I think that modern healthcare is inefficient in general cost/benefit terms: what outputs you get at the cost of which inputs. Compared to what seems achievable in the future, of course.
I suppose that in optimistic scenarios one could imagine cutting labor costs using high automation, but we would probably still going to need hospitals, drug manufacturing facilities, medical equipment factories, and so on.
Fusion reactors, for example.
Always 20-30 years in the future for the last 60 years.
I'm under the impression that nuclear fusion reactors might have already reached technological maturity and thus diminishing returns before becoming commercially viable.
Even if commercial fusion reactors become available, they would hardly be "too cheap to meter".
They have to use the deuterium-tritium reaction (deuterium-deuterium is considered practically unfeasible), which has two main issues: it generates lots of high-energy neutrons and tritium must be produced from lithium.
High-energy neutrons erode any material and make it radioactive. This problem exists in conventional fission reactors, but it's more significant in fusion reactors because of the higher neutron flux. A commercial fusion reactor would probably have higher maintenance requirement and/or shorter lifespan than a fission reactor with the same power.
Lithium is not rare, but not terribly common either. If we were to produce all the energy of the world from fusion, lithium reserves would last between thousands and tens of thousands years, assuming that energy consumption does not increase.
That's clearly an abundant source of energy (in the same ballpark of uranium and thorium), but not much more abundant than other sources we are used to.
Moreover, in a fission power station the fuel costs make up only a fraction of the total costs per joule of energy. Most of the costs are fixed costs of construction, maintenance and decommissioning.
A fusion power station would have similar operational and decommissioning safety issues of a fission one (although it can't go into melt down), and probably and higher complexity, which mean that fixed cost will dominate, as for fission power.
If fusion power becomes commercially viable it would be valuable but most likely not "too cheap to meter".
I suppose that in optimistic scenarios one could imagine cutting labor costs using high automation
No, I primarily mean new ways of treatment. For example, a hypothetical country which can easily cure Alzheimer's would have much lower costs of medical care for the elderly. Being able to cure (as opposed to control) diabetes, a large variety of autoimmune disorders, etc. has the potential to greatly improve the efficiency of health care.
Always 20-30 years in the future for the last 60 years.
Yes, but I am not saying it would happen, I'm saying this is ...
Background:
On the most recent LessWrong readership survey, I assigned a probability of 0.30 on the cryonics question. I had previously been persuaded to sign up for cryonics by reading the sequences, but this thread and particularly this comment lowered my estimate of the chances of cryonics working considerably. Also relevant from the same thread was ciphergoth's comment:
Based on this, I think there's a substantial chance that there's information out there that would convince me that the folks who dismiss cryonics as pseudoscience are essentially correct, that the right answer to the survey question was epsilon. I've seen what seem like convincing objections to cryonics, and it seems possible that an expanded version of those arguments, with full references and replies to pro-cryonics arguments, would convince me. Or someone could just go to the trouble of showing that a large majority of cryobiologists really do think cryopreserved people are information-theoretically dead.
However, it's not clear to me how well worth my time it is to seek out such information. It seems coming up with decisive information would be hard, especially since e.g. ciphergoth has put a lot of energy into trying to figure out what the experts think about cryonics and come away without a clear answer. And part of the reason I signed up for cryonics in the first place is because it doesn't cost me much: the largest component is the life insurance for funding, only $50 / month.
So I've decided to put a bounty on being persuaded to cancel my cryonics subscription. If no one succeeds in convincing me, it costs me nothing, and if someone does succeed in convincing me the cost is less than the cost of being signed up for cryonics for a year. And yes, I'm aware that providing one-sided financial incentives like this requires me to take the fact that I've done this into account when evaluating anti-cryonics arguments, and apply extra scrutiny to them.
Note that there are several issues that ultimately go in to whether you should sign up for cryonics (the neuroscience / evaluation of current technology, estimate of the probability of a "good" future, various philosophical issues), I anticipate the greatest chance of being persuaded from scientific arguments. In particular, I find questions about personal identity and consciousness of uploads made from preserved brains confusing, but think there are very few people in the world, if any, who are likely to have much chance of getting me un-confused about those issues. The offer is blind to the exact nature of the arguments given, but I mostly foresee being persuaded by the neuroscience arguments.
And of course, I'm happy to listen to people tell me why the anti-cryonics arguments are wrong and I should stay signed up for cryonics. There's just no prize for doing so.