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Where's My Jetpack?: A Guide to the Amazing Science Fiction Future That Never Arrived
by Daniel H. Wilson and Richard Horne

Where's My Jetpack?: A Guide to the Amazing Science Fiction Future That Never Arrived Cover

Powells.com Staff Pick

If you are like me, the Roomba just does not cut it when what I expect is the domestic help of the robot maid featured on The Jetsons. In this highly entertaining look at futuristic inventions once envisioned, but never fully realized, Daniel Wilson tells us what really happened to every one of them.
Recommended by John, Powells.com

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

It's the twenty-first century and let's be honest — things are a little disappointing. Despite every World's Fair prediction, every futuristic ride at Disneyland, and the advertisements on the last page of every comic book, we are not living the future we were promised. By now, life was supposed to be a fully automated, atomic-powered, germ-free Utopia, a place where a grown man could wear a velvet spandex unitard and not be laughed at. Where are the ray guns, the flying cars, and the hoverboards that we expected? What happened to our promised moon colonies? Our servant robots?

In Where's My Jetpack?, roboticist Daniel H. Wilson takes a hilarious look at the future we always imagined for ourselves. He exposes technology, spotlights existing prototypes, and reveals drawing-board plans. You will learn which technologies are already available, who made them, and where to find them. If the technology is not public, you will learn how to build, buy, or steal it. And if doesn't yet exist, you will learn what stands in the way of making it real. With thirty entries spanning everything from teleportation to self-contained skyscraper cities, and superbly illustrated by Richard Horne (101 Things to Do Before You Die), Where's My Jetpack? is an endlessly entertaining, one-of-a-kind look at the world that we always wanted.

Review:

"Clinically depressed fans of Star Trek and The Jetsons, take heart: the future you've been dreaming of-ray guns, robot maids, unisex jumpsuits, space vacations-is ready for production. Sort of. That's the premise of this tongue-in-cheek look at all the techno-wonders that 21st century man was promised by sci-fi dreamers of the past. In his introduction, author and robotics expert Wilson (How to Survive a Robot Uprising) sets forth a pledge: 'If the technology is possible-even remotely so-this book will lay it out,' gamely ignoring 'any potentially catastrophic consequences.' Happily, this Ph.D. isn't trading in idle speculation; among plenty of jokes and silliness he deals in solid-and fascinating-science. For instance, it turns out that teleportation can work, and in fact already has: exploiting an obscure (and complicated) rule of quantum physics, scientists achieved, under lab conditions, the teleportation of a single photon in 1993. Wilson goes on to explain (or debunk) much-anticipated wonders like robot pets, food pills and cryogenic freezing ('the chance of being reborn in the future as a brain-dead humanoid zombie surely beats having no chance at all'). Though readers of this slim guide may not be inspired to 'raise your voice, and demand your personal jetpack,' it's got plenty of encouragement and info for frustrated futurists." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

Review:

"Wilson's tone is humorous, yet he does justice to the science underlying his topic with quick, clear, sound explanations..." Seattle Times

Review:

"[A]n amusing look at technological innovations that haven't quite come to be...Where's My Jetpack?...is surprisingly informative." Oregonian

Synopsis:

Roboticist Wilson takes a hilarious look at the future imagined through movies, television, and comic books. He reveals which technologies are already available and those that do not yet exist — explaining what stands in the way of making them real.
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About the Author

Daniel H. Wilson, Ph.D, has a degree in Robotics from Carnegie-Mellon. He is the author of How to Survive a Robot Uprising. He lives in Portland, Oregon.
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What Our Readers Are Saying

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Average customer rating based on 1 comment:
Miss Gretchen, June 6, 2007 (view all comments by Miss Gretchen)
A great gift book! I picked this up as a birthday present after reading the author interview here at Powells. The recipient, an engineer, got a big kick out of it and all of us at the party read out loud from the book our favorite childhood predictions of the space age future (bemoaning the fact that none of us were wearing a unitard or silver flight suit.) Thought provoking, the science is solid, and the graphic design is faboo.
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Product Details

ISBN:
9781596911369
Subtitle:
A Guide to the Amazing Science Fiction Future that Never Arrived
Author:
Daniel H. Wilson and Richard Horne
Author:
Horne, Richard
Author:
Wilson, Daniel H.
Author:
Wilson, Daniel
Illustrator:
Horne, Richard
Publisher:
Bloomsbury USA
Subject:
General
Subject:
General science
Subject:
History
Subject:
Inventions
Subject:
General Humor
Copyright:
2007
Publication Date:
20070417
Binding:
TP
Language:
English
Illustrations:
, Y
Pages:
192
Dimensions:
7.82x5.10x.58 in. .75 lbs.
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