Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Things like the internet, cell phones and home computers were predicted not only by experts or sci-fi writers but in movied and even popular comics. For example, the comic strip Dick Tracy had a amazing wrist watch sized communicator used by Tracy that is much like a cell phone in the 1960s. In the movie 2001 Dave Bowman is shown eating breakfast on the Discovery Jupiter Mission watching or getting his morning news using a flat screen device playing a news item from the BBC -- an Apple i-pad as viewed from 1966-7 when Kubrick shot those parts of the film. As for home computers they were viewed as being used for tasks like running the home of tommorrow's kitchens and home cleaning or maintenace robots and for the anticipated jobs of tommorrow like teleworking and the home office of contract workers !
I think the '30s to '50s had more of a fanciful view of today's world. By the 1960s, with technology evolving, they could see what ways it was going and a lot of realistic predictions were made at that time.
Jules Verne got many of his technology ideas by actually discussing them with scientists. That is why many of his "predictions" seem so accurate.
We are at a point now that our protectionist patent laws and environmental and safety regulations actually prevent a lot of innovation from ever making it to the marketplace. Remember the initial bloom of computer software and wildly disparate interfaces? Wonder why nobody has put up a replacement for the train wreck that is eBay today? The natural end-point for a fearful government is the banning of innovation, whether through law or intimidation. It has happened many times in history.
July 6 1971. Under the cover of night a Pakistani airliner arrives in Beijing carrying Henry Kissinger and three aides on a secret mission to meet with Premier Zhou Enlai and prepare the way for a visit from President Richard Nixon. Before talks begin, Kissinger insists on delivering a special gift from the president to Chairman Mao. American made chopsticks from the famous Culinary Insitute of America, or CIA. The chopsticks were designed to explode as soon as they touched hot food, but they fizzled.
Instead of blowing the old tyrants head off, they cooked the food to perfection. It was so delicious that Mao turned to General Tso and said,"Ah, Tso,you must try this!" Just then the chopsticks exploded, blowing the general's head onto a nearby roof. Mao was delighted. He asked Kissinger for a million pairs: "One pair for each of my general's" Nixon's visit to China the next February was historic, but this was the moment real detente began.
This is classified under Weapons we're glad they never built.
Instead of blowing the old tyrants head off, they cooked the food to perfection. It was so delicious that Mao turned to General Tso and said,"Ah, Tso,you must try this!" Just then the chopsticks exploded, blowing the general's head onto a nearby roof. Mao was delighted. He asked Kissinger for a million pairs: "One pair for each of my general's" Nixon's visit to China the next February was historic, but this was the moment real detente began.
This is classified under Weapons we're glad they never built.
I had heard that when Tso initially demurred, Mao complained "General Tso's Chicken!" and the name stuck.
The suppressed inventions on this list, do you think any of them could have really become a reality or were they too much under the guise of science fiction?
Anthony Fokker was the most famous aircraft designer of WW 1, having contributed three very important planes.
The Fokker Eindeker...the first true fighter plane:
The Fokker Dr1 ...the famous Triplane :
And the Fokker D VII..generally regarded as the finest fighter of the war:
Having contibuted a monoplane, a biplane and a triplane, where was there to go? Well, between the Dr1 and the D VII, Fokker put his engineers to work on the ...Quntideker? This was the Fokker V 8, a five wing aircraft featuring a tri wing configuration at the extreme forward end of the aircraft, and a bi wing configuration behind the cockpit.
Fokkers engineers told him the idea was crazy, but he insisted that they go ahead with the work. A prototype was produced which everyone refused to test pilot, leaving Fokker himself to fly the craft the only two times such attempts were made. Both tests were very short, Fokker barely able to get the plane aloft and finding it impossible to control once in the air. The design was scrapped after the second flight.
Fokker's chief designer, Reinhold Platz, later stated that Fokker had no real purpose or theory in mind with the aircraft apart from the childish reasoning that if three wings were good, five had to be better.
Wow, we could have had a V 8
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
