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100 years ago, a newspaper published Thomas Edison's musings on the far-off future of 2011. According to the famed inventor, we should be driving around in solid gold taxis. More »
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As we prepare to bid farewell to 2009, it's only natural to wonder what 2010 will hold. Will we see amazing technologies? Discover evidence of alien life? Or begin a slide into dystopia? We look at scifi's predictions for 2010. More »
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Are you enjoying your "smellyvision?" Does your implanted microchip adjust every building's temperature when you enter? Or how's your portable quantum generator working out? These are just a few of the craziest predictions for 2010, made in 1999 and 2000. More »
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A decade ago, the world was braced for the Y2K bug and everyone was prognosticating about the 21st century. Ten years into the new millennium, we look back at those predictions and decide which still seem likely - or not. More »
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As we bid farewell to 2008, it’s time to find out what the new year will hold. Amazing technologies? Alien lifeforms? Giant monsters? We look at science fiction’s predictions for the year 2009. More »
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If you need a hoot, check out 2012: Science or Superstition, all about the ancient Mayan prophesy that the world ends in 2012. Which apparently has much to do with VCR clocks. More »
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Astronomer Marcus Chown wonders if science fiction is dying. With technology and scientific discovery advancing so quickly, it's unclear what will become of a genre based largely on predicting the future. Charles Stross has gone so far as to say that it’s no longer possible to write near-future science fiction. Six other science fiction writers, including William Gibson, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Kim Stanley Robinson, join him in the latest issue of New Scientist to weigh in how science fiction needs to change. More »
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In December 1957, only two months after the Soviets launched Sputnik, Look magazine presented a timetable predicting the future of American space travel. "If you have a life expectancy covering the remainder of the 20th century, you will live to see man land on the moon," it stated confidently. At the time, the U.S. space program had yet to successfully launch a satellite of its own. Perhaps as a result, Look's timeline was surprisingly cautious. More »
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Video surveillance is the hot new thing. Tech market think tank ABI Research has just come out with a new study predicting that the global video surveillance market will "expand from revenue of about $13.5 billion in 2006 to a remarkable $46 billion in 2013." In a press release only Philip K. Dick could love, ABI gushes excitedly about all the fun new uses of the vidcams and databases you could be manufacturing, buying, and selling to the surveillance-craving masses. More »
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In the 1950s Pageant was a digest-sized general-interest magazine, given to pretty cover girls and sensational stories like "Sex: The American Way Is Best" and "9 Hours In Hell With A Dope Addict." But with the help of a pair of geologists from Columbia University, in February 1955, Pageant looked at "Our World in 30,000 Years." Some of the article sounds suspiciously familiar, especially if you've seen An Inconvenient Truth. First of all, rising seawater eventually swamps the east coast under 500 to 600 feet of water. And there's more. More »
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"What'll It Be Like in 2000 A.D.?" asked Popular Science in its April 1962 preview of the marvels to be found at the Seattle World's Fair, which opened that month. First up on Popular Science's tour of the future was the Standard Oil diorama. Not surprisingly it featured a host of gas-guzzling vehicles for land and air—and failed to predict either fuel shortages or oil at $100 a barrel. More »
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One of the best Christmas presents I ever received was David Wallechinsky and David Wallace's The People's Almanac. Published in 1975, the Almanac covered all sorts of juicy topics to keep an impressionable 14-year-old happy—famous crimes, oddities, utopias, and (oh, baby!) sex. There was even an entire chapter devoted to predictions given by not only the usual psychics, but an array of "Modern Scientists," among them the "prolific writer of science fiction" and famous predictor, Arthur C. Clarke. Here's how some of his People's Almanac predictions for 1991-2000 and beyond are stacking up. More »
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In 1955, Tempo magazine made some predictions for the faraway world of twenty years hence. Despite the mag's cheesecake cover (peek below fold for full effect), universal babedom was not among them, but here's a smattering of what "Your Life In 1975" did promise. More »
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Using the deadly SARS flu outbreak as a template, researchers have created a model that can predict the spread emerging global epidemics. A team of researchers in the US and Europe incorporated travel and census data from 3100 urban areas and 220 countries to figure out where a virus would travel and how fast. More »
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By the early 1980s, the Soviet Union will have a fleet of space shuttles far superior to our own, plus a network of space stations and a second fleet of orbital vehicles to service them. Oh, and mega laser weapons. That was the prediction in a 1974 book Soviet Conquest From Space. How did Peter James get it so wrong? More »
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