You know the feeling. It's the one where you're standing in your driveway, or worse, the side of the road, next to a car that has malfunctioned. You're sunk. Immediately your mind goes to the last time the car broke and it seems like it was a week ago, probably because you spent a few hundred dollars on it, and that's about all you wanted to spend for about a year on the thing. But no, here you are, stuck wherever it is that this thing has broken.
It's totally weird how this is our most common and most used mode of transportation. This is one of those things. It's 2012 now, and we're still using a variation of something that came about over 100 years ago. We invented flight not too long after, and it's proven to be an even more efficient mode of travel, but it too has seemed to stop getting better. The rate at which the two technologies have advanced has been slow in comparison to the good ol 1900s.
Our imaginations sure aren't the problem. We're dreaming huge right now, and have been for a good while, using what we have as a springboard for new ideas. The problem is, most of these dreams are just CG effects on the silver screen. I think that has something to do with the fact that the area in which technology has been accelling most lately is entertainment. 20 years ago, when I was born, half of the stuff I use to entertain myself didn't exist. No, more than half. For whatever reason, entertainment's where it's at right now. So what happened to all the other technology advancing?
Well, for America, I'd say the Cold War was part of it, since that was mostly about not just inventing the biggest, baddest weapons, but also keeping them a secret. So a lot of what got developed at the time only leaked out into the things the general public was consuming. I think the focus on advancement for the military probably stifled advancement for everyone. By the time the Cold War was over, the public had moved on to the whole entertainment bit. Note that I haven't done any research on this...it's really justa paper-thin non-scientific theory.
What really frustrates me is pretty much what I started with, actually. The only thing that keeps getting better in transportation technology it seems, is the computers in them that...don't really help me get from A to B. They don't really extend the life of the parts of my car either, making it work longer, nor do they make my car go faster or transcend the limits of travel set by the arbitrary roads that we use to get around. When the computers in a car can monitor its well being and fix it when need be, then we'll be getting somewhere.
My 96 Honda Accord breaking every so often, yeah, I get it, it has almost 200k miles on it. My parents' old van, yeah, it's going to break. It's because they're old...but really, a car being new doesn't really stop it from having problems. When they start to age or whatever, they're gonna break, and at that point they're no different than the '96 car, and it'll probably be even more expensive to fix. I'd rather have a car that has better longevity than my last one than one that can tell me where the next burger joint is.
But even that is small talk. The other day I was talking with a friend about the limits of travel. Why is it that I can sit here in 2012 and believe that Canada is as far away and inaccessible as the moon? It's attached to my freaking country, and yet it'd take a good bit of planning and an amount of money large enough for me to shy away from it to get there. What the hell is that? If I want to go, it shouldn't be a big thing. Considering we've had the technology to go to the moon and outer space for over 50 years now, anything short of breaking through the atmosphere should be a piece of cake.
Right now you've got to be rich to go anywhere on a moment's notice. Private jets exist but aren't accessible like they should be. Imagine if you had to take the bus everywhere with everyone except those who can afford cars. It'd be annoying, especially since those personal cars are a lot more efficient. Hell, anything that doesn't have to use a road is going to be more efficient. Imagine this one: if we embraced our ability to fly and lifted our transportation into the air, we could tear up the roads and highways and plant trees or build some much needed homes and stuff.
Okay, I know that's a bit much to ask, but admit it, it'd be so cool. I know there are issues with that, you know, like how do we get flying machines to be as fuel efficient as ground ones? How do we regulate sky traffic? Yeah, they're problems, but they're better than "how do we widen the roads so our overflowing population can fit on it?" Flying cars and hovercrafts are a whole new thing, a whole new realm of possibilities. Suppose we do come up with transportation that can get us around the world in 3 hours. How then do you prevent the people who'd then use these things to launch quick, surprise attacks on people they hate?
That brings up another point. I know I haven't even touched on corporate greed and all that, and honestly, I probably won't. Just mentioning it nowadays can give you a whole list of implications that sort explain "this has stunted the growth of...well...everything in some way or another." No, what really pisses me off is the violence. Okay, so who's bright idea was it to use a plane...as of right now our best mode of fast transportation...as a fucking death machine? No really, what the hell? That person has single-handedly slowed the evolution and advancement of the entire human race. This is a big reason why the only advancements in air travel in recent memory have been advancements to security.
Of course, the presence of ill intentions stunts us in other ways. Let me level with you for a second. How many ways are there to get from here, the USA, to Canada...or better yet somewhere like England? Plane and boat. Two. Now, how many ways are there to kill a person? A shit ton. I mean, say I want to headshot someone...I've got like a billion different options of guns to do it with. With our weapon technology, we can kill millions of people with a single hunk of metal. We could do that back in 1945. So what did we do afterwards? We made them more powerful. We came up with more ways to kill people.
Who does that make happy? Okay, suppose you get off on killing, you're happy when you hear you managed to kill 8008 people. Then what happens? Other people get angry, and then they come after you and kill a bunch other people, potentially you. And then you're not happy. You're either pissed or dead, the former which will instigate more people seeking happiness by trying to kill you. See how this works in a circle? Seriously, I'd rather have a car that can tell me where the next burger joint is than a new type of gun.
Speaking of which, it's pretty freaking crazy that I started this post by talking about something as simple and stupid as a car not starting. Eh, that's just what runs through your head when you're born with the ability to overthink things like I do. But if you think about it and summarize this post...today, your car breaks down and tomorrow millions of people die. Maybe more than anything this was just a look into my mind. Even so, can we all agree that transportation should be much easier and more effective than it is? Let's.
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