Perhaps the trickiest part of making predictions is getting the timing right. Some advances are slowed by social inertia or economic impracticality. Others suddenly leap ahead as a result of a technological breakthrough such as the microchip.

In making the 110 predictions in this special issue, we tried to balance our deep-rooted techno-optimism with some hardheaded skepticism. We turned to scores of experts—scientists, engineers, and many longtime PM contributors and consultants—to help us sketch the rough shape of the next century. We canvassed our experts about the nature of future changes and when key breakthroughs might occur. How did we do? There's only one way to know for sure: Check back with us in 110 years.


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Sid2

Very amusing! I hope they were joking!

What I would like to see is a few sets of serious predictions that were made in the past, because we can check now to see how accurate they were. I'm sure they must be out there, but I wouldn't know how to find them. One publication that has been around a long time is Scientific American. Actually Popular Mechanics has been around for a long time, too. They should show us some of their past predictions.

Thanks for the links. That's just what I was looking for!