I have a feeling its adoption would bring the end of cash a big step closer.

Monero fixes this

You people realize that most crypto is even less private? Every transaction ever can be viewed by everyone, forever, by design.

There's some truth to this but it's also not really the case.

• Each address is pseudononymous even in original Bitcoin.
• Bitcoin lightning transactions are completely opaque to the network, they are never on-chain. At this point, there are vastly more transactions on lightning than on-chain. They confirm instantly and are known only to your node, the receiver's wallet, and intermediary nodes (if any). Lightning inherits security from the main chain while giving you sub-second transaction confirmation times.
• Monero exists, coinjoin (Bitcoin) exist, changing addresses and having multiple wallets exists, liquidity swaps exist. The chain analysis game is getting harder and more complex every year.

good luck

except there are many sites dedicated to doing exactly that. you can send cash in the mail, giftcards, exchange via other cryptocurrencies, etc.

False. Use Monero.

Yes. But the draw is that it is still leagues easier use privately than the traditional banking system. With cryptocurrency, you "only" need proper understanding of OPSEC. With banking system - you also need to break the law somewhere in the KYC process.

CBDCs are coming whether you like it or not and a GNU Taler based payment system is currently our best mitigation strategy against them.

The best mitigation strategy is to refuse to use them and to point out when systems, like Taler, are actively working to further their introduction of use. Using your national currency is mandatory to pay taxes, it's not mandatory for anything else in most countries. We have the option to opt out, just like we do with every other privacy-attacking technology. Assuming it's inevitable is how they win.

It didn't create the system, and it doesn't have the power to replace it.

But it does support the system by being a part of it

Central Bank Digital Currency. Its a controversial project by many central banks around the world to establish a digital cash alternative, but the current proposals are usually not very privacy friendly.

That may technically be true, but it's currently very normalized. Do we actually want to denormalize it? Should the government know about every trivial transaction?

not if they're only covering the cost of parts

Which jurisdiction are you referring to? GNU Taler isn't specific to any particular country or currency.

If you can do a P2P transaction like that, you need either a central server or a blockchain or equivalent to prevent double-spends. There is no other way. Satoshi's innovation for Bitcoin was developing a system (blockchain) that can do this without a central server.