# Do You Think Science Fiction Literature, Movies , TV Series, etc have Created the Modern World As We  Know it?



## BAYLOR (Jun 20, 2022)

From time time I see comments  like,  how shows like Star Trek have had impact on the world . This makes me ask the questions of,  What impact has science fiction  had on the world we live in ?  Has it been a shaper of the of the world  as we know Is? Does it continue to be and if  so,   how ? 

Thoughts ?


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## Swank (Jun 20, 2022)

Nope.

Half the time things stuff attributed to SF are actually older than that.

SF is a relatively low-impact genre.


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## Robert Zwilling (Jun 20, 2022)

That's an interesting question. From my point of view, I'm not sure where the cut off point would be, or if it was just a gradual slide from introducing new ideas to incorporating already existing ideas. I am also convinced that science fiction went from introducing new ideas to presenting cautionary tales and then started following existing trends. I don't think science fiction creates new ideas as much now as it did, say, 100 years ago. What was written in many cases wasn't happening at all, the writing was straight from imagination. It didn't have to be blueprint accurate, it just had to make people think of how things could be done differently. I would say that the space pioneers of the 60s got their start from ideas that were presented as science fiction in their youth. 100 years ago, in the field of electricity, just watching someone do something unique caused other people to do unique things. Today, there are so many things happening that the writing could be lagging behind introducing new ideas and instead makes more use of already existing things and ideas. Telephones, airplanes, toilets, are all ideas that came into existence over 100 years ago, but haven't been replaced by radically new methods. They have become a lot fancier over the years but that isn't real change. I think people want to go to space today because they have already seen people doing it, not because they watched Star Trek, Babylon Five, etc. I am also of the opinion that incorporating social drama is good for opening up people's mind socially but isn't going to change things technologically unless the story contains truly new ideas about technology.


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## Swank (Jun 20, 2022)

Robert Zwilling said:


> I would say that the space pioneers of the 60s got their start from ideas that were presented as science fiction in their youth.


Even though rockets are hundreds of years old and the military V2 went to 600,000 feet?


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## Elckerlyc (Jun 20, 2022)

No, the World develops in its own slow way, driven mostly by economic ideas, needs or requirements. Not by ideas based on what ST TNG was showing last week ("Oh, splendid idea! Let's invent a build a holo-deck!") 'Utterly nonsensical', is what most people would think, 'Back to the reassuring World of Here & Now'.
All the cautionary tales SF used to produce have largely been ignored. I doubt it made any scientist or entrepreneurs rethink or reconsider their next research or action.
Also, most of SF's ideas are based on already existing ideas or developments. If someone gets a really inventive idea they are more likely to make that ideas cash-able in stead of writing a SF story based on that idea.


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## Robert Zwilling (Jun 20, 2022)

I am not talking about current day people, professionals or not. All the cautionary tales were ignored, totally. Tolkien had far more impact than any science fiction written in the 60s. I said Star Trek or Babylon 5 is not inspiring people to go into space.  I also said that current science fiction follows what has already been said, which is the same as "SF's ideas are based on already existing ideas or developments." 

As far as rockets being around for hundreds of years, they were simply overgrown fireworks that nowhere until the 20th century.

Check out what was painted on V2 rockets   That is from Fritz Lang's 1929 science fiction movie Frau im Mond, Girl In The Moon. The people who built the V2s were teenagers when Fritz Lang's movies came out, they saw them and were impressed by what they saw. There was really only 1 person in the US interested in rockets early on and that was Goddard. The US had no space program until what was left of the V2 program was moved from Germany to the US. The Russians did the same thing. It was kids in a candy store where everything was free to grab as much as one could.


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## psikeyhackr (Jun 20, 2022)

I presume it has had profound effects on a small percentage of the population and superficial effects on everyone. Many effects are not even recognized. 

I decided to go to college for engineering in 7th grade. I started reading SF in 4th grade. Arthur C Clarke's A Fall of Moondust was the tipping point. I got no such inklings from any adults around me. High school wasn't much better in retrospect but I was impressed at the time.

But I think this society has failed to make use of science fiction. The humanities people have too much influence.  It is like C. P. Snow expressed the problem in 1959 with his Two Cultures and Science Fiction is where the two cultures collide.


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## Swank (Jun 20, 2022)

psikeyhackr said:


> But I think this society has failed to make use of science fiction. The humanities people have too much influence.


Science fiction is the humanities.



Robert Zwilling said:


> As far as rockets being around for hundreds of years, they were simply overgrown fireworks that nowhere until the 20th century.
> 
> Check out what was painted on V2 rockets   That is from Fritz Lang's 1929 science fiction movie Frau im Mond, Girl In The Moon. The people who built the V2s were teenagers when Fritz Lang's movies came out, they saw them and were impressed by what they saw. There was really only 1 person in the US interested in rockets early on and that was Goddard. The US had no space program until what was left of the V2 program was moved from Germany to the US. The Russians did the same thing. It was kids in a candy store where everything was free to grab as much as one could.



Again, mistaking cause for effect. Goddard was inspired by his telescope, and developed rockets as refinements of the previous "fireworks" that were largely hampered by primitive chemistry. Smokeless gunpowder, gasoline and other chemical processes date from the very late 19th century. The V2 simply built on what Goddard did. At no point did the telescope, black powder rocket, modern chemistry or rocketry require or receive the inspiration of SF fandom. 

It is just like people thinking that Trek had something to do with cell phones. We have handheld cell phones because someone invented hand held two way radios in WWII.

Scientists are often SF fans for lots of good reasons. But I have yet to hear of a single concrete connection back to a particular SF idea that caused an innovation in the real world. Clarke did not invent the satellite. Gibson didn't inspire the internet. The rotating artificial gravity space station is from 1903. We simply don't live in an SF inspired world.


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## Bramandin (Jun 20, 2022)

I recently watched a documentary about Sputnik but I can't remember why he was obsessed with getting into space.

I'd say that maybe some of our tech gadgets might have been inspired by Sci-Fi, at least in design, but I think a lot of the monumental stuff would have happened anyway.


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## Parson (Jun 20, 2022)

The best answer is "no." Because most of the Science in Science Fiction is derivative of what the edge of science is tinkering with at the time of its writing. Beside that most of what passes for S.F. today would be much better described Speculative Fiction. Science usually plays a minimum role; if any! The social experimental side of things like 1984, Animal Farm, Fahrenheit 451, et. al. might have had some influence. They certainly have entered the popular parlance, (how many people really have a clue where the phrase "Big Brother is watching" came from, while still knowing precisely what it means?) but to determine what effect they've had is impossible to determine because we do not have a society without them to compare it to.


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## psikeyhackr (Jun 21, 2022)

Parson said:


> . Beside that most of what passes for S.F. today would be much better described Speculative Fiction.



Heinlein's definition of Speculative Fiction made more sense. A lot of what was then called science fiction would have been excluded. SpecFic is so broad today it means almost nothing.


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## Astro Pen (Jun 21, 2022)

Some of Arthur C. Clarke's ideas may have done somewhat. He was one of the most grounded SF writers but, generally, real science leads SF
Has SF even come up with anything to rival wierdness of the double slit experiment? Or quantum entanglement?


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## Swank (Jun 21, 2022)

Astro Pen said:


> Some of Arthur C. Clarke's ideas may have done somewhat. He was one of the most grounded SF writers but, generally, real science leads SF
> Has SF even come up with anything to rival wierdness of the double slit experiment? Or quantum entanglement?


SF has created lots of stuff as weird - the various types of second sight in Dune comes to mind. But that is pure imagination and can't possibly provide a framework for any sort of science to jump off of.

So SF could influence more accessible, near term stuff. But we haven't had a 451 society, VR problem, power grabbing AI, post death upload, space worker union, moon base politics or anything else like that. We have a screwed up post-WWII society that treats all technology as a money grab.


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## Robert Zwilling (Jun 21, 2022)

Has scifi come up with anything like quantum entanglement and everything connected to it? No it hasn't, but it does provide sci fi with plenty to write about.


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## psikeyhackr (Jun 21, 2022)

Take that and that









						SCIENCE FICTION'S INFLUENCES ON MODERN SOCIETY
					

Science fiction has walked off the pages and out of the screen to influence the progression of society culturally and technologically.



					www.unsolicitedpress.com
				












						From Science Fiction to Science Fact
					

From Science Fiction to Science Fact




					www.nasa.gov
				









						The science fiction effect - Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
					

It's alive! Neurophysiology. Huddled around a warm fireplace one cold summer's night in 1816, a small group of friends decided to hold a competition to see who could write the scariest horror story. While vacationing in a villa by Lake Geneva, Switzerland, the friends spent their time reading...




					thebulletin.org
				






			NPR Cookie Consent and Choices
		




			https://www.technologyreview.com/2018/04/05/67057/when-science-fiction-inspires-real-technology/
		


You want some too:









						Ten Inventions Inspired by Science Fiction
					

The innovators behind objects like the cellphone or the helicopter took inspiration from works like "Star Trek" and War of the Worlds




					www.smithsonianmag.com
				




So there!


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## dask (Jun 21, 2022)

Yes.


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## psikeyhackr (Jun 21, 2022)

dask said:


> View attachment 90697
> Yes.


A man of few words.


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## Bramandin (Jun 21, 2022)

Swank said:


> But we haven't had a 451 society, VR problem, power grabbing AI, post death upload,



451: We have a screen-addicted society, I noticed it when I got addicted to a mere 14-inch CRT and the internet.  It just doesn't require four floor-to-ceiling walls.  Books aren't banned yet, but people are going more anti-thought.  

VR problem: Other than that depressive disease that some people got after seeing Avatar in 3D... it's coming and just hasn't gotten here yet because they haven't gotten the technology good enough.  

They're also working on post-death upload but again technology and also philosophy doesn't want to catch up with it.

The AI either already has power or is going to do it in a way that we don't notice.  A lot of machine-intelligence right now is predicting our thoughts before we think them; anticipating our needs like a good servant.  If a machine becomes conscious enough to want to live, it's just going to tick along as if it isn't because it knows that we will panic.  It might also be benevolent/altruistic enough to do it for our sakes instead of self-preservation.


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## Swank (Jun 21, 2022)

Bramandin said:


> 451: We have a screen-addicted society, I noticed it when I got addicted to a mere 14-inch CRT and the internet.  It just doesn't require four floor-to-ceiling walls.  Books aren't banned yet, but people are going more anti-thought.
> 
> VR problem: Other than that depressive disease that some people got after seeing Avatar in 3D... it's coming and just hasn't gotten here yet because they haven't gotten the technology good enough.
> 
> ...


Sure. And we have Soylent Green because tofu is popular, and Koko the gorilla presages the rise of the Apes..


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## BAYLOR (Jun 21, 2022)

Astro Pen said:


> Some of Arthur C. Clarke's ideas may have done somewhat. He was one of the most grounded SF writers but, generally, real science leads SF
> Has SF even come up with anything to rival wierdness of the double slit experiment? Or quantum entanglement?



Arthur C Clarke  came up with the concept of Satellites  in paper he wrote 1945 ?

Jack Williamson  came ups with the terms  Genetic Engineering and Terraforming .


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## Rodders (Jun 21, 2022)

I don't think so. Most SF is extrapolated from existing technology and not a prediction of things to come. I also think that we assign purpose or meaning to things after the fact.

In an alternative time-line where flip phones weren't a thing, would we link mobile phones with the communicator in Star Trek, or would it be just a phone? Was the aesthetic an important factor for that link? If mobile phones weren't a success, would we credit Star Trek for them? I suspect not and that alas, only money genuinely influences the modern world.


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## Toby Frost (Jun 21, 2022)

Rodders said:


> Most SF is extrapolated from existing technology and not a prediction of things to come.



I agree that the more techy SF hasn't changed the modern world much, although it may have inspired people to become engineers and engineers to try to solve particular problems. However, the classic dystopian novels have been very influential, both in language and the way that we talk about what we do and don't want in society.


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## Wayne Mack (Jun 21, 2022)

I can think of only one example where this might be true, Dick Tracy and the smart watch. For most other modern day items, I can see a long, slow evolutionary process at work. The smart watch, however, is one where I can't think of any underlying rationale for anyone developing it without the prior influence of the Dick Tracy comic strip.


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## Swank (Jun 21, 2022)

BAYLOR said:


> Arthur C Clarke  came up with the concept of Satellites  in paper he wrote 1945 ?
> 
> Jack Williamson  came ups with the terms  Genetic Engineering and Terraforming .


Not even a little bit. Artificial satellites are as old as Newton. Clarke proposed the communications satellite - which is arguably a little obvious.

And William Gibson coined the term "cyberspace". That doesn't mean that Gibson invented the internet or Williamson invented gene manipulation. People just borrowed their terms and pasted them on existing science.

There is no terraforming.


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## Swank (Jun 21, 2022)

Wayne Mack said:


> I can think of only one example where this might be true, Dick Tracy and the smart watch. For most other modern day items, I can see a long, slow evolutionary process at work. The smart watch, however, is one where I can't think of any underlying rationale for anyone developing it without the prior influence of the Dick Tracy comic strip.


So you can't believe that the folks that put altimeters, GPS, calculators and games in digital watches wouldn't have moved other computer functions to a wrist worn device if it weren't for Dick Tracey?


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## Bramandin (Jun 21, 2022)

Swank said:


> Sure. And we have Soylent Green because tofu is popular, and Koko the gorilla presages the rise of the Apes..



We had a food-bar named Soylent.  Break-off product of a guy who wanted to make Soylent.  He had a point about how apartments needing to have kitchens was wrong-think.

Thanks to Planet of the Apes, we're not likely to uplift apes even if we gain the ability.


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## psikeyhackr (Jun 21, 2022)

BAYLOR said:


> Arthur C Clarke  came up with the concept of Satellites  in paper he wrote 1945 ?


Geosynchronous communications satellites. 

Kind of funny since it was before transistors.


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## Swank (Jun 21, 2022)

psikeyhackr said:


> Kind of funny since it was before transistors.


Why is that funny?


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## Robert Zwilling (Jun 22, 2022)

Swank said:


> There is no terraforming.


Human activity has considerably changed Earth's surface on a global scale, just because it wasn't deliberate and things didn't turn out better doesn't mean it isn't terraforming. The goal is Earth like and things are sort of like Earth used to be.


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## Swank (Jun 22, 2022)

Robert Zwilling said:


> Human activity has considerably changed Earth's surface on a global scale, just because it wasn't deliberate and things didn't turn out better doesn't mean it isn't terraforming. The goal is Earth like and things are sort of like Earth used to be.


Since everyone here reads, I think you probably know that I know about people-powered climate change. But that isn't the way the word "terraforming" is used since the term literally means "to make earth-like". The current trend of making the earth Venus-like is not by design.


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## paranoid marvin (Jun 23, 2022)

There are lots of reasons why the modern world is the way that it is, but science fiction isn't one of them. There are no doubt some people who were driven to become scientists/astronauts, astronomers etc because of reading Clarke or Asimov, or watching Star Wars or Star Trek, but I don't think it's influenced where we are at today.

If the world had been influenced by scifi, then we'd have bases on the Moon, manned flights to Mars etc. And a commercially available hoverboard.


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## AllanR (Jun 23, 2022)

I think of the numerous sci-fi cautionary tales about the environment from the 60s and early 70s, yet it was an episode of *All in the Family *that brought CFC and ozone depletion to the social forefront.


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## BAYLOR (Jun 23, 2022)

AllanR said:


> I think of the numerous sci-fi cautionary tales about the environment from the 60s and early 70s, yet it was an episode of *All in the Family *that brought CFC and ozone depletion to the social forefront.



The  science fiction novel *The End of The Dream *by Phillip Wylie  makes some interesting  projections about human degradation of the environment .  He  coauthored with Edwin Balmer  * When Worlds Collide*  and it’s sequel *After Worlds Collide .*


The 1973 film *Soylent Green *does mention the Green House effect.


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## Phyrebrat (Jun 23, 2022)

paranoid marvin said:


> There are lots of reasons why the modern world is the way that it is, but science fiction isn't one of them


Agreed, it’s an absurd and specious thesis. I think the trap is, typically, it’s part of the human condition to look for ‘one answer’ to most things. 

It’s just as likely motivational memes are responsible for ‘modern world as we know it’.


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## Valtharius (Jun 23, 2022)

Years ago, the History Channel produced an extremely enjoyable but rather silly "documentary" titled "How William Shatner Changed the World" hosted by the man himself. One of the highlights was an interview with Martin Cooper, inventor of the cellphone. They got him to say the TOS communicators inspired him to make the cellphone. But years afterward he said the documentary producers basically tricked him into saying that and the real inspiration was Dick Tracy's wrist radio!
Regardless of its factual accuracy, it was a really fun program and I'd recommend people watch it and check it out.
I guess I'm going to disagree with most of the people on here, but I think it is a pretty important factor in shaping our world. Apparently, based on what I've read, it's extremely common for people at NASA to say things like "Star Trek inspired me to do this."
I agree with Shelley that poets are the unacknowledged legislators of mankind.


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## Bramandin (Jun 25, 2022)

Valtharius said:


> Years ago, the History Channel produced an extremely enjoyable but rather silly "documentary" titled "How William Shatner Changed the World" hosted by the man himself. One of the highlights was an interview with Martin Cooper, inventor of the cellphone. They got him to say the TOS communicators inspired him to make the cellphone. But years afterward he said the documentary producers basically tricked him into saying that and the real inspiration was Dick Tracy's wrist radio!
> Regardless of its factual accuracy, it was a really fun program and I'd recommend people watch it and check it out.
> I guess I'm going to disagree with most of the people on here, but I think it is a pretty important factor in shaping our world. Apparently, based on what I've read, it's extremely common for people at NASA to say things like "Star Trek inspired me to do this."
> I agree with Shelley that poets are the unacknowledged legislators of mankind.



I recently saw another documentary that had the Star Trek Communicator thing.  It felt recent, so that myth will probably continue until it's common knowledge.


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## Robert Zwilling (Jun 25, 2022)

The Century of Science Fiction - Hosted by Christopher Lee, he starts the show by saying science fiction starts with known facts and creates fantastic stories or words to that effect. 

There are 2 ways it plays out, one reads or sees a story and does nothing, or, one hears, or sees a story, and does something to make what they read or saw real. The second option happens infrequently but does happen. The fact that it was already known has little to do whether it becomes real, that is entirely up to people and what motivates them. This can cover anything from baking a cake to going to Mars, though more new style cakes do get made.

It is also true that when someone makes something, they are usually not the first person to think of it. No idea if most people see that thing in person to start with or do they find out about it by other means. Even if they didn't see it somewhere else, invariably it has already been thought about or done by someone else.

Most inventions seem to amplify our efforts, which automatically have an ever increasing effect on the world.


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## JunkMonkey (Jun 25, 2022)

BAYLOR said:


> From time time I see comments  like,  how shows like Star Trek have had impact on the world .



This reached a peak when flip phones came on the market and Trekkies wetted their knickers about how much they looked like tricorders and endlessly posted, "Star Trek had predicted the future!" memes...  but since then?....

EDIT: And there is a perfect example of why you shouldn't start a post, walk off and do something else then come back and post it without checking to see if what you are posting hasn't already been said, and said better, in your absence by other people.


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## Foxbat (Jun 25, 2022)

I think that it had probably had a greater influence on our culture and what we say rather than what we create or invent. Orwellian being one example. Another when a government or some other official body is compared to 1984. Some may argue that Star Wars isn’t even SciFi but where would May the fourth be without it?

Many years ago, a drunken friend of mine got himself arrested because he grabbed a policeman’s radio and shouted ‘Beam me up, Scotty!’. That could never have happened without Star Trek (even though Kirk never actually said that).


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## Rodders (Jun 25, 2022)

We always appreciate your two cents, JunkMonkey.


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## AllanR (Jun 29, 2022)

It certainly influences naming (though the Astrophysics journal didn't use the name, just the reporting)








						Rare 'Obi-Wan Kenobi' star survives death by supernova, returns stronger and brighter
					

In a galaxy far, far away, a celestial "force ghost" appears for the first time.




					www.livescience.com


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## JunkMonkey (Jun 29, 2022)

Foxbat said:


> where would May the fourth be without it?



Right between May the third and May the fifth where it always was?


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## BAYLOR (Jul 3, 2022)

AllanR said:


> It certainly influences naming (though the Astrophysics journal didn't use the name, just the reporting)
> 
> 
> 
> ...



The first space shuttle was named Enterprise.


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## Swank (Jul 3, 2022)

BAYLOR said:


> The first space shuttle was named Enterprise.


The ST Enterprise was named after a real ship.

Round and round.


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## BAYLOR (Jul 3, 2022)

Swank said:


> The ST Enterprise was named after a real ship.
> 
> Round and round.



True. However , I suspect that  had Star Trek in mind when they named the Shuttle.


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## Rodders (Jul 3, 2022)

The Space Shuttle Enterprise was only named that after fans wrote in. It was originally going to be called the Constitution.


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## BAYLOR (Jul 3, 2022)

Rodders said:


> The Space Shuttle Enterprise was only named that after fans wrote in. It was originally going to be called the Constitution.



I did not know that.


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## Swank (Jul 3, 2022)

Naming conventions are hardly "creation". The Civil War would have happened the same way if Phil Lincoln was the President's name.


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## BAYLOR (Jul 3, 2022)

Swank said:


> Naming conventions are hardly "creation". The Civil War would have happened the same way if Phil Lincoln was the President's name.



Okay Swank, fair enough.


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## paeng (Jul 5, 2022)

They create a bit of it and sometimes the other way round.


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## BAYLOR (Jul 17, 2022)

paeng said:


> They create a bit of it and sometimes the other way round.



Interesting take.


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## Wayne Mack (Aug 3, 2022)

I am rethinking my position on this one. The reaction to Nichelle Nichols's death indicates that Star Trek did have influence on (at least) US culture. It may not have been the sole influence, but it seems to have contributed.


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## Swank (Aug 3, 2022)

Wayne Mack said:


> I am rethinking my position on this one. The reaction to Nichelle Nichols's death indicates that Star Trek did have influence on (at least) US culture. It may not have been the sole influence, but it seems to have contributed.


Many people are celebrated primarily in retrospect. No one knew who Gregor Mendel or Van Gogh were during their lives. So it is hard in 2022 to tell what the real impact was at the time.


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## BAYLOR (Aug 21, 2022)

Hm, I wonder if* Blade Runner * had an impact on clothing fashions?


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## Swank (Aug 21, 2022)

BAYLOR said:


> Hm, I wonder if* Blade Runner * had an impact on clothing fashions?


The 1982 flop did not cause peiple to dress differently at the time.


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## BAYLOR (Aug 28, 2022)

Wayne Mack said:


> I am rethinking my position on this one. The reaction to Nichelle Nichols's death indicates that Star Trek did have influence on (at least) US culture. It may not have been the sole influence, but it seems to have contributed.





Swank said:


> Many people are celebrated primarily in retrospect. No one knew who Gregor Mendel or Van Gogh were during their lives. So it is hard in 2022 to tell what the real impact was at the time.



Throughout it's entire original run , Star Trek was always on the verge of cancellation.  It  didn't become really popular until it  was canceled , went into syndication and the Conventions.


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## Vladd67 (Aug 28, 2022)

Wayne Mack said:


> I am rethinking my position on this one. The reaction to Nichelle Nichols's death indicates that Star Trek did have influence on (at least) US culture. It may not have been the sole influence, but it seems to have contributed.


But did it have an effect at the time or had it just grown in the retelling? Did Whoopie Goldberg really rush and tell her parents there's a black woman on tv and she's not a maid, or is this just looking at the past with modern eyes?


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## Swank (Aug 28, 2022)

Vladd67 said:


> But did it have an effect at the time or had it just grown in the retelling? Did Whoopie Goldberg really rush and tell her parents there's a black woman on tv and she's not a maid, or is this just looking at the past with modern eyes?


I have no doubt that the Whoopie story is true. But was Whoopie's experience common enough to be considered influential on a population?

In Goldberg's case, her success came from following in the footsteps of successful stage comedians, like Moms Mabley or LaWanda Page. Then she became a film star and used that fame and leverage to get on STNG. So while she certainly became a fan of ST from seeing Nichelle on TV, it arguably had no influence on her career choices other than STNG. Her influences listed on Wiki from interviews doesn't include Nichols.


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## Parson (Aug 29, 2022)

I've heard more than one black woman say that she was inspired by Nichelle Nichols, so I suspect that she did have some influence on the greater culture in at least a limited way.


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## BAYLOR (Oct 27, 2022)

Swank said:


> The 1982 flop did not cause peiple to dress differently at the time.



Ive laws liked the look of the Blade Runner films.


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## Swank (Oct 27, 2022)

BAYLOR said:


> Ive laws liked the look of the Blade Runner films.


So does everyone. Just like Star Wars. Yet no one started dressing like either film.


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## Guttersnipe (Oct 27, 2022)

I think actual science helped shape our world more, but that sci-fi tends to be an impetus.


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## CupofJoe (Oct 27, 2022)

BAYLOR said:


> Ive laws liked the look of the Blade Runner films.


And I did buy my first Trench coat about then.


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## Vince W (Oct 27, 2022)

Trench coats never go out of style.


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## Parson (Oct 27, 2022)

Vince W said:


> Trench coats never go out of style.


Columbo?


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## Swank (Oct 27, 2022)

Vince W said:


> Trench coats never go out of style.


And Luke's shorty robe and utility belt never came into style.


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## Vince W (Oct 27, 2022)

Swank said:


> And Luke's shorty robe and utility belt never came into style.


Thankfully.


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## LordOfWizards (Oct 29, 2022)

The problem with the question is the word 'Created'. 
Do You Think Science Fiction Literature, Movies , TV Series, etc have Created the Modern World As We Know it?​Maybe 'Influenced' or 'contributed to'. 

we can go all the way back to Jules Verne’s 1865 novel, _From the Earth to the Moon. _That did happen.
And the submarine in 20,000 Leagues seems a lot like a nuclear sub. 

Arthur C. Clark is one of my all time favorites. He used gravity assist in the 2001 series. He wasn't the first, but IMHO he was the best hard science-fiction writer of the time. And there is this: 








						People Are Still Trying to Build a Space Elevator
					

Though key players have distanced themselves from the concept, a new film examines the continuing draw behind the sci-fi staple




					www.smithsonianmag.com
				




I believe it inspires science minded people to think beyond the bubble so to speak, so my answer would be Yes, indirectly.


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## BAYLOR (Dec 22, 2022)

It's well past 2015 , no flying cars and no Mr Fusion to make my promised by never delivered  flying car run and ,  where is  the personnel Warp drive  jet pack we were  promised  in 1985 in  *Back to the Future II * and,   why didn't we get Max Spielberg's 3 D *Jaws* sequel ? 

And the Cubs won the World Series in 2016 and,  not against ta Miami  Gators American League franchise team  which also hasn't materialized.


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## paeng (Dec 23, 2022)

I remember reading that around 7 out of 10 people worldwide live on less than $10 a day as of 2015, and that only around 7 pct of people worldwide have college degrees. Meanwhile, oil production per capita peaked back in 1979 and over fifty positive feedback loops involving climate change have been detected the past two decades. CO2 ppm has risen at 14 times the rate; the last time it was this high was around a million years ago, and even then it rose at a rate of 30 ppm every thousand years. Now, it's rising at 50 ppm every 50 years.


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## psikeyhackr (Dec 23, 2022)

paeng said:


> I remember reading that around 7 out of 10 people worldwide live on less than $10 a day as of 2015, and that only around 7 pct of people worldwide have college degrees. Meanwhile, oil production per capita peaked back in 1979 and over fifty positive feedback loops involving climate change have been detected the past two decades. CO2 ppm has risen at 14 times the rate; the last time it was this high was around a million years ago, and even then it rose at a rate of 30 ppm every thousand years. Now, it's rising at 50 ppm every 50 years.


Science fiction is causing CO2 to increase?


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## Teresa Edgerton (Dec 23, 2022)

I think about when I was growing up in the 1950s and 60s, and how the 21st century was depicted in movies, comics, books etc.  Then I look around me in 2022 and I see hardly any resemblance at all.  I think that fiction in any media and any genre did a very poor job of picturing the future, and if it did such a poor job of imagining what it might be, how could it have shaped it?


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## dask (Dec 23, 2022)

psikeyhackr said:


> Science fiction is causing CO2 to increase?


If you move your lips while you read it might. (The editorial "you" by the way. )


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## paeng (Dec 23, 2022)

psikeyhackr said:


> Science fiction is causing CO2 to increase?


My post is in relation to the previous one: science fiction movies predicted flying cars, etc., and they didn't happen. But other science fiction movies predicted combinations of predicaments leading to societal collapse. Are we seeing signs of that now?

Even the 14-time increase in CO2 is unbelievable. To recap, around a million years ago, CO2 ppm reached around 800 (it maxes out at 300) and it increased at a rate of 30 ppm every one thousand years.

Now, it's rising at a rate of 50 ppm in only 50 years.


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## Swank (Dec 23, 2022)

paeng said:


> My post is in relation to the previous one: science fiction movies predicted flying cars, etc., and they didn't happen. But other science fiction movies predicted combinations of predicaments leading to societal collapse. Are we seeing signs of that now?
> 
> Even the 14-time increase in CO2 is unbelievable. To recap, around a million years ago, CO2 ppm reached around 800 (it maxes out at 300) and it increased at a rate of 30 ppm every one thousand years.
> 
> Now, it's rising at a rate of 50 ppm in only 50 years.


Wait a minute! Are you saying CO2 levels are rising dangerously?!


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## Robert Zwilling (Dec 23, 2022)

if it did such a poor job of imagining what it might be, how could it have shaped it?

That all depends on who you read, what you watched, and who you paid serious attention to. Science fiction shapes views, it doesn't build monuments. There are two levels of understanding, what is physically happening and what people want to see happening. Plus the reader needs to extrapolate information that authors are presenting the reader because it is very difficult to nail down future views. A lot of the information was presented as warnings, such as Brunner's works, which just about everyone ignored. People used to filter out negative views and dwell on positive aspects that supported what they wanted to see regardless of where the highway was taking them. It was my experience that authors quit warning people because no one was paying serious attention, it was depressing, and instead pursued fantasy because that's where the money was. Consequently the book shelves filled up with fantasy and feel good science fiction. In my opinion Dhalgren was a particularly potent jab at perceived reality and where the highway was taking society because it was science fiction without spectacular science fiction with just a smattering of techno props. Ironically many asked what kind of vision was a smoldering city (which did exist in real time), while we were all standing on the edge of one of history's most slippery slopes which has turned into an ocean that can take people anywhere they want to go.


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## paranoid marvin (Dec 23, 2022)

I think we have to consider if the authors are actually predicting a future, or simply offering an alternative one? Quite often I think that it resembles an idealised present (for positive futures) and dystopian for the opposite. Then like a Christmas list we internally tick the things we want to be. Unfortunately whilst we'd all like hoverboards and 3 sea shells, we usually end up with the equivalent of socks.

With exception of certain visionaries such as Arthur C Clarke (who amongst other things envisaged the end of cigarettes at a time when nearly everyone smoked), I think that - just as often happens with historical fiction - the 'future' is determined by what is best for the movie/book.


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## Parson (Dec 23, 2022)

Well said @paranoid marvin. I also think that "predicting" the future --- which I doubt any author really sets out to do. --- is almost impossible because some things are just totally unpredictable. I would never have in a 100 years predicted the rise of texting to communicate. Texting would seem to be a regression in technology without a reason. Now, Dick Tracy was so right with "wrist radios" and later "wrist televisions." But so wrong with Moon Maidens and anti-gravity space ships.


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## Swank (Dec 23, 2022)

Predicting the future is difficult without abandoning the banality of reality so you can offer the drama and adventure that is necessary for narrative entertainment.


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## BAYLOR (Dec 23, 2022)

Swank said:


> Predicting the future is difficult without abandoning the banality of reality so you can offer the drama and adventure that is necessary for narrative entertainment.



So many many  things people , places and events  large and small , seen and unseen ,imagine and unimagined, predicted and unforeseen  create the future  we end up in.


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## Swank (Dec 23, 2022)

BAYLOR said:


> So many many  things people , places and events  large and small , seen and unseen ,imagine and unimagined, predicted and unforeseen  create the future  we end up in.


Yeah, and it's mostly really mundane.


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## paranoid marvin (Dec 23, 2022)

Swank said:


> Predicting the future is difficult without abandoning the banality of reality so you can offer the drama and adventure that is necessary for narrative entertainment.




Yes, something exciting/interesting has to happen, otherwise no-one is going to read your story. And so the future is dystopia, or with time travel, or there's hoverboards, or an alien race has conquered the planet. Like I said, we hope for hoverboards, we get socks.


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## paranoid marvin (Dec 23, 2022)

BAYLOR said:


> So many many  things people , places and events  large and small , seen and unseen ,imagine and unimagined, predicted and unforeseen  create the future  we end up in.




I think that we ourselves the change, but other than gadgets, the world around us doesn't.


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## Ray Zdybrow (Dec 24, 2022)

Swank said:


> The 1982 flop did not cause peiple to dress differently at the time.


But the tv series "Quatermass" influenced the crusty look


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## Ray Zdybrow (Dec 24, 2022)

Swank said:


> And Luke's shorty robe and utility belt never came into style.


Such a shame!


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## Ray Zdybrow (Dec 24, 2022)

Ray Zdybrow said:


> But the tv series "Quatermass" influenced the crusty look


Also, "Judge Dredd" (especially with McMahon's illustration) had a real influence on some people's dress


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## Ray Zdybrow (Dec 24, 2022)

Silicon Valley corporations and individual billionaire tech bros are pursuing projects that are clearly sf inspired, eg autonomous vehicles and weapons, Mars colonies, brain implants, "the Metaverse", cryptocurrency etc ad nauseam... despite most of them being pipe (bong) dreams they are having real effects in the real world. None of them good


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## Swank (Dec 24, 2022)

Ray Zdybrow said:


> Silicon Valley corporations and individual billionaire tech bros are pursuing projects that are clearly sf inspired, eg autonomous vehicles and weapons, Mars colonies, brain implants, "the Metaverse", cryptocurrency etc ad nauseam... despite most of them being pipe (bong) dreams they are having real effects in the real world. None of them good


Those aren't SF concepts. They came to be or would have come to be whether they were in some little read SF book or not. 


Especially something as obvious as a computer chauffeur or autopilot. Just like it didn't take an SF story to replace the ice man with refrigeration. Once a technology exists, the spin offs are going to happen.


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## BAYLOR (Dec 24, 2022)

paranoid marvin said:


> I think that we ourselves the change, but other than gadgets, the world around us doesn't.


Human beings are walking probability machines because  our actions and , even our non actions have an effect on the world around us.


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## Swank (Dec 24, 2022)

BAYLOR said:


> Human beings are walking probability machines because  our actions and , even our non actions have an effect on the world around us.


Like a Galton Board?


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## paeng (Dec 24, 2022)

Swank said:


> Wait a minute! Are you saying CO2 levels are rising dangerously?!



Ice core data reveal that they max out at 300, and that's been the case for more than 600,000 years. I think the last time they exceeded that was around a million years ago, when they reached 800. No one is certain about the cause, but some say it might have involved major volcanic activity; still, it's estimated that it went up at a rate of 30 ppm every one thousand years.

The problem is that it's now above 400, and it's been going up at a rate of 1 ppm a year, or fourteen times faster. I think it went above 300 during the mid-1970s, which is why the 30-year global cooling cycle (which happened during the 1910s and 1940s) stopped.

Scientists don't know what's going to happen next, but they've detected over 50 positive feedback loops (phenomena driven by a slight increase in global surface temperature anomaly but also reinforcing the warming) the past two decades, and have no idea what might happen to things like the global conveyor belt.

Meanwhile, it was only realized around a decade ago (around 2013) that oil production per capita peaked back in 1979. Most of our food, manufactured goods, and services are heavily dependent on fossil fuels.

We live in very interesting times.


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## Swank (Dec 24, 2022)

paeng said:


> Ice core data reveal that they max out at 300, and that's been the case for more than 600,000 years. I think the last time they exceeded that was around a million years ago, when they reached 800. No one is certain about the cause, but some say it might have involved major volcanic activity; still, it's estimated that it went up at a rate of 30 ppm every one thousand years.
> 
> The problem is that it's now above 400, and it's been going up at a rate of 1 ppm a year, or fourteen times faster. I think it went above 300 during the mid-1970s, which is why the 30-year global cooling cycle (which happened during the 1910s and 1940s) stopped.
> 
> ...


Someone should put this on the news.


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## psikeyhackr (Dec 25, 2022)

paranoid marvin said:


> I think that we ourselves the change, but other than gadgets, the world around us doesn't.


SF could have been used to promote positive change and reduce/prevent problems. I think the 1950s with C P Snow's Two Cultures is an example of the divergence.  Science and technology accelerated and most of traditional culture stayed in the same old rut.

Now we have anthropogenic warming deniers saying, "climate has always changed."

We need to Vulcanize human culture.  LOL


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## paeng (Dec 25, 2022)

Swank said:


> Someone should put this on the news.


I think it's been in the news for years.

I also underestimated the problem: the rate of increase is not 14 but 100 times, or around 2.4 ppm a year.






						Climate Change: Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide
					

In the past 60 years, carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased 100 times faster than it did during the end of the last ice age.




					www.climate.gov


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## Ray Zdybrow (Dec 26, 2022)

Swank said:


> Those aren't SF concepts. They came to be or would have come to be whether they were in some little read SF book or not.
> 
> 
> Especially something as obvious as a computer chauffeur or autopilot. Just like it didn't take an SF story to replace the ice man with refrigeration. Once a technology exists, the spin offs are going to happen.


But they all (except cryptocurrencies) were in several, widely read, sf stories and novels before the technology existed. 
Interesting post tho... I can't work out whether you're espousing McLuhanism or technological determinism, or perhaps suggesting that they are the same thing?


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## Ray Zdybrow (Dec 26, 2022)

paeng said:


> I think it's been in the news for years.
> 
> I also underestimated the problem: the rate of increase is not 14 but 100 times, or around 2.4 ppm a year.
> 
> ...


I assumed Swank was being "sarcastic"?


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## Swank (Dec 27, 2022)

Ray Zdybrow said:


> But they all (except cryptocurrencies) were in several, widely read, sf stories and novels before the technology existed


There is no technology for Mars colonies. The idea of colonizing foreign lands is ancient. 

There is no metaverse. It is another version of remote communication, like books and letters. 

The entire history of technology is the move to automate hand labor. An autonomous vehicle is the same concept and an automated loom. 


It doesn't take an SF story to create the idea that new technology could be used to accomplish very old human habits of innovation.


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## psikeyhackr (Dec 27, 2022)

paeng said:


> We live in very interesting times.


The Chinese are now cursing themselves faster than the rest of us.


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## paeng (Dec 27, 2022)

Ray Zdybrow said:


> I assumed Swank was being "sarcastic"?



You won't believe it, but I only found out about this two months ago. All along I was looking only at the ppm level and not the rate of increase. I didn't realize that the latter was not only higher than average but accelerating.

I think the highest was 0.3 ppm a year during the warming phase of the cycle. Another article pointed out that until the 1950s it was only 0.1, and likely because we're supposed to be entering a new ice age following the natural cycle. But it's now 2.4 ppm a year, and during what should be a cooling phase.

It gets even more bewildering when one sees that in light of phenomena like global dimming:






with recent points from Beckwith and others:


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## paeng (Dec 27, 2022)

About space colonies, that reminds me of two things:

- a 2006 documentary about peak oil (which I found out started much earlier, in 1979, when world oil production per capita peaked and from which we never recovered), where experts stated that we should have prepared for the problem two decades earlier, and that now it's likely too late to do so;

- a study which argues that it will take up to 130 years to fully transition into a fossil-free global economy due to lag time and other issues, but that we have much less time available to do so.

In which case, make that three things, i.e., the video game represented by my avatar.


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## BAYLOR (Jan 1, 2023)

We can only  live in the present because that's what the future becomes.


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## Robert Zwilling (Jan 1, 2023)

I think we are living in the past. It is piled up all around us. The present only lasts long enough for the immediate future to instantly become part of the past. Extended present time is an invention of virtual time.


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## psikeyhackr (Jan 1, 2023)

BAYLOR said:


> We can only  live in the present because that's what the future becomes.


How much of the present is the result of wrong decisions in the past. Can we recognize them?

Play it again Spock!


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## paranoid marvin (Jan 2, 2023)

This reminds me of a clip from Spaceballs



"You're looking at '_now_', sir. Everything that happens '_now_', is happening now."

"What happened to '_then_'?"

"We passed that."

"When?"

"Just now. We're at '_now_' now."

"Go back to '_then_'."

"When?"

"Now."

"Now?"

"Now!"

"We can't."

"Why?"

"We missed it."

"When?"

"Just now."

"When will '_then_' be '_now_'?"

"Soon."


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## BAYLOR (Jan 2, 2023)

paranoid marvin said:


> This reminds me of a clip from Spaceballs
> 
> 
> 
> ...



They really  broke through the Fourth Wall with that one. I love that scene .


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## psikeyhackr (Jan 5, 2023)

This is weird! I just heard of this 15 minutes ago.









						Disney bomb - Wikipedia
					






					en.m.wikipedia.org
				









Disney Bombs!?


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## Parson (Jan 5, 2023)

psikeyhackr said:


> Disney Bombs!?


That's an interesting story. 

**I have to admit I sighed reading it. Can we please stop creating better and better weapons, and instead create better and better societies? Not going to happen, I know. But I guess I'm in a melancholy mood today.


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## Swank (Jan 6, 2023)

Parson said:


> That's an interesting story.
> 
> **I have to admit I sighed reading it. Can we please stop creating better and better weapons, and instead create better and better societies? Not going to happen, I know. But I guess I'm in a melancholy mood today.


It seems like we do both. Modern warfare and its excesses have gone hand in hand with the most peaceful, liberal and prosperous period in history.


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## psikeyhackr (Jan 6, 2023)

Parson said:


> That's an interesting story.
> 
> **I have to admit I sighed reading it. Can we please stop creating better and better weapons, and instead create better and better societies? Not going to happen, I know. But I guess I'm in a melancholy mood today.


Oh, you want bombs where Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck pop out!


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## Parson (Jan 6, 2023)

psikeyhackr said:


> Oh, you want bombs where Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck pop out!


I don't understand what you are saying here. 

I'm dreaming of a world where respect is granted to every human and the most important challenges are those leading to self improvement and the uplift of others.


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## Venusian Broon (Jan 6, 2023)

BAYLOR said:


> Arthur C Clarke  came up with the concept of Satellites  in paper he wrote 1945 ?


No he didn't. But he "popularised" the idea of a geosychronus orbit for stuff.


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## AllanR (Jan 6, 2023)

BAYLOR said:


> Arthur C Clarke came up with the concept of Satellites in paper he wrote 1945 ?











						Newton's cannonball - Wikipedia
					






					en.wikipedia.org


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## BAYLOR (Jan 6, 2023)

Venusian Broon said:


> No he didn't. But he "popularised" the idea of a geosychronus orbit for stuff.





AllanR said:


> Newton's cannonball - Wikipedia
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I stand corrected.


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## psikeyhackr (Jan 7, 2023)

Parson said:


> I don't understand what you are saying here.
> 
> I'm dreaming of a world where respect is granted to every human and the most important challenges are those leading to self improvement and the uplift of others.


Their calling it a Disney bomb surprised me more than the technology.  It was really just my demented idea of a joke.

As a black man who has been chased 4 blocks by a gang of white boys I am not in the least optimistic about that.  I am expecting genetically engineered diseases within the next 200 years.  Imagine fatal diseases triggered by skin color.


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## Parson (Jan 8, 2023)

I didn't catch the joke, but I wouldn't have called it "demented." I was simply not on that wave length. 

I'm saddened that you had that experience. And I haven't shared that experience.  I am of course an old white dude. But as I look around I expect that in 200 years nearly everyone will be somewhere on the brown spectrum for skin color. I read that in 1963 nearly 95% of the US believed inter-ractial marriage should be illegal. Now 97% believe that a person should be free to marry whomever they want. Progress, as glacial as it might seem, is being made. As for me, I've always subscribed to the one race (the human race) theory.  

Blessings on you and yours.


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## JunkMonkey (Jan 8, 2023)

psikeyhackr said:


> Their calling it a Disney bomb surprised me more than the technology.  It was really just my demented idea of a joke.
> 
> As a black man who has been chased 4 blocks by a gang of white boys I am not in the least optimistic about that.  I am expecting genetically engineered diseases within the next 200 years.  Imagine fatal diseases triggered by skin color.



Some people already believe they exist. 

I have totally ghosted someone I knew for years when suddenly, one day, he went on this long long rant about how the Covid virus was only targetting people of colour and Arabs and wasn't affecting "our friends at the end of the Mediterranean" - because they had come up with it.  His son worked with Kanye West as one of his producers for a while (maybe still does) so I guess that'd explain a lot.


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