h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

"It would give a fresh insight into whether or not there's any truth in the phenomena of cellular memory"

What's cellular memory?

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The address book on a mobile phone...

Cellular memory is the phenomena where organ recipients take on personality traits, and in some cases even memories that the donor had.

no money needed or used in shops all on a data card

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That's a great idea in principle but in practice it doesn't work (Swindon was one of the towns used for the Mondex trial a while back and after a flurry of interest it fizzled out and was never heard of again).

Replacement for spam

Other no-money card systems seem to work and do the job well, such as Transport for London's RFID based Oyster Card. I'd quite like to see that expanded to cover the full country.

Personality cosmetic surgery. The whole world would benefit from some people having their stupidity nipped, sense of humour enhanced and irritatingness removed

A cure for nasty people who snipe at others here

There's some famous people and z-list "celebrities" who'd definately benefit from personality cosmetic surgery Dale Winton for example could benefit from being removed completely

A banality filter would be great.

Cure for the commen cold

And the uncommon one too

laughing theraphy for office workers

Mass produced Clue-by-4's and LARTs.

what happened to cold fusion?

About twelve years ago, I saw a photo of a human braincell that had been cultured to grow on a computer chip. There was no doubt that while the neuron was alive, there was some interchange of bio-electrical activity with the computer chip... the question, I guess, would be creating or stimulating meaningful interaction between the bio and electronic components of a symbiotic entity like that.

And being able to read it / communicvate with it / interact with it from outside.

So how do you eavesdrop on the conversation between computer chip and braincell?

It had me thinking of the computer game "Better Than Life" in Red Dwarf, the one that plugs directly into the brain and makes your wildest fantasies come true in the best possible virtual reality.

Now THAT will be a growth area!

I predict: as the two sexes get more and more hacked off with each other, men in particular will withdraw from what they may see as frustrating and unfulfilling atempts at relationships with women.

Instead, better and better virtual reality will allow the two sexes to lift a finger of farewell to each other, and create their own idealised relationships inside their own heads - VR will give us the power to be solipsistic.

A great spur to "perfect" VR, akin to Star Trek's holodecks, will be from men who want guaranteed sex without the drawbacks. Does this sound too cynical? Well, the sex industry, when you think about it, has been in on EVERY technological advancement right at the start, why should VR be any different?

(The first photograph ever taken might have been a street in paris in 1846; the SECOND photo was of a woman doing something eye-watering with a Shetland pony. True!)

So if consumer pressure creates a drive to perfect VR, possibly in conjunction with bioengineering, could this be the end of the human race? (ie - the real thing is problematical, messy,involves dealing with another irrational human being, and can never live up to the fantasies we have inside our own heads> Allow us the perfect fantasy, and will we ever want to come out of it?)

I will never look at Shetland ponies in quite the same way again...

On that subject the thing that would be mind-blowing is if scientists found a way to digitise your consciousness - to effectively transfer your thoughts and feelings onto digital form when your body starts giving up on you. I had this thought a few years back and instantly consigned it to the mad bin, until it appeared up on the web news a few weeks ago.

>> to effectively transfer your thoughts and feelings onto digital form when your body starts giving up on you. I had this thought a few years back and instantly consigned it to the mad bin, until it appeared up on the web news a few weeks ago. <<

Iain M Banks has been writing in this vein for donkey's years.

RF

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Ahh, yes, the good old bitumen blob.