What is the one idea or mystery that, if solved, would make someone an overnight billionaire?

47 comments

1. Cure for the common cold.

   Though, realistically, it would probably just make whichever pharma company that person works for a bunch of money.

2. Non drip teapot

3. Universal cancer vaccine

4. Nuclear fusion.

   Edit : I mean, of course, sustained, controlled nuclear fusion in a power generating plant.

5. Superconductors that work at ambient temperature and pressure.

6. Happiness pill or liquid luck lol

7. Relief for period pain that has no side effects.

8. Perpetual motion.

9. The maths things with prime numbers that underpins modern banking cryptography.

10. Pill for obesity cure
    Pill for tinnitus cure – I’d pay for that!

11. Seriously?

    Medication that numbs the pain from menstrual cramping *completely* and lasts for a week or so could be a game changer. I can still remember my sister being taken to the doctor because her cramps were absolute agony.

    On a more personal note (only because I’ve lost friends to it) a cure for HIV. Oh, and for purely selfish reasons (because I have it) a cure for MS would be nice.

12. the answer is to work out how to become a billionaire overnight.

13. Cure for some sort of cancer seems the most obvious..

14. Guess the private key for a full bitcoin wallet.

15. Cure for baldness, for sure

16. Efficient ways to store large quantities of electricity produced from renewables.

17. Artificial organ implants.

    Like if someone had liver failure or something, you could just swap it out for a implant.

18. Matter manipulation/generation. Although I imagine that would actually result in money being useless!

19. The ability to store the power of a lightning strike.

20. Teleportation or similar… Public transport is a pita for many reasons.

21. Cure for hangovers.

22. Finding an unlimited energy resource would be a fantastic way to become murdered overnight.

23. A 5 minute daily treatment that is low effort and gives you a perfect physique

24. A substance with the flavour of chocolate and negative calories.

25. Making a vegan cheese that is indistinguishable from dairy cheese.

26. A way of blocking reposts on Reddit

27. Full autonomous driving software for all cars.

28. Treatment for chronic pain that’s as effective as opiates but is non addictive.

29. AGI (Artificial General Intelligence), it’s why Microsoft is piling billions of dollars into OpenAI. The first company/organisation to achieve it will become the richest that’s ever existed.

30. Teleportation

31. A cure for aging would make anyone a trillionaire if you had a good business manager or were good at business management

    Or a cure for bipolar and or Asperger’s, both of these illnesses are what give mental illness it’s ” superpower ” name both cause a good deal of suffering for a good deal of payoff both academically and creatively, it’s on a spectrum so it doesn’t apply to all people with these disorders but… Some of these people could afford a lot and I’m the case of bipolar empathy could play a big part in wanting to fix this for others with the same disorder

32. Hangover cure

33. Cheap, green desalination

34. Pies that cook at the same temperature and time as oven chips

35. How to recycle carbon fibre

36. DNA test that you were Queen Elizabeth’s legitimate first born

37. I have actually had that idea, working on it as we speak. Send me £5 and I’ll let you in in the ground floor

38. Alzheimer’s cure.

39. In the UK, a way to privatise air, they would make stupid amounts of money…

40. I mean … Aging is the obvious one isn’t it

41. Cure for cancer, but I wouldn’t want the money. I’d set up my own company to manage it/production, would only charge to cover costs. No profit.

42. Wheat that can grow in saltwater.

    Fresh water is scarce in Western Australia and other areas, and is only getting scarcer.

    Desalination is crazy expensive and will not be viable to fight the food shortages which are coming.

    If you can get wheat to grow with sea water all of these areas become easily irrigable. Wheat production booms worldwide.

    It would make the revolution that was dwarf wheat look tiny in comparison.

43. How to sex a chicken at conception. Then all the male chicks wouldn’t be minced live at birth.

44. Take 20-50% of the income of every working person in the country. Then take 20% of every transaction in the country.

    Then tell all the plebs it’s for their own good.

45. A way to safely and reliably snip out latent viruses from human DNA. Bye bye herpes and HIV.

46. Cure for ME/CFS. And I would support them being a billionaire for it, as it would save millions of lives from those of us suffering this illness.

47. 210 comments and time machine has not come up? Reddit let me down.