Wow. Some of these are really interesting and I've completely missed them. For example:

http://edge.org/response-detail/26769

TL;DR: forcing homozygosity through applying CRISPR to hack DNA repair = a way to spread any gene quickly throughout an entire population of sexually reproducing (fast enough) organisms. Apparently it's demonstrated to work.

Apart from Crispr, Deep Learning, Autonomous drone swarms, and Mars missions, an important development in human society seems to be the dawning of an era in which "crime" becomes impossible.

Accuracy in determining our genetic and digital fingerprints, combined with ubiquitous surveillance and predictive machine learning may make going "on the lam" prohibitively difficult. In concert with LE's newfound prowess would be a subtle but pervasive mass media campaign that targets pre-criminals with cautionary tales of the apprehended. One hopes that progress in rehabilitation and societies capacity for forgiveness matches these developments apace.

ps happy 2016 HN!

A little surprising to me to see Peter Gabriel amongst the respondents!

His answer [1] seems to be an update of the scenario which (iirc) inspired the lyrics to the song Here Comes The Flood[2], co-written with Robert Fripp quite some time ago, which ponders the impact of a sudden explosion in the availability of previously private "inner" information.

1: http://edge.org/response-detail/26632 2: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MdwLhu9bZAE

For me, the most "interesting" scientific news in my lifetime, is also the worst: Global warming.