Ever feel like you're living in the Future?

[TomMazanec]

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?

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

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.

 

[BAYLOR]

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.

 

[CupofJoe]

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...

 

[Jo Zebedee]

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

 

[TomMazanec]

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.

 

[Matteo]

To answer the question...

Yes, and it's not a bright one.

 

[Vladd67]

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

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.

 

[BAYLOR]

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

 

[Matteo]

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

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

 

[Bick]

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.

 

[BAYLOR]

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 ?

 

[Astro Pen]

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

 

[Bick]

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

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

 

[Vince W]

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.

 

[BAYLOR]

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 .

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

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.

 

[BAYLOR]

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 .

 

[Astro Pen]

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

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

 

[Parson]

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.

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?