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Star Trek Tech That Exists Today

Posted by Soulskill on from the where-are-my-self-sealing-stembolts dept.

Esther Schindler writes "When Star Trek hit the air waves, talking computers were just a pipe dream. While teleportation remains elusive, several once-fictional technologies are changing the way people live and work. Here are some ways in which we're approaching the gizmos that Star Trek demonstrated. Speech recognition? Check. Holodeck? Sort of. Replicator? Workin' on it."

4 of 207 comments (clear)

  1. iPhone by MrEricSir · · Score: 3, Informative

    What about the white iPhone 4?

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    There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
  2. Re:What was the TV show about this? by clong83 · · Score: 5, Informative

    I think you're looking for "How William Shatner Changed the World", hosted by William Shatner.

    No, really, I think that's it.

  3. nothing like a holodeck by ThorGod · · Score: 5, Informative

    Look, until we can whip matter up to our exact specifications, we can't rightly say anything we're doing is remotely similar to a "holodeck".

    Sorry but fancy images on a 2D or pseudo-3D screen aren't what they're hopping about in TNG/DS9.

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    PS: I don't reply to ACs.
  4. Re:Not really... by Beardo+the+Bearded · · Score: 5, Informative

    But they leave off the ones that have actually been realized. Communicators the size of a lapel pin were wild conjecture at the time of the original series.

    And these actually exist in real life. One of the hospitals in my home city uses a Voceracommunication system. You press your lapel button, say the name of the person you want to talk to, and it opens a fucking communication channel between the two of you.

    People overlook the simple things. I thought the most impressive part of Iron Man was the AI. "Holy fuck, his computer is telling a joke when it's not helping him design a suborbital flight suit." "Now it's bringing up the files on everyone he's flying past?"

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    ECHELON is a government program to find words like bomb, jihad, plutonium, assassinate, and anarchy.