What may happen in the following century, by the year 2001!

[Mitsukara]

http://img253.imageshack.us/img253/1248/aaach3.jpg

I found this interesting thing posted on another forum and figured people here might enjoy it. It's a bunch of predictions from (I assume; it wasn't dated) 1901, stating broadly what kind of changes America could expect by the year 2001. A few bits are accurate, and some are funny. It also seems that in the 1900s, electricity was magic kinda like radiation in the 50s and black holes/dark matter/genetic engineering seems to be regarded today.

It's kind of interesting that they put such weighty expectations on electricity considering that it obviously did enable major technological changes and daily life changes, just not in the way they expected (what with digital technology especially). I'm a bit baffled at it's talk of "telephoning operas" to preserve music; didn't the phonograph exist yet?

They also apparently expected life to become more artificially-dictated, with wild animals vanishing and all useful/edible plants becoming super gigantic. Sadly, they expected the life expectancy to grow to 50 as opposed to the contemporary 35- yikes. Automobiles were fully expected to become heavily used, but they also predicted that they wouldn't clog city streets; airplanes were more or less expected, but to be impractical and rarely used.

X, C, and Q were predicted to no longer be in use.

Very interesting stuff, I thought ^^

[Aegix Drakan]

:P Wow. This is pretty funny.

Growing veggies by electricity? NO MOSQUITOS?!?

:laughing: Like we could EVER get rid of those pests...And if we did, there would be an imbalance in nature.

Now wasps...those serve no purpose, and I wouldn't mind them being exterminating.

[Yoshiman]

There will be no C, X, or Q
So guys, did you all hear that the Kween kan't get her eks-rays done?


A man or woman unable to walk ten miles at a stretch will be regarded as a weakling.
Or be regarded as a typical American. :p


There will be Air-Ships
... In Final Fantasy.


A university education will be free to every man and woman.
College tuition says otherwise. :<

[phattonez]

Well a few of these are right, except that we lag behind with speed of trains, and it takes an hour to go 10 miles from the suburbs. Everybody will walk 10 miles? Haha, we have gotten lazier because of cars. Free education? Haha, how about large plants, that's going to happen. Genetically modified foods have already made that happen.

[ZTC]

Interesting find.

[mikeron]

A lot of those are actually quite accurate. As for airships, they do exist (Hindenburg, anyone?), and there's a German company working on huge ones for cargo right now.

[phattonez]

^^Would that create less pollution than cargo ships? This would be great, but where would they land, where's the infrastructure for something like that? Sound like a good idea though, depending on how much it can haul.

[mikeron]

^^Would that create less pollution than cargo ships? This would be great, but where would they land, where's the infrastructure for something like that? Sound like a good idea though, depending on how much it can haul.

http://www.aerospace-technology.com/projects/cargolifter/
Apparently, they had financial problems, but I'm fairly certain the development goes on, because I keep hearing about contracts.

http://www.aeroscraft.com/
This is a cool project that involves a hybrid (airship with wings).

[Grasshopper]

We may not have "airships" like they have imagined, but we do have airplanes.

Free university educations? Maybe not to everyone, but we do have things like scholarships, grants, and other means of financial aid, where some you don't have to pay back.

[MasterSwordUltima]

I'm pretty sure by air-ships they just meant a large vehicle that travels predominantly through the air, and what was their largest vehicle back then? A ship. So what do you call a ship that goes through the air? Air-ship! [lmao, Ocean-Ship :O]

I'm also sure that the Telephoning Operas was RADIO. Or even Records, as that seems more closely related to that stuff.

My favorite part was how building a house in bricks would become illegal. Same with having food out in fresh-air in a store. Brilliant job, Mr. Watkins, absolutely brilliant.
[notices that it was published in The Ladies' Home Journal...O_o]

[Breaker]

notice how nobody predicted that women would be able to vote

[MasterSwordUltima]

Or anything to do with slavery.

[The_Amaster]

Wow, some of those are scarily accurate. I mean, the world wide telephone was just an expansion. But the fast outside eateries? McDonalds anyone?

And then there were the just impossible ones. All animals domesticated. Yeah right.

[Breaker]

Or anything to do with slavery.

In January 1865, Congress passed the 13th Amendment, abolishing slavery. This was written in 1901. Women were granted the right to vote in 1920.

[Toolie]

These are such stunningly accurate predictions that I'm actually a bit skeptical to the validity of this article. Has anyone done any research or have any proof for this? I suppose I'm a bit lazy to do it myself.

Assuming this is true, these are wonderfully insightful predictions. Even the predictions such as a phonetic written language were seriously attempted during the twentieth century, and still are, in languages like Simple English and Esperanto.

Looking forward, what are some reasonable proposals for the next century? If you think about the Internet, we are still manufacturing "Model-T" versions of network switches, computers, and satellites. During the twenty-first century, these networks will mature and blossom into an all-encompassing blanket of sensors and communicators that almost completely covers every square meter of Earth. For every person there will be thousands to hundreds of thousands electronic sensors per individual, measuring environmental conditions, physiological diagnostics, and all types of social communications. With 12 to 15 billion people, we could see thousands of trillions of sensors. If you were to take each human being and its sensors as a single neuron, by the end of the twenty-first century, the Earth will start "waking up" with its primitive electronic global ganglion and be well on its way to biological self-awareness, able to boldly say to the other bodies in space "I exist". Computational capacity available to each person by the turn of the twenty-second century will meet or exceed the current computational capacity of the entire planet.

Industrialized societies will continue to increase their quality of life and lengthen their lifespans with a steady onslaught of advances made by biology and geneticists. What happened with physics and electronics in the twentieth century will pale in comparison to the revolution and golden age of biology that will happen in the twenty-first. In the twentieth century, we increased our lifespan by thirty years. We will reach a biological "escape velocity" by the end of the twenty-first century if we can increase our average lifespans by one year or more for every calendar year. As new problems arise afflict individuals, medicine will be able to cure these problems before they become fatal. This will leave humans with indefinite lifespans.

Politically, it becomes more speculative. Commercial exploitation of low-earth orbit will probably become profitable. Deeper-space mining and mineral exploits may become profitable as well. Depression, mental ailments, and social problems will probably increase as humans accelerate further away from their natural state and into the digital realm.

[Toolie]

Hat tip to the good people at The Straight Dope for this gem - if you were wondering as I was about this article's authenticity:

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=447557

It seems like it checks out. Interesting!

[DarkDragoonX]

notice how nobody predicted that women would be able to vote

Well, I mean, obviously, right? That would just be silly!