future
Exploring the future of science today, while looking back on the achievements from yesterday. Science fiction is science future.
The Sci-Fi Museum Lover's Bucket List
If you’re a true fan of science fiction, whether campy or classic, space opera or speculative fiction, Star Trek or Jules Verne, you probably can’t get enough of the worlds your favorite characters inhabit, the clothes they wear, and the technology they wield. Lucky you, because some of the most exciting artifacts and memorabilia are exhibited in carefully curated museums around the world, and the momentum is building for even more. Check out this bucket list of already-existing sci-fi museums and exhibits, then get ready for two world-class museums coming to Hollywood, California and Washington D.C. in the years to come.
By Sarah Quinn8 years ago in Futurism
Orwell's 1984 Was Optimistic
When George Orwell wrote his most famous, and last, novel, 1984, it was against a backdrop of rising fascist totalitarianism in Europe. Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, Franco, all turned their respective democratic nations into oppressive regimes. While Hitler sought war with Europe, Stalin declared war on his own people, purging the Soviet Union of anyone he feared might usurp him – they numbered in the millions. It was after participating in the Spanish Civil War, against Franco’s Nationalists, that Orwell’s writing direction turned towards one of speaking out against totalitarianism and promoting democratic socialism.
By Jacob Frommer8 years ago in Futurism
New Words Were Needed
I spent the past semester teaching two separate courses— one on science fiction, the other on modernism— to some very bright high school students. Having expected to suffer some intellectual whiplash as I shifted several times a day from talking about aliens and cyberpunk to Dadaism and the Harlem Renaissance, I was relieved at how naturally it all came to me. No doubt this is because I like all this stuff and generally know my way around it, but what surprised me was how much overlap these "genres" turned out to have (they're not really "genres," but I can't seem to find a better word)— that is, that I enjoy Ulysses and A Martian Odyssey for many of the same reasons; it's just that these reasons are operating at different levels of the text.
By M. Thomas Gammarino8 years ago in Futurism
Who Will Survive the Next Biotic Crisis?
While the next biotic event is probably not in the near future, fossil records clearly testify that extinction is an unavoidable fate for all species. The real question remains: what is left in the wake of mankind? Our lineage is more likely to be altered through evolution than entirely snuffed out.
By Brian Switek8 years ago in Futurism
Why 3D Printing Will Change the World
1984, Orwell’s prophetic year of Big Brother, saw the release of the Mac which broke the idea that centralized control could ever be what it was before. That year also saw the first workable prototype for a 3D printer. Built by Charles Hull, the technology was then known as stereolithography. We know it as 3D printing, and that’s a term that covers a variety of different processes which may revolutionize all stages of the global manufacturing and distributing process. In that very science fictional year, Hull set off a revolution that is only now seeing fruition. 3D printing continues to threaten the social and economic structures which preceded it. When we speak about 3D printing, we’re speaking of a general technique of printing successive layers to form a three dimensional object at the end. From powder to paper to human tissue, these thin membranes are laid down like the construction of a plaster mask. From that simple concept, the 3D printer offers the reverse of Ford’s mass production revolution. Printing one item is now as cost effective in some cases as manufacturing a thousand items in the traditional way.
By Chris Lites8 years ago in Futurism
Ghosts Amongst the Stars
The old man sat on the rock near the top of the small hill as he had for many years now and watched the first stars begin to peek out of the deepening purple sky. The boy at his side, watched solemnly, as he had for most of his young life. They sit in silence.
By Futurism Staff8 years ago in Futurism
Freeman Dyson's Vision of the Future
Professor Freeman J. Dyson has been discussing mind-boggling concepts in a calm, matter-of-fact, one-should-expect way since 1956. 'One should expect that within a few thousand years of its entering the stage of industrial development, any intelligent species should be found occupying an artificial biosphere which completely surrounds its parent star.' It is his hobby he says disarmingly, something that grew up alongside his career as one of the finest mathematical physicists of the last century. To his former colleagues at Princeton's Institute for Advanced Studies, Dyson was known for his understanding of what goes on in the core of a star or in the interaction of high-energy beams of subnuclear particles—contributions that earned him the American Institute of Physics' Heineman Prize and the Royal Society's Hughes Medal.
By George Gott8 years ago in Futurism
Is Technology Making Us Dumb?
It won’t be long before computers can think faster and better than humans. Artificial Intelligence exists, and it is getting smarter at an incredible rate. As so many focus on how well machines can think, alarmingly few people are concentrating on how well humans are thinking (or rather, how they aren’t thinking as well as they used to). A side effect of epic proportions has accompanied our ventures into superior technology. We have become inseparable from our computers and, as time goes on, we are relying on them for more and more of our daily cognitive functions. The brain needs exercise. When you don't use it often enough, your abilities deteriorate. The resources at our disposal are enabling us to perform more advanced tasks faster than ever before, but when it comes to plain old thinking, is technology making us dumb? The answer is two sided. On one hand, our ability to locate information is exponentially higher. On the other, we are retaining far less than we ever have.
By Chelsea Pullano8 years ago in Futurism
The Five Holy Wounds of a Second Coming
9:00 am –– Thursday, April 14th 2033 There wasn't any room for the light. It could echo and bounce with no destination beyond entropic, move along little light. Presenter understood this, he felt most at home in the shadows, and their molesting reach dimming the flesh, dimming the speckled reminders. Pushing his sweat damaged linens off his gaunt frame, Presenter’s now upright body took aim at its beckoning stage. Joints cracked, or were they bones? Doesn't matter. He moved onwards, rising from the bed. The cracked and crusted eye sockets of his pale face were wiped and cleared, christened with the softness of the escaping sunlight. He wet his eyes with a yawn and unburdened himself with a throat clearing cough; reluctant to focus his sight, the parabolic flight of expulsion went unknown. Firmly composed, a blasé pace took Presenter over the refuse and across the threshold; entering the open concept kitchen, obeying his mandate.
By Joseph Somers8 years ago in Futurism