Poll: You can make a type of technology from sci-fi real. Which do you choose?

[Eddie the head]

What is this a joke? FTL Drive in a heart beat.

 

[keiji_Maeda]

Star Trek's Holodecks ALL the way!

its also the last thing humanity would ever invent too apart from better automated power systems

People would go ape-shit over illegalizing certain programs. People would absolutely be abusing that thing for sex.
And you could absolutely murder-simulator on that thing! And it would be SOOOOOO much fun. Imagine some 1000 vs 1000 Paintball game or something?

Edit:
Urgh, and there would be massive product placement too, wouldn't there?

I imagine my great-great-grandchildren filing a future claim for pre-emptive suing the future equivalent of EA about spoiling the end of Mass effect 6 (the reapening yet again on the holodeck.

But seriously, i haven't watched star trek for a while. Can someone give me a motivation for why holodeck? I mean, beyond the entertainment valuie. i guess the possibility of running fully realistic research projects without ANY risk of contamination/explosive reactions taking place could be pretty usefull.

You can create anywhere/anything. Maybe even alter physics. You can make personalized school room for tutoring for your children. An instant gym for working out with a spotter and motivation crowd to cheer you. A pool to swim and cool off. To hunt game without killing for the sport of it.
You can train for anything. Practice anything. Even a holographic doctor. Everything in the next room as you need and want.

It's the best thing you can ask from technology.
But you may need a lot of those other technologies to get it.

As i said i haven't watched star trek TNG for a while, but isn't the holodeck a ships entire DECK. doesn't the sheer size make it slightly impratcial? I mean, suppozing that shrinking it inhibits it's abilities.

There have been instances of such large-scale holdecks, but usually it's room-sized with the yellow-box grid. Likely intended for fewer people.

Well that does sound pretty nifty!Thnks for explaining it for me.

But i'm standing by Nano-tech as a whole

 

[A Raging Emo]

Pfffft... Either FTL Travel or Omni-Tools.

 

[Wyld Fyre]

Element Zero or EEZO from the Mass Effect Universe.

If you read up on it, or read/listen to the codex in the game, you will notice that you get all kinds of madness from it.

Be it FTL or Mind Bullets. The stuff is amazing and easy to activate, a simple positive or negative charge will result in more or less mass in an area. (mass is kinda a big deal)

 

[Latinidiot]

I say unlimited energy, and then we'll work out the rest.

 

[Guffe]

No idea, too many options!!!
Worldpeace!
no wait...
Jurassic Park!

 

[Nerexor]

Future fuel because it will actually change things on a geopolitical scale. The oil money will finally get its ass kicked and we can take down the tycoons exploiting our economies to line their own pockets while killing the planet. Granted it will probably also involve a war or two in the process, but ideally someone will have built some superweapons using the energy tech and will end it quickly. Preferably someone Canadian from my point of view. Not just because I am one, but because nobody would see it coming.

Also I can't help but imagine this power source as the one invented by Tony Stark, so go go Iron Man tech while we're at it!

 

[ABLb0y]

The Death Note. Hells yeah.

 

[Loop Stricken]

INB4 everybody says Replicator and Holodeck.

Seriously, with just one of those two you'd be set.

I think if those were invented before anything else, humanity would stagnate whilst we replicate ourselves delicious food and delicious sex.

 

[burningdragoon]

FTL travel provided that that whole physics thing is also solved (as in time passes 'normally' when using it)

If not, teleportation provided that the more philosophical issue of if it is really "you" that comes out the other side or just an exact copy is not actually an issue.

If not, jetpacks please.

 

[Dwarfman]

Snip

The new reliable fuel source came in at a close second for me but the real winner hands down was terraforming.

But why restrict terraforming to outside colonies. Here on earth we have the sahara desert that once was the bread basket of past empires, the ever expanding gobi desert, the salination of once fertile land and water supplies. Terraforming the Earth would reclaim these lost regions, reverse pollution and solve our land, food and resource problems in one swift stroke.

 

[Benni88]

FTL Travel is the obvious selection as we'd be visiting other solar systems which would rock,

But....

That's too obvious a choice. I choose, the Minds from Iain M. Banks "Culture" novels. Having A.I.s responsible for the well-being of every citizen would be awesome.

 

[Wintermoot]

a small mech suit (3-6 meters tall)
I just have a thing for mechs
or a jetpack those things look awesome

 

[Hira]

Other:

The insta-meal machines from the Jetsons. Press a few buttons, have your dinner a second later.
I want one.

 

[MercurySteam]

Cyborgs are awesome and it's clear that many lonely people would benefit from the existence of androids.

We technically do have androids and cyborgs in the present, albeit not as advanced as the ones in most sci-fi universes.

 

[BOOM headshot65]

It is a tossup between FTL drives or Terraforming. All I know is we NEED to leave Earth behind and get on new planets, to new solar systems. It is the only way to handle the increasing population.

 

[Alexias_Sandar]

Terraforming first. We can work on FTL after we've made a few planets or moons dance to our toon. It's closer to within reach in many ways anyhow, though we aren't there yet.

As for some of the others? We're already having good success in the bionics department, and there's jetpacks out there as well... both are just... expensive, and improving. However... we've been progressing in leaps and bounds with the bionics... we don't need 'super future tech there', we need 10 to 20 more years of progress with current research to make things more economical.

Biological enhancements...might be interesting, but... I'd rather just let the doctors work on treating things, rather than enhancement, for now. When we've got more diseases and injuries and the like dealt with...then maybe we can think about improving on humanity.

 

[Rowan93]

It is a tossup between FTL drives or Terraforming. All I know is we NEED to leave Earth behind and get on new planets, to new solar systems. It is the only way to handle the increasing population.

Whichever of those you pick, you still have to at least get into LEO the old-fashioned way, and in rocket terms that's literally half the work. So you'd have to ship those colonists up into orbit using rockets, which costs $20,000 per kilogram.

$1,600,000 for each person. If you want to make a dent in the earth's population, you'll have to ship, what, a billion? Half a billion? Try the population of the US, 300,000,000 (ish) people.

That would cost $480,000,000,000,000. The GDP of the entire world is $63.12 trillion.

So, if your colony ships were all ready and waiting in orbit to go where no-one has gone before, just putting the passengers and crew on the vessel would cost eight times the GDP of the entire planet.

There are much cheaper ways available, but we'd have to build them first, and none will be here soon enough.