Tuesday, December 4, 2007

Old-time futurism

Alexander Rose, from the Long Now Foundation points us to an article from the Ladies' Home Journal, published in 1900: "What May Happen in the Next 100 Years." Some of the predictions seem remarkably prescient, such as "Photographs will be telegraphed from any distance" or "Wireless telephone and telegraph circuits will span the world." Others, comically wrong ("Everyone will walk 10 miles a day"). A few are just bizarre, especially the author's obsession with gigantic food (peas as large as beets, strawberries the size of apples, and "One cantaloup [sic] will supply an entire family." WTF?)

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the author is most accurate where he is extrapolating from well established technologies of the day. Predicting that the telephone, telegraph, and railroad would all get better is pretty safe. His population forecasts are pretty good, but they are a bit high because he failed to predict the drop in fertility rates that accompanied industrialization. He does less well with technologies like aviation, which had not yet taken hold, vastly underestimating their prominence. Technologies yet unimagined in 1900, such as transistors and integrated circuits, are completely absent from his predictions, and when it comes to cultural trends he is all over the map.

Contemporary futurists can take some lessons from these predictions. Incremental improvements to existing technologies are easy to predict, but tend to underestimate the scope of technological progress. The real revolutions will come from new technologies not in common use today. Some of them, like aviation in 1900, may be right on our doorstep. And people will remain as stubbornly unpredictable as ever.

There is one thing, however, that I feel pretty confident about: no giant fruits and vegetables, ever. You can take that one to the bank.

1 comment:

Kristin said...

I believe Doctor Benson Honeydew would take exception to the dismissal of the giant fruit. He once created a four-foot prune, although the effects were 'sadly temporary'.