Chris Lites
Bio
Masters Degree in Writing and Publishing from DePaul University. Book reviewer at The Rumpus. Short stories available on Amazon.
Stories (2)
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Why 3D Printing Will Change the World
1984, Orwell’s prophetic year of Big Brother, saw the release of the Mac which broke the idea that centralized control could ever be what it was before. That year also saw the first workable prototype for a 3D printer. Built by Charles Hull, the technology was then known as stereolithography. We know it as 3D printing, and that’s a term that covers a variety of different processes which may revolutionize all stages of the global manufacturing and distributing process. In that very science fictional year, Hull set off a revolution that is only now seeing fruition. 3D printing continues to threaten the social and economic structures which preceded it. When we speak about 3D printing, we’re speaking of a general technique of printing successive layers to form a three dimensional object at the end. From powder to paper to human tissue, these thin membranes are laid down like the construction of a plaster mask. From that simple concept, the 3D printer offers the reverse of Ford’s mass production revolution. Printing one item is now as cost effective in some cases as manufacturing a thousand items in the traditional way.
By Chris Lites9 years ago in Futurism
Can We Live on Venus?
Floating cities on Venus; it sounds like something Hugo Gernsback would have published in the pulp era of science fiction, but colonizing the second planet from the sun may not be as impossible as is widely believed. Despite Dantean-like surface conditions with temperatures that can melt lead, and atmospheric pressure equal to being under 3,000 feet of water, there remains a plausible place humanity might be able to exist—not on the surface but in the atmosphere above.
By Chris Lites10 years ago in Futurism
