Examining the 50 coolest, most stylish, and most popular futuristic inventions, this handbook peers through the lens of today’s science, looking at which ones have become reality and how they work, and which are still in the imagined future—will we ever get to ride our jetpacks? From prototype to realization, the technological evolution of each invention—such as the Star Trek communicator, which has become today’s cell phone; the robot pets of Dr. Who; Vanilla Sky's cryonics; and even Sleeper’s orgasmatron—is charted in this veritable history of the future.

Examining the 50 coolest, most stylish, and most popular futuristic inventions, this handbook peers through the lens of today’s science, looking at which ones have become reality and how they work, and which are still in the imagined future—will we ever get to ride our jetpacks? From prototype to realization, the technological evolution of each invention—such as the Star Trek communicator, which has become today’s cell phone; the robot pets of Dr. Who; Vanilla Sky's cryonics; and even Sleeper’s orgasmatron—is charted in this veritable history of the future.