Zócalo Public Squarethe future – Zócalo Public Square https://legacy.zocalopublicsquare.org Ideas Journalism With a Head and a Heart Mon, 21 Oct 2024 07:01:54 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 Let’s Violate the Laws of Physics https://legacy.zocalopublicsquare.org/2014/09/12/lets-violate-the-laws-of-physics/ideas/up-for-discussion/ https://legacy.zocalopublicsquare.org/2014/09/12/lets-violate-the-laws-of-physics/ideas/up-for-discussion/#respond Fri, 12 Sep 2014 07:01:44 +0000 Zocalo https://legacy.zocalopublicsquare.org/?p=55510 Science fiction writers can be eerily prescient. Consider what John Brunner got right about our world in 2010, as described in his 1968 novel Stand on Zanzibar: a world shaken up by terrorist attacks and school shootings, the near-abandonment of Detroit, a zeal for upgrading everything, including our bodies. When Isaac Asimov envisioned in 1964 what 2014 would be like, he described what we’ve come to know as satellite phones, Skype calls, and driverless cars. Of course, with all hits, there have been some misses: We don’t have Brunner’s single supercomputer that powers the world, but the rhizome of the Internet with servers all over the globe; we don’t have the moon colonies that Asimov assumed we’d already have. Still, the power of science fiction comes from the license to dream–and in many case to have nightmares. In advance of the Zócalo/ASU Center for Science and the Imagination Event

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]]> Science fiction writers can be eerily prescient. Consider what John Brunner got right about our world in 2010, as described in his 1968 novel Stand on Zanzibar: a world shaken up by terrorist attacks and school shootings, the near-abandonment of Detroit, a zeal for upgrading everything, including our bodies. When Isaac Asimov envisioned in 1964 what 2014 would be like, he described what we’ve come to know as satellite phones, Skype calls, and driverless cars. Of course, with all hits, there have been some misses: We don’t have Brunner’s single supercomputer that powers the world, but the rhizome of the Internet with servers all over the globe; we don’t have the moon colonies that Asimov assumed we’d already have. Still, the power of science fiction comes from the license to dream–and in many case to have nightmares. In advance of the Zócalo/ASU Center for Science and the Imagination Event “Can Science Fiction Revolutionize Science?”, we asked experts: What idea from science fiction would you most like to see become reality?

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