Museum of Science and Industry Chicago New Exhibit

Perhaps I should wait until I've seen this to write about it, but a new permanent exhibit has opened at the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry, titled Fast Forward ... Inventing the Future. It looks to be a very interesting exhibit, and I'm looking forward to getting up there and seeing it.

It apparently features exhibits including one on a single occupant electric automobile that has a range of about 30 miles, and can reach speeds of up to 75 mph, a "food replicator" which would take coded information about food and "create" it in a processor, technology that could be useful for sustaining astronauts on long spaceflights, and vertical farming, where crops would be raised indoors and on elevated floors of a high rise farm. There are several other interesting exhibits, also.

I've read some discussion about whether EPCOT's mission should be to educate or to entertain, and while I've always voted "both", it's a fair question as to whether places like the Museum of Science and Industry and other science learning centers around the country do education so much better that it doesn't make sense to create a tourist destination with this as it's main goal.

Whatever the answer to this question, places like this can provide inspiration for the future.

There is also a Fast Forward podcast avaliable at the Museum of Science and Industry's website.