In the past I've pondered as to just how easy or difficult different technological ideas might actually be make happen. I remember reading about the early computers in the 1950s and how it was generally assumed at the time that within a few decades the ultimate 'Universal Problem Solver' would be constructed. This computing device would just need to be given a problem, such as "find a cure for cancer" and would go off and solve it. Obviously everyone involved had underestimated the technology required by quite a margin.
It occurred to me what if our assumptions were way off in other area too and that some inventions may be easier to solve than we think and others much more difficult.
For example we all assume that a practical realisation of time-travel is a long way off. On the other hand we generally assume that a floating three-dimensional 'holographic' display is going to be available in the very near future.
But what if we're vastly wrong in these assumptions and holographic diplays are fundamentally tricky and won't be made for another 200 years, whereas time-travel devices turn out to be a rather simple take on an established field of research or existing technology and as such are up and running by next year?
Today I was thinking along similar lines but with a twist...
What if the discovery and understanding of the principals that govern an invention are hugely complex and require centuries or even millenia to grasp, and yet the practical application is really very simple and could feasibly be implemented today using nothing more than readily available household items or natural materials.
Say it took 500 years of research and understanding together with a plethora of smaller discoveries built up upon each other to yield a working teleportation device. Having gained the knowledge of how to construct it, it could well be that a working teleporter was simply a case of arranging half a dozen teak coffee tables in a precise manner coated in Reggae-Reggae sauce?
Perhaps only then will we realise why the urban legends of time-slips and teleportations occurred simply because the subjects were driving at 88mph whilst listening to a particular country & western song.
Perhaps the Victorians could have made an anti-gravity machine or the Elizabethans a radio but not understood how or why it worked.
Who knows and who cares. Food for thought that's all. Discuss.
2 comments:
You have too much time on your hands.
Read Immanuel Kants Critique of Pure Reason, got a good couple of chapters on what space and time are!
Also read Reasons and Persons by Derek Parfit (brother of Rik - possibly). This will give you a good indication of what could go wrong with your identity due to transportation devices that you are talking about.
I have copies if you want them!
How would he get them if you are anonymous or invisible or in a ||rallel youniverse. You have too little time to show your hand my friend. We are all gone in a flash of iternity.
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