it's partly thanks to Captain Kirk.

In Star Trek, first broadcast in 1966,

he used a pocket-sized device to communicate with his crew.

Martin Cooper, the man who invented the mobile phone,

says the show was the inspiration for his idea,

which launched seven years later.

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos based Alexa,

the voice-activated speaker on

Star Trek's talking computer.

Transporters engaged.

Welcome aboard.

Sci-fi fan Elon Musk

is building rockets that he hopes will one day

carry people to Mars.

Submarines, helicopters, rockets, and touch screens

all appeared in science fiction

before becoming science fact.

Sci-fi inspires real world technology.

It also provides a way to explore the moral dilemmas

that advanced technologies could pose.

Paul McAuley is a scientist turned science fiction writer.

All science fiction is basically about is presence,

so it's about a heightened version of the present.

It's about anticipating where technology is going to go

and it's about our fears of where technology is going to go

and what uses or misuses we might make of that technology.

Divers information paper's ready and--

Techno world, do you need to buy a suitcase?

Utopia, huh?

You know they set up shop here, right?

Few films better encapsulate this than

Ridley Scott's 1982 cult classic Blade Runner.

The film is set in a dystopian future

where synthetic human workers are bio engineered

by a corporate power.

In London, fans are arriving for a Blade Runner

screening with a difference.

Keep moving, guys, come on.

Let's go, quickly scan.

We are in World Terminus, checkpoint 4.C

We're in Los Angeles in 2019.

Secret Cinema is a multilayer physical experience.

We build these physical sets,

creating a world inspired by a film.

So instead of just watching a film,

you literally buy a ticket, you become a character,

and you become part of an interactive theatrical experience.

Hey you lot in there!

You thirsty or what?

I think the science fiction genre allows us to dream

about another world.

We've taken the inspiration from Blade Runner

and built an entire world around it.

The film explores the ethical implications

of creating highly intelligent robots

that have thoughts, feelings, and emotions.

My wife's just back from a convention about AI,

artificial intelligence, in Cambridge.

A lot of the AI people think about what would happen

if real AI came on very powerfully

and what they'd do to us and that's one of the things

that science fiction has been exploring

for quite a long time now.

Steven Spielberg's latest movie,

Ready Player One, explores another emerging technology,

virtual reality.

The film imagines a future where overpopulation,

pollution, and climate change have forced

most people to live in sprawling, slum-like cities.

Young people escape the desolation by living much

of their lives in virtual reality.

Are you ready?

Although there is a wide gap

between the virtual world shown in the film

and the capabilities of current VR technology,

the idea that young people can get hooked

on virtual fantasies is a long-standing concern.

No, no, no, no, no!

To be compelling, science fiction

has to be convincing.

So writers and film directors enlist the help of

designers and engineers.

Syd Mead designed the look of some of Hollywood's

most seminal sci-fi films including

Blade Runner, Star Trek The Motion Picture, and Aliens.

In the real world, he's designed cars for Ford

and electronics for Philips.

Because I'm a trained designer,

I can imagine how things might be made.

People always say that my stuff looks real

even though it's futuristic.

The pods for Aliens that I designed were

real mechanical articulations.

When they opened, they looked absolutely real

for people to be in for long duration space travel.

I was hired to design the vehicles for Blade Runner.

Deckard's vehicle was, in my mind,

a decommissioned aerial limousine.

It's overlaying the familiar with the weird

and that's a surefire formula

for interesting things to look at.

Science fiction introduces

people to real world science and technology.

Some fans develop a lifelong passion.

The tech industry is led by sci-fi nerds

who are creating the things they read about

or saw on screen.

We all stand to benefit from their creations.

Provided, that is, they can avoid the ethical pitfalls

depicted in science fiction.