Each person in his own way represents his future, as well as the future of all mankind. Some pessimistic people believe that we no longer have a future. Soon the world will not be due to a catastrophe of a planetary scale. Others are convinced that every person will leave the real world and go to the virtual one, and this will also be our end. There are also positive views on the future. People with such views think that very soon the long-awaited scientific and technological revolution will take place, which will open us access to other planets or even worlds. Be that as it may - each person sees the future in a different way. But for those people who lived on this planet tens, hundreds or even thousands of years ago, we are the future.
Futurologists have lived at all times. Even the most dense and dark. These were people who fell into their own time by an obvious mistake, because their thoughts were ahead of their time, sometimes even by millennia. Back in the Roman Empire during the time of Emperor Tiberius Augustus, thinkers said that one day it would be possible to instantly and at a distance transmit orders to even the most distant Legions. Of course they talked about what is now called radio communication. It sounds incredible, but some drawings in the Ancient Egyptian pyramids clearly indicate that even then the priests knew that there was also something behind the sky. They did not know yet that the Earth was round, but they were already drawing rockets on the walls of the pyramids. The dreamers of those times undoubtedly thought that their heirs would go to the sun god Ra on a sparkling cone-shaped tube.
Now it is difficult to imagine, but a few hundred years ago, basically, all futurists faced an unpleasant fate. In the dark Middle Ages, such thoughts were deadly. Any desire for rationalization, for improving human life, and especially for predicting the future, attracted the attention of the Inquisition. Many were fortunate that they talked about things that only came true in the twentieth century. Those who had the imprudence to actually predict an event that happened almost immediately after the prediction were unlucky, to put it mildly. They were tortured, forced to confess to witchcraft, and then burned. But despite this, there were already so-called futurists.
In the 19th century in the Russian Empire, engineers and designers already predicted the imminent appearance of submarines and even icebreakers. In the same century, many European writers wrote that a person could one day go to the moon. It all came true. All the then predictions of futurologists, for the most part, did not come true and will never come true, as well as the predictions of futurologists of the mid-20th century. Then, after all, progress developed so quickly that it seemed impossible to slow it down. Futurologists excitedly talked about how we will manage the weather, ride atomic trains, fly to other planets and even worlds. And robots should have become human loyal helpers by 2017. Unfortunately, they were all wrong. Hyper-progressing of scientific thought is possible only in conditions of fierce competition, sufficient funding and urgent need. Then,all such conditions were present. The Cold War was going on and scientific thought was generously stimulated and encouraged. But that country was gone and the conditions disappeared. Global progress has greatly reduced the pace of its development, and the futurists of those years at least badly miscalculated with the time frame. However, despite all this, the future has already arrived.
What did futurists promise us? First of all, a global dependence on machines and technology. These things have become so commonplace for us that we cannot even imagine life without them. What if it all breaks down or disappears overnight? What can we do? Nothing. We have long been accustomed to the fact that machines and computers do a lot of work for us, we are accustomed to not having to keep information in our mind, because it is much easier to write it down on a computer and save it to an information medium. Finding ourselves without technology, we will understand that even medieval people would have had a better chance of surviving, because all our knowledge was contained in technology. Science fiction writers said that the Internet will be carried to every home. Isn't that so? Today we are all heavily dependent on the Internet, for some it is entertainment, but for some communication,for some it is a place of work. Will our life change dramatically if the Internet is turned off? Very much.
Dreamers of the future said that the whole world could fly into space. Were they wrong? The crew of the International Space Station is international. Indeed, each state can send into orbit using the services of one of the aerospace corporations. We also talked about the fact that we will fly freely around the world. So it did become commonplace. We have long been accustomed to the developed air transport, to trains and cars. Even to travel to the North Pole, it is not necessary to be elected; today many icebreakers sell passenger tickets. Space tourism has also been promised. Someone will say that he is not, but do not forget that we are already on his doorstep. Elon Musk and his company are already completing tests of a tourist suborbital ship.
To date, atomic rocket engines and much more are being tested. Already today, car brands are producing self-driving cars that partially act as drivers, and the largest multinationals are testing cars that are completely controlled by artificial intelligence and do not even have a steering wheel. Many miracles that were not even described in science fiction films of the 2000s have already happened. Yes, we didn't have flying cars or teleportation, but there are many other great inventions that are not inferior to the dreams of science fiction writers.
Even if our world is not at all what many would like to see it, but it is modern. There are already many examples of corporations hiding technology. After all, if the technology is far ahead of its time, then its implementation will not be so profitable. We can say with confidence that many things already exist that we see in science fiction films. Researchers from private laboratories and even from the military have long been several decades ahead of their time. There is no need to regret what did not happen. You need to enjoy the benefits of progress and understand that the future has already arrived.
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