Sunday 17 September 2017

3D Printer Filament Is Reinventing Everything

By Dorothy Miller


It is doubtful that anyone could have imagined the technological breakthrough of the three-dimensional printers. Although it is still little more than a toy to most people, this toy is better than Lego blocks, erector sets, fashion plates, and real working Hot Wheels combined. With a little 3D printer filament, the boundaries of potential creation do not exist.

Those first brave souls to pry open their crate and attempt to comprehend the owners manual barely knew what they held in their hands. They learned how to be inventors for the invention, while the world slept. It was not until average people began to understand exactly how this technology could impact their lives, improve it, before the world began to take notice.

Some of the first things the world saw coming from these machines were Holiday ornaments. Some of them had lights that charged up from sunlight during the day, and many of them had minute, mechanical, moving parts that chimed as they wound their way through a universe of perpetual motion. Those ornaments were very likely the fire lit in many minds, and the technology took an amazing leap none could have foreseen.

There are many children who, for whatever reasons, are born with hands, arms, feet, limbs missing. When a parent of such a child saw these tiny machines hanging from artificial trees, ornamenting the Holidays of strangers, an idea suddenly emerged into concept. A parent made a child an artificial hand that was radically Transformers in appearance, and could be redesigned over and over as they grew.

With the expansion of the materials available for these printers, so do the ideas and objects that human beings create. Some first prototypes do not live up to their originals, such as the first musical instruments created. However, electric instruments created in this way have a most excellent sound, and some of them are unlike anything anyone has ever dreamed could be.

Clothing designers have even taken a hand at creating the first styles and designs utilizing this medium. There is no end to how this industry, and others, will be forever changed with this technology. From the mind of an artist that utilizes the hands of robotic whimsy, even our clothing is three dimensional now.

Erupting from this flood of creative flow came yet another unexpected tsunami of potential. The implications of using this type of manufacturing in order to create body parts from stem cells carries a heavy implication that our bodies could one day be self-maintained biological machines, and we can be our own mechanics. This potential for all of us to live longer and better without doctors is heavy.

Now we KNOW we will be pushed to drink because three-dimensional printing has just replaced every warehouse worker, seamstress, artisan instrument creator, and the entire medical community. It would seem that this is telling us it is time for the human race to rethink everything we ever imagined our future could be. There are no limits, but we are going to have to find some new ways to keep ourselves occupied.




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