What is the most amazing technological or science concept you ever saw in sci-fi?

In general? Mine would probably be a Planck accelerator, a particle accelerator as long as the galaxy OR a Bootes Void Dyson Sphere that is responsible for us not seeing any stars or galaxies in that Void.

 

To me the holodeck and replicator are the top two or maybe they are also the ones most desired. I think the Tardis is also up their as well especially since their is still so many mysterious about it and how it works.


Jason

 

Transporter
Holodeck
Replicator
Warp drive
Fold space drive
Light saber

 

The Great Machine of the Krell
The Monolith of 2001

 

Very good choices.

 

Medical..
Regeneration Technology.. as in alot of the stem cell work thats going on today, I'd think by 23rd or 24th century that we would have the ablity to "Regrow" well.. body parts.. arms, legs, hearts etc. in Star Trek, they use robot limbs.. and hearts..

 

Don't know if this qualifies.. but the whole dream sharing thing in Inception. However, how DOES it work? Does the architect save her maze on a disk (it's established she doesn't need to share in the dream) .. also the suitcases don't seem to HAVE the dream.. it just seems a way to share the chemical (both quantity and a simultaneous delivery into the veins)... but it's not actually the dream sharing device.

Nolan skimps on explaining how this all works

 

It might have been when Drexler's Engines of Creation version of nanotech started appearing in skiffy stories. I first encountered the fictional version of it in Carver's From A Changeling Star.

 

Teleporter, easily.

That and most of the items as shown in the 1973 sci-fi thriller "Sleeper"

 

Pretty much anything from Iain M. Banks' Culture novels. One single General Systems Vehicle could house billions of people and be run by a superintelligent Mind that could have simultaneous intelligent conversations with every single inhabitant at the same time AND run the ship AND converse with Minds aboard other ships.

 

The justice field from the Red Dwarf episode 'Justice'.

 

Spaceships with gravity and people can actually live on for years and years. Space Stations also in the same category.


Jason

 

Yes! We need to develop one of these!

Also, I always liked the S.E.P. (Somebody Else's Problem) field from the Hitchhiker's books. The idea is that, in order to make something functionally invisible, you don't try to make it innocuous; you make it as problematically attention-grabbing as possible, thus everyone will willfully ignore it and try to make it Somebody Else's Problem.

 

I’d go with the holodeck and warp drive.

Transporters existing in real life would be terrifying. The idea anyone could kidnap or kill you from a distance leaving no evidence. Or just beam a bomb into anywhere.

 

Consciousness transference. It is literally a gateway to a new evolution of the human mind, allowing for not only immortality, but also potentially limitless cognitive expansion

 

I wonder what space battles would be like if the field was weaponized and deployed over vast portions of space.

 

Time travel technology! Just think, there wouldn't have to be any unanswered questions about history, etc. I'd love to check out what dinosaurs really looked like, and how they behaved. We could answer questions like: who was Jack the Ripper, how were the Egyptian pyramids actually built (or any pyramids, really); what happened to Jimmy Hoffa; the six wonders of the ancient world that aren't around any longer....Inquiring nerdy minds want to know.

 

It's got to be replicators and transporters/transmat/teleporter/ect. I would love to be able to get whatever I want or go wherever I want instantly.
I've also got a bit of a soft spot for the Leviathans from Farscape.

 

And then I would just be nipping back in time to rescue lost episodes of Doctor Who before they got junked in the 1970s.

 

I never think of time travel as a technological or science concept. It's like psionics and telepathy, a fantasy element.