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Visions of the Future

jpl.nasa.gov

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Re: Visions of the Future

#11

Post by TheCoreh »

theothermkn wrote: post #9

FTA: > Imagination is our window into the future. Maybe. But the outlook is from the past, and is subject to the past's failures and to failures of the imagination that are due to the juvenile foible of nostalgia. These posters are, after all, riffs in the genre of travel marketing, which is designed to sell the experience of a place as more than it is; they push a particular and motivated hyper-reality. This betrays…

Intercontinental travel was once like this, too. Take several months to make a horrible journey that could very well kill you. Now you can do it in under a day, safely, for a very reasonable price, with just a mild discomfort.

I think the point of these pieces is to make us think about the possibility that some day technology will have advanced so much that this is possible. Maybe we'll get there faster, or we'll develop a way to live longer so it won't matter.

Re: Visions of the Future

#12

Post by csixty4 »

shawnmk wrote: post #3

I love these and wanted prints of them for myself and thought others might too (and I own a printery), so: http://www.artfrom.space

Thank you! I'm working on a space-themed nursery and I was worried the baby would be here before the JPL Store got posters in stock.

Re: Visions of the Future

#13

Post by theothermkn »

TheCoreh wrote: post #11
theothermkn wrote: post #9

FTA: > Imagination is our window into the future. Maybe. But the outlook is from the past, and is subject to the past's failures and to failures of the imagination that are due to the juvenile foible of nostalgia. These posters are, after all, riffs in the genre of travel marketing, which is designed to sell the experience of a place as more than it is; they push a particular and motivated hyper-reality. This betrays…

Intercontinental travel was once like this, too. Take several months to make a horrible journey that could very well kill you. Now you can do it in under a day, safely, for a very reasonable price, with just a mild discomfort. I think the point of these pieces is to make us think about the possibility that some day technology will have advanced so much that this is possible. Maybe we'll get there faster, or we'll dev…

> Intercontinental travel was once like this, too. Take several months to make a horrible journey that could very well kill you.

Which is why there aren't travel posters for those journeys in that era.

> I think the point of these pieces is to make us think about the possibility that some day technology will have advanced so much that this is possible.

I agree. But my point is twofold. One, these journeys will never be possible in that way. (The energy requirements alone for that kind of fast travel is an insurmountable barrier, just due to the square term in .5mv^2, and anything of non-negligible mass that is moving that fast is an interplanetary doomsday weapon.) Two, these pieces draw a false parallel between the romance of steamer travel or early train/air travel and the harsh realities of space travel.

And, to forestall a cliche by doubling down, I'm siding with the people who say "it will never happen."

Re: Visions of the Future

#14

Post by gervase »

TheCoreh wrote: post #11
theothermkn wrote: post #9

FTA: > Imagination is our window into the future. Maybe. But the outlook is from the past, and is subject to the past's failures and to failures of the imagination that are due to the juvenile foible of nostalgia. These posters are, after all, riffs in the genre of travel marketing, which is designed to sell the experience of a place as more than it is; they push a particular and motivated hyper-reality. This betrays…

Intercontinental travel was once like this, too. Take several months to make a horrible journey that could very well kill you. Now you can do it in under a day, safely, for a very reasonable price, with just a mild discomfort. I think the point of these pieces is to make us think about the possibility that some day technology will have advanced so much that this is possible. Maybe we'll get there faster, or we'll dev…

Or maybe not - the Grand Tour[1] was historically restricted a wealthy elite, after all. I guess it depends on the time scale of the perspective.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Tour

Re: Visions of the Future

#16

Post by vonklaus »

hodwik wrote: post #6
vonklaus wrote: post #4

I have a lot of respect both for the artists that made this and for the scientists pushing boundaries forward in a way that was almost inconceivable a decade ago. That said, if anyone here works at JPL, I can't be (but feel like I am) the only person wondering what the hell happened to memex-explorer. We are talking about the obvious change in search. If you are not familiar, the memex-explorer project seemed to be t…

Why don't you e-mail continuum and report back: https://www.continuum.io/contact-us

i emailed who I believe to be the lead dev.

edit: email bounced to support. Since the email was a super autistic and sarcastic look at the ecosystem as I made a case for continued development, the support guy whose desk it bounced to from the lead dev, was forgiveably baffled.

Re: Visions of the Future

#17

Post by mattbeckman »

shawnmk wrote: post #3

I love these and wanted prints of them for myself and thought others might too (and I own a printery), so: http://www.artfrom.space

You should ask SpaceX if you can print their retro space tourism posters from last year as well. You know... where these NASA artists probably got the idea from :)

http://gizmodo.com/spacex-just-dropped-these-amazing-retro-m...

Re: Visions of the Future

#18

Post by Grishnakh »

I like looking at stuff like this, but it's a completely unrealistic view of humanity's future.

If we're really lucky, the cities of the future will look something like those in Blade Runner (minus the part about people living offworld) or Dredd, or even the Mad Max movies. But more likely, things are going to look more like 28 Days Later or The Walking Dead, or the scene of the future in The Terminator.

Re: Visions of the Future

#20

Post by mikeash »

mattbeckman wrote: post #17
shawnmk wrote: post #3

I love these and wanted prints of them for myself and thought others might too (and I own a printery), so: http://www.artfrom.space

You should ask SpaceX if you can print their retro space tourism posters from last year as well. You know... where these NASA artists probably got the idea from :) http://gizmodo.com/spacex-just-dropped-these-amazing-retro-m...

As that article mentions, JPL's exoplanet tourism posters preceded SpaceX's posters:

http://planetquest.jpl.nasa.gov/exoplanet_travel_bureau

In any case, no need to ask SpaceX, the posters were released into the public domain.

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