SOCIAL
Anthropology
Fossilized human remains will be discovered in southeastern Syria in 2008-2009, which will establish that humankind developed an artistic capability, e.g., jewelry making, painting, statues, etc., 100,000 years earlier than currently believed.
Additional premodern human artwork will be found in caves in Australia by the year 2016 to 2017. This will confirm creativity in humankind approximately 175,000 to 325,000 years earlier than originally thought.
By the year 2010, new bone discoveries in Africa will establish that while both Neanderthal and modern man had the capacity to make tools, use fire, produce speech, and interact with one another, each is descendent from a separate line of ancestors. In other words, there is no branching of a common ancestral tree. It will take an additional seventy-five years to determine the probable origin of modern man, which will eventually be blamed on comet (ice-and spaceborne) viruses.
Archaeology
Within the next three years, a search team will discover a sealed vault-type room within seventy-five yards of the front left of the Egyptian Sphinx. Inside they will find a segment of old leather, possibly from a shoe; bits of cloth; remnants of weaving (possibly from the seat of a chair); fragments of unidentifiable clay pots or shards from plates; sand; dirt; and other debris. The most valuable object to be extracted from this room will be the air within it.
I believe the significance of the Sphinx is allegorical. It is the protective lion of Egypt. As protector of the desert sands for thousands of years, its life's blood is represented by the
Nile River. Therefore, the Sphinx should be viewed in the larger sense, as though straddling the Nile with its head facing north, spilling forth the great Nile Delta from its mouth. Its paws would then be seen more as protective, covering the Sinai to the northeast, the Eastern (Arabian)
Desert to the southeast, the great Western (Libyan) Desert to the southwest, and the left paw would then rest squarely over the city of Alexandria.
While the long-lost treasure of knowledge, which everyone seeks and has been predicted to be buried physically near the Sphinx, it is more likely somewhere in or near Alexandria. This will be verified between the years 2030 and 2033, with the discovery of a great tomb of clay tablets in the southeastern portion of Alexandria.
New evidence that North America was visited as early as 1100 will be discovered in Nova Scotia before the year 2022.
Evidence that the Mediterranean Sea was actually a series of lakes, much like the Great Lakes in North America, will be established before 2005.
The lost city of Atlantis will be found between 2012 and 2014. It lies in the Aegean Sea, somewhere below the water south of the city of Piraeus, Greece. The island town of Aiyina carries evidence of its existence.
Arts
A cave with hundreds of missing works of art will be discovered in the northern Alps sometime between 2008 and 2009. It will be part of the loot stolen during World War II. Dismantled segments of the original "Amber Room," along with other valuable art pieces and treasures, will be found buried in Russia sometime between 2008 and 2010. These things will be discovered within the walls of an old Coptic church, under a woman's grave that is marked with the comment "My lovely dark Lady." Unfortunately, I have been unable to identify the town, but I believe it is within 200 kilometers of Saint Petersburg.
An unknown work by Michelangelo will be authenticated in Florence, Italy, before the year 2020. It will be found within a church.
Education
American high schools will be totally restructured by the year 2015. Students will be able to choose the days and hours they attend class. The curriculum will be altered to permit technical or trade study rather than college preparation. In effect, high school will become the apprentice period for trades such as plumbing, heating and air conditioning, electrical contractor, etc.
The competition for entry into a state college in America will be worse than it has ever been by the year 2019. The SAT scores will no longer matter, since everyone will be near maxing them. In all probability, entry will be governed by lottery.
Action will be taken by 2021 to limit foreign student attendance of American colleges. The reason so many foreign students will want to go to American colleges is twofold: there are fewer foreign advanced educational facilities, which means they are nearly always overcrowded, and as expensive as American colleges will be, they will still be cheaper than facilities overseas.
There will be at least two major strikes by teachers in American schools before 2010, primarily over the issue of salary. The average teacher will be receiving less than half what the average school administrator receives in salary or benefits.
Entertainment
By the year 2006, you will be able to purchase a television/computer screen that can be molded to a wall surface. These screens will range in size from 35 to 90 inches diagonal, with designer edges or no edges, depending on your personal taste.
Holographic—suspended three-dimensional—presentations will be possible by 2050. These will be accomplished using ionized gas chambers shaped like very large, clear-glass tubes, and the projection of intersecting energy beams. Believe it or not, this advance will be born out of an area of medical research used to fight cancers.
All television shows will be interactive by 2020.
Major feature-length movies will no longer be shot on film by the year 2030. They will be stored and manipulated digitally. Directors will be able to modify scenes after they have been shot by moving actors around in them, altering their actions, or dropping and adding lines of dialogue.
By 2075, actors will no longer be required to perform their roles. They will simply be modeled and inserted into programs that will automatically turn plots (screenplays) into movies. Making movies the old-fashioned way (digitally) will be considered very risque, and these films will become very popular with the jet set.
To shop for books in the year 2025, you will first read about them on an electronic book sales line. Once you have made a choice, you will have the option of buying it in one of several formats. From cheapest to most expensive, these will be:
Books will no longer be printed unless ordered and the normal turnaround will be approximately two days.
By 2030, all magazines will be offered electronically on line. By 2040, it will be illegal to print magazines on paper stock.
In 2010, most journalistic matter available electronically will be automatically encrypted with a hidden string or code. Attempts to change or modify the content of the article, manuscript, book, etc., will result in garbling the entire document, rendering it unreadable. Attempts to copy the material will result in its destruction.
Before 2025, the data for most books will be stored on small plastic disks the size of a nickel. Collectors will be able to store their libraries inside small notebooks like stamps. Book readers will be able to read these books using small machines that transmit the information over an infrared connection to a pair of dark goggles.
By 2030, interactive books will work in the same way. A machine will transmit a textbook to individual pairs of goggles in a classroom, as well as a large screen on the wall. The teacher will be able to physically write on the screen, or use an electronic pointer to help students understand what they are seeing. Students will be able to take the day's lesson home with them on recorded "nickels" to study for exams.
Families
Formal extended-family living will become a significant part of American life during the next twenty-five years. People will eventually develop a preference for living in what I call "shared life centers."
As an example, three families will come together and build a home that essentially consists of three separate houses, all interconnected with common living spaces. Each family will have its private space, but will share meals, entertainment, gardening, hobbies, etc.
This kind of arrangement will be appealing for the consolidation of support, both social and financial, it provides. These social structures will begin with older couples whose children have moved away. This will offer a way to reduce the burden of living alone in old age. People will be able to help one another when needed, while preserving the quiet and serenity of private living. Eventually it will spread to younger generations and families with kids, as a means of dealing with all the pressures of modern living.
Holidays
The average number of vacation days in 2025 will be twenty-one per year; average workdays, four per week.
The average number of vacation days in 2050 will be sixty per year; average workdays, three per week.
The average number of vacation days in 2075 will be none; average workdays, none. Work and play will be the same thing.
By the year 2038, Sunday will no longer be a day of rest. It will be treated just like any other day in the week.
Language
The common language for most countries in 2030 will be English. By 2075, nearly everyone will consider English their first language and their native language as secondary, to be used only for private communications.
By 2075, English will not sound the way it does today. There will be approximately forty-five recognized dialects of English, some of which will be nearly indecipherable to most English-speaking people.
Almost a third of all other languages will contain English words or phrases by the end of the twenty-first century. This will be a result of the "techno" revolution that will create whole new social systems between 2080 and 2090.
Sex
You will be able to have your physical sex changed by 2260. This will include hormonal responses, most physical characteristics, and voice alteration. The change will be undetectable.
Between 2015 and 2020, members of a medical sex clinic somewhere in Western Europe will be arrested for genetic manipulation of unborn children. Their goal? To produce a supply of hermaphrodite children to Middle Eastern brothels.
A very large push to eliminate child pornography in the Americas will begin by the year 2009. It will be kicked off by the disclosure of a large kidnapping ring that has been operating in the northeastern United States and Canada for over thirty years.
Husbands with multiple wives, and wives with multiple husbands, will be permitted in all fifty states by the year 2040, provided they agree to limit the number of children they produce.
The single greatest number of deaths will be due to sexually transmitted diseases by the year 2040.
An AIDS vaccine will be discovered before the year 2004.
The cure for AIDS will elude science until the year 2033. By 2010, a pill will be available to men that prevents pregnancy in women.
Regardless of the moral arguments, abortions will be legal throughout the next century. In fact, as populations continue to grow out of control and we exceed our ability to feed the hungry, they will become a moot point.
Permanent castration will be a legal option for child molesters and rapists in 2010. They will be applied under the law for two-time offenders.
Sports
There will be a backlash between 2011 and 2013 to some of the growing excesses in sports. This will generate changes over a twenty-year period that will shake "sports" to the core. Some of the expected changes include the following:
1) The elimination of professional boxing, full-contact martial arts, and wrestling by 2025.
2) Maximum ceilings on a player's salary in any sport by 2015. This will begin with baseball, then quickly spread to football and basketball.
3) Maximum gate charges for attendance, by 2015.
4) Major rule changes in football, ice hockey, and other contact sports to reduce unnecessary injury, by 2022.
5) Sometime between 2006 and 2010, the introduction of a formal book of ethics with which all players will have to comply, or lose the privilege to play. These rules of ethics will also levy heavy fines.
A new type of long-distance, cross-country car racing will be introduced sometime between 2001 and 2003. It will require a team to cover a set distance within the least amount of time, and be limited to a set amount of supplies (tires and gasoline.) Vehicles taking part will have to pass certain design requirements for safety. They will have to carry two passengers—a co-driver and navigatoritchnician. All repairs will have to be made by the riders.
By the year 2015, the most popular sport on television will be "treasure hunts." Teams will compete to figure out clues, find other clues, and locate pre-hidden treasures somewhere in the world. The search will require participants to hike in the wild, swim rivers, climb mountains, negotiate heavy traffic, talk their way into businesses, and negotiate trades. In short, they will have to be prepared to deal with all sorts of difficulties, both mental and physical. The prize will be worth it—a minimum of one million dollars tax free.
General Social
A new material for clothing will be unveiled in the 2030s. It will have memory. When it is put on, it will automatically interact with body heat to conform to the body shape of the wearer. For those who are shape conscious, there will be material with extra padding in the right places.
A new science will exist by the year 2006. It will specifically addresses the future. The scientists who specialize in it will be called "vaticinationists." Their primary concern will center on the evaluation of the impact of current-day conceptualizing and how it might affect the future. The science will not gain sufficient prominence or have a broad effect on world decisions until after 2028. By then, it will be apparent that changes in one aspect of social behavior have decisive effects on unrelated fields of endeavor.
There will be a major resurgence in private clubs by the beginning of the next century-2001 through 2003—with membership based primarily on income. Their existence will be tested in court, but the right to form such clubs will be upheld.