# It's 2014 and where's the future? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [February 11, 2014, 10:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045 "2014-02-11T10:05:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/41 "2014-02-12T00:01:32Z")
Get one! There’s a tricorder app! ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/42 "2014-02-12T00:19:40Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > I think the conveyor belt roads were just different than “really good cars” and so they seemed more future-y. Cars today are pretty much the same as cars in 1935, just much much better, and roads are pretty much the same as roads in 1935, just much more extensive. Heinlein’s roads were really just very wide railroad cars, where you could eat while traveling, just like the real railroads - and going to limited places, also like them. Cars today are getting less and less like 1935 cars all the time. When I went out in the dark for the paper this morning my Prius sensed that I (or my key) was there and turned on the interior lights for me. We have mapping build in, we have bluetooth, we have some simple collision avoidance, and Google people are sitting in self-driving cars on the road I take to work. > [@](#): > > So in the lifetime of someone like Heinlein we have a switch from horse and buggy and steam trains to automobiles and airplanes, and it happened pretty quickly. So the notion that 50 years in the future, in the distant world of 1996, people were still going to be using cars didn’t seem plausible. We’d switch to some revolutionary new technology, and after that to another revolutionary new technology. Futurama in the NY Worlds Fair of 50 years ago (which I went on lots) had plenty of cars, though self-driving ones. Of course it was in the GM pavilion. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/43 "2014-02-12T00:28:14Z")
To try to stay slightly GQish, predictions usually are either of trends at the time of the prediction or what the person making the prediction wants to happen. If you read Galaxy and If in the very early '70s 2014 was an overpopulated polluted, crime-ridden nightmare. We have a lot better future than that one. People thought of computers as getting more powerful, which was obvious, but not smaller, which was not. They also tended to assign robots to do the things people did just like people did them. Rosie used a vacuum cleaner just like a '60s housewife, whereas today our robots are vacuum cleaners, which is much more efficient. Instead of a robot chopping and cooking we can buy pre-chopped components, if we want them, and cook in the microwave much faster. I own around half of all the 1950s sf magazines published, and have read most of them. The big sin of most writers as futurists (not that this was their role) was picking one thing to extrapolate and keeping everything else constant. Writers imagined flying cars but not working from home. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/44 "2014-02-12T00:32:17Z")
> [@](#): > > Instead of a robot chopping and cooking we can buy pre-chopped components, if we want them,… Which probably were chopped by a robot, just one in a big efficient factory somewhere where it can work 24/7, not in your kitchen where it only works a few minutes a day. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/45 "2014-02-12T00:33:40Z")
Be of good cheer! Orwell’s _1984_ arrived no more than few years late, thanks to our friends in NSA & Homeland Stupidity. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/46 "2014-02-12T00:35:54Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > People thought of computers as getting more powerful, which was obvious, but not smaller, which was not. They also tended to assign robots to do the things people did just like people did them. Rosie used a vacuum cleaner just like a '60s housewife, whereas today our robots are vacuum cleaners, which is much more efficient. Instead of a robot chopping and cooking we can buy pre-chopped components, if we want them, and cook in the microwave much faster. One of the things I say about 50’s and 60’s Robots was that one guy built them out of parts, turned it on and it worked and had intelligence. :eek: (The whole “And then a Miracle happened” paradigm.) And not one of those people ever guessed that one of the richest men in the future world would be the guy who wrote the operating system for most of the computers. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/47 "2014-02-12T00:38:13Z")
Everything **Whynot** said, and: Picturephones? Are you kidding? (Actually we do kind of have that anyway, what with Skype and similar technology, and it “fits” seamlessly into our computers and or mobiles that we already have. As far as I’m concerned that’s true progress–the possibility of piggybacking new functionality onto the devices we already have. While it’s true that we do need to upgrade our computers and phones from time to time, in order to support these features, that’s still better than having to go out and buy an entirely new kind of device, like the Picturephones that were exhibited in the 1960s.) ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/48 "2014-02-12T01:18:34Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > The big sin of most writers as futurists (not that this was their role) was picking one thing to extrapolate and keeping everything else constant. Still happening. _Her_, the overpraised new movie, is the perfect 1950s science fiction story. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/49 "2014-02-12T01:25:05Z")
> [@Xema](#): > > How is extra mass in an aircraft engine beneficial? I think **Exapno** was trying to say that since aircraft demand higher performance (and specifically power/weight), they need to spend a higher fraction of their total mass on engine. It’s not really true, though. For instance, a 767 weighs about 90 tons and has a pair of 4-ton engines, for 9% of the mass. A Honda Accord weighs around 1450 kg and has a 167 kg engine, for 11.5% engine fraction. Obviously these values differ based on the plane and automobile, but they’re also clearly in the same ballpark. That said, turbojet engines have a fantastic power/weight ratio, and so the plane as a whole also has a higher power/weight ratio. Flying cars will probably never make sense. They’re a complete non-starter without automated systems to control them. But the same level of automation applied to cars will make them far safer, faster, and better able to prevent traffic jams. For longer distances, trains and larger aircraft will remain a better option. ---
**Author:** ![Melchior](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Melchior](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melchior)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/50 "2014-02-12T01:25:47Z")
> [@WhyNot](#): > > flying cars: we realized that drivers are dangerous enough in two dimensions, adding a third would be a nightmare > > jetpacks: [been available for almost a decade now](http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/aviation/diy-flying/4217989), if you have more money than sense > > food in pill form: [it’s here](http://www.campingsurvival.com/surtabnewcon.html), but people don’t like it as much as they like food > > robots: we have dozens of these in our houses, they just don’t look like Rosie. A single “does everything” automaton has failed to satisfy, so, like people, our robots specialize. A coffemaker can make your coffee for you ready when you wake up. Your automatic shower cleaner sprays to clean your shower when you’re done. Your bread machine bakes your bread while your Crock-Pot makes your dinner and your Roomba vacuums while you’re at work… > > holograms: [we have those](http://science.howstuffworks.com/hologram.htm). What would you like to do with them? > > virtual reality: [ditto](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/10621480/Virtual-reality-headset-recreates-England-rugby-squad-training-experience.html). > > rockets: ditto, I think. I mean, we’ve had rockets for decades. I’m not sure what futuristic rocket you’re thinking of here > > moon bases: budget cuts > > Why doesn’t it \*feel \*like we’re in “the future”? Because it’s gradual to those who go through it. While a literal frog will not literally boil if you start him in cold water, it’s still a good metaphor for social and technological change - being around for the leaps and mini leaps means we see each new thing as an adaptation of an old thing. When those writers were speculating, the audience couldn’t conceive of the middle steps, and so it seemed much more amazing than it turns out to be when you’re alive to watch the development. I saw an episode of Outer Limits the other night, from 1964. The episode was The Duplicate Man, set in the ‘future’ (about now, I would say). The cars shown were just sports cars with some fancy grillwork added. Phones were rotary dial(!) with video capability. Nobody seems to have anticipated cell phones, though there were car phones. Clothes? Men wore tight-fitting suits without lapels and narrow ties (current men’s fashion is not all that different except for the lapels). I prefer the styles of the early 90s for men. [http://wearecontrollingtransmission.blogspot.com/2011/03/spotlight-on-duplicate-man.html](http://wearecontrollingtransmission.blogspot.com/2011/03/spotlight-on-duplicate-man.html) The predictions of flat-screen TVs have come true, but high-definition was not really thought of. The world of today is not really all that different from the 1950s, except for cell phones and small computers. ---
**Author:** ![Darth\_Panda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ee7513/32.png) [@Darth\_Panda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Panda)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/51 "2014-02-12T01:45:37Z")
Seriously, you can have bacon in like 15 or 20 seconds. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/52 "2014-02-12T01:49:35Z")
Flying cars make no damned sense from a safety and liability angle. Do you really want that asshole down the block flying over your house at 3am? Do you want drunk drivers slamming into houses and the sides of apartment and office buildings? What happens when they lose power or run out of fuel mid-air? Even if they were well within our capacity to build them, we’d never allow them. The insurance alone would bankrupt you. Oh, and food in pill form? People like to eat. Pills are self-defeating. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/53 "2014-02-12T02:01:29Z")
From Flying Cars:The Extraordinary History of Cars Designed for Tomorrow’s World, by Patrick J, Gyger, p. 10 > [@](#): > > But what sort of bastard machine is likely to emerge from this union of different technologies? The design brief is perfectly clear: that the vehicle should be cheap, durable, practical and simple. In other words it should be as easy to fly in the sky as to drive on the road. Unfortunately this is conceptually nigh-on impossible. A plane must be as light as possible while having a powerful engine; the ideal car, in contrast, should be above all sturdy and safe, spacious and comfortable - which means being relatively heavy - and should have moderate fuel consumption, which means no more than moderate power. If you start to get into the detail, it’s evident that a certain standard of tyre will be indispensable for safe landings, as well as powerful dampers - not to mention a cabin that can resist stresses that have no equivalent in the use of a normal car on normal roads. ---
**Author:** ![Melchior](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Melchior](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melchior)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/54 "2014-02-12T02:20:44Z")
It’s interesting how long photographic film has lasted. I do not own a digital camera, because I have two Leicaflex SL2 bodies and 8 lenses. So long as I can use film, I’m not switching. ---
**Author:** ![Melchior](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Melchior](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melchior)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/55 "2014-02-12T02:27:30Z")
It’s interesting how long photographic film has lasted. I do not own a digital camera, because I have two Leicaflex SL2 bodies and 8 lenses. So long as I can use film, I’m not switching. Look at the clothes, furniture, and camera in this scene from \*2001: A Space Odyssey: \* [http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-crmL62FoESo/TiTBk-yyUdI/AAAAAAAADBo/a2jA1ru-sno/s1600/20015.png](http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-crmL62FoESo/TiTBk-yyUdI/AAAAAAAADBo/a2jA1ru-sno/s1600/20015.png) ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/56 "2014-02-12T02:37:13Z")
If anyone hasn’t seen the iconic illustrations done by Art Radebaugh on “The Future We Were Promised” they are really magnificent eye candy. I don’t think the original website that featured them so gloriously is up any more, but you can still see some of them in some form here: > **[Radebaugh: The Future We Were Promised](http://arthur-radebaugh.blogspot.com/)** > > A tribute to the futuristic illustrator Arthur C. Radebaugh > **[21 RADEBAUGH, The Future We Were Promised ideas | futuristic, decorative...](https://www.pinterest.com/thegrandreview/radebaugh-the-future-we-were-promised/)** > > Dec 12, 2017 - Explore The Grand Review's board "RADEBAUGH, The Future We Were Promised" on Pinterest. See more ideas about futuristic, decorative prints, retro futurism. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/57 "2014-02-12T03:23:18Z")
Dick Cheney walked around for a year and a half with a mechanical pump instead of a heart, and then had a heart from another person put into his body. Who the hell ever dreamed of something like that? ---
**Author:** ![Dman53](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/eb9ed0/32.png) [@Dman53](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dman53)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/58 "2014-02-12T03:40:31Z")
what happend? obama, thats what happend… ---
**Author:** ![skdo23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@skdo23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/skdo23)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/59 "2014-02-12T04:02:24Z")
We still have time to make [this prediction](http://www.dumpaday.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/just-a-friendly-reminder.jpg) come true if we act now. ---
**Author:** ![kaltkalt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bb73d2/32.png) [@kaltkalt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaltkalt)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2014, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045/60 "2014-02-12T04:52:38Z")
this makes me really depressed. it’s 2014 and we haven’t been back to the moon since 1972 - not one person has been there in my entire lifetime. Meanwhile the number of Americans who believe the bible is literally true and who believe in satan and the virgin birth but not in evolution keeps rising to ridiculous levels. things are worse now than ever before. what a horrible future. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-2014-and-wheres-the-future/681045.md?page=4)