Regular readers won't be surprised to learn that
the first book I read on the Kindle was 20,000
Leagues Under the Sea. There's something
so right about reading a century-old tale -- whose narrator is enthralled with
the power of electricity -- on a device that's a pretty darn enthralling use of
electricity.
That said, in exploring how the image of
technology and the future has changed over time, few books are as influential
as this one. Some observations:
1. Captain Nemo's built himself a utopia.
Consider that he says the Nautilus is out of reach from tyrants and built so
well that it can't be damaged by nature. Nemo says he's never been as
free as when he put himself inside the sub. There's a library with nearly
unlimited information. The ocean provides an unlimited amount of food.
Everyone's healthy thanks to the constant temperature and fresh sea air.
Electricity, described as providing light "more uniform and continuous
than the sun" and behaving "more obedient than gas" provides an
unlimited amount of power. Sounds like every other golden
age longed for through time, but this one is all thanks to
technology--and especially electricity.
2. The constant use of extreme detail in the book,
going on for pages and pages about what the fish look like and rattling off
measurements, give the fantasy parts of the book much more credence.
It’s a lesson on the benefits of getting granular when selling a vision of the
future.
3. There's a great passage where, on behalf of
science, Verne snobbily says, "It was Tasman who discovered this group in
1643, the year Torricelli invented the barometer and Louis
XIV mounted the throne. I leave the reader to decide
which of these events has been more useful to the human
race." This wasn't the
first time an innovator scoffed at a politician, but it’s certainly one of the
sharpest. Food for thought for those
innovation v. public policy debates that break out every so often.
