Ｆｕｔｕｒｅ Ｗｏｒｌｄ

It’s Friday morning in the year 2025， and you’re running late. You got distracted by watching the music video that was playing in the corner of your bathroom mirror while you were brushing your teeth. How will you get to your office at Mega Giga Industries on time?

A quick check of your Internet-connected refrigerator magnet tells you your train which travels at speeds up to 250 miles an hour—is a bit behind schedule， too. So you decide to drive your environmentally hydrogen fuel cell car instead—or rather， let your car drive you. It’s programmed to know the way， and it will get you there without speeding， getting lost， or crashing.

Settling into your office chair， which changes color to match what you’re wearing， you pick up yesterday morning’s newspaper. Printed on reusable electronic paper， it instantly rewrites itself with today’s headlines. Now it’s time for your big meeting. Uh-oh! You’ve left your handwritten notes at home. No problem. The digital ink pen you used has stored an electronic copy of what you wrote.

Your wristwatch videophone suddenly rings. Your best friend’s face pops up on the organic light-emitting diode screen asking what you’re doing this weekend. Will you slap on your 3-D contact lenses and play virtual soccer with the U.S. Olympic team? No， no. Your friend says， so you have to take the new nanotube elevator (made of microscopic fibers many times stronger than steel) 60，000 miles into space.

Could this scene really take place in just a couple of decades? The researchers who are currently developing all this stuff think so. These gadgets may be as common in 20 years as cell phones and DVD players are today.

譯文：

未來世界

2025年的一個星期五早上，你眼看就要遲到了。你正在盥洗室里刷牙，卻被玻璃鏡一角正放著的音樂錄像弄得分了心。你怎樣才能按時趕到米嘉·技嘉公司上班呢？

趕快查一下電冰箱上的磁貼，那是與互聯網鏈接的。磁貼告訴你：你所要乘坐的、時速達250英里的磁懸浮列車，正好也晚點了。于是，你決定開著環保型的氫動力車去上班，或者更確切地說，讓你的車載著你去上班。這種車是經過程序設計的，知道行進方向，它可以載著你安全抵達目的地，不超速，不迷路，也不會出車禍。

你把自己舒舒服服地安頓在辦公室的椅子上，這種椅子會自動變色，好與你的衣服顏色相配。拿出一份昨天的晨報，報紙是印在可以重復使用的電子紙上的，它立刻自動換上了今天的新聞標題。好啦，你該參加一個重要會議了。哦，你把手寫筆記忘在家里了！沒問題。你用過的數字水筆已經儲存了一份相關內容的電子文本。

突然，你手表上的可視電話響了。你最要好的朋友出現在有機激光顯示屏上，問你這個周末有何打算。想戴上三維隱形眼鏡，與美國奧林匹克隊進行一場虛擬足球比賽？不，不。你朋友說，那么你們打算乘新型的納米電梯（用微纖維制成，強度比鋼高出許多倍）進入60，000英里高度的太空遨游。

再過二三十年，這一切真的會發生嗎？那些目前正在開發這些東西的研究人員對此深信不疑。20年后，這些小玩藝兒就會像今天的手機和DVD機一樣隨處可見。

Questions:

1. What kind of car do you have to drive if you don’t want to be late in 2025?

2. What are the elevator made of?

3. Do you believe if all these will happen in the future?