It's funding (whether private or public) that decides the reality of ideas like GPS, interstellar travel, the Internet and more - what would you pay for? f you listen to podcasts and haven't listened to Levar Burton reads, you may want to consider it. It does offer some very interesting stories and Levar's readings are incredible.
One recent listen was "The Best We Can" (by Carrie Vaughn) about first contact with aliens - you. can READ the story here but Burton's read really does make it come to life. What was neat about the timing, however, was this story that just landed a few days ago. That the project of sending flying rovers to Saturn beat out the project that would catch the surface of a comet.
We (or at least I) often think of NASA as being an organization with a single goal but, in fact, there are lots of projects that engineers come up with that have to fight for funding. From solar sails (which also had a Levar Burton Reads story) to this recent one, even physicists have different ideas of what technologies are even worth pursuing. This interview with Michio Kaku on the James Altucher show posits that instead of thinking about traveling to another planet, we might want to consider instead simply projecting ourselves there (although that certainly wouldn't be as fun).
Much of today's realities are inspired by science fiction that are then turned into projects by government organizations such as NASA. While some people still like to think everything worth inventing has already been invented, reading about these projects does show that there is still so much more to create. How they finally get implemented and integrated into our everyday lives may not be something I live to see but then the speed in which many of these things occur always amazes so who knows?
But it's funding (whether private or public) that decides the reality of these ideas - what would you pay for?
One recent listen was "The Best We Can" (by Carrie Vaughn) about first contact with aliens - you. can READ the story here but Burton's read really does make it come to life. What was neat about the timing, however, was this story that just landed a few days ago. That the project of sending flying rovers to Saturn beat out the project that would catch the surface of a comet.
We (or at least I) often think of NASA as being an organization with a single goal but, in fact, there are lots of projects that engineers come up with that have to fight for funding. From solar sails (which also had a Levar Burton Reads story) to this recent one, even physicists have different ideas of what technologies are even worth pursuing. This interview with Michio Kaku on the James Altucher show posits that instead of thinking about traveling to another planet, we might want to consider instead simply projecting ourselves there (although that certainly wouldn't be as fun).
Much of today's realities are inspired by science fiction that are then turned into projects by government organizations such as NASA. While some people still like to think everything worth inventing has already been invented, reading about these projects does show that there is still so much more to create. How they finally get implemented and integrated into our everyday lives may not be something I live to see but then the speed in which many of these things occur always amazes so who knows?
But it's funding (whether private or public) that decides the reality of these ideas - what would you pay for?
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