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What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

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Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#81

Post by worldvoyageur »

viraptor wrote: post #21

When he mentions the lack of cables, he's pretty close with most of them being underground. But also he's incredible close if you consider the mess of cables that was the Stockholm telephone tower, functioning until 1913 https://www.amusingplanet.com/2017/09/the-stockholm-telephon...

It is an excellent article, I agree. However, it strikes me that the author was more likely female than male. (gender deliberately obscured in the author's name, 'W.L. George', for instance.).

If a male writer, the article is even more impressive given the clear sensitivity to, and awareness of, women's issues and the likely impact of technology and social changes on women.

That said, the author was likely a person of privilege rather than someone more representative of the population of 1922. A starving writer was unlikely to have been so focused on the challenges of hiring good household staff.

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#83

Post by max_ »

nottorp wrote: post #57

He got a lot of things right but, like everyone else, they didn't predict the internet and its consequences. Does anyone know of a proper prediction of the internet? And I don't mean predicting handheld devices or wireless networking. Predicting the decentralized communication part that makes distance irellevant and upgrades point to point communication to group. And its consequence that it's very easy now to find a…

1950's America had online shopping.[0]. This may be the closest thing to today's websites.

[0]https://www.messynessychic.com/2016/01/14/online-shopping-in...

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#84

Post by gadders »

" A sight of the world today would surprise President Jefferson much more, I suspect, than the world of 2022 would surprise the little girl who sells candies at Grand Central Station. For Jefferson knew nothing of railroads, telegraphs, telephones, automobiles, aeroplanes, gramophones, movies, radium, &c.; he did not even know hot and cold bathrooms."

I wonder what we would show the girl of 1922? Space travel and obviously the internet & computers come to mind. Antibiotics, DNA? Anything else?

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#86

Post by ceejayoz »

mc32 wrote: post #66
ceejayoz wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The “lunch will be a pill” stuff is always funny to me. There’s a major volume issue unless you’re gonna have me eat chunks of uranium or neutron star or something.

If NASA[1] could have this, they would do this. They'd prefer it if they could give their *nauts pill-like nutrition delivery systems. [1] Also armed forced with deployed troops would love this too as it makes food logistics much easier.

The closest we can get volume-wise is a cup of olive oil for about 2k calories. Stuffing any more calories into the same volume would require using materials we can't currently digest.

(NASA does not like the side-effects of an all-oil diet on space toilets, I suspect.)

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#87

Post by azangru »

nottorp wrote: post #57

He got a lot of things right but, like everyone else, they didn't predict the internet and its consequences. Does anyone know of a proper prediction of the internet? And I don't mean predicting handheld devices or wireless networking. Predicting the decentralized communication part that makes distance irellevant and upgrades point to point communication to group. And its consequence that it's very easy now to find a…

> like everyone else, they didn't predict the internet

Nor the computer, personal or otherwise; nor robotics. It's funny to see how he could predict, sometimes with surprising accuracy, the trajectory of development of technologies that were already in place, but could not fathom what had not yet been discovered and thus had not yet entered the public discourse.

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#88

Post by misnome »

mc32 wrote: post #80
pindab0ter wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What terrible phrasing is "they cease to be productive and look for ways to while away their time." We don't live to work, we work to live. Once less work is required to live, more living can be done. Some people may 'while away their time', others do valuable things that don't produce monetary value.

Progress depends on people or, the economy in general, progressing. If everyone is happy where they are and want no more, there is no need to innovate and progress stops. That may be fine if we think we have achieved all we need to achieve as a society or species but most think we have a bit of a ways to go still before we can declare victory.

What about people who are made happy by innovating and progressing?

Re: What the world will be like in a hundred years (1922)

#90

Post by ydlr »

overthemoon wrote: post #35

It's interesting to compare this to the WEF future projections: https://www.forbes.com/sites/worldeconomicforum/2016/11/10/s... Especially with regards to this passage:: "In 2022 [economic development] will be as finished as it is to-day in England. American wealth will then be either developed or known, and all of it will belong to somebody. There will be no more opportunity in America than there is in England to-da…

United States does rank below the UK in terms of social mobility. The notion that that is because the economic development of the country is "finished" seems weird.

https://www3.weforum.org/docs/Global_Social_Mobility_Report....

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