Arts & Mad Sciences
Am I the only one who is generally disappointed with the way the technology seems to be advancing? I mean, yes, sure, there have been some amazing advances in the late 20th Century. In particular, we're getting extremely good at spying on Americans, blowing up brown people and making consumer electronics really small and thin.
In fact, I think most Americans would join me in saying to our large electronics purveyors..."Thank you very much. Those consumer electronic devices are extremely thin. Well-played. Is there any way you can, you know, make sure they work properly for more than 6 months? Now that you've got the whole really thin, small thing down?"
There's just a whole lot of dreary, actual science and not nearly enough mad science. I feel like, every time I read a news article about the latest scientific discovery, they've found out something else that's simultaneously both dull and seemingly-impossible.
"Researchers from the Kochakahotchee Observation Center have announced their discovery of a distant quark that strongly resembles actor and noted philanthropist Jerry Lewis. If accurate, their discovery provides us with new insight about space, and how occasionally, heavenly bodies will resemble beloved celebrities.
"'Obviously, because of Kreishlachler-Meindorff's Second Principle of Applied Meta-Computational Super-String Quantum Mechanics, we can't be sure if the quark looks more like the nerdy Jerry Lewis of The Delicate Delinquent or the sassy, suave Jerry Lewis of The Ladies' Man and half of The Nutty Professor,' said Elizabeth Jane-Downingford, a member of the team reporting the discovery. 'But at the very least, it's a find of equal magnitude to that nebula that kind of looked like Jesus surfboarding that we spotted last year.'"
You know what I'm saying.
Microchips and super-colliding superconductors and bullet trains...That stuff's all neat, but I can't have been the only one really hoping for flying cars and teleportation machines and time travel, right?
And then I see a photo like this one, and I'm reminded that we're still just a bunch of stupid, backwards-ass apes.
No, I'm not objecting to Miss Emma Watson's brand of beer, although drinking Corona is a touch barbarian. I just feel like we're advanced enough as a species to have developed some sort of ray or whatever to prevent child actors from getting old.
See, here's the thing...Emma Watson plays Hermione in the Harry Potter films. And I was already in my 20's when the Harry Potter books were first published in the United States. That means that, seeing the young actress hired to play one of the characters from those books in the ensuing series of movies growing up and enjoying the fruits of adult life makes me feel goddamn ancient.
Surely, I'm not the only person to feel this way. It would be the same, I suspect, for someone of the previous decade seeing the young cast of "Saved by the Bell" blossom into active, successful...well, into adults, anyway.
What I'm saying is, surely if we're going to make advancement in any major field of research, it should be in the Anti-Child-Actor-Aging Ray Gun Department. Or any actor aging, really, because it's totally depressing to see good-looking people get old and saggy.
And if there are any scientists reading the blog right now, here are some more totally brilliant suggestions:
No-Spill Port-a-Potties
Watching the film North Country recently, in which a group of brutes overturn a portable john with a meek little female inside, I was struck by the fatally-flawed design of these contraptions. Now, obviously, I understand that, by definition, there is no way to actually dispose of human waste within the confines of a portable toilet. But at the very least, could there not be some sort of valve or one-way flap preventing the waste from coming back up in the unfortunate event of a topple? No Mr. Wizard's out there capable of rigging up such a device? You know this has happened to people in real life...I would think the very first victim of such an accident would invent something to ensure that there was never, ever, ever a repeat episode.
Leaf Blower Silencers
I've spoken about my hatred for leaf-blowers on the blog before. (Here, if you must know). What I don't understand is, if we're capable of devising a silencer for a gun - surely among the more noisy contraptions - why not the machine that blows leaves and dirt around?
Stay-Put Socks
They never fall down.
A Computer Operating System That Looks Like the Kind Hackers Use in the Movies
You know how, when people are hacking into computer systems in movies, it always looks like they're exploring this futuristic, 3D computer environment? That's a really cool idea! It would sure make hacking easier, right? Like playing some 80's PC game...you just walk down the right hallway, hide from the cyber-guard, and get in to grab whatever information you need. Make it work in tandem with a Nintendo Power Glove for even better results.
The Hangover Pill
Okay, some of these entires have been jokes (particularly the "Ren and Stimpy" reference). But I'm totally 100% serious about this one. Not only do we know the immediate cause of hangovers - excessive drinking - but we even know the physiological reason for hangovers - dehydration. So how come we don't have a way to just not get hangovers? Everyone has their own remedies - I myself only start to feel better after eating the greasiest-possible meal, a habit started back in my days at the UCLA dorms, when nights of excessive drinking were typically followed by cafeteria Monte Cristo sandwiches and bad coffee. But these are really just rituals to ease the suffering, not actual cures.
Superheroes
I can't tell you how disappointed I am in science for never having once produced a superhero, even accidentally. Isn't anyone randomly messing around with gamma radiation any more? What about mutant spiders? Robotic arms fused into spinal cords? Not only hasn't anyone ever developed crazy powers, but we don't even have any brilliant inventor/vigilantes! You're telling me not one single dot-com billionaire thought to invest in military-style armor, sleek bullet-proof vehicles with mounted machine guns and high gliders emblazoned with his or her personal insignia?
Sexy Robots
I mean, do I even need to explain the dire societal need for this one? We already have robots, but they always look like Hondas with legs. If we're going to bother building humanoid robots at all, then someone needs to get started on building some that are really hot.
Child Forcefields
Okay, let me explain this one...By forcefield, I simply mean some sort of protective zone that would hover around a child, one that could only be penetrated by a parent or guardian holding on to a specialized remote control. This thing would have two main uses:
(1) It keeps kiddie fiddlers, kidnappers and other undesirables away from your kids during those few moments when you aren't looking AND
(2) If properly sound-proofed, it would allow you to shut out your child's irritating and constant noise emissions, thus salvaging your own sanity and earning you the appreciation of any and all persons in your immediate vicinity
Don't ask me how it would work. I don't have a mind for that sort of thing. I'm just an idea man.
3 comments:
You're lucky I'm bored. Let's take this in order:
Flying car: The problem is more regulatory than technological. Moller's been working on it for decades and has had working prototypes for a while. Here's an easy to read overview of flying car attempts (the third page has a good list of current competitors).
Teleportation: Not anytime in the distant future. And never like it was in Star Trek. More realisticly, we should eventually be able to record the full atomic structure of a person, transmit the data wherever you need to send it, and then use nanotech construction to assemble a perfect replica on the other side. However, that's cloning, not transporting. To make it a proper "teleportation", you'd have to then kill the original. :)
Time travel: Forward is trivial, backward is as yet impossible. That's the simplified answer. The complicated answer probably requires a Ph.D in physics - which I don't have, and therefore haven't been able to understand.
Emma Watson: If she didn't age, she couldn't play Hermione past movie #2. I'm not so much disturbed by her aging, as by the fact that a picture of her drinking is important enough to make it's rounds on the internets. Plus, she's a cutey. Let her reach adulthood, I'm not complaining. :)
Port-a-Potties: As you said, an auto-shut valve would be trivial. How often do they get turned over in real life, though? I think keeping in the stink is a bigger benefit of an auto-shut valve then protecting oneself from pranksters. Anyone who actually thinks its funny to do that to someone should be buried alive in diarrhea.
Leaf Blower Silencers: Amen.
Stay-Put Socks: I learned the hard way in school that socks-up = nerd and socks-down = fitting in (dress socks being an exception), so I don't need this one myself, but I'm amused by the idea. I bet it's doable. Did you see any of the news stories about the new suits the olympic skiers are using that are normally soft but become hard during an impact? Maybe that technique could be use to stiffen the sock after it's on so it retains it's shape.
Operating System: Fancy interfaces are generally considered impractical, but if you like, check out SGI's 3d interface. It was demoed in Jurassic Park. Yes, it's a real desktop UI. The UI in Minority Report was a little more promising (although obviously overly dramatic). There's an amazing UI demo making the rounds that seems partially inspired by Minority Report. Specifically, it demonstrates what you could do with a touch screen that detects all pressure points simultaneously (modern touch screens are one-point X/Y affairs).
Hangover Pill: Already invented, starting seeing commercials just recently. Don't know if it actually works.
Superheroes: Will happen soon enough, but not as a result of radiation or toxic waste. :) Genetic engineering, and it's going to throw athletic competition into total fucking chaos. Also, the military has been working on exo-skeletons for quite some time, and there's some pretty good ones already in production - they've even leaked into the private sphere.
Sexy Robots: Mechanical engineering is suited for fundamentally different tasks than bioengineering. I don't think we'll see sexy "robots" any time in the near future, if ever. Much more likely we'll see human-like organisms grown in labs without a functioning neocortex, perhaps replaced by a computer brain with the limited programming necessary to perform it's task. This provides the feel of a real sex partner while avoiding the messy ethical issues of enslaving a sentient being.
Child Forcefields: There are already parents surgically implementing locator chips in their children to prevent kidnapping (a stupid idea, won't get into that now). I imagine more technology will develop along those lines, maybe involving sensors for detecting specific situations. I'm not particularly thrilled about this. Minors are the most unprivileged class of people in the modern world, and almost no one seems willing to recognize that fact. It disgusts me.
As for the noise factor - science may have a solution to that as well. I can't find any relevant links right now, but sound travels as pressure waves through the air. It should be possible to disrupt those waves, say in a cone-like shape, ensuring privacy at a dinner table or, as you suggest, shutting up annoying kids.
Great comment, possibly the most thorough and interesting in Crushed by Inertia history.
I like, as well, how you listed, along with all this pseduo-science topics and made-up technology, the category of "Emma Watson."
Truly, if she did not already exist, we'd have to invent her.
I was only responding to the points in your post, and Emma Watson was clearly one of them (even earned the only image slot).
As for inventing her... out of our hands. Unfortunately, that is the one field of engineering entirely dominated by women. :)
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