How true is it that according to Ray Kurzweil, we are reaching a point where sickness & disease are all conquerable?

Are we 'reaching a point where sickness and disease are all conquerable’, apparently according to a 2005 book? A notion grounded in reality or one that exists in the fantasy landscape inhabited by those in positions of enormous wealth and influence? I'm particularly stuck by the yawning, obscene contrast between the techno-utopia implied by this question and manifest reality. Some absurd propositions just beg to be introduced violently to the reality on planet Earth.

The example of Remote Area Medical - Wikipedia (RAM) helps puncture the brazenly clueless notion that human sickness and disease are anywhere close to being 'conquered'. Started by Stan Brock (philanthropist) - Wikipedia in 1985, RAM provides a variety of healthcare services to needy people in remote parts of the world.

Needy people in remote parts. Maybe people in earthquake-hit parts of so-called Third World countries like Haiti? Rather, the bulk of RAM's services are provided in the US. Not remote parts of the US mind unless somehow places like Inglewood, CA, Seattle, WA, Knoxville and Memphis, both in TN, and Las Vegas, NV, (see examples below) are remote in which case the word's patently become meaningless.

So, in the year 2017, affordable healthcare is still so much out of reach for so many millions in the US that thousands of Americans wait for hours, even overnight, to get really free medical, dental and vision care at huge RAM clinics organized in enormous stadiums to accommodate the huge numbers in need (see below from remote area medical Archives - Insurance Thought Leadership and The Atlantic, Olga Khazan, January 22, 2015. Life in the Sickest Town in America).

If so many people in arguably the most powerful and wealthiest country in the world, in fact its sole current superpower, can't even access basic healthcare, how likely is it that we are even remotely close to a time when sickness and disease are all conquerable?

To conquer sickness and disease, shouldn't their diagnosis be a given in any and all circumstance in the first place, and if even that's not guaranteed in the US of all places, what chances it's universally available and affordable elsewhere? And of course, these are times when guarantee of life itself doesn't even exist in conflict-ridden places like Syria, Iraq, Democratic Republic of Congo and so many other places, a time when unprecedented numbers of people have recently joined the ranks of refugees. Let's park this techno-utopia where it truly belongs, in the realm of fantasy...unless we accept as reality the future depicted by sci-fi movies like Elysium (film) - Wikipedia.

Sources for further reading:

The Atlantic, Olga Khazan, January 22, 2015. Life in the Sickest Town in America

The Guardian, Amy Woolard, November 23, 2016. The enormous pop-up clinic trying to bridge America’s health divide | Amy Woolard

The Guardian, Jessika Bohon, June 12, 2017. Rural Appalachia is facing a healthcare crisis. I fear it's going to get much worse | Jessika Bohon

Ray Kurzweil, 2005. The Singularity Is Near - Wikipedia

https://www.quora.com/How-true-is-it-that-according-to-Ray-Kurzweil-we-are-reaching-a-point-where-sickness-disease-are-all-conquerable/answer/Tirumalai-Kamala

What are some examples of “intentional” bad design?

Termed 'defensive' or Hostile architecture - Wikipedia, a cornucopia of 'intentional' unpleasant design abounds all around us, especially in affluent urban centers. Examples of unpleasant design (see below from 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) conspicuously shape public spaces to placate haves at the expense of have-nots, i.e., their aim ‘isn’t to achieve something good, like a safety goal’, but rather to keep certain people out.

Crudely executed ones such as the London Spikes (7) puncture the carefully constructed facade of how we engender consensus around the idea of what's publicly acceptable, which usually entails some form of hostility to the homeless.

Predictably of short duration, such outcries are responses to how public space is shaped, not about why it's being done in the first place. They also deflect attention from the core issue of how complicity is inherent to public consensus, how public policy usually assuages the wants of the haves at the expense of the needs of the have-nots.

Plenty more global examples of defensive architecture by Nils Norman - Wikipedia on his web-site (6).

Bibliography

1. Slate, Kristin Hohenadel, June 12, 2014. Are Anti-Homeless Sidewalk Spikes Immoral?

2. Guardian, Ben Quinn, June 13, 2014. Anti-homeless spikes are part of a wider phenomenon of 'hostile architecture'

3. Fagstein, June 13, 2014. “Homeless spikes” are gone — but what about Montreal’s other homeless deterrents?

4. The Atlantic, Robert Rosenberger, June 19, 2014. How Cities Use Design to Drive Homeless People Away

5. Guardian, Alex Andreou, February 18, 2015. Defensive architecture: keeping poverty unseen and deflecting our guilt

6. Archives | Dismal Garden

7. Petty, James. International Journal for Crime, Justice, and Social Democracy 5.1 (2016): 67-81. The London Spikes Controversy: Homelessness, Urban Securitisation and the Question of ‘Hostile Architecture’

https://www.quora.com/What-are-some-examples-of-%E2%80%9Cintentional%E2%80%9D-bad-design/answer/Tirumalai-Kamala