2000 as Seen in 1910 (23 pics) • Hacker News Board

Re: 2000 as Seen in 1910 (23 pics)

#81

Post by dirtyaura » Mon, Feb 28, 2011, 9:07 PM UTC

burgerbrain wrote: post #80

dirtyaura wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the true wisdom in past future predictions is something that people didn't get right. For example another (my) take on the three first predictions, that you listed as successes, are: no practical text-to-speech(1), no truly intercontinental trains(2), no robots on construction sites(3) If you look it from that perspecive, there's something to be learned. It's easy to vision, but it's difficult to understand w…

"no practical text-to-speech" Huh? How do you figure? I use text-to-speech all the time and besides sounding distinctly robotic, it works extremely well. And the current state-of-the-art stuff is damn near as good as HAL9000. EDIT: and we do have practical home robots, they're called roombas and programmable microwaves. They just don't look like something out of the Jetsons, and we've seen the technology improve over…

Ok, granted, text-to-speech works, but it's still not good enough for main stream adoption.

Roomba, on the otherhand, is a pathetic, if you compare it to visions.

Re: 2000 as Seen in 1910 (23 pics)

#82

Post by shpxnvz » Mon, Feb 28, 2011, 9:16 PM UTC

silverbax88 wrote: post #78

treeface wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A Cessna 172 is no more complicated than an economy car. Not trying to sound snarky here, but have you ever piloted an airplane? The pre-takeoff checks take a little while, require a good bit of technical expertise, and are absolutely required if you want to be pretty damn sure that your airplane won't fall out of the sky. Safety is, at times, overemphasized, but then again your car won't fall from the sky when it st…

It does sound like someone who hasn't experienced flight training. You don't have to know how to drive a car by instruments alone.

You don't have to know how to fly an airplane by instruments alone, either, until you want to get an instrument rating.

As an example of a lower barrier to entry, the (relatively) new Sport Pilot certificate allows for the operation of smaller, lighter aircraft with training and testing requirements that are not dissimilar to those for getting a driver's license.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pilot_certification_in_the_Unit...

Re: 2000 as Seen in 1910 (23 pics)

#83

Post by mih » Mon, Feb 28, 2011, 9:24 PM UTC

Today's 'Steampunk' is yesteryear's 'Sci-fi'

Re: 2000 as Seen in 1910 (23 pics)

#84

Post by burgerbrain » Mon, Feb 28, 2011, 9:26 PM UTC

dirtyaura wrote: post #81

burgerbrain wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"no practical text-to-speech" Huh? How do you figure? I use text-to-speech all the time and besides sounding distinctly robotic, it works extremely well. And the current state-of-the-art stuff is damn near as good as HAL9000. EDIT: and we do have practical home robots, they're called roombas and programmable microwaves. They just don't look like something out of the Jetsons, and we've seen the technology improve over…

Ok, granted, text-to-speech works, but it's still not good enough for main stream adoption. Roomba, on the otherhand, is a pathetic, if you compare it to visions.

I'm not sure what your definition of mainstream is, but I commonly see text-to-speech listed as an advertised feature of mainstream consumer products.

TTS's dirty little is that it's actually much faster to read something yourself than have something read to you, assuming you are fluent in the language. It's not a failing of TTS, it's just people not properly considering the use of technology. The same goes for the roomba and the programmable microwave. It makes much more sense to have small single-purpose robots that function well, than a single multipurpose humanoid robot.

Re: 2000 as Seen in 1910 (23 pics)

#85

Post by Zak » Mon, Feb 28, 2011, 9:52 PM UTC

treeface wrote: post #59

Zak wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personalized flight on the whole was really the only big miss. I think the main reason that isn't more mainstream is that even with small planes, we chose to emphasize safety far more than with road vehicles. I don't know why that is; I'd gladly trade some amount of safety if it meant I could afford to own and operate a plane. A Cessna 172 is no more complicated than an economy car. It costs $275,000 due to regulatio…

A Cessna 172 is no more complicated than an economy car. Not trying to sound snarky here, but have you ever piloted an airplane? The pre-takeoff checks take a little while, require a good bit of technical expertise, and are absolutely required if you want to be pretty damn sure that your airplane won't fall out of the sky. Safety is, at times, overemphasized, but then again your car won't fall from the sky when it st…

Well, there was this time when I was two and I was sitting on the pilot's lap....

I've spent a lot of time as a passenger in small planes and I have a good idea of what's involved in a preflight. I'm not against safety in general, but I think lawsuits and government oversight have really held back general aviation. A plane should be more reliable and therefore expensive than a car with a similar level of sophistication, but it doesn't need to cost 15 times as much.

Edit: based on khafra's comment, a possible reading of my earlier comment is that it's no more complicated to fly a plane than drive a car. I intended to say that it's no more complicated to build a single-engine propeller-driven airplane than to build a car.

Re: 2000 as Seen in 1910 (23 pics)

#86

Post by lloeki » Mon, Feb 28, 2011, 10:15 PM UTC

kenjackson wrote: post #63

51Cards wrote: post #13

They weren't so wrong... sure their form factors were way off but they had all the ideas down... 1. Electronic Books 2. High speed aerodynamic trains 3. Computer aided manufacturing 4. Motorized personal transport 6&7. Ok no one is letting a robot cut their hair or do makeup, but we're using robots for surgery 9. Aerodynamic motorcycles 10. Webcams 11. Where's my flying car! 12. Tanks 13. Electronic news etc. etc. If…

Ok no one is letting a robot cut their hair Although we are using a electric mechanical device to do so. In particular with shaving we have devices that do all the cutting and make it virtually impossible to cut yourself. So kind of similar even there.

And there are electric hair driers, hair irons, shavers and various chemical products allowing one to change hair shape and color at will.

Re: 2000 as Seen in 1910 (23 pics)

#87

Post by Dramatize » Mon, Feb 28, 2011, 10:25 PM UTC

treeface wrote: post #59

Zak wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personalized flight on the whole was really the only big miss. I think the main reason that isn't more mainstream is that even with small planes, we chose to emphasize safety far more than with road vehicles. I don't know why that is; I'd gladly trade some amount of safety if it meant I could afford to own and operate a plane. A Cessna 172 is no more complicated than an economy car. It costs $275,000 due to regulatio…

A Cessna 172 is no more complicated than an economy car. Not trying to sound snarky here, but have you ever piloted an airplane? The pre-takeoff checks take a little while, require a good bit of technical expertise, and are absolutely required if you want to be pretty damn sure that your airplane won't fall out of the sky. Safety is, at times, overemphasized, but then again your car won't fall from the sky when it st…

All you need is an Airplane Parachute: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4a8cntPdRtk

Re: 2000 as Seen in 1910 (23 pics)

#88

Post by lloeki » Mon, Feb 28, 2011, 10:34 PM UTC

Zak wrote: post #85

treeface wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A Cessna 172 is no more complicated than an economy car. Not trying to sound snarky here, but have you ever piloted an airplane? The pre-takeoff checks take a little while, require a good bit of technical expertise, and are absolutely required if you want to be pretty damn sure that your airplane won't fall out of the sky. Safety is, at times, overemphasized, but then again your car won't fall from the sky when it st…

Well, there was this time when I was two and I was sitting on the pilot's lap.... I've spent a lot of time as a passenger in small planes and I have a good idea of what's involved in a preflight. I'm not against safety in general, but I think lawsuits and government oversight have really held back general aviation. A plane should be more reliable and therefore expensive than a car with a similar level of sophisticati…

People often underestimate how important regular car maintenance is for safety. Just because it statically holds on ground or casual speed doesn't mean it'll grip in a quick wet corner or handle safely in an emergency situation. Hence (partly) car death+accident rate is abysmal compared to flying vehicles. In addition to weekly maintenance checks, I personally always run quick pre+post drive checklists on my car, but then that may be because I received flight education :)

Re: 2000 as Seen in 1910 (23 pics)

#89

Post by bigiain » Mon, Feb 28, 2011, 10:44 PM UTC

dirtyaura wrote: post #81

burgerbrain wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"no practical text-to-speech" Huh? How do you figure? I use text-to-speech all the time and besides sounding distinctly robotic, it works extremely well. And the current state-of-the-art stuff is damn near as good as HAL9000. EDIT: and we do have practical home robots, they're called roombas and programmable microwaves. They just don't look like something out of the Jetsons, and we've seen the technology improve over…

Ok, granted, text-to-speech works, but it's still not good enough for main stream adoption. Roomba, on the otherhand, is a pathetic, if you compare it to visions.

I'd be interested to see what percentage of random dialed phone numbers end up connected to text-to-speech "if you want sales, press 1 now. If you want support, press 2 now, for all other queries, press pound or just wait." type of responses.

(Hmmm, a free $30 credit Twilio account and their "detect answering machine" API call could generate a sample of 3000 random phone numbers pretty quickly...)

Re: 2000 as Seen in 1910 (23 pics)

#90

Post by russell » Mon, Feb 28, 2011, 10:46 PM UTC

segabach wrote: post #18

The one thing they totally failed to predict was the trend toward much more casual clothing. Partially due to technology becoming available to all the classes but even upper class people would find this level of dress over the top for current times. How long before we end up in the stereotypical white space jump suit?

If they could have accurately predicted today's women's clothing, the cards would have been banned as porn. Even SF cant manage the future. Forbidden Planet, one of my favorite movies, all the men had DA haircuts. Start Trek crew had these monster devices hanging out their ears. Heinlein envisioned Autodesk but the drawings were made by a robot device.