I remember being an outcast because I didn't believe in God, and people would casually tell me I was going to go to Hell.

Nah, 20 years is an entirely different cultural paradigm.

I think basically every single top level comment has zero understanding of what a short time 20 years actually is.

I also expect almost everything that is acceptable today will also still be in 20 years, including nearly every example suggested in this discussion.

The world simply does not change that fast as a general rule.

In 2003, you could still smoke indoors in many states/countries who have since made it illegal.

In 2003, cannabis and homosexuality was illegal in many more countries than it is now.

In 2003, there were many more TV shows/movies with ingrained sexism than there are now.

In 2003, having hundreds of "online friends" meant you were a social recluse who only spent time on IRC/MSN messenger.

In 2003, if you met a significant other online, you came up with an elaborate story to hide it.

In 2003, most people had a paper map of the streets folded up in their glove compartment.

In 2003, people still remembered phone numbers, phones all had removable batteries, every phone company had a different OS/charging cable, and no phone had a screen >6 inches big.

(cheating a little here, but I would be remiss not to mention this) In 2000, it wasn't illegal to bring a full water bottle into a plane.

I remember 20 years ago. I remember 40 years ago. It changes pretty fucking fast and it gets faster every year.

I don't have much to say except this take is flat out incorrect

undeclared AI usage for photos, video, code, etc

I think this is the one. It's this generation's Napster, but the difference is it's not Britney Spears and Metallica getting robbed. It's every artist who ever posted their work to the Internet, and that's a huge, huge deal.

I would argue that its not acceptable now.

That's gonna take a lot more than 20 years

Doubtful. Coffee, tea and caffeine in general have health benefits when consumed in not extreme dosages.