[ih] Fiction->History

[Craig Partridge]

Hi John:

Ah, if you’re talking 100 years, I agree.  The literature being cited in the discussion was 20 to 40 years old, when it sounds as if we agree, prediction has been feasible.

As for predicting the dumb stuff — didn’t Farber coin a phrase about reinventing (dumb) ideas every 7 years or so? :-)

Craig

> On Sep 24, 2015, at 2:26 PM, John Day <jeanjour at comcast.net> wrote:
> 
> C’mon, Craig, ;-) predictions over 20 years is hardly any time at all. ;-)  I was thinking of all of those predictions by experts of 50 to 100 years.  They seldom even get the broad brush right. 
> 
> Actually, at a recent conference I got asked the “old man question.”  ;-)  “Gee, what do you think about having all of these iPhones and iPads and stuff?”  ;-)  After stifling a chuckle, I patiently explained that in 1974, there was a book called Computer Lib/Dream Machines  by Ted Nelson and Stewart Brand that laid out the Dynabook and much else. We have just been waiting for the hardware to catch up.  ;-)  (And BTW, I still have my copy).
> 
> Predicting over the last 40 years in our field has been relatively easy. The hard part has been predicting the dumb things that have happened!  ;-)
> 
> Take care,
> John
> 
>> On Sep 24, 2015, at 14:03, Craig Partridge <craig at aland.bbn.com> wrote:
>> 
>> 
>>> On Sep 24, 2015, at 1:41 PM, John Day <jeanjour at comcast.net> wrote:
>>> 
>>> "1000 Monkeys at a 1000 typewriters  . . .”  Only half joking, with all of the sci-fi writers out there you would expect a few to come close once in awhile.  ;-)  But future predicting in general has been pretty bad.
>>> 
>> 
>> If you said said “future predicting” by sci-fi authors, I’d agree.  But my experience with researchers is that that experienced ones do a pretty good job.  That is, they can predict trends and technical stresses some years into the future and make intelligent predictions about the broad style of solution that will result.  On details, they’re rarely right — but the broad picture, they’re often right.  Personally,
>> having gone back and looked at my predictions over the past 20 years or so, I’m right well over 50% of the time. Side observation - one can be right about the technology and then be completely wrong about which company will take advantage.
>> 
>> Craig
>> 
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