What futurists thought 2012 would be like

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http://news.ninemsn.com.au/technolog...-would-be-like

It's funny what humans think will happen in the future and predict what would be invented by a certain year. Some of the predictions made about 2012 were just ridiculous, especially the one suggesting that internal combustion engines would be extinct by now. Others were just a little too optimistic about the year.

Paraplegics walk again, among other medical breakthroughs

An article published in the Sun-Herald in May 1993 quoted American pathologist Dr Jeffrey Fisher, who examined medical research in more than 60 fields for his predictions.

Among them:

In 2005, Alzheimer’s disease is cured with new growth factors and drugs.
In 2007, drug addiction would be conquered with designer drugs which correct abnormal genes and eliminate desire.
Humans now live an average of 120 years.
A new vaccine has cured 80 percent of colds.
First successful cloning of a human being. The purpose is for a repository of organs for transplant.
In 2010, paraplegics and quadriplegics walk again. Artificial nerves bypass spinal cord breaks.
New drugs used for Alzheimer's now used on teenagers and adults to create supernormal memories.

The last petrol station in Brisbane closes

A lighthearted Courier Mail article from 2003 titled “The future timeline map of possibilities” provided some exciting predictions for the future.

It said that in 2012 Brisbane would shut down its last petrol station, with drivers having fully migrated to renewable energy.

Perhaps more interestingly, the article also predicted Osama Bin Laden would be assassinated in 2006 and 40 percent of Brisbane would be damaged by a storm in 2008.

Considering Osama was assassinated in 2011 and Brisbane was devastated by floods the same year, those predictions weren’t too far off.

Don’t like your genes? Just change them

An article published in the Sydney Morning Herald in December 1989 said that replacing defective genes with healthy substitutes would be a common medical practice by the year 2000.

Another article, published in The Futurist magazine the same month, said that by 2010 the practice would be so widespread that "every family will probably have a member who has undergone such treatment".

Almost ten years later, in 1998, the Sunday Herald Sun quoted Francis Collins, the scientist who was in charge of the Human Genome Project at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) near Washington.

He expected that by 2005 his team would have deciphered the secrets held within our genes and for the first time, scientists would be able to view the complete genetic code of humanity.

"It is reasonably likely that by the year 2010, when you reach your 18th birthday, you will be able to have your own report card printed out listing the risks that you run of contracting a disease in the future, based on the genes you have inherited," he said.

It turns out that Dr Collins was right — his team created a working draft of the human genome in 2000 and a complete one in 2003. Today it is very possible for scientists to analyse your genes and see which diseases you are predisposed to.

Robots go to school

In 2002, the Herald Sun ran a story exploring how quickly artificial intelligence (AI) would progress.

Researcher Ian Neild from UK firm BTexact Technologies predicted that the first artificial mind would pass Year 11 in 2010, Year 12 in 2011, gain a degree in 2013, a master's degree in 2014, a PhD in 2016, and win a Nobel Prize in 2018.

While AI has come a long way in the last decade, the artificial mind is not yet close to human intelligence in most areas.

In June this year, a robot called Eugene developed by a Russian team came within a hair’s breadth of passing the Turing Test — an exercise in which an unseen robot communicates with a group of humans via text, and they have to decide whether or not it is a person.

Eugene was emulating a 13-year-old boy at the event in Buckinghamshire, England, and it fooled the judges 29.2 per cent of the time, nearly reaching the 30 percent pass mark set when the test was first devised by mathematician Alan Turing more than 60 years ago.

Cancer is cured

An article published in June 1989 in the Sun-Herald, cautiously titled “An Optimistic Look at Life Beyond the 1990s”, ran a list of predictions from the Japanese Government's Science and Technology Agency.

The agency compiled a forecast covering the years between 1994 and 2015 after surveying 2,000 optimistic professionals and specialists.

Among the predictions — in 2005 there would emerge a method of restoring cancerous cells to normal conditions.

The same year was expected to see the development of technology for commercially disposing of radioactive waste in outer space.

In 2010 the world's motorists would be driving hydrogen-fuelled cars and doctors would be inserting artificial nerves in their patients.

And in 2012 there would be permanent space stations circling the Earth (good call) — with a manned spaceship landing on Mars the year after (not so good).

Soviets land on Mars

In July 1988 the Soviet Union announced to much fanfare that they planned to land humans on Mars by the year 2010.

Leonid Gorshkov of the Soviet space agency Glavkosmos was quoted in the Los Angeles Times announcing the plan, which he called "a logical expansion of human development".

To be fair, he also added: "but sometimes we think we are a bit optimistic".

Little did he know he was also being optimistic about the longevity of his entire nation. The Soviet Union dissolved in 1991.