Brad Feld

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Why Do We Still Have Airplanes?

Oct 10, 2014

I’ve been listening to the Hyperion Cantos on my iPhone while I run/bike (it’s amazing – I’m almost done with book two) and I’ve been wondering why we still have airplanes.

We’ve already figured out how to go from analog form to digital form back to analog form. Consider the telephone.

We’ve already figured out how to go from atoms to bits to atoms. Consider the 3D printer.

We can transmit energy and information, so why can’t we yet teleport?

Who is working on this?

In Hyperion, the machines (the AI) ended up figuring this out for the humans. It feels like we are on the cusp of this as a species.

Ponder that as you board your next plan. Wouldn’t it be better to farcast to where you are going? Or would it?