Star Wars

About this book

For almost thirty years, the words "Star Wars" have summoned images of spaceships, super-weapons, and futuristic visions of all kinds. But George Lucas's immensely popular, vividly imagined blockbusters of life in "a galaxy far, far away" have often anticipated real-life technology right here on Earth—and this fascinating, visually irresistible book probes the amazing interface between movie magic and practical science. Today's scientists are taking Star Wars fictions and turning them into fact; travel entrepreneurs are making plans for commercial space flight, and high-tech mag-lev trains defy gravity to zoom along like Luke Sky-walker's landspeeder. As the beloved C-3PO observes in his introduction to the book, robots are now a reality, and microscopic nanobots are already performing surgery internally. In the next twenty years, human soldiers will wear exoskeletal armor like Imperial stormtroopers and carry laser weapons as lethal as any light-saber, while orbiting satellites spy on the enemy and accurately pinpoint targets thousands of miles away. These exciting advances, often fraught with peril, are explored by the book's technological experts, who consider the risky implications and possible consequences of their inventions.

Themes & subjects