by Sarah Salas

Created on: February 19, 2009   Last Updated: February 22, 2009

Anyone who has watched science fiction movies has probably been blown away by the amazing inventions and scientific discoveries on screen. However in real life, sometimes things don't turn out quite how we would imagine them. Here is my list of the top ten things that science fiction got wrong:

10. Virtual Reality. Movies like 1994's Strange Days promised us a world in which we could experience anything. All we would have to do is pop in a disk we would be living, feeling and experiencing a whole other life. While VR and simulations have definitely improved, we are still far from finding Utopian bliss in a compact disc.

9. Flying cars. This was always my favorite sci-fi prediction. I'm still driving a Hyundai with four wheels.

8. Time travel. I was first introduced to time travel when an older cousin took me to see Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. I was about 6 and time travel seemed perfectly logical to me. While still a compelling theory, I haven't taken any trips to visit Cleopatra or King Arthur, how about you?

7. Disease Eradication. Many future sci-fi communities have mastered the eradication of disease (of course sometimes it goes horrible wrong-see I am Legend). Unfortunately for all of us, this is one prediction we are all still waiting to come true.

6. Big-Brother. While the government has become more intrusive, and there are cameras everywhere, we have not yet come to a 1984 Brave New world government control. Yet.

5. Computers. In most science fiction from before 1970, computers are large and nothing like the common PC's and Macs found in homes all over the world.

4. Vacations on Mars. From Star Trek to Planet of the Apes, space travel should by all sci-fi accounts be much further ahead by now. Space travel has not made much progress since the 1960's and 1970's and I have yet to book my vacation on Mars.

3. Beam me up! Who didn't want Scottie to beam them up? The ultimate in quick travel, alas this one seems to have fallen to the way side of scientific exploration. Still a cool idea though.

2. Aliens among us. To the best of my knowledge there are no aliens among us. At least none that are acknowledged. Of course there are celebrities we all wonder about, but there is no thriving space alien community which has brought riches and intellectual advances to the general (non-alien) race.

1. Apocalypse. Thank heavens this one has not played out. When nuclear technology was discovered, paranoia took hold in many sci-fi writers minds. Yet here we all. I guess we can all be thankful for this one.

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