A character in Arthur C. Clarke’s novel Fountains of Paradise remarked that the first space elevator would be built about 50 years after everybody stopped laughing at the idea. Twenty years after writing those words, the British author and scientist has revised his forecast to account for advances in technology. Speaking via satellite to an audience of scientists on the first day of the second annual Space Elevator Conference in Santa Fe on Saturday, Clarke said the elevator might be built just 10 years after people stop laughing. “I’m 86 now, so in 20 years I’ll be only 106,” he said. “So I may live to see it.”