Fictional technology
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Fictional technology is proposed or described in many different contexts for many different reasons:
- Exploratory engineering seeks to identify if a prospective technology can be designed in detail, and simulated, even if it cannot be built yet - this is often a prerequisite to venture capital funding, or investigation in weapons research.
- Pro-technology propaganda often emphasizes a speculative potential of a specific technology in order to stimulate investment in it, or a counter-technology. This is a common motivation in any society dominated by a military-industrial complex, such as the 19th century British Empire or 20th century United States. See also militarism, technological escalation, arms race.
- Advertising which emphasizes some amazing potential of some technology that is "under development" (usually without any specific timelines) by a company that is seeking simply to present itself as being competent with technology. See also vaporware, persuasion technology.
- Science fiction which explores the social or political or personal impact of some technology through storytelling.
Examples of such fictional technologies are:
Many technologies were fictional for a long time before they became real. Examples are:
- hypertext, e.g. the World Wide Web
- rocket pack
- atomic bomb
- expert system
- genetic engineering
- radiological weapon
- mobile phones
There are also technologies that have been proven to work beyond question, but currently are not practical given the alternatives, i.e., there is a more appropriate technology for that purpose:
- General purpose robots (only economically feasible with rather drastic energy and material subsidy, or in extremely hazardous applications that, arguably, no one should really be doing at all). However, note that specialized robots are widely used in industrial production.
- death ray (easier to kill people in other ways)
- jet pack (while rocket packs are useful in space, jets are only useful in the atmosphere where there are better ways to get around than strapping this on your back)
- artificial intelligence (any intellectual task that can be reduced to instructions and the sensory data inputs provided is in theory automatable, but the human effort to do so is frequently not worth the gains made)
- antimatter weapon (with current technology, antimatter cannot be produced in sufficient quantities to be used as weapons)
Proposals for further development of these are thus more and more likely to be seen as fictional, misleading or amusing. Robot toys for instance have become popular. One could argue that the atomic bomb, given the consequences of its use, also belongs in this category.