Everyone can fly! Now what?

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The Gnome King

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shadowstriker86 said:
So, imagine if a midget fell into a tank of purple kool-aid and got struck by lightning, causing a planetwide effect, unlocking the ability to fly for everyone on the planet! It's Peter Pan style by the way, just think of a happy thought and you're off!

So now what? How will this affect air travel? Or rather everything? Your thoughts?
This is so sad. The first thought that popped into my head:

"Oh sh!t... now all of our friends will be able to travel here and pop by uninvited for visits that much easier."

Wow, we're isolated.
 

The Code

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Shipping people everywhere via plane, car, and boat would be essentially dead, illegal immigration would skyrocket (no pun intended), and conventional travel would only be used for shipping large amounts of materials and supplies. The world would be changed forever and I think it would be awesome. I'll admit I'd be kind of sad that Jetpacks won't be invented, but I can still fly so it's all good.
 

DyqstARD

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I'd be surprised if there was order of any kind as crime would just skyrocket to the goddamn moon, and there's nothing they can do because I doubt there is technology that can catch a flying human.
 

TheDoctor455

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shadowstriker86 said:
So, imagine if a midget fell into a tank of purple kool-aid and got struck by lightning, causing a planetwide effect, unlocking the ability to fly for everyone on the planet! It's Peter Pan style by the way, just think of a happy thought and you're off!

So now what? How will this affect air travel? Or rather everything? Your thoughts?
Given the rules you just put in there...

that would make spotting those suffering from grief, loss, depression, or just general melancholy A LOT easier to identify.

Also means I probably couldn't fly.

Have a hard time thinking, let alone sustaining 'happy thoughts'.
 

Alcamonic

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I know what most people would do. Undress pants, find a bird and launch projectile fecal matter, the wet the better. NOW WE'RE EVEN!
 

Spiritofpower

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How fast can we go? Or, more precisely, how much thrust can we generate? Is it dependent on how happy we feel? Do we use up energy by doing this? How many scientists will commit suicide now that any random schmuck can break thermodynamics?

Because depending on how those questions are answered we might be able to channel super-happy people into interstellar near-light travel. And also infinite energy.
 

shadowstriker86

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Spiritofpower said:
How fast can we go? Or, more precisely, how much thrust can we generate? Is it dependent on how happy we feel? Do we use up energy by doing this? How many scientists will commit suicide now that any random schmuck can break thermodynamics?

Because depending on how those questions are answered we might be able to channel super-happy people into interstellar near-light travel. And also infinite energy.
Well since i started it with peter pan rules, may as well keep it by that same render. I don't even think flying made them tired. I took a look at the disney version and i'd say the speed limit is probably around 120 mph given how much the human body can endure without special equipment. If you need to know why use google, wikipedia or just watch the first 1/2 or 1/3 of The Right Stuff. Happy thoughts are only needed to take off, not for sustained flight. The way I see it, the only way you could fall is if you fall asleep but even then if you're having a nice dream you might stay afloat, although there should be some debate on that.
 

JasonBurnout16

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Well I'd like to think, at the most extreme, that we'd no longer be split up into countries. If travel is made that much easier, no one's going to need a passport, or to pay for travel or anything like that. That would also mean airlines go bust within a week, or have to make it so that all they're transporting is goods now.
 

Specter Von Baren

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Airlines would still be used. Saying that airlines would go away is like saying cars shouldn't be around because we can walk. You may be able to fly, and you may be able to get places quicker, but you're still going to want protection from the elements and the ability to take stuff with them.

I think it would effect transportation a lot less than anyone thinks it would, essentially. If something were to no longer be a viable market then I think the first thing to go would be ladders.

Strangely, the first thing it makes me think of is how much easier mundane tasks will be. Cleaning, getting things in high places, not needing a chair, ect.
 

C F

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Well, the first thing I'd figure out is how fast I could fly unaided, and then with protective equipment like a motorcycle helmet. Wind in your face at speeds of 60mph or greater is quite unpleasant. Assuming I could clock a couple hundred, it might be hard to even breathe.

Depending on the speeds, passenger air travel might not be fazed out. The travel industry on a whole would be wrecked though. There's a lot of people like taxi cab drivers and rail-car workers and bus drivers and little local kids with scooters giving rides to tourists in third world countries that make money off of transporting people. That would be hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people worldwide that would need to find another way to earn a living. I'm sure a lot of other industries would be affected to, though probably not to the same extent.

ffs-dontcare said:
Also, governments would step in and try to regulate flying even further so as to save the airlines. It would probably be illegal to "lift off" and land anywhere other than an airport.

Basically, the conspiracy theorist in me suspects oil companies and corporations affected by the emergence of this new-found superpower would pressure governments to implement bureaucratic measures which would allow them to restrict us common folk while preventing themselves from losing money (and more than likely allowing them to make further profits) due to said superpower.
The good news is: you're wrong! Oil companies are just as dead too, and I'd give them at MOST a year of stalling before they're forced to step down from their high horse and downsize to accommodate for the concept of the automobile being taken almost entirely out of commission. And that's if they're both dumb enough to try AND lucky enough to last that long. I'd give them three months at most. The smart ones would start liquidizing assets and pulling contingency plans immediately.

And the airline industry could try to motion for a law, but they don't have quite the same influence as the oil barons to move it along, and the bill would probably be stuck pending in congress long enough to see serious harm from their lack of profits.

Plus, personal liftoff regulations can't even come close to being enforceable. What's the police-to-citizen ratio again? Oh, right. Somewhere between 1:300 and 1:Frozen hell. On the very off chance a law like that DOES pass here in America, it won't last long before it's repealed.
Prohibition was a better idea than that.
 

Evil Smurf

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Then I'd do the parkour+flying I do in Saints Row 4 in real life. Trips to uni would be more fun.
 

NoOne852

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Now? Now we ride!

...or not... because you know... we can fly now >_>

But depending on how fast exactly you can fly, this could simplify many things, and would probably be very helpful overall...assuming people didn't immediately start using this ability for rather unethical uses.
 

Miss G.

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Risingblade said:
Crime rates would soar.
And so would my blood pressure. I'm pretty sure I'd be having anxiety attacks a lot more than usual if this were to happen. It'd be like all those nightmares of falling come true, except that I won't be able to escape it without resorting to more permanent means.
 

2012 Wont Happen

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Wars would be a lot more tactically complex, and soldiers would be given MDMA in battle so they could keep thinking happy thoughts while warring so they could fly to maneuver.

Also raves would be even more chaotic.
 

Scarim Coral

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Depend on a few things like by having the ability of flight, would our resistance to cold temperature increase too? If we don't have that then I guess some designer will make a flight suit which would be a thermal suit aswell to travel that high in the sky, otherwise everyone will be a low flyer.

Other than that I guess they will have to make some entrance on the roof that has a door access in the first place and I guess the government would try to create some kind of a sky route which would fail.