Hard to believe, but Star Trek – the television show – debuted in 1966. That’s 32 years ago. Technology has evolved tremendously since then.
When you watched Captain Kirk back in that original series beaming down to a planet with Spock, or flipping open their communication devices to speak with someone back on the ship, you never thought that’s something that could possibly occur. Hear someone on a phone through space? Huh? Dematerialize, then rematerialize matter in another place? Yeah, sure.
Science fiction is the art of the possible, in many ways. A future scenario is thrown into the public arena by a creative-type and the idea, concept, story-line, piece of technology either sinks or swims in the coming years. We have found the past 20 years or so that technology compounds on itself and one innovation begets another until finally, for example, we are talking almost seamlessly across space to one another on smart devices and sending data that magically appears out of thin air on the screen of someone 4,000 miles away. It’s all pretty damn incredible.
But back in 1966, not that I saw the first Star Trek shows (watched the reruns in the early 1970s), you didn’t project forward. No one thought, “Wow, we’re going to have phasers we can set on stun.” Or, “We’ll be able to fly a spaceship at warp speed.” Or, “I can’t wait until someone creates invisible shields.”
Yet when you see how far we’ve come in transmitting images and data through thin air, is it so pie in the sky that some of the other technology imaginations from the show will become reality? You have to wonder.
My personal favorite in terms of healing is the medical device that McCoy deployed. He turned on a small scanner, ran it over the affected part of your body, then read the output of your diagnosis. Then the remedy for your malady was scanned over the injury and POOF, you were better. Imagine that. Imagine if we could develop technology to so quickly figure out what is wrong with your body and introduce the immediate healing powers to bring you back to 100 percent.
There’s an implicit message from the medical community today that you can be fixed through drugs, surgeries, vaccinations and therapy but nothing with the speed inherent in that scanner. It would be a miracle if instead someone could invent the instantaneous body fixer scanner. Boy, could we all save some money, headaches (literally and figuratively) and time.
An even better invention if someone could get on this was the deporting machine. You or an object were dematerialized, then you rematerialized at specific coordinates where you wanted to go. Great stuff. Think about having that today and getting all those semi-trucks unnecessary cars off the highways. We’d probably reduce world air pollution by 60 percent or more. Painful stuck-in-traffic commuting would go away.
Personally, I don’t now if I’d want my atoms scrambled and put back together. My face might end up where my butt belongs. Sending PRODUCTS through the machine though? That would be darn good, IMO. Some brilliant engineer needs to focus on this intently with a powerful team of compadres. Elon Musk?
Star Strek and other science fiction show us a path for technology and human development. It’s a starting point for certain futures that improve lives here on earth.
When you watched Captain Kirk back in that original series beaming down to a planet with Spock, or flipping open their communication devices to speak with someone back on the ship, you never thought that’s something that could possibly occur. Hear someone on a phone through space? Huh? Dematerialize, then rematerialize matter in another place? Yeah, sure.
Science fiction is the art of the possible, in many ways. A future scenario is thrown into the public arena by a creative-type and the idea, concept, story-line, piece of technology either sinks or swims in the coming years. We have found the past 20 years or so that technology compounds on itself and one innovation begets another until finally, for example, we are talking almost seamlessly across space to one another on smart devices and sending data that magically appears out of thin air on the screen of someone 4,000 miles away. It’s all pretty damn incredible.
But back in 1966, not that I saw the first Star Trek shows (watched the reruns in the early 1970s), you didn’t project forward. No one thought, “Wow, we’re going to have phasers we can set on stun.” Or, “We’ll be able to fly a spaceship at warp speed.” Or, “I can’t wait until someone creates invisible shields.”
Yet when you see how far we’ve come in transmitting images and data through thin air, is it so pie in the sky that some of the other technology imaginations from the show will become reality? You have to wonder.
My personal favorite in terms of healing is the medical device that McCoy deployed. He turned on a small scanner, ran it over the affected part of your body, then read the output of your diagnosis. Then the remedy for your malady was scanned over the injury and POOF, you were better. Imagine that. Imagine if we could develop technology to so quickly figure out what is wrong with your body and introduce the immediate healing powers to bring you back to 100 percent.
There’s an implicit message from the medical community today that you can be fixed through drugs, surgeries, vaccinations and therapy but nothing with the speed inherent in that scanner. It would be a miracle if instead someone could invent the instantaneous body fixer scanner. Boy, could we all save some money, headaches (literally and figuratively) and time.
An even better invention if someone could get on this was the deporting machine. You or an object were dematerialized, then you rematerialized at specific coordinates where you wanted to go. Great stuff. Think about having that today and getting all those semi-trucks unnecessary cars off the highways. We’d probably reduce world air pollution by 60 percent or more. Painful stuck-in-traffic commuting would go away.
Personally, I don’t now if I’d want my atoms scrambled and put back together. My face might end up where my butt belongs. Sending PRODUCTS through the machine though? That would be darn good, IMO. Some brilliant engineer needs to focus on this intently with a powerful team of compadres. Elon Musk?
Star Strek and other science fiction show us a path for technology and human development. It’s a starting point for certain futures that improve lives here on earth.