Rocket Man

And I think it’s gonna be a long long time

Till touch down brings me round again to find

I’m not the man they think I am at home

Oh, no, no, no! I’m a rocket man

—Bernie Taupin

Grateful Monday

My kind of a Rocket Man—he dispenses cold beer.
Photo Source: Rocket Man Equipment Co.

I’m grateful I don’t have a jet pack. An article in Reasononline (Mangu-Ward, 2007) got me thinking about all the things the futurists predicted—from underwater cities to flying cars—and why I am grateful they did not come to be. At least, not yet.

I am no stick-in-the-mud Luddite or anything like that. I just don’t see the need for personal flight. I don’t jump out of good airplanes, and I don’t want a jet pack.

As Katherine Mangu-Ward notes, we—you and I, the lowly consumers of this world—control which inventions dominate the market. And as long as we have jobs left in this country where we can earn some disposable income, we will continue to make people who understand what we want rich. We want something that is usable, safe, and not-too-expensive. We have jet packs, underwater cities, and flying cars; we just don’t want them.

References

Mangu-Ward, K. (2007, October). From Sky Flivver to Hydropolis: What happened to the science-fiction future? Retrieved October 29, 2007, from reasononline: http://reason.com/news/show/122027.html