How ‘Star Trek’ helped invent the future

Star Trek first beamed into our lives at 8:30 p.m. on Sept. 8, 1966, and the science fiction world was never the same. The show, though canceled after just three seasons, went on to become a lasting pop culture phenomenon that has spawned an entertainment empire, with movies, spinoffs, merchandise, and a fan following that few intellectual properties can match. But Star Trek proved to be more than just an entertainment property. The technology the show imagined inspired many future developers to try to recreate the gadgets they saw growing up. And some of those fantastical devices have become part of daily life, even if we’re still a long way from launching our own five-year mission to explore strange new worlds. Here’s some of the on-screen technology that has become real. Communicators Captain Kirk and crew stayed in touch with each other and the Enterprise via a handheld device that flipped open. Modern technology managed to replicate that by 1989, with the release of the first Motorola StarTAC phone, and arguably perfected it with the Razr in 2004. The technology, of course, has continued to improve, and the “communicators” we carry today, in the form of iPhones and the wide a…