A Failure to Anticipate
by Tom Neven on 12/31/2008 at 11:11 AM
So another new year is upon us, and pundits and prognosticators near and far are making their predictions for what's to come in 2009. And they'll almost certainly be wrong.
A mere six months ago, wise men were telling us to expect oil to hit $200 a barrel, and drivers could expect to pay $8 a gallon or more for gasoline. (Yes, I know our overseas friends probably laugh at our panic at having to pay that much.) Yet just yesterday oil dropped to $37 a barrel, and I topped off my car for $1.39 a gallon. Not even adjusting for inflation, that's less than a gallon of gas cost in 1979.
And what about those sure-thing predictions that the 2008 presidential contest would come down to Rudy Giuliani and Hillary Clinton? Or that the Dow would top 15,000? Wrong, wrong, and wrong—waaay wrong on that last one.
Many such predictions fail because of our human tendency to think in static terms. We think things will remain basically the same. But even as we try to reason through some possible causes and effects, we fail to account for all the factors in the equation, even if they're available to us. (Credit-market meltdown, anyone?) More unpredictable are the random X factors that change the equation completely. (Cue speech about chaos theory by Jeff Goldblum character in Jurassic Park.)
All this to say that at this turn of a new year I recommend you check out two books that I've recently enjoyed, Follies of Science and Yesterday’s Tomorrows. They're chock full of past imaginings of how the future world would look. For example, by 1980 we were all supposed to be flying around in personal, nuclear-powered helicopters. I guess I failed to sign up for mine.
My favorite is the bold imaginings of our future cities that look remarkably like old cities with only a few imagined "improvements" such as movable walkways or flying buses. (Nuclear-powered, natch!) None imagined the Interstate highway system or the growth of suburbs, which have largely emptied the imagined megacities of tomorrow.
Houses would be built of lead, concrete, asbestos (!), foam, or plastic. The kitchens of tomorrow featured pop-up ranges, retracting cabinets, and all sorts of other gadgetry (not to mention female models all looking remarkably like June Cleaver). Not one featured today’s nearly ubiquitous microwave oven.
In the 1950s one car manufacturer bragged about how much you'd love its new plastic seats, failing to anticipate the combined effects of (a) plastic vinyl, (b) wearing shorts, and (c) heat and humidity. (Which allows me also to plug one of my favorite white-trash, hillbilly-funk, road-kill rock bands, Southern Culture on the Skids, and their best album, Plastic Seat Sweat.)
And pity the poor creators of the original Star Trek series. They set their story 400 years in the future but wrote it only a few years before the microchip integrated circuit became widely available, meaning all their "futuristic" equipment looks unbelievably clunky and stupid today, full of dials and knobs and blinking lights that look downright laughable compared to today's average cell phone or iPod.
So, I'll read the predictions for next year. Some might be close; most will be wrong. And I'll put my trust in the one prediction that I know is true because it was made by one who proved His reliability through His life, death, and resurrection.
Happy New Year to all.
1. Tami said the following at 11:53 AM on Dec 31:
Tom, thanks again for another enjoyable post :)
Happy new year to you and every member of the Boundless crew, as well as my fellow commenters.
2. P&P said the following at 4:58 PM on Dec 31:
Southern Culture on the Skids!!
What a great band. Bless your heart for mentioning them.
3. Bethany said the following at 5:02 PM on Dec 31:
Another good source of old-fashioned futurism is the old-time radio show X Minus One (1955-1958), which is now available as a free podcast on the unimagined-in-1958 internet. Several episodes set in the 1990's feature weekend trips to Mars or the moon!
4. Priscilla said the following at 6:41 PM on Jan 1:
Check out this intriguing article written in a 1900 edition of The Ladies Homes Journal:
http://bp3.blogger.com/_sGYULzoQCgA/RiR7L_dyCLI/AAAAAAAAAdU/2COTRQtZAk8/s1600-h/Ladies+Home+Journal+Dec+1900+paleofuture+paleo-future.jpg
Some of the predictions are absolutely hilarious, some are surprisingly accurate, considering that it was written over a century ago. Anyone care to make their own prediction for year 2109, if the Lord tarries till then?
5. Mike Theemling said the following at 6:42 PM on Jan 1:
Despite the author's criticism of Star Trek, despite a number of things they got wrong, they actually got a number of things right, at least conceptually (even though it was clunky).
The flip communicator turned into the flip cell phone. The data cards turned into flash drives. The sick bay diagnostic turned into the modern medical computer displays we have now. And the holodeck from Next Generation turned into...well, one can always hope :)
6. Texas Craig said the following at 6:42 PM on Jan 1:
Nice post!!! :-)
Although, I will say that Star Trek got it right with its communicators, because they look remarkably like most flip cell phones from the late 90s early 2000s!
7. Leah said the following at 11:01 AM on Jan 3:
The Jetsons was based in the year 2000 ;)
Bill Gates said in the 80s that the average home computer would never need more than 500KB in harddrive space.
“Lee DeForest has said in many newspapers and over his signature that it would be possible to transmit the human voice across the Atlantic before many years. Based on these absurd and deliberately misleading statements, the misguided public … has been persuaded to purchase stock in his company …” — a U.S. District Attorney, prosecuting American inventor Lee DeForest for selling stock fraudulently through the mail for his Radio Telephone Company in 1913.
Lee DeForest wasn't the smartest, though. He predicted “To place a man in a multi-stage rocket and project him into the controlling gravitational field of the moon where the passengers can make scientific observations, perhaps land alive, and then return to earth - all that constitutes a wild dream worthy of Jules Verne. I am bold enough to say that such a man-made voyage will never occur regardless of all future advances.”
And how about the esteemed Lord Kelvin: “Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible.” AND “X-rays will prove to be a hoax.”
Or Albert Einstein! “There is not the slightest indication that nuclear energy will ever be obtainable. It would mean that the atom would have to be shattered at will.”
One that always makes me laugh: “The Americans have need of the telephone, but we do not. We have plenty of messenger boys.” — Sir William Preece, Chief Engineer, British Post Office, 1878.
“Rail travel at high speed is not possible because passengers, unable to breathe, would die of asphyxia.” — Dr Dionysys Larder (1793-1859), professor of Natural Philosophy and Astronomy, University College London.
Find more at http://listverse.com/history/top-30-failed-technology-predictions/
8. mary kate said the following at 11:09 AM on Jan 3:
wow! southern culture on the skids! banana puddin' is such a wonderful song!!!
9. Kelly said the following at 11:39 AM on Jan 5:
This post makes me quite sad. My entire life I have dreamed of going to Mars. If only those predictions had come true. :(