5 Technologies That Prove We've Caught Up With Star Wars

Two droids were introduced back in 2009 which closely mimicked both the function and appearance of C3PO and R2D2, our favorite ambiguously gay duo (can you be gay without a gender? C3PO says, "Oh my, yes!"). First up, the 3PO clone, Wakamaru:

Wakamaru is a Japanese-built robot butler: It serves you food, makes calls for you and keeps note of your schedule with friendly reminders. With its built-in phone, Wakamaru can call emergency services if you are in danger or your doctor if you need medical attention. For patients in need of constant care, Wakamauru's eyes can be programmed to transmit everything it sees into an Internet live stream, so that medical staff or family members can keep an eye on you. And though it's not quite a translation bot, Wakumaru is good with languages, just like C3P0: It has the ability to understand commands in virtually any tongue, because it's been programmed with an international dictionary. Now, all we're waiting for is the dang Chinese to finish up work on that prissiness chip, and we're in business.

On to the only mime that anybody has ever loved, R2D2: Replicas of the plucky droid have been on the market for ages, but all they would do is beep, swivel or, at most, tell time. Not so with PaPeRo.

Developed as a "cute" media accessible robot, PaPeRo does the same kind of stuff as R2 -- which is to say: everything. PaPeRo (an acronym for partner-type personal robot) can access your email and read aloud any unread messages. It can also access social-networking sites and keep you abreast of any status updates. And if you're bored, you can ask PaPeRo to dance or play a game with you. PaPeRo also has two webcams in place of eyes so it can establish video chats with other people around the world, it has four microphones to detect and understand voice commands, and its chest is an ultrasound device for navigation (yes, it moves around and everything). Not convinced of its R2-ness? Well, just like R2D2, PaPeRo also understands human beings far beyond simple voice recognition. It's been programmed to detect stress levels in your voice and respond accordingly. If you yell at it, it can ignore you. If you're nice to it, maybe it'll do some work for you. Yes, we've finally done it: We've programmed a robot capable of insolence.

In Star Wars: A New Hope, Luke hops on to his landspeeder and zooms out to the dessert to chill with a possibly murderous hermit (not the brightest lightsaber in the rack, that guy). But at least he thinks to bring along his special augmented-reality binoculars -- ones that give him enhanced range and detailed feedback about whatever he's looking at. That's one of the more mundane inventions in Star Wars, but it's also one of the most useful in reality. For the past couple years, DARPA has been working on super binoculars that can do everything Luke's could, and more.

And, like Luke's binoculars, they'll mainly be used to locate sand people.

DARPA's proposed binoculars would have dramatically enhanced range, much like Luke's, and they would also relay coordinates and other tactical information back to the soldier using them (again like Luke's). However, DARPA's set, tentatively dubbed Luke's Binoculars (see? We told you they were doing it on purpose), are only the first step in the project: DARPA eventually wants to expand the technology and incorporate it into their bionic eye project, the Argus II. The final goal is to also embed EEG's or brain signal transmitters into the eye, which would be able to not only warn soldiers of potential enemy combatants in their area, but also clue them in to their intentions. And this isn't one of those DARPA projects that's two parts wishing to one part neato drawings; this is actually being constructed. According to their white papers, they plan to get Luke's Binoculars in use within the next three years.

Image via DARPA
We're not sure how they'll remove these once you leave the army

The fun doesn't end at Luke's Binoculars, either. DARPA is developing a whole line of products based on Star Wars, called Luke's Devices, which includes crazy, top-secret stuff like the mysterious Luke Arm, which we couldn't tell you about, or else we'd have to kill you ...

Touch Bionics, Inc. has developed a robotic hand with never before seen sensitivity, called the I-Limb Pulse. It's a breakthrough design that not only allows for greater control, but greater strength as well: It can bear up to 200 pounds, much more than a normal hand (just be careful with your "personal time," as there is substantially less research going into superior bionic phalluses).

The big deal about the I-Limb isn't the preternatural strength, however; it's the small increments of grip it can dole out in response to electrical pulses. This allows for a smoother, more precise motion, much closer to that of a real hand. It gives such fine control, in fact, that users can do simple but intricate tasks like tying their own shoelaces. The hand has also been integrated with MyBioSim software, which allows the user to enable a Bluetooth connection to their home computer or wireless phone. You know, just in case you feel like opening up control of your supernaturally strong limbs to hackers, or handing over their function over to the trusting arms of Microsoft.

Image via Touch Bionics
Fatal errors are now terrifying literal.

In the Star Wars universe, force fields are shown as impenetrable walls of awesome sauce that keep blaster fire from harming the ships. The military defense department thought that was pretty cool, and having no concept of human limitations, decided to just up and build one. However, the Army's version is formatted to target RPGs rather than lasers and the psychic powers of interstellar farmboys. Back in 2002, they began testing these new force fields for use in Iraq on small carrier vehicles and, holy shit, the tests were successful. The force field detected all incoming attacks, and zapped the grenades with hundreds of thousands of volts of electricity, thus disarming the devices and crushing them into debris which passed safely around the vehicle.

Finally, the U.S. Military has a practical solution to the Jedi menace.

These real-life force fields are made up of a series of metal plates installed directly to the exterior of a vehicle, and they're said to offer the same protection of a tank with only 1/20th of the weight. This isn't just theoretical labwork, tested once and returned: The force-field equipped army vehicles were introduced into Iraq and Afghanistan back in 2005, and according to their producer, BaeSystems, they've successfully survived live fire many times. The fact that there's still a war at all when our enemies see that we have fucking forcefields now is either a testament to Al Qaeda's psychotic bravado, or to their extreme retardation. We assume a combination of the two.

Image via hight3ch.com
We call that combination "bretarvo"

Mohammed Shariff is a genius who graduated high school at age 15, he would have graduated at 12 but he wanted a social life. If you contact him mohammed.jaleel.shariff@gmail.com he can edit a college paper for you for a small fee.

For the implications of some of our most dreamed about sci-fi gadgetry, check out 5 Awesome Sci-Fi Inventions (That Would Actually Suck). Or learn the truth behind 7 High Tech Products And Their Cheap Ass Ingredients .