It's not because people are "smarter and more mature." We will definitely see another parabolic rise eventually, it's just too soon. It's only been a few months since the bottom of the bear market.
At this point in 2015, we were still more than a year away from the parabolic phase of the bull market. The same is probably true now. The chart probably won't go vertical again until we make a new ATH at $20K. My guess is, that'll happen some months after the halving next year.
When going by propertion to ath with the 4 year cycles, we are right now about $500 in May 2015 - a bit under half of the previous ath. This is quite a bit higher than it was in May 2015, so I expect the run up over the next couple years to be more gradual and steady, with a less dramatic crash following the next ath. We may drop back into the $6ks over the summer and finish the year around $10k, this scenario would be pretty similar to how 2015 went.
It's too early for me to speculate much yet on long term price trajectory but I'm looking for a similar scenario for 2019. If we're following 2015 then we haven't seen the August crash yet. After a correction and recovery like that, I'll be more confident about making long term projections, especially time-based ones.
I just know it will look somewhat different than previous cycles (history rhymes but never repeats), and it already does like quite different than 2015. I also know the post-bear consolidation should take quite a bit of time. It looks hyper bullish right now so people think we're going to $20K next month, but after we correct downwards for a few months that sentiment will be destroyed, and a sideways 2019 will look a lot more reasonable.
To understand how high it could go this time around we need to look at the reasons behind it. First off is the potential of it becoming used in the mainstream with online purchases, with the LN being a big part of making this work. More importantly, as always, there is the fiat system that is failing before our eyes and is getting closer and closer to collapse. The rate of increase in the world debt in general, and the US debt in particular is extremely alarming. Keep in mind, the USD is the world reserve currency, and I think whether bitcoin will or will not actually end up replacing it doesn't matter so much as it's potential to do so. Just the chance that this happening in the future is a HUGE reason for people to want to own some. To me, this is a far more compelling reason for a pump than in 2017, when it was basically fueled by ethereum's scam ico mania.
So as far as I'm concerned, I would not be surprised at a million dollar bitcoin price within the next 3 years. This would not only make John Mcaffee the most respected bitcoin caller in history for going out on such a long limb and being right, it would also save his dick. This potential also has me questioning how much more bearish the market could get from here forth, it's conceivable we don't have many more opportunities for sub $10k bitcoins.