The computer mouse has been a stable since 1984 when it was popularized on the Macintosh computer. And has gone relatively unquestioned since. However, the mouse also prevents us from doing many things. Like what, you might ask? Well, doing those things that we now commonly do with touch-screen tablets  and phones.
A computer mouse, regardless of its number of buttons is still a mouse. That means it operates one cursor at one spot on one display. While UIs (user interfaces) have gotten creative with the ever-growing number of mouse buttons, wheels, and clicks, I view the device as going from one to two to three to five to absurd numbers of actionable pressure sensitive spots on a deck-of-cards sized forever-horizontally limited symbolic object trying desperately to mimic a vertically imprisoned arrowhead. Mostly the additional buttons on a mouse operate other features in a faster pathway, but still there are only so many buttons one can keep track of, program, and install updated drivers.
But today, we are learning to love a faster, simpler, and arguably more natural interface using gestures with one or more fingers. While four fingers seems to be the limit right now, possibly because we only have four fingers, the combination of swiping in four directions (up, down, left, right) with one, two, three, or four fingers give sixteen obvious possible combinations. But wait there’s more! Gestures include pinching, stretching, tapping (single, double, triple), and two and three finger rotation (left and right). While not all combinations work together right now, it is clear that the number of possible communications signals that can be sent to the computer from a few activations of a couple muscles operating one hand can be turned into hundreds of possible meanings.
And that’s just one motion going one way. If the computer could respond with submenus (which it can) or pressure sensitivity (which is possible in some programs) or even acceleration which proportions the speed of the gesture with its active effect or duration which are common preferences, the level of control is truly infinite.  And all that with just one hand…and without a thumb! I can easily imagine a dual surface vertically positioned pinch interface system giving the opposable digit we are so proud of as a species (well Order anyway) a useful computing purpose beyond punching squares on a tiny keyboard, or sharing a oversized space bar with yet another thumb.
So what does all this mean to science education? Well, I would like to posit that much of the imagination behind our science education teaching with technology is mouse-driven and therefore suffers from two-dimensional thinking. If we could free ourselves from the excruciatingly limited choices of the computer mouse, we might open an entirely new world of rich, interactive content.  Imagine navigating the periodic table like you can Google Earth! Imagine moving thorough a complex spreadsheet of data as if you were diving in and out and around a high-resolution photography.
What is the gain? Three things come to mind. First, it will allow a customized presentation (or perspective) of information for the user. Second, it will present the data in ways that will likely allow new discoveries from the same information set. And third, it will spur new, more powerful ways to present, share and manage information.
While the visual computing of Hollywood with the immersion of Minority Report and puppeteer speed of Iron Man coming to mind, it might seem like the wild and visionary techniques for engineering and statistics are a long way off. But as gesture-controlled computing gains traction in school environments, I’d bet the objects of science fiction dreams might be closer than they appear.