Future Shock

I've just finished a little book by French economist—and futurist—Jacques Attali entitled A Brief History of the Future (Arcade Publishing, March 2009). And, it got me thinking. First, about predicting the future in general, and second, about Monsieur Attali's particular take on the future.

Lots of people try to predict the future. Lots of people are wrong.

Believe what you want. Nostradamas. "Revelations." Carnac the Magnificent.

But, as Doc Brown reminds Marty McFly in "Back to the Future": "your future hasn't been written yet. No one's has."

That, however, can't stop people from speculating. And, that's okay. It's not all quixotic. Visions of the future can inspire us. Remind us of opportunities. Warn us of pitfalls. But, there are NO immutable laws that history must obey. So, history is always dynamic, never static. Always a moving target that few can hit consistently.

Beware anyone who claims differently. Think about it: If someone could really tell the future, he'd be richer than Croesus and wouldn't be anxious to share the wealth.

I've been checking and have corralled a few examples of predictions that went spectacularly wrong:

Back in 1936, John Langdon-Davies in A Short History of the Future—substitute the synonym "Brief" for "Short" and you've got Attali's title—predicted that "[d]emocracy will be dead by 1950." Who knew? Besides Mr. hyphenated surname?

In 1895, scientist and president of the British Royal Society, Lord Kelvin, stated unequivocally that "[h]eavier-than-air flying machines are impossible." Those hopelessly naïve—and optimistic—Americans weren't listening though. Within a decade, bicycle mechanics Orville and Wilbur Wright would take wing.

Two years later, Lord Kelvin was at it again promising anyone who would listen that "radio has no future."

Then, there's Robert Millikan, American physicist and Nobel Prize winner, who promised in 1923 that "there is no likelihood man can ever tap the power of the atom." Whoops!

Business Week magazine boldly and confidently predicted in 1968 that the auto industry didn’t have to worry about the Japanese: "With over fifteen types of foreign cars already on sale here, the Japanese auto industry isn't likely to carve out a big share of the market for itself." Unfortunately, the Big Three and the UAW spent the next forty years acting as if this was gospel.

There are those big thinkers who aren't interested in discrete pronouncements about the future. That's what makes them big thinkers. No, they have discovered what eludes the rest of us: natural historical laws. Immutable. So, all they need do is extrapolate into the future and everything becomes clear. Everything. A comprehensive, one-size-fits-all, end-of-history future.

My favorite is Karl Marx. Here's a guy who never did much in his life. He lived off handouts from sponsors. He ignored his family. But, that's okay because he was a prophet. No, more than that: a savior.

Marx discovered the key to the future: a future that was spooling out according to immutable laws. A utopian future of justice and equality that was preordained. The Russians got there first. How'd that work for them?

Lots of American liberals fell for Marx and his disciples in places like the Soviet Union and Cuba. The muckraking journalist Lincoln Steffens visited the Soviet Union early on and proclaimed, "I have seen the future, and it works." Sixty-plus years later—even as the Soviet Union tottered on the edge of collapse—many western liberals still pined for a Marxist Utopia in their future.

Please feel free to post your favorite examples of predictions gone awry.

Next: Future Shock, II—Jacques Attali's Future