When I read articles either online or in Scientific American, I think about how the research and theories behind those articles might influence our lives in the future. This is not as simple as it sounds.

For example, flying cars have been a mainstay of Science Fiction stories for quite a while. The writers of these stories viewed the technology of their times and extrapolated that flying cars would be technically feasible in the future. Whether or not the production of a device is possible is not the only obstacle to its implementation. It must fill a need. It must be cost effective. It must be controllable. It must be marketable. Flying cars fail one of these requirements; they are not controllable. Can you imagine your next-door neighbor at the controls of an aircraft? How long would it take before you would be picking pieces of that neighbor out of the side of your house? For there to be flying cars, there would need to be some system of altitude control that would prevent the added dimension of movement from increasing the level of danger. This could be accomplished by equipping the cars with governors that only allow altitude changes at certain locations and that would separate these altitudes into distinct strata. This would establish a computer generated system of passageways through the air that allow traffic congestion to be alleviated by spreading it across different elevations. The system also would have to assure that the cars did not run out of fuel or fail while in the air. Maybe this will be practical some day, but I do not see today's average driver graduating to pilot status anytime in the foreseeable future.

So no air cars in my stories.