# Ever feel like you're living in the Future?



## TomMazanec (Nov 1, 2020)

I sometimes do.
When I got my first calculator. When I got my Apple ][+. When I moved to Twinsburg (For some reason there are a lot of LED signs on my street here. I had never seen one before). When I got my first Kindle. My first iPhone. On 9-11. When I realized how bad the pandemic was going to be. When I got an infrared thermometer.
How about you?


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## Victoria Silverwolf (Nov 1, 2020)

I find myself utterly baffled by the little things that people carry around and look at all day.  I believe they call them "phones," which, to me, is something that plugs into the wall and allows you to talk to other people who also have such devices plugged into the wall.  There are also similar devices that they call "books," also these do not resemble the things made out of paper with which I am familiar.  

The fact that the current year starts with a "2" also seems like a strange joke, without a punchline.


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## BAYLOR (Nov 1, 2020)

Even with the new technology and devices  creeping up around me, it doesn't feel like living in the future. I think of it as living in an ever more enhanced material  present.


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## CupofJoe (Nov 4, 2020)

No... Because none of the technology excites me.
I have a phone that can read and speak foreign languages for me and will tell me where I am and where to go when I'm lost.
I have a TV that lets me watch 100s of channels...
And I'm still not excited.
The phone doesn't stop me getting lost or help me know another language and the TV never tells me what might be good to watch.
About the most exciting technology I've seen recently... the laser 3D xmas display a neighbour has put up [already] that shows Santa on his sleigh landing in front of their house. I'm guessing it's lasers...
That said I am getting used to the fact I am living in a time after the first Blade Runner film... And there are no Hovercars!!!
As for Replicants... I'm not so sure. There are some strange _people_ about...


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## Jo Zebedee (Nov 4, 2020)

Well this year maybe... (I write dystopia)


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## TomMazanec (Nov 4, 2020)

The TV may never tell *you* what to watch, CupofJoe, but my Amazon Prime video gives me suggestions of shows I might like (Upload, Feed, Earth 2050,Tomorrow's World, Salvation, Humans) that I never knew existed and that I now watch.


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## Matteo (Nov 7, 2020)

To answer the question...

Yes, and it's not a bright one.


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## Vladd67 (Nov 7, 2020)

Victoria Silverwolf said:


> I find myself utterly baffled by the little things that people carry around and look at all day.  I believe they call them "phones," which, to me, is something that plugs into the wall and allows you to talk to other people who also have such devices plugged into the wall.  There are also similar devices that they call "books," also these do not resemble the things made out of paper with which I am familiar.
> 
> The fact that the current year starts with a "2" also seems like a strange joke, without a punchline.


Something else to confuse you


TomMazanec said:


> The TV may never tell *you* what to watch, CupofJoe, but my Amazon Prime video gives me suggestions of shows I might like (Upload, Feed, Earth 2050,Tomorrow's World, Salvation, Humans) that I never knew existed and that I now watch.


I miss the Old Tomorrow's World.


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## BAYLOR (Nov 7, 2020)

The Future isn't all it's cracked up to be.


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## Matteo (Nov 7, 2020)

BAYLOR said:


> The Future isn't all it's cracked up to be.


I also find that nostalgia isn't what it used to be...


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## Bick (Nov 14, 2020)

I think I increasingly feel, not so much that I’m living in the future (because it clearly is the present), but that I’m living at the wrong time myself. I think I would have enjoyed the world more if I’d been born at least 40-50 years earlier. I’m very underwhelmed by the present and pessimistic about the dystopian future ahead of us. I’m a ray of sunshine, me.


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## BAYLOR (Nov 15, 2020)

Bick said:


> I think I increasingly feel, not so much that I’m living in the future (because it clearly is the present), but that I’m living at the wrong time myself. I think I would have enjoyed the world more if I’d been born at least 40-50 years earlier. I’m very underwhelmed by the present and pessimistic about the dystopian future ahead of us. I’m a ray of sunshine, me.



Have you ever seen the Twilight Zone episode * Once Upon a Time *?


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## Astro Pen (Nov 15, 2020)

The future has arrived and it is called Japan 
Enjoy the ride.
PS well worth going full screen for.


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## Bick (Nov 16, 2020)

Astro Pen said:


> The future has arrived and it is called Japan
> Enjoy the ride.


Made me feel slightly sick - I'll never go on it!


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## Vince W (Nov 16, 2020)

Bick said:


> I think I increasingly feel, not so much that I’m living in the future (because it clearly is the present), but that I’m living at the wrong time myself. I think I would have enjoyed the world more if I’d been born at least 40-50 years earlier. I’m very underwhelmed by the present and pessimistic about the dystopian future ahead of us. I’m a ray of sunshine, me.


I feel I was lied to in my childhood about the future. I was promised a world where I could live on a space station or on the moon and maybe even Mars.


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## BAYLOR (Nov 16, 2020)

Astro Pen said:


> The future has arrived and it is called Japan
> Enjoy the ride.
> PS well worth going full screen for.



I did try it full screen. I actually got a bit queasy just watching it .


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## Teresa Edgerton (Nov 16, 2020)

No, I don't.  Back when I was growing up in the fifties and sixties, there were comic books, and cartoons, and movies, set in the 21st century.  The future they predicted had very little resemblance to the world we live in now.  I imagine that the future ahead will be as unpredictable.


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## BAYLOR (Nov 16, 2020)

Teresa Edgerton said:


> No, I don't.  Back when I was growing up in the fifties and sixties, there were comic books, and cartoons, and movies, set in the 21st century.  The future they predicted had very little resemblance to the world we live in now.  I imagine that the future ahead will be as unpredictable.



The future is never what you imagine it's going to be .


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## Astro Pen (Nov 16, 2020)

BAYLOR said:


> The future is never what you imagine it's going to be .



Yeah. Prepares through life for Arthur C Clarke --- gets Orwell


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## Parson (Nov 16, 2020)

CupofJoe said:


> And there are no Hovercars!!!


Flying Car

And some of them are being sold, for the price of a near mansion: $600,000 but technically available. 



Vince W said:


> I feel I was lied to in my childhood about the future. I was promised a world where I could live on a space station or on the moon and maybe even Mars.



Some people live on a space station right now. The moon? perhaps slightly possible in a decade. Mars? slightly possible, perhaps in twenty years, but Mars will be likely, only if you want a one way trip.

>>> Today is a lot like some of the 50's and 60's S.F. thought. What's really different is that we are not part of the 1% of people who can afford incredible luxuries. Even today, most of the near term positive S.F. books have things like these happening to people who are one or more of the following: Unbelievably wealthy, Unbelievably smart, or Unbelievably lucky and probably two of the previous. (all of which would be in the 1 in a billion category at minimum.)

So yeah, I do sometimes feel like I'm living in the future, it's just not as accessible as my dreaming self thought 50 or so years ago. And some of the stuff we have weren't often written about. Perhaps not even imagined?


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## F.J. Hansen (Nov 16, 2020)

There was a scene in Babylon 5 where Franklin compares the future to a toy that you nag your parents about, but when you finally get it, it's not as great as the ads made it out to be and you lose interest in it.

Garibaldi replies: "Somebody should've labelled the future: 'Some assembly required'."


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## dask (Nov 16, 2020)

I‘m still pretty amazed with this thing called WiFi which I consider to be the greatest invention since the coffee pot. Arthur C. Clarke was spot on: this IS sufficiently advanced technology and it may as well be magic. Feels like the future to me. Can you imagine interacting with the Chrons on a rotary phone?


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## BAYLOR (Nov 16, 2020)

dask said:


> I‘m still pretty amazed with this thing called WiFi which I consider to be the greatest invention since the coffee pot. Arthur C. Clarke was spot on: this IS sufficiently advanced technology and it may as well be magic. Feels like the future to me. Can you imagine interacting with the Chrons on a rotary phone?



*The Metal Monster* by Abraham Merritt  written in 1928 an expedition into the mountains of Asia and they encounter a race of machine who use something that suggest WIFI


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## BAYLOR (Nov 16, 2020)

F.J. Hansen said:


> There was a scene in Babylon 5 where Franklin compares the future to a toy that you nag your parents about, but when you finally get it, it's not as great as the ads made it out to be and you lose interest in it.
> 
> Garibaldi replies: "Somebody should've labelled the future: 'Some assembly required'."



They were both wonderful actors. It's sad that they're both gone.


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## MikeAnderson (Nov 18, 2020)

The future is a liar, and so is Robert Zemeckis. I bought a bunch of Pepsi when Back To The Future 2 came out because I thought it'd be worth $50 a bottle. 2015 came around, all I had was flat Pepsi attracting ants.


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## Don (Nov 18, 2020)

Jo Zebedee said:


> Well this year maybe... (I write dystopia)


Yes. Our contemporary zeitgeist makes me feel trapped in a PKDian future dystopia with no way out, except the inevitable way.


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## AnyaKimlin (Nov 18, 2020)

I'm writing a story set in 1986 so I'm having run everything past the kids to see if they get the references.  And sometimes I feel old lol Apparently Ikea was 1987 so I had to nix that joke. I had to find a way to explain Band Aid. We are currently discussing can I keep a Laurel and Hardy reference. My son says I can't whereas my daughter loves silent movies and reckons most kids would Google it so I can keep


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## Robert Zwilling (Nov 18, 2020)

I never felt like I was living in the future until recently. All the technology just seemed like natural advancements. Going to the moon, great, but not unexpected. It was supposed to happen. Then not going to the moon only seemed to confirm that well, it confirmed something. It wasn't until all the data mining, digital profiling, socialized socializing, canned entertainment and the weather getting worse every month, which was the final straw, that brought the future clearly into view.


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## BAYLOR (Nov 20, 2020)

Bick said:


> I think I increasingly feel, not so much that I’m living in the future (because it clearly is the present), but that I’m living at the wrong time myself. I think I would have enjoyed the world more if I’d been born at least 40-50 years earlier. I’m very underwhelmed by the present and pessimistic about the dystopian future ahead of us. I’m a ray of sunshine, me.



  Have you ever seen the Twilight Zone Episode *Once Upton a Time* with Buster Keaton ?    It's a great episode and  hilariously funny,  it make some  interesting points  about the potential pitfalls of wishing one lived in a different in time.


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## hitmouse (Nov 20, 2020)

I am stuck in a time-loop where it is permanently 08.00h on Friday morning, knackered, and it is raining heavily.


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