Visit to the World's Fair of 2014 (1964)

1 - Glowing ceilings and walls - not really, most people still use separate light fixtures

2 - Windows mostly obsolete - no

3 - Polarized glass in windows - kind of - mostly no, though some exist

4 - Opacity of glass changing based on light intensity - yes, but rare

5 - Underground housing - yes, but rare

6 - "Light-forced vegetable gardens" - yes, but rare

7 - Surface of the Earth used only for large-scale agriculture, grazing and parklands - no

8 - Kitchen gadgets - yes

9 - Robots with computers minituarized to serve as their "brains" - yes

10 - Trash picking and gardening robots - yes

11 - 3D movies - yes

12 - Waiting in line for movies - yes

13 - All appliances lack electrical cords - no

14 - Appliances "powered by long-lived batteries running on radioisotopes" - no

15 - Fission power supplies "well over half of the power needs of humanity" - no

16 - Experimental fusion power plant - no? (experiments with fusion power yes, but no power plants, afaik)

17 - Large solar-power stations - yes

18 - Power stations in space - no

19 - Road building factories - no

20 - "crowded highways along which long buses move on special central lanes" - no

21 - "ground travel will increasingly take to the air a foot or two off the ground" - no

22 - Aquafoil - kind of - these exist but are of very limited use

23 - Jets of compressed air lifting land vehicles off the highways - no

24 - Self-driving cars - yes

25 - Moving sidewalks downtown - no

26 - "Compressed air tubes will carry goods and materials" - no

27 - Video calls - yes

28 - Screens for studying documents and photographs and reading passages from books - yes

29 - Global satelite communication - yes

30 - Moon colonies - no

31 - GM creating "large soft tires intended to negotaiate the uneven terrain that may exist [on the moon]" - no

32 - Communication between Earth and moon via laser beams - no

33 - Plans for a manned expedition to Mars - yes

34 - Models of an elaborate Martian colony - kind of

35 - "Wall screens will have replaced the ordinary [TV set]" - no

36 - Transparent cubes for 3D viewing - no (though VR might qualify as being similar enough)

37 - World and US population predictions - yes

38 - Underwater housing - no

39 - Underwater cities - no

40 - Micro-organism factories for efficient food production - no

41 - Food made of yeast and algae - kind of (algae yes, though not popular... yeast, not so much)

42 - "algae bar", "mock-turkey", "pseudosteak" - yes

43 - Mechanical replacements for hearts and kidneys - yes

44 - Life expectancy in some parts of the world at 85 - yes

45 - Worldwide propaganda drive in favor of birth control - yes

46 - Rate of population growth has been reduced compared to 1964 - yes

47 - World Population Control Center - no

48 - Mankind has become "largely a race of machine tenders" - no

49 - Schools with closed-circuit TVs and programmed instructional tapes - yes

50 - All high-school students taught computer fundamentals - yes

51 - Mankind suffers badly from "the disease of boredom" - kind of, for some

52 - Psychiatry is "far and away the most important medical specialty" - no

53 - We live in a society of "enforced leisure" - no

---

Totals:

Yes - 22

No - 26

Kind of - 5

Actually pretty good for a 50 year prediction!

Anyone want to make 50 predictions about 2069?

That was an interesting read. Many things wrong, but many things right, and perhaps nothing so sobering as the closing thoughts:

> Even so, mankind will suffer badly from the disease of boredom, a disease spreading more widely each year and growing in intensity. This will have serious mental, emotional and sociological consequences, and I dare say that psychiatry will be far and away the most important medical specialty in 2014. The lucky few who can be involved in creative work of any sort will be the true elite of mankind, for they alone will do more than serve a machine.

> Indeed, the most somber speculation I can make about A.D. 2014 is that in a society of enforced leisure, the most glorious single word in the vocabulary will have become work!

I don't know about 50, but I'll make one: the limiting factor on the widespread deployment of self-driving vehicles will turn out to be vast numbers of unemployed drivers protesting by blocking roads and staging violent attacks on self-driving vehicles. This will be resolved by introducing a tax on self-driving vehicles, the proceeds of which will be used to employ former drivers to work as security guards to protect self-driving vehicles against attacks. In the end, the economics will self-stabilize so that there are just enough people attacking self-driving vehicles to justify the continued employment of the remainder as security guards. The net effect, if you do the math (which no one will) will be that driving will end up being 50% more expensive than it was before on an inflation-adjusted basis.