Top scientists and young filmmakers meet at USC to discuss the love affair between science and science fiction – and learn that much film and TV sci-fi is already real

By Paul M. Allen

Get your spandex jumpsuits ready as cloaking devices real now

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Today) 11/17/09 – What will the world look like in 2050 when science further looks like science fiction does today? Or today looks like the science fiction of the 1950s?

We never got the flying cars the 50s “house of the future” promised, but there are robots to vacuum, refrigerators that talk and so on.

And if you have the money, you can get a copter, voyage to the bottom of the sea or fly into space.

Some of world’s finest scientists and film imaginations got together at the USC School of Cinematic Arts Research, and we found out there is already a real cloaking device like in “Star Trek,” nanotechnology similar to that of the replicators on “Stargate-1,” and data gloves that work as those do in the movie “Minority Report.” Cellphones have long been like the communicators on “Trek” while “Star Wars”-like laser guns are all too real. One scientist noted he has been inspired by Stanley Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey.”

And likewise, Kubrick and other great filmmakers like Spielberg and Lucas have started their sci-fi story-telling with as much real science as possible, and then added a bit of imagination. The same is true with every writer, sci-fi or otherwise, whether books, film or television.

Yet since I don’t have a flying car yet, real life creeps in. After making it through the traffic, street closures and sirens from numerous police, fire, and ambulance brigades surrounding the downtown Los Angeles campus of the University of Southern California, I finally reached one of several parking structures.

I noted a small army of Film School students prepared to videotape the upcoming event. They worked as if they were all seasoned professionals and had been doing this for decades. I was Very Impressed.

There was a reception in the Steven Spielberg building. There were people dressed in suits, jeans and T-Shirts, and everything in between. Little did I know that I was in for such a wonderful night of “Geek Speak” from some of the brightest minds on the planet.

I spoke with some film students and we talked about so many things in such a short time that my head was spinning. I knew that USC has the reputation for putting out some of best directors, cinematographers, writers, etc. in the entertainment industry, but these “kids” were well beyond their years. I found them all fascinating.

We were herded across the small courtyard to the George Lucas building. Once inside, we took our seats in the beautiful wood adorned auditorium that was buzzing with an air of anticipation of the night’s discussion.

The moderator, Associate Professor of the USC School of Cinematic Arts Research, Richard Weinberg, began the discussion with the question “how will technology and science impact the world by the year 2050?” “To answer some of our questions and help us decide what we should include in our Time Capsule that will be opened in 2050, here are…” as he introduced the panel to the audience.

His first introduction was his co-moderator for the evening, IBM Fellow Dr. Don Eigler who is the first ever to precisely manipulate individual atoms. I sat with my jaw in my lap as I recalled a promotional advertisement from IBM from many years ago where scientists actually spelled out the IMB logo with Xenon atoms. This was like the Wright Brothers at Kitty Hawk! This accomplishment also marked the beginning of what we call today nanotechnology.

Before Professor Weinberg introduced the rest of the panel, he asked Dr. Eigler if it would someday be possible to build a Replicator like those used on the television show Star Trek. Well, that just opened Pandora’s Box. It turns out that not only is Dr. Eigler a huge fan of the hit TV show, he also got some of his ideas from Star Trek and other Sci-Fi shows and films including Kubrick’s “2001 A Space Odyssey”.

Dr. Eigler continued by letting us know that there is really such a thing as a “cloaking device”, the Motorola Razor reminded him of the Star Trek “communicator” and that there will be a “Replicator” some day that can make us a cup of Earl Grey Tea by assembling atoms into the right configuration. Sadly, he thinks that by 2050 we will have that Replicator, however the cup might only be as big as a grain of salt, but it will be able to be done!

Professor Weinberg next introduced Dr. Winfred Wilke who is a program director at the IBM Almaden Research Center in San Jose, California. Dr. Wilke, like the rest of this prestigious panel has too many accomplishments and accolades to note in this article, but one giant note is that Dr. Wilke was the project manager to (Victor and Vulcan) which became the precursors to the IBM SP line of massively parallel supercomputers. Today, about 30 percent of the world’s 500 fastest supercomputers are SP machines. Additionally, Dr. Wilke’s work in Lithium-Ion Batteries

(see http://www.almaden.ibm.com/institute/resources/2009/presentations/WinfriedWilcke-AlmadenInstitute2009.pdf )

and other energy storage schemes is something that will affect us all in the coming years and Green Initiatives leading towards renewable energies. When asked by Prof. Weinberg, Dr. Wilke noted that by 2050 we would see electric motors powerful enough to fly a commercial airliner with a zero carbon footprint. I believe him!

The next panelist was Tom Zimmerman who is known as the creator of what we call “Virtual Reality” by inventing the Data Glove that sold over a million units for IBM. If you’ve seen the Tom Cruise movie “Minority Report”, then you have seen one of Tom’s inventions. As a matter of fact, Tom Zimmerman has over 30 patents with IBM. He believes that there is a Synthetic Immortality and that we will see Automated Taxis in our lifetime. It’s something like what he calls “where the bits meet the flesh.” Mr. Zimmerman also believes that Space is Not the Final Frontier – the Ocean is!

One thing I can tell you about Tom Zimmerman is that not only is he cool for his inventions and ability to transcend the ordinary, but he is a also a real humanitarian who provides real work and effort to help those starting out. Mr. Zimmerman founded and directs the Extreme Science Program at the Latino College Preparatory Academy (LCPA) in East San Jose, a hands-on after-school science enrichment program to encourage young people to pursue careers in science and engineering.

Next on this prestigious panel is Dr. Melissa Cefkin, a business and design anthropologist with experience in research, management, teaching and consulting specializing in workplace ethnography, services research, product and service design and deployment, organizational change management, and learning research and program development. This Fulbright Award Grantee not only makes sure that all of the people within an organization play nice together, she makes sure that the environment they work in is conducive to good business.

Dr. Cefkin not only sees a future where the environment will react to human emotion and reflect those emotions through color, textures and overall “feel. “ I’m sure that Drs. Cefkin and Eigler could collaborate and actually build the perfect “Holodeck” as was used for R&R on Star Trek.

The next panel member was perhaps the most “outrageous” of them all. He is Dr. John Cohn, self proclaimed “Mad Scientist” who can fix anything electronic and design faster and better than McGiver. Dr. Cohn was recognized as IBM’s premier technical leader in electronic design automation (EDA) technology and for innovation in the design of microprocessors, system-on-a-chip solutions, and technology enablement services.

His enthusiasm for all things Science is clear from the moment you meet him and his sense of humor is first class. At one point of the discussion, this Carnegie Mellon/M.I.T. graduate pulled out a headband that he made with flashing L.E.D. lights in multi-colors that had the audience on the floor with laughter.

Last spring, he was named an IBM Fellow, joining the prestigious circle that has received the company’s highest technical honor. There have only been 193 IBM Fellows in the past 43 years, including 62 active Fellows in a company of nearly 300,000 employees. His work in Integrated Circuits, Cloud Computing and extraordinary ability to think outside the box has made him a celebrity on many levels. In fact, you can catch Dr. Cohn on the Discovery Channel’s “The Colony” where he along with other “survivors” lives in an abandoned downtown Los Angeles warehouse. It is there that this simulated post global viral disaster plays out and a very special group of people do everything that they can to survive.

Finally, the last but certainly not least panel member is Dr. Irving Wladawsky-Berger who is an expert in emerging technologies, former co-chair of President Clinton’s Information Technology Advisory Committee and Chairman Emeritus of IBM’s Academy of Technology. This Cuban born scientist retired from IBM in 2007 after 37 years. However, in his emeritus role with the IBM Academy, he will continue to participate in a number of technical strategy and innovation initiatives.  At MIT, he is involved in multi-disciplinary research and teaching activities focused on how information technologies are helping transform business organizations and the institutions of society. His work in supercomputing, grid and parallel computing has all lead the way towards what we now know as Cloud Computing or The Internet (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_computing ). This new way of removing the need for specific hardware and software at the client level allows us all as end users to take advantage of global resources shared over the Internet.

Dr. Wladawsky-Berger has much to proud of throughout his long career with IBM as well as his academic achievements and contributions. However, he is most proud of his being named the 2001 Hispanic Engineer of the year.

The evening was a tremendous success and was a great opportunity for the USC students, faculty and this writer to meet with some of the people that are certainly responsible for many of the greatest innovations of the 20^th century. “It’s an exchange we hope will fuel the imagination on both sides of the collaboration,” said Professor Richard Weinberg, Ph.D.

For more information:

About IBM
For more information, visit www.research.ibm.com/theworldin2050

About the School of Cinematic Arts

For more information, visit http://cinema.usc.edu