Nigel P., great song. Great! / I dunno, though...the brother sez some of yer men the cosmetologists below in th' labour oratories do be thinkin' the oul' timetravellin' is jus' beyond th' horizontals above an' yer man Eenstein not out standin' on th' contraries...bedad here's me bus...

Jack the Sailor, I saw on some TV program that the KGB *had* a Shoe Phone! Well -- something like it anyway. Hidden in a shoe. Maxwell Smart, indeed. :)

Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World" (socio-politico-science-fiction?) portrayed a society in which totalitarian government used science/technology to keep the people constantly surveilled, sedated, docile, and "happy". Hmph. Among the approved entertainments was the game of Centrifugal Bumble-Puppy. Are we getting there? (Are we having fun yet?) Can't stop Progress y'know.

As I vaguely recall it, Robert A. Heinlein's "The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress" favorably presented the inhabitants of a lunar (former)penal colony as a libertarian society which, rebelling against their oppressive Terrestial overlords, catapulted rather-sizeable moonrocks to Earth (humanely targetting the oceans, I think, as warning shots) via sentient-computer computations & taking advantage of weak lunar gravity. (Whew.) The mighty moonstones hit the Terran seas with small-nuclear-bomb-like energy, like little asteroids y'know. The independent-minded, prison-colony-descended moonfolk won their freedom. / OKOK, that hasn't come true yet. But let's not send a lot of Aussies to the Moon, all right? :)

Human cloning and "designer" genetic engineering/selective breeding, for good & for ill, are going to be done despite all prohibitions. Because they *can* be. This will be a big huge deal. Lifespan may increase radically, for those with access to the science, plus the food & housing & little things like that. This may not be so great: a world dominated by Rich Old Farts.