We all think we are pretty cool with our ATT (All The Time) internet, integrated handheld communication devices, flat panel TV’s on the wall, microwave cooking, stay sharp knives… and we have this perception that the rate of technological change is very high. “Moores Law” dictates that the speed of PC processors doubles every 6 months or something?
But are we really advancing as quickly as we think? I refer back to a 70’s TV show and a 60’s movie.
The TV show was called Space 1999 and it was about a colony on the moon and the hilarious miss-adventures of the inhabitants (I think it was a comedy, I don’t really recall too much). The point is, it was set in the future – 1999, that was 10 years ago, and there are no such colonies!
The movie is Space Odyssey 2001. Hello! Hello! The writers projected that in 38 years from then we would be flying around in space ships off into deep space. 38 years seemed a reasonable timeframe to arrange that! And yet here we all are, stuck on boring earth rather than floating huge distances through the frozen and desolate void of space, millions of miles from anything, eating food through a straw and getting your faeces sucked out of you in zero g… actually earth aint too bad!