Contagious and infectious diseases have been largely overcome,
and the average length of life of man has increased to fifty-eight
years. The great causes of death in middle and later life are
diseases of heart, blood vessels and kidneys, diseases of the
nervous system, and cancer. The progress that is being made
would suggest that within the measure of time for this forecast
the average life time of civilized man would be raised to the
biblical term of three-score and ten.
Arthur Keith: Medicine Will Be Overspecialized (CHECK)
Eighty years ago medicine was divided among three orders of
specialists – physicians, surgeons, and midwives.
Now there are more than fifty distinct special branches for the
treatment of human ailments. It is this aspect of life – its ever
growing specialization – which frightens me. Applying this law
to The New York Times, I tremble when
I think what its readers will find on their doorsteps every Sunday
morning.
Robert Millikan: Science Will Solve All Problems (NOT QUITE)
Among the natural sciences it is rather in the field of biology
than in physics that I myself look for the big changes in the
coming century. Also, the spread of the scientific method, which
has been so profoundly significant for physics, to the solution of
our social problems is almost certain to come.
The enormous possibilities inherent in the extension of that
method, especially to governmental problems, has already
apparently been grasped by Mr. Hoover as by no man who has
heretofore presided over our national destinies, and I anticipate
great advances for moving in the directions in which he is now
leading.
Michael Pupin: Wealth Will Be Distributed Equitably (WRONG)
The great inventions which laid the foundation of our modern
industries and of the resulting industrial civilization were
all born during the last eighty years, the life time of The New
York Times. This civilization is the greatest material
achievement of applied science during this memorable period.
Its power for creating wealth was never equaled in human
history. But it lacks the wisdom of distributing equitably the
wealth which it creates.
One can safely prophesy that during the next eighty years this
civilization will correct this deficiency by creating an industrial
democracy which will guarantee to the worker an equitable
share in the work produced by his work.
Arthur Compton: National Boundaries Will Not Be Important (NOT QUITE)
With better communication national boundaries will gradually
cease to have their present importance.
Because of racial differences a world union cannot be expected
within eighty years. The best adjustment that we can hope for to
this certain change would seem to be the voluntary union of
neighboring nations under a centralized government of
continental size.
Henry Ford: Impossible To Know (COP OUT)
To make an eighty-year forecast may be an interesting exercise,
first of the imagination and then of our sense of humility, but its
principal interest will probably be for the people eighty years on,
who will measure our estimates against the accomplished fact.
No doubt the seeds of 1931 were planted and possibly
germinating in 1851, but did anyone forecast the harvest? And
likewise the seeds of 2011 are with us now, but who discerns them?
William Ogburn: Labor Force Will Peak, Key Is Efficiency, And Government Will Grow (CHECK)
The population of the United States eighty years hence will be
160,000,000 and either stationary or declining, and will have a
larger percentage of old people than there is today.
Technological progress, with its exponential law of increase,
holds the key to the future. Labor displacement will proceed
even to automatic factories. The magic of remote control will be
commonplace. Humanity’s most versatile servant will be
the electron tube. The communication and transportation
inventions will smooth out regional differences and level us in
some respects to uniformity. But the heterogeneity of material
culture will mean specialists and languages that only specialists
can understand. The countryside will be transformed by
technology and farmers will be more like city folk. There will be
fewer farmers, more wooded land with wild life. Personal
property in mechanical conveniences will be greatly extended.
Some of these will be needed to prop up the weak who will
survive.
Inevitable technological progress and abundant natural resources
yield a higher standard of living.
Poverty will be eliminated and hunger as a driving force of
revolution will not be a danger.
Inequality of income and problems of social justice will remain.
Crises of life will be met by insurance.
The role of government is bound to grow. Technicians and
special interest groups will leave only a shell of democracy.
The family cannot be destroyed but will be less stable in the
early years of married life, divorce being greater than now.
The lives of woman will be more like those of men, spent more
outside the home. The principle of expediency will be the
dominating one in law and ethics.
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