Since humanity began, we have wondered what the world will be like in the future. In less than a month, we will be in 2020. Did you guess what previous generations predicted for us in the second decade of the 21st century? We can say that, although we have seen many impressive technological advances, it is not quite the world of flying cars that people imagined we would have by now.
1. We will have monkey drivers, by the RAND Corporation, a global think tank that contributed to the space program and the development of the internet, in 1994;
2. All roads will become tubes, by Popular Mechanics, in 1957;
3. We will finally reach Mars, by Wired Magazine, in 1997;
4. We will live in flying houses, by inventor, science writer, and futurist Arthur C. Clarke – who co-wrote the script for 2001: A Space Odyssey, in 1966;
5. And our houses will be cleaned by hoses, by Popular Mechanics, in 1950;
6. We will eat candy made from underwear, by Popular Mechanics, in 1950;
7. We will have both telepathy and teleportation, by Michael J. O’Farrell, founder of The Mobile Institute, in 1985;
8. Mail will be sent by rocket, by Postmaster General Arthur E. Summerfield, in 1959;
9. We will have personal helicopters, by Popular Mechanics, in 1951;
10. C, X, and Q will not be part of the alphabet, by John Elfreth Watkins Jr., curator of mechanical technology at the Smithsonian Institution, in 1900;
11. All women will be built like wrestlers, by Dorothy Roe, writer for the Associated Press, in 1950;
12. Human feet will become just one big toe, by a surgeon named Richard Clement Lucas at the Royal College of Surgeons of England, in 1911;
13. We will wear antenna hats and disposable socks, by product designer Gilbert Rhode for British Vogue, in 1939;
14. Everything will be made of steel, by Thomas Edison for the Miami Metropolis, in 1911;
15. We will be able to vote electronically from home, by Schwartz and Leyden for Wired, in 1997;
16. Everyone will stop drinking coffee and tea, by Nikola Tesla for Vogue, in 1937;
17. There will be “blood banks” for teeth, by journalist Lester David for Modern Mechanix Magazine, in 1947;
18. Everyone will be vegetarian, by Gustav Bischoff, former president of the American Meat Packers Association, in 1913;
19. But also, eating will no longer be necessary, by futurist and computer scientist Ray Kurzweil, in 2005;
20. We will have robots as therapists, by global trends expert Ariane Van de Ven;
21. Vacuum cleaners will be powered by nuclear energy, by Alex Lewyt, former president of Lewyt Vacuum Company, in 1955;
22. No one will work and everyone will be rich, by Time magazine, in 1966;
23. There will be no need for futurists to predict the future, by Dave Evans, the chief futurist at Cisco Visual Networking;
And the coming decades? Perhaps we will communicate with deceased relatives via virtual reality; or our kitchen will be able to restock itself; perhaps pills will be able to cure cancer; an asteroid “may” destroy us all, and we will have to leave Earth.
It’s that time of year again. How do you see us in the future?
Source: Bestlife