h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

When I was a kid, "21st century" meant "the FUTURE!!!!", 2001 was the quintessential sci-fi movie, 2000AD was my favourite comic, and so on.

Well, 2000AD has now moved to the status of fond and dimming memory, but it occurred to me that when was a kid I was promised all kinds of things by now. I'm not talking about the cliched "where's my jetpack?" kind of whining that itself has gone out of fashion, I'm on about serious predictions which have either come to pass or have signally failed to happen.

The most significant ones to me are:
- fusion power. Promised "in about 20 years" in the mid seventies. This was revised to "within about 20 years" in the eighties, then to "within about 20 years" in the 90s. Still no sign, AFAIK.
- climate change. I think it was "Horizon" did a show in which they predicted catastrophic climate change by now, but the global COOLING that all the scientists were bleating about - a new ice age - hasn't emerged.
- bee die-off. Weren't we all supposed to have starved to death by now because the bees were gone? What happened to that story?
- holograms. By now I was promised HD 3D screenless images. No sign so far... although VR seems to be making (or trying to make) a comeback at last after a few false starts about 25 years ago.

Science fiction rather raised our expectations - Where are the teleports, hoverboards, flying cars and what happened to reducing our diets to little pills?

I can remember when 1984 was the future. Well, we did get Big Brother.

Quite honestly, though, I'd have to think very hard to remember things we were told last century that would be part of everyday life by now. I'll give it a try.

The future just ain't what it used to be when I was young…

Well, starting off with 'Back to the Future' – flying cars, hoverboards (proper ones that hover, not weird wheeled spontaneously-combusting battery-powered skateboards), self-drying clothes.

Other things include AI robots that do the ironing and make
And Internet fridges. Still no idea why you'd want an internet fridge, but then I don't like kitchens. The kitchen is the room where all the tedious stuff like cooking and washing take place and full of annoyingly noisy appliances like washing machines, dishwashers, tumble dryers, extractor fans, microwaves, humming fridges, blenders. Not a place you can sit down and relax.

Telepaths. Where is the next generation of Homo superior that 'The Tomorrow People' predicted, eh?

<BB<

If your fridge is humming it is probably happy. Try to be one with your fridge.

As Neil deGrasse Tyson is fond of reminding people we have "flying cars", they're called helicopters.


Along with fusion power being eternally 20 years away, so are consumer level fuel cells and fuel cell powered vehicles. So often I read yet another story about some breakthrough in battery technology that will make electric vehicles and other tech financially viable that's right around the corner. The superlatives that describe each of these advances are always promising, but Li-Ion and LiPo batteries are still about the best we got.

We were all supposed to be wearing sliver jump suits all the time. That fashion icon seems to be still in the future.

The Bee thing is pretty real. There are very very few wild bees in the UK now (only a couple of tiny refuges are left) - only farmed bees exist and these are endangered by the widespread use of indiscriminate pesticides (bee killing ones are now severely restricted). There's also a virus that is wiping them out iirc.
The mass starvation thing I'm not sure about but a potential complete loss of an important pollinating insect is not ideal.

I used to watch Tomorrow's World avidly, but like others I've largely forgotten a lot of their predictions. Many many of them have come true.

Fusion power would be awesome - it's proved a little tricky to do in a controlled fashion sadly.

I think my generation dressed more "futuristically" than any to follow it.

I mean, c'mon! Parachute pants! Superfluous zippers and hot pink silk ties! Fluorescent lycra!

Just look at this stuff!

http://www.google.com/search?q=80%27s+fashion&espv=2&biw=1861&bih=1270&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjv7PvyrcnRAhUC4yYKHUeRC6EQ_AUIBigB

"The Bee thing is pretty real. There are very very few wild bees in the UK now (only a couple of tiny refuges are left) - only farmed bees exist and these are endangered by the widespread use of indiscriminate pesticides (bee killing ones are now severely restricted). There's also a virus that is wiping them out iirc.
The mass starvation thing I'm not sure about but a potential complete loss of an important pollinating insect is not ideal." [orcus]

Cell phone signals have been blamed for confusing bees so that they can't find their way back to their hives. Varroa mites are a serious problem for bees, though some Russian bees seem to have some protection against them.

I tried to find out how many bee species were native to England, and came upon this link, which assumes I meant new England :

http://www.nativebeesofnewengland.com/bee-diversity.html

There's an island off the coast of Boston, far enough away that you wouldn't expect native bees to be able to fly there, but they obviously have, because there are almost 100 species of them there.

Global banana extinction.

PP.

I had forgotten about that prediction. Would I have noticed if there were no longer any bananas?

I was promised that Social Security would be defunct by the time I retire (15-20 years from now, if I'm lucky). They've (mostly republicans) have been saying this since Reagan. Considering the big hit SocSec will take now that the Baby Boomer generation is reaching retirement age and how stridently republicans are trying to destroy it, this one might actually happen.

These were late 1970s predictions, I think.

I definitely remember a prediction that in The Future we wouldn't buy records or tapes any more, but would instead listen to tracks as often we liked over a phone. I think there was mention of dialling, and a phone line, so it wasn't entirely accurate. But Spotify.

I also remember being told that in The Future we wouldn't carry cash, but would pay for things using a card like a credit card. So whenever I make a contactless payment I feel like I'm living in The Future

My dad was involved in a project called the OPD, or One Per Desk. This project was based on the (then) daring idea that everyone working in an office needed a phone and a computer on their desk. You could even send written messages to other computers linked to the system! Crazy, huh? And well ahead of its time - it used mini-casettes to run the software.

I also remember one occasion (c 1992) when we had all had to log off so the IT guy could receive some info from Norway, and he told us that one day, we wouldn't have to do this - everyone would be connected to everybody else *all the time*. Nutter.

To a certain extent, every time I come here I feel like I'm in The Future, because when I first signed up we were using a dial-up connection.

I was certainly promised an ice age. And lots more leisure time than workers had in the 1980s. Not noticed either yet.

Mol

Maybe global warming and the ice age have cancelled each other out.

I still think my fridge's humming is a sign of laziness – I've told it the words are 'Na na na na-na-na-na, na-na-na-na, hey Jude!' still it only hums…

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I should have been more specific I guess... I meant what were we REALLY promised, by science, not what did scifi writers imagine?

As far as jumpsuits - about half the people I know have onesies. So... kind of. I remember once in the eighties using a service called "Dial-a-disc" or similar, where they published a list of phone numbers and records, and you dialed the number and the song was playing on the other end of the phone. With a selection of only about 20 songs and glorious mono sound coming out of your phone and it costing you per second, Spotify it was not, but now someone mentions it the two are conceptually connected...

That was likely They Might Be Giants. TMBG famously published the phone number to their "Dial-A-Song" service, simply an answering machine featuring one of their songs each day. They ran this service from the early '80s until 2006. They got their record deal thanks to Dial-A-Song, reportedly. They recently (2015) brought back Dail-A-Song:

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/they-might-be-giants-resurrect-dial-a-song-in-2015-20150104

There's also now a web version:

http://www.dialasong.com/

Solar panel windows. As all the world's fossil fuels were going to run out by the 1990s they predicted that everyone's windows would in fact be solar panels that would supply each individual house with its power needs.

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That's actually coming soon from what I've heard of late.

Are they still promising 'a cure' for cancer...?

That's not going to happen seeing as there's many different kinds. But they do progress

Not that solar panel windows will be much use here in the UK - the ubiquity of roof panels is only supported by massive subsidy.

There are a lot of republicans pushing an ending of all subsidies for renewable energy. Last week I read about a bill in one state that would prohibit all utilities from using renewable energy (they would only be allowed to use energy from "approved" sources, i.e. coal and oil).


I'd be OK with ending subsidies on solar panel companies if similar subsidies were also cut on fossil fuel companies. Cutting one but not the other creates an unfair market advantage that should outrage "free trade" conservatives.