[Animats]

Well, that didn't work out.

Back in the 1930s, there was a similar enthusiasm about air travel. Watch H. G. Wells "Things to Come".[1] "Wings over the World", indeed.

There was a repeat of this in the Space Age, ("We came in peace for all mankind") but that didn't last long.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kn76zoYjr4k

[rayiner]

There is always a lot of enthusiasm about technology that is ultimately tempered by cold hard reality. When I grew up in the 1990's, computers in the classroom were going to change education. But that idea is a farce today. Same thing with space travel, supersonic flight, nuclear power, etc. The landscape is littered with the bones of techno-optimist dreams from the 1980's and 1990's.