> Thing is, we do know what humans need. We need better battery technology, improved drugs

You just demonstrated that you don't know - we dont need batteries spesifically, we need zero carbon power for vehicles, which can be done by fuel cells or plutonium or maybe something we haven't considered.

Same way before you would have asked for a faster oven, because you didn't even know a microwave is a possible concept

Research is not a restraurant menu, you dont get to choose what you will discover and how much it will cost