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Star Trek, tech companies, and the death of futurism in cinema

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Re: Star Trek, tech companies, and the death of futurism in cinema

#61

Post by keiferski »

michaelfeathers wrote: post #49

There's still a lot of ground to cover with the future. For one thing, everyone assumes minimalism. I can imagine a very lush future with ornate decoration. We could have a renaissance triggered by nearly cost-free manufacturing. Another vision of the future might be excessively biological. Sci-fi authors have depicted bio-engineered worlds, but cinema doesn't seem to do much with the idea. An old favorite of mine in…

I'm glad someone mentioned Existenz. God, that movie is weird, but it's definitely very unique in its biological approach to sci-fi. Very interesting though, check it out if you haven't yet.

Re: Star Trek, tech companies, and the death of futurism in cinema

#62

Post by ChuckMcM »

snowwrestler wrote: post #15

I guess I was watching a different movie, because I saw: - advanced handheld medical scanners and treatments - a genetically engineered human with super strength, health, and intelligence - suspended animation that keeps humans alive for centuries - artificial gravity - faster than light communication and travel - materials strong enough to maintain structural integrity after falling from space and plowing through a…

The discussion here demonstrates the problem.

So lets take a moment and think about what we see vs what we do.

So if you take the Internet and extend it to its logical next step we've got 20 - 40gbits of bandwidth between everyone and everyone else.

We've got parallel rendering pipelines and physics simulation such that you can render a scene that is indistinguishable from reality to our poor brains, and then you can project all the moving pieces between any group of people.

So in a plausible future everyone is sitting inside a brain jar experiencing a 'shared world' in what is not unlike a giant World of Warcraft type experience, including the ability to do magic, conjure things out of thin air. While nutrients feed what's left of our bodies.

Is that exciting? Does that make for dramatic movies? No. But sadly it is the current path we are on.

Re: Star Trek, tech companies, and the death of futurism in cinema

#63

Post by TillE »

icebraining wrote: post #23
zipppy wrote: post #14

I tend to have an opposite reaction -- I get annoyed with futurism that is unrealistic compared to how far in the future the story takes place. Even Star Trek is completely unrealistic - it takes place less than 25 decades from now. There's no way we have space vehicles so advanced so soon. (edit: even ignoring 'warp speed')

People alive today still don't believe we were able to get to the moon; what makes you so sure about your predictions?

If you understand the basics of physics and the nature of Earth and the moon, as we did by about 1700, it's easy enough to grasp how you might get from one to the other given sufficient energy. A little over 250 years later, it happened.

I wouldn't necessarily rule out a major breakthrough in space travel, though it seems extremely unlikely. But transporter technology is so wildly implausible as to be effectively impossible, certainly in that time frame. Reassembling a full human being doesn't even begin to fit our current understanding or any suggested theory of physics.

Re: Star Trek, tech companies, and the death of futurism in cinema

#64

Post by froo »

peterhajas wrote: post #57
saurik wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it wasn't the same future as predicted in the 70's, it wouldn't have been Star Trek: they may have thrown away all of the later canon, but they couldn't just start over... it wouldn't be the same universe.

(Hi, saurik!) Even TNG reimagined the technology of the future through the lens of the 80's and 90's, though. Holodecks, the Borg, Geordi's visor, Data. I think this movie could have been more forward-thinking.

They couldn't create tech that was TOO forward thinking, IE creating tech that might be seen around the time of TNG - given that as a franchise they could still mine a reboot of TNG if the well for Kirk-era Star Trek runs dry.

I wasn't disappointed by the tech. To be frank, I think that they're simply giving themselves room to continue making money with rebooting other Star Trek franchises in the future

Re: Star Trek, tech companies, and the death of futurism in cinema

#65

Post by [deleted] »

zipppy wrote: post #14

I tend to have an opposite reaction -- I get annoyed with futurism that is unrealistic compared to how far in the future the story takes place. Even Star Trek is completely unrealistic - it takes place less than 25 decades from now. There's no way we have space vehicles so advanced so soon. (edit: even ignoring 'warp speed')

[deleted]

Re: Star Trek, tech companies, and the death of futurism in cinema

#66

Post by gnaritas »

peterhajas wrote: post #57
saurik wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it wasn't the same future as predicted in the 70's, it wouldn't have been Star Trek: they may have thrown away all of the later canon, but they couldn't just start over... it wouldn't be the same universe.

(Hi, saurik!) Even TNG reimagined the technology of the future through the lens of the 80's and 90's, though. Holodecks, the Borg, Geordi's visor, Data. I think this movie could have been more forward-thinking.

TNG had to, they're the future; the current movie is the time-line of the original Trek; they can't do that, it wouldn't make sense.

Re: Star Trek, tech companies, and the death of futurism in cinema

#67

Post by gnaritas »

Zimahl wrote: post #54
vec wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plus since it's (kinda) supposed to be a prequel to NextGen/DS9/Voyager it has to cram itself into that thin wedge between more futuristic than now and noticeably less futuristic than we imagined a decade ago.

Let's talk about this thin wedge (hopefully without spoilers). I understand that this is a relaunch of the series but I think they did it wrong. It probably would've been blasphemy to throw it all out the door, and 'historically' the same things can happen but they really should be ignoring everything from TOS. Will we see VGER? The monolith from 'Voyage Home' (ST4) must make an appearance, right? I mean we have to a…

I think you missed the point of the reboot, Vulcan was destroyed, the time-line forever altered, this crew isn't going to re-live the events of the original crew.

Re: Star Trek, tech companies, and the death of futurism in cinema

#68

Post by nazgulnarsil »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #62
snowwrestler wrote: post #15

I guess I was watching a different movie, because I saw: - advanced handheld medical scanners and treatments - a genetically engineered human with super strength, health, and intelligence - suspended animation that keeps humans alive for centuries - artificial gravity - faster than light communication and travel - materials strong enough to maintain structural integrity after falling from space and plowing through a…

The discussion here demonstrates the problem. So lets take a moment and think about what we see vs what we do. So if you take the Internet and extend it to its logical next step we've got 20 - 40gbits of bandwidth between everyone and everyone else. We've got parallel rendering pipelines and physics simulation such that you can render a scene that is indistinguishable from reality to our poor brains, and then you can…

sadly?

Re: Star Trek, tech companies, and the death of futurism in cinema

#69

Post by Florin_Andrei »

snowwrestler wrote: post #15

I guess I was watching a different movie, because I saw: - advanced handheld medical scanners and treatments - a genetically engineered human with super strength, health, and intelligence - suspended animation that keeps humans alive for centuries - artificial gravity - faster than light communication and travel - materials strong enough to maintain structural integrity after falling from space and plowing through a…

I guess the author was lamenting the absence of things such as the 3D user interfaces from Minority Report.

Re: Star Trek, tech companies, and the death of futurism in cinema

#70

Post by Steko »

peterhajas wrote: post #57
saurik wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it wasn't the same future as predicted in the 70's, it wouldn't have been Star Trek: they may have thrown away all of the later canon, but they couldn't just start over... it wouldn't be the same universe.

(Hi, saurik!) Even TNG reimagined the technology of the future through the lens of the 80's and 90's, though. Holodecks, the Borg, Geordi's visor, Data. I think this movie could have been more forward-thinking.

The new movies were backward thinking by design. Into Darkness takes place 5 years before TOS and 100 years before TNG. Any radically new federation technology inserted there but not shown in TOS/TNG would just look out of place and be held against it.
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