"It was a good description to say that it was a game, a very interesting game one could play. Whenever one solved one of the little problems, one could write a paper about it. It was very easy in those days for any second-rate physicist to do first-rate work. There has not been such a glorious time since then. It is very difficult now for a first-rate physicist to do second-rate work." P.A.M. Dirac.
The quote is about physics, but it certainly also applies to medicine. All the low hanging fruits have been picked. The problem now is not the lack of talent, funding, interest or dedication: it's the lack of fruits.
To continue the analogy: The amount of reachable fruit depends a lot on the availability of tools. That’s why we didn’t have computer science in the copper age. There have a lot of new tools been developed recently, eg deep learning, and new areas of expertise have been unlocked with it. One just has to figure out what kinds of fruit are reachable now.
The quote is about physics, but it certainly also applies to medicine. All the low hanging fruits have been picked. The problem now is not the lack of talent, funding, interest or dedication: it's the lack of fruits.