From 1968, a prediction of 2008

intersting read. Fairly insightful overall; even the misses are
understandable (for the most part)

-goro-

http://blog.modernmechanix.com/2008/03/24/what-will-life-be-like-in-the-year-2008/

40 Years in the Future

By James R. Berry

IT'S 8 a.m., Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2008, and you are headed for a
business appointment 300 mi. away. You slide into your sleek, two-
passenger air-cushion car, press a sequence of buttons and the
national traffic computer notes your destination, figures out the
current traffic situation and signals your car to slide out of the
garage. Hands free, you sit back and begin to read the morning paper--
which is flashed on a flat TV screen over the car's dashboard. Tapping
a button changes the page.

The car accelerates to 150 mph in the city's suburbs, then hits
250 mph in less built-up areas, gliding over the smooth plastic road.
You whizz past a string of cities, many of them covered by the new
domes that keep them evenly climatized year round. Traffic is heavy,
typically, but there's no need to worry. The traffic computer, which
feeds and receives signals to and from all cars in transit between
cities, keeps vehicles at least 50 yds. apart. There hasn't been an
accident since the system was inaugurated. Suddenly your TV phone
buzzes. A business associate wants a sketch of a new kind of impeller
your firm is putting out for sports boats. You reach for your attache
case and draw the diagram with a pencil-thin infrared flashlight on
what looks like a TV screen lining the back of the case. The diagram
is relayed to a similar screen in your associate's office, 200 mi.
away. He jabs a button and a fixed copy of the sketch rolls out of the
device. He wishes you good luck at the coming meeting and signs off.

Ninety minutes after leaving your home, you slide beneath the dome
of your destination city. Your car decelerates and heads for an outer-
core office building where you'll meet your colleagues. After you get
out, the vehicle parks itself in a convenient municipal garage to
await your return. Private cars are banned inside most city cores.
Moving sidewalks and electrams carry the public from one location to
another.

With the U.S. population having soared to 350 million, 2008
transportation is among the most important factors keeping the economy
running smoothly. Giant transportation hubs called modemixers are
located anywhere from 15 to 50 mi. outside all major urban centers.
Tube trains, pushed through bores by compressed air, make the trip
between modemixer and central city in 10 to 15 minutes.

A major feature of most modemixers is the launching pad from which
200-passenger rockets blast off for other continents. For less well-
heeled travelers there are SST and hypersonic planes that carry 200 to
300 passengers at speeds up to 4,000 mph. Short trips-- between cities
less than 1,000 mi. apart--are handled by slower jumbo jets.

Homes in Mi's 80th year are practically self-maintaining.
Electrostatic precipitators clean the air and climatizers maintain the
temperature and humidity at optimum levels. Robots are available to do
housework and other simple chores. New materials for siding and
interiors are self-cleaning and never peel, chip or crack.

Dwellings for the most part are assembled from prefabricated
modules, which can be attached speedily in the configuration that best
suits the homeowner. Once the foundation is laid, attaching the
modules to make up a two- or three-bedroom house is a job that doesn't
take more than a day. Such modular homes easily can be expanded to
accommodate a growing family. A typical wedding present for the 21st
century newlyweds is a fully equipped bedroom, kitchen or living room
module.

Other conveniences ease kitchenwork. The housewife simply
determines in advance her menus for the week, then slips prepackaged
meals into the freezer and lets the automatic food utility do the
rest. At preset times, each meal slides into the microwave oven and is
cooked or thawed. The meal then is served on disposable plastic
plates. These plates, as well as knives, forks and spoons of the same
material, are so inexpensive they can be discarded after use.

The single most important item in 2008 households is the computer.
These electronic brains govern everything from meal preparation and
waking up the household to assembling shopping lists and keeping track
of the bank balance. Sensors in kitchen appliances, climatizing units,
communicators, power supply and other household utilities warn the
computer when the item is likely to fail. A repairman will show up
even before any obvious breakdown occurs.

Computers also handle travel reservations, relay telephone
messages, keep track of birthdays and anniversaries, compute taxes and
even figure the monthly bills for electricity, water, telephone and
other utilities. Not every family has its private computer. Many
families reserve time on a city or regional computer to serve their
needs. The machine tallies up its own services and submits a bill,
just as it does with other utilities.

Money has all but disappeared. Employers deposit salary checks
directly into their employees' accounts. Credit cards are used for
paying all bills. Each time you buy something, the card's number is
fed into the store's computer station. A master computer then deducts
the charge from your bank balance.

Computers not only keep track of money, they make spending it
easier. TV-telephone shopping is common. To shop, you simply press the
numbered code of a giant shopping center. You press another
combination to zero in on the department and the merchandise in which
you are interested. When you see what you want, you press a number
that signifies "buy," and the household computer takes over, places
the order, notifies the store of the home address and subtracts the
purchase price from your bank balance. Much of the family shopping is
done this way. Instead of being jostled by crowds, shoppers
electronically browse through the merchandise of any number of stores.

People have more time for leisure activities in the year 2008. The
average work day is about four hours. But the extra time isn't totally
free. The pace of technological advance is such that a certain amount
of a jobholder's spare time is used in keeping up with the new
developments--on the average, about two hours of home study a day.

Most of this study is in the form of programmed TV courses, which
can be rented or borrowed from tape _ * libraries. In fact most
schooling--from first grade through college--consists of programmed TV
courses or lectures via closed circuit. Students visit a campus once
or twice a week for personal consultations or for lab work that has to
be done on site. Progress of each student is followed by computer,
which assigns end term marks on the basis of tests given throughout
the term.

Besides school lessons, other educational material is available
for TV viewing. You simply press a combination of buttons and the
pages flash on your home screen. The world's information is available
to you almost instantaneously.

TV screens cover an entire wall in most homes and show most
subjects other than straight text matter in color and three
dimensions. In addition to programmed TV and the multiplicity of
commercial fare, you can see top Broadway shows, hit movies and
current nightclub acts for a nominal charge. Best-selling books are on
TV tape and can be borrowed or rented from tape libraries.

A typical vacation in 2008 is to spend a week at an undersea
resort, where your hotel room window looks out on a tropical
underwater reef, a sunken ship or an ancient, excavated city.
Available to guests are two- and three-person submarines in which you
can cruise well-marked underwater trails.

Another vacation is a stay < on a hotel satellite. The rocket ride
to the satellite and back, plus the vistas of earth and moon, make a
memorable vacation jaunt.

While city life in 2008 has changed greatly, the farm has altered
even more. Farmers are business executives running operations as
automated as factories. TV scanners monitor tractors and other
equipment computer programmed to plow, harrow and harvest. Wires
imbedded in the ground send control signals to the machines. Computers
also keep track of yields-, fertilization, soil composition and other
factors influencing crops. At the beginning of each year, a print-out
tells the farmer what to plant where, how much to fertilize and how
much yield he can expect.

Farming isn't confined to land. Mariculturists have turned areas
of the sea into beds of protein-rich seaweed and algae. This raw
material is processed into food that looks and tastes like steak and
other meats. It also is cheap; families can have steak-like meals
twice a day without feeling a budget pinch. Areas in bays or close to
shore have been turned into shrimp, lobster, clam and other shellfish
ranches, like the cattle spreads of yesteryear.

Medical research has guaranteed that most babies born in the 21st
century will live long and healthy lives. Heart disease has virtually
been eliminated by drugs and diet. If hearts or other major organs do
give trouble, they can be replaced with artificial organs.

Medical examinations are a matter of sitting in a diagnostic chair
for a minute or two, then receiving a full health report.
Ultrasensitive microphones and electronic sensors in the chair's
headrest, back and armrests pick up heartbeat, pulse, breathing rate,
galvanic skin response, blood pressure, nerve reflexes and other
medical signs. A computer attached to the chair digests these
responses, compares them to the normal standard and prints out a full
medical report.

No need to worry about failing memory or intelligence either. The
intelligence pill is another 21st century commodity. Slow learners or
people struck with forgetful-ness are given pills which increase the
production of enzymes controlling production of the chemicals known to
control learning and memory. Everyone is able to use his full mental
potential.

Despite the fact that the year 2008 is only 40 years away--as far
ahead as 1928 is in the past--it will be a world as strange to us as
our time (1968) would be to the pilgrims. *
.

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