Post by Attero Dominatus on Jul 26, 2011 23:01:40 GMT -5
A matter replicator would change the world, we thought. No more vast, patchwork mess of mines, refineries, factories, distribution networks or money to pay for it all, or massive armed encampments to protect the whole mess, or the wars that came with them.
Anything and everything could be made for free. Demands go in, and goods come out. No more food shortages, no more laws of supply and demand, no more inflation or deflation. No more territory to fight wars over, no more money to earn or lose. Just a perfect life for everyone.
There was one little problem, however; the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. The more accuracy you have in locating that proton for use in building that perfect girl to be your love slave -- or that electron for the hydrogen you need for produce drinking water -- the more likely it would be somewhere else... right next to you, the next town over, out in the Pacific ocean, near the surface of the moon, even inside the sun or on the other side of the universe! Surely, there had to be away to compensate for that!
Cooling the replicator device to just a few octillionths of a degree above absolute zero improve accuracy, and people were all too willing to hand money over to us, going so far as to donating or selling their most prized possessions. It was truly an example of people giving their all for the common good, but each improvement cost more than the last and gave ever diminishing advances.
The people began to starve, but still they gave us what little left they had. Utopia was just around the corner and the ends justified any means, so we stole every last possession, and after a couple of years achieved quantum teleportation!
We changed the world. There was no one left.
Anything and everything could be made for free. Demands go in, and goods come out. No more food shortages, no more laws of supply and demand, no more inflation or deflation. No more territory to fight wars over, no more money to earn or lose. Just a perfect life for everyone.
There was one little problem, however; the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. The more accuracy you have in locating that proton for use in building that perfect girl to be your love slave -- or that electron for the hydrogen you need for produce drinking water -- the more likely it would be somewhere else... right next to you, the next town over, out in the Pacific ocean, near the surface of the moon, even inside the sun or on the other side of the universe! Surely, there had to be away to compensate for that!
Cooling the replicator device to just a few octillionths of a degree above absolute zero improve accuracy, and people were all too willing to hand money over to us, going so far as to donating or selling their most prized possessions. It was truly an example of people giving their all for the common good, but each improvement cost more than the last and gave ever diminishing advances.
The people began to starve, but still they gave us what little left they had. Utopia was just around the corner and the ends justified any means, so we stole every last possession, and after a couple of years achieved quantum teleportation!
We changed the world. There was no one left.
