What Will Life Be Like In 2008?

tblake writes "Back in 1968, Modern Mechanix mused what life would be like in 40 years. Some things they came pretty close on: '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.' Some things are way off: '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 whiz past a string of cities, many of them covered by the new domes that keep them evenly climatized year round.' And some things are sorta right: '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.'"

Comments

Re:I'm impressed

[Kandenshi]

Well, I think you almost hit the nail on the head. "most predictions from the 60s and 70s..." There were quite a few of them right? Seemed like every author or magazine wrote at least one article talking about what stuff would be like in the year 2000, 2010, etc...
So we've got plenty of predictions from the 60s and 70s, and this guy mananged to get several of his right (though others are way way off).

What's that they say about an infinite number of monkeys? We only had a finite (if large) number of predictors, but unlike monkeys most of them wont just write down "j ,kmdsxzqw3i98" either. It's nice for him that he got some stuff mostly right, but unlike you being impressed at this, I would have been more impressed if none of them did.
As for the driverless car thing, I think that it could conceivably happen in my own lifetime, but I don't expect it anytime soon. Certainly not as a common thing in the next decade.

Re:Goddammit!

[garcia]

Flying cars? Fuck flying cars, I want my four hour work day god damn it:

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.

They were just confused that the ease in which we can accomplish four 1968 work hours would eliminate us from having to do an additional four hours of additional work.

The pace of change is slowing down.

[Animats]

The pace of change is slowing down. Look at four 50 year periods in history.

1. 1808 In 1808, life was pretty much like it had been for the previous thousand years. Land travel was on foot or by horse; most people never went fifty miles from their birthplace in their entire life. Heating was from burning wood; lighting from candles. Everything was made by hand. But things were just starting to pick up steam, literally. The first locomotive was in 1804. The very first passenger train ran in 1807. Iron was rare, and steel rarer still.
2. 1858 Railroads connected the major cities in Europe, England, and the US east of the Mississippi. Gas lighting had appeared in cities. Some ships were steam powered. Western Union had telegraphs up and running. Factories were coal burning and steam powered. Textiles were being manufactured by power looms and were much cheaper. Iron was plentiful; steel was still rare. The first oil well was a year in the future.
3. 1908 Major cities had electricity. Telephones were available. All commercial shipping was steam powered. The first cars were running, and the first aircraft had flown. Big hydroelectric plants at Niagara Falls were running. Steel was widely available and cheap. The first skyscrapers had been built. An active oil industry was producing.
4. 1958 Radio, TV, electronics, computers, and atomic power were all working. Transistor radios were available. Oil and natural gas were supplanting coal. Huge farm surpluses were a normal event in the US. The first satellites were in orbit. Large jet transports were flying. Good highway system pervasive. Vaccines for polio, tetanus, diphtheria, yellow fever. Antibiotics widely available. The problems of transportation, power, manufacturing, and agriculture had all been overcome, more than overcome, for the first time in history.
5. 2008 Improvements over 1958, but few breakthroughs. No major new power sources. Energy costs up during this period, for the first time in 200 years. No major new form of transportation. No major improvement in space launch technology. Some progress in biotech but no major life extension. Much progress in electronics and computers.

Progress is flatlining.

Re:250 mph

[cbreaker]

There's a reason it's mandatory, you know. It's so that when you're hit by some asshole driving like an idiot, you get your car fixed and you get your medical bills paid.

The only insurance that's required by law is liability.

Before it was required, people were getting completely fucked. You'd get hit by some asshole and he's be broke and not give a shit. You can't get blood from a stone, so you could potentially lose everything you own paying for an accident that wasn't your fault.

In a perfect society, people would get insurance on their own and everything would be good. But we don't live there, so sometimes shit needs to be required, as shitty as it may seem. Don't blame Uncle Sam, blame shithead John Doe down the road.