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It’s the end of the year and you won’t be able to escape a wave of technology predictions for next year. Most of them seem to fairly reasonable, but they aren’t quite as aggressive and entertaining anymore as they were in the past. Here are our 25 favorite technology predictions that were not exactly true.
Rand Technology home computer from 1954
1878 - Erasmus Wilson (Oxford professor): “When the Paris Exhibition [of 1878] closes, electric light will close with it and no more will be heard of it.” Fact: The first electric light was made in 1800 by Humphry Davy. Thomas Edison is credited with the invention of the light bulb in October of 1879.
1903 - Michigan Savings Bank advising Henry Ford’s lawyer, Horace Rackham: “The horse is here to stay but the automobile is only a novelty – a fad.” Fact: The first working steam-powered vehicle was designed by Ferdinand Verbiest in 1672. Karl Benz is generally considered to be the inventor of the modern car. He patented his Motorwagen in 1886. Ford’s iconic Model T car, was built from 1908 through 1927. More than 15 million were built.
1909 - Scientific American: “That the automobile has practically reached the limit of its development is suggested by the fact that during the past year no improvements of a radical nature have been introduced.” Fact: We do know that the automotive industry is still going through rapid innovation cycles, almost 125 years after the patent for the Motorwagen was filed. We are not seeing an end yet, especially since we will be getting the most interesting hybrid vehicles in 2011 so far.
1926 - Lee DeForest (Inventor of the vacuum tube): “To place a man in a multi-stage rocket and project him into the controlling gravitational field of the moon where the passengers can make scientific observations, perhaps land alive, and then return to earth – all that constitutes a wild dream worthy of Jules Verne. I am bold enough to say that such a man-made voyage will never occur regardless of all future advances.” Yuri Gagarin was the first man in space in April of 1961. Today we are talking about commercial spaceflights – there is a Commercial Spaceflight Federation and you could even book spaceflights through carriers such as Virgin Galactic for $200,000 per seat (no flights scheduled yet).
1932 - Albert Einstein: “There is not the slightest indication that nuclear energy will ever be obtainable. It would mean that the atom would have to be shattered at will.” Fact: Enrico Fermi achieved the first nuclear reaction in 1941.
1936 - New York Times: “A rocket will never be able to leave the Earth’s atmosphere.” Fact: The first rocket capable of reaching space was Germany’s V2 missile that was first launched in 1942. The first rocket that actually carried something into space (the Sputnik satellite) was launched in 1957.
1943 - Thomas Watson (president of IBM): “I think there is a world market for maybe five computers.” Fact: Gartner predicts that 352.4 million PCs will be sold in 2011. Including the iPad and other tablet devices, more than 400 million personal computing devices are forecasted to be sold next year.
1946 - Darryl Zanuck (movie producer, 20th Century Fox): “Television won’t last because people will soon get tired of staring at a plywood box every night.” Fact: We may fall asleep in front of the TV, but the modern TV is just about to be reinvented with connected TVs as well as the first naked-eye 3D TVs that could make an appearance at CES 2011 in two weeks.
1949 - Popular Mechanics: “Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons.” Fact: Apple’s 11″ Macbook Air weighs 2.3 pounds.
1955 - Alexander Lewyt (president of vacuum cleaner company Lewyt): “Nuclear-powered vacuum cleaners will probably be a reality in 10 years.” Fact: Dyson vacuum cleaners look like they are nuclear powered, but they are, as far we know, powered by standard electricity that may be generated by nuclear power plants. Lewyt was sold to Budd (today ThyssenKrupp Budd) in 1957.
1959 - Arthur Summerfield (U.S. postmaster general): “We stand on the threshold of rocket mail.” Fact: The average letter still takes about 2 days to be delivered. For faster delivery times, faster than rockets that is, check email or SMS.
1962 - Dennis Gabor (British physicist): “Transmission of documents via telephone wires is possible in principle, but the apparatus required is so expensive that it will never become a practical proposition.” Fact: The first emails was reportedly send in 1971. Among the first commercial email services was CompuServe, which began offering such services in 1978 under the name Infoplex.
1966 - Time: “Remote shopping, while entirely feasible, will flop – because women like to get out of the house, like to handle merchandise, like to be able to change their minds.” Fact: U.S. Consumers spent more than $28 billion in holiday online shopping in 2011.
1968 - Business Week: “With over 50 foreign cars already on sale here, the Japanese auto industry isn’t likely to carve out a big slice of the US market.” Fact: According to the Wall Street Journal, Japanese car manufacturers currently hold a combined 38% of the U.S. new car sales market.
1969 - A British bank manager to John Edwards, a former RAF radio engineer, when he asked for 250,000 British pounds of investment in cell phone technology: “No one wants to carry around a phone all the time.” Fact: There is a dispute who really invented the cell phone. Edwards apparently developed the cell phone parallel to efforts in the U.S. and got stuck when he ran out for money. He maintains until today that he is the true inventor of the cell phone and says that he forgot to patent the technology, because he was simply excited about the technology. Today, he holds several other patents such as the hijack alarm in air planes.
1977 - Ken Olsen (founder of Digital Equipment Corporation): “There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home.” Fact: The most famous IT prediction.
1983 - Bill Gates (Co-founder and CEO, Microsoft): “Microsoft will never make a 32-bit operating system.” Fact: Windows NT was Microsoft’s first 32-bit operating system in 1994.
1995 - Bob Metcalfe (founder of 3Com): “The Internet will collapse in 1996.” Fact: According to Internet World Stats, there are currently 1.97 billion Internet users. Attacks on free speech and spam remain the biggest threats to the Internet. Otherwise, it is still going strong. IDC estimated the number of Internet users in 1995 at 16 million.
1997 - Nathan Myhrvold (CTO of Microsoft): “Apple is already dead.” Fact: Apple’s stock closed 1997 with a price of $13.13 and a market cap of about $12 billion. Today, Apple has a market cap of $297 billion, ahead of Microsoft’s $242 billion. Apple also surpassed Microsoft in quarterly revenues.
1998 - Bill Gates (Co-founder and CEO, Microsoft): “This antitrust thing will blow over.” Fact: From today’s view, Gates may have been right. Microsoft was sued by the DOJ and 20 U.S. states in 1998. A settlement was reached in 2001 and Microsoft’s settlement obligations expired in 2009. It took more than a decade, but Microsoft has not seen considerable damage by this suit, but seems to be shooting itself in the foot instead. However, companies such as Google may want to keep the Microsoft lesson in mind.
1999 - Hans Moravec, Robotics Institute, Carnegie Mellon University: “By 2050 (assuming a global population of 9 billion), $1000 worth of computing power will equal the processing power of all human brains on earth.” I could not resist adding this one to this list. Someone should keep this one in a diary and check back in 39 years. By 2020, we are predicted to get the first exascale supercomputers, which can deliver 1 000 000 000 000 000 000 calculations per second for a little more than $1000, we assume.)
2003 - Bill Gates: “These Google guys, they want to be billionaires and rock stars and go to conferences and all that. Let us see if they still want to run the business in two to three years”.Fact: Both Larry Page and Sergey Brin are ranked among the 25 wealthiest people in the world with an estimated wealth of $17.5 billion each. The do not appear at conferences very often anymore.
2004 - Bill Gates: “Two years from now, spam will be solved.” Fact: Gates was wrong.
2005 - Gene Munster, Piper Jaffray: “Apple could release a 1 TB iPod by the end of 2010.” Fact: There is no need for a 1 TB iPod. The hard drive model is dead and 64 GB is the most you can get right now. Your storage space will be in the cloud in the future.
2009 - Cisco: “The first commercial quantum computer will be available by mid-2020.” Fact: Another one to be checked – in 9 years. However, I was fascinated how precise this forecast was. If it is released in Q4 2020, can we consider it to be late to market? However, there have been several quantum breakthroughs this year and we remember that D-wave announced the first Quantum computer in 2007 and the first quantum processor was announced in 2009.
Breathtaking photos of one of the world’s last uncontacted tribes
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New photos obtained by Survival International show uncontacted Indians in never-seen-before detail. The Indians are living in Brazil, near the Peruvian border, and are featured in the ‘Jungles’ episode of BBC1’s ‘Human Planet’ (Thurs 3 Feb, 8pm, UK only).The pictures were taken by Brazil’s Indian Affairs Department, which has authorized Survival to use them as part of its campaign to protect their territory. They reveal a thriving, healthy community with baskets full of manioc and papaya fresh from their gardens.
The tribe’s survival is in serious jeopardy as an influx of illegal loggers invades the Peru side of the border. Brazilian authorities believe the influx of loggers is pushing isolated Indians from Peru into Brazil, and the two groups are likely to come into conflict.
Survival and other NGOs have been campaigning for years for the Peruvian government to act decisively to stop the invasion, but little has been done.
Survival and other NGOs have been campaigning for years for the Peruvian government to act decisively to stop the invasion, but little has been done.
Last year an American organization, Upper Amazon Conservancy, carried out the latest of several overflights on the Peru side, uncovering further evidence of illegal logging in a protected area.
Marcos Apurinã, Coordinator of Brazil’s Amazon Indian organization COIAB said today, ‘It is necessary to reaffirm that these peoples exist, so we support the use of images that prove these facts. These peoples have had their most fundamental rights, particularly their right to life, ignored … it is therefore crucial that we protect them.’
Renowned Brazilian Indian leader Davi Kopenawa Yanomami said today, ‘The place where the Indians live, fish, hunt and plant must be protected. That is why it is useful to show pictures of the uncontacted Indians, for the whole world to know that they are there in their forest and that the authorities must respect their right to live there.’
Marcos Apurinã, Coordinator of Brazil’s Amazon Indian organization COIAB said today, ‘It is necessary to reaffirm that these peoples exist, so we support the use of images that prove these facts. These peoples have had their most fundamental rights, particularly their right to life, ignored … it is therefore crucial that we protect them.’
Renowned Brazilian Indian leader Davi Kopenawa Yanomami said today, ‘The place where the Indians live, fish, hunt and plant must be protected. That is why it is useful to show pictures of the uncontacted Indians, for the whole world to know that they are there in their forest and that the authorities must respect their right to live there.’
Peru’s Amazon Indian organisation AIDESEP issued a statement saying, ‘We are deeply troubled by the authorities’ lack of action… despite complaints from Peru and abroad against illegal logging, nothing has been done.’
TV presenter Bruce Parry of hit TV series Tribe said, ‘Protecting the land where uncontacted tribes live is of global importance. We have consistently failed to introduce them to our world without inflicting terrible traumas. It is for them to decide when they want to join our world. Not us.’
TV presenter Bruce Parry of hit TV series Tribe said, ‘Protecting the land where uncontacted tribes live is of global importance. We have consistently failed to introduce them to our world without inflicting terrible traumas. It is for them to decide when they want to join our world. Not us.’
Survival’s Director Stephen Corry said today, ‘The illegal loggers will destroy this tribe. It’s vital that the Peruvian government stop them before time runs out. The people in these photos are self-evidently healthy and thriving. What they need from us is their territory protected, so that they can make their own choices about their future.
‘But this area is now at real risk, and if the wave of illegal logging isn’t stopped fast, their future will be taken out of their hands. This isn’t just a possibility: it’s irrefutable history, rewritten on the graves of countless tribes for the last five centuries.’
‘But this area is now at real risk, and if the wave of illegal logging isn’t stopped fast, their future will be taken out of their hands. This isn’t just a possibility: it’s irrefutable history, rewritten on the graves of countless tribes for the last five centuries.’
The Bruce Lee Style of Fitness, Exercise & Working Out
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In the world of bodybuilding and physique transformation, one of the most highly respected physiques of all time belonged to a guy who stood 5’7″ and weighed between 130 and 165 lbs.
That’s right…at his heaviest, Bruce Lee weighed only 165 lbs.
And yet, bodybuilders like Arnold Schwarzenegger were in awe of the body he built.
So, how did he do it?
And more importantly, how can you do it?
How can you build a body like this?
Well, if you want to learn about the weightlifting routine he used to build his strength and increase his muscle mass….pick up a copy of The Art of Expressing the Human Body.
But…you will be wasting your time.
If Bruce Lee was alive today, he would not be using the training routines found inside that book.
Bruce Lee believed that as a warrior and as a person, one should never “get set into one form. One should adapt and create your own style, and let it grow, be like water”.
Empty your mind, be formless, shapeless — like water.When you put water in a cup, it becomes the cup;When you put water into a bottle it becomes the bottle;When you put it in a teapot it becomes the teapot.Now water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend.
At this point, you may be asking…what the heck does being formless like water have to do with fitness, working out and getting a wicked set of abs like Bruce Lee?
Well, I’m going to tell you.
Being formless like water means using those training techniques that work for your particular goals…and to not get all wrapped up in dogma.
There is no perfect workout
There is no perfect diet.
What there is, is….
- your body as it currently exists,
- your vision of how you want your body to be
- and a whole bunch of tools & techniques that may or may not help you achieve your goals.
Becoming attached to a certain training method (bodybuilding, yoga, pilates, crossfit, cardio, walking, aerobic classes, Tae-Bo, P 90X, etc…) is a sure path to stagnation and unattained goals.
The same goes for nutrition.
If the tool is ineffective, find a way to make it effective or replace it with another tool.
Be like water
.
In tomorrow’s post, I will list some of the training methods & modifications that I use to help my clients achieve their individual goals.
- What workout is best for hypertension?
- What diet is best for rapid weight loss?
- What workout is best for helping a hardgainer gain muscle?
- What diet is best for foodies?
- How does a 16 year old kid get huge biceps?
- How does a 40-something year old woman tighten up her triceps?
Unique goals require unique solutions.
One size does not fit all.
Be fluid like water…and get a wicked set of abs like Bruce Lee
10 Weird Achievements in the Guinness Book of World Records
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Sunday, February 27, 2011
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1. Married 23 Times – Linda WolfeLinda Wolfe of Anderson, Indiana, has been married 23 times and holds the title of world’s most married person. Good for her. Marriage is a wonderful thing, right? You get to have a wedding. People get together and dance. We’d hate to be her sister, though. Being the bridesmaid and not the bride once is painful enough, but 23 times? Just grimace your way through the speeches, sister.
2. Watching Television for 72 Hours – Suresh Joachim
We’re pretty sure this record has been broken before. It’s just never been reported. Sri Lankan native Suresh Joachim outsmarted every couch potato in the world by having Guinness observe him as he watched 72 hours of TV straight – something most of us do in private. If he was smart, he avoided QVC completely, because he’d have to look away if he wanted to order that real funny one-a-day kitten quotation calendar. Cats! They’re just like us!
3. Sitting in Bathtub with 87 Rattlesnakes – Jackie Bibby
Ever been relaxing in your bathtub and hear a hiss and think, “OH MY GOD THIS BATHTUB IS FULL OF RATTLESNAKES!” only to realize that it was just one your lavender-scented Pier 1 candles going out? Well, Jackie Bibby doesn’t have that problem. The Texas-bred serpentine-lover loves getting nice and comfortable with our scale-bellied friends in the most intimate way. We’re pretty sure that the only reason the snakes are cool with it is because Bibby puts some John Tesh on the CD player before he slips in. That guy is a modern day snake-charmer.
4. Eating 200 Earthworms in 30 Seconds – C. Manoharan
Here’s something to think about: there’s a record for eating a bucketful of earthworms and there’s also a record for eating that bucketful quickly. That’s two separate records for eating worms. C. Manoharan of India holds the record for swallowing 200 earthworms in 30 seconds (completely unaided by ketchup or tartar sauce). He also tried to set a record by flossing two snakes through one nostril but failed – possibly because he realized how greedy he was being.
5. Holding Breath for 13 Minutes and 42.5 Seconds – Robert Foster
USA! USA! American purebred Robert Foster holds the record for longest breath-holding at a whopping 13 minutes and 42.5 seconds. And to make this even more impressive, he did it back in 1959 way before we had all these newfangled breath-extension technologies. It just goes to show you, America is really good at a lot of things. No one can beat us when it comes to controlling our breath. Just look at Kenny G.
6. 75 Beer Glasses Balanced on Chin – Ashrita Furman
If you’re ever eager to get kicked out of a bar super fast, tell the manager that you’re world-record holder Ashrita Furman. After he gives you 75 pint beer glasses, make a huge speech about how you managed to do this for 10 seconds in New York almost ten years ago, but tonight you’re going to do it for 11… then fail miserably. Just shatter those glasses with zero impunity. If there’s anyone there who reads every edition of the Guinness Book of World Records, they’ll eat it up. (Not the glass, the act. Unless, of course, they hold the record for eating glass.) Furman is known for holding multiple records. Although he has set 328 official world records since 1979, he currently holds only 126.
7. 124 One-Finger Push-Ups – Paul Henry Allen Lynch
My dad’s a lawyer. What’s your dad do?He goes from town to town doing one-finger push-ups.Wow, that’s much cooler than what my dad does. Your dad makes my dad look like a total chump.
8. Stretching Skin to 6.25 inches – Garry Turner
Garry Turner, of the Lincolnshire Turners, went on national television and stretched the skin of his stomach to 6.25 inches for the sole purpose of showing the world he could do it. One can only imagine that there were a lot of people watching at home that were holding onto their stomachs as they watched, either because they wanted to throw up or because they quietly suspected they could probably beat that record.
9. 19 People Inside a Soap Bubble – Sam Heath
This country has been suffering ever since the real-estate bubble burst. But that doesn’t mean that all bubbles are bad, right? How can you hold anything against a giant soap bubble? That’s right, you can’t! Sam Heath set the world record for most people inside a single bubble when he used his giant bubble wand to encapsulate 19 people inside. Witnesses say Sam then cast a magical spell, the bubble popped, and its inhabitants disappeared. Just kidding. It popped, everyone clapped politely, and people talked about it for maybe three days.
10. Squirting Milk from the Eye – Mike Moraal
If you want to be like Mike Moraal of British Columbia and squirt milk from your eye 2.6 meters, you’ll have your name in the ol’ G-books for… probably forever. But you should never tell your date that you did it, and you should definitely never try to do it while you’re dining at the Olive Garden. Wait until you get home at least. No one likes eye milk on their never-ending salad bowl.
10 Ancient Methods of Birth Control
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Tuesday, February 1, 2011
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This year marked the fiftieth anniversary of the birth control pill, which many considered to have empowered women and sparked the sexual revolution. But as this list will show, women have had some control over their reproductive rights for millennia, although some of these ancient birth control methods were, admittedly, more terrifying than most of the methods in use today.
To be included on this list, the birth control had to be at least plausibly effective to some degree. Records exist of women in ancient Rome and Greece relying on dances and amulets to prevent pregnancy, and we can safely assume that those probably didn’t do much. At the risk of stirring up controversy, I’ve listed both contraceptives—which prevent sperm from fertilizing egg—and abortifacients, which induce abortion. For the sake of interest, I’ve focused on methods that would be unusual today, and not on methods that are still regularly practiced—like abstinence, coitus interruptus, or fertility awareness—to similar effect now as a few centuries ago. These items are in no particular order.
Lemons
Citric acid is said to have spermicidal properties, and women used to soak sponges in lemon juice before inserting them vaginally. Mentioned in the Talmud, this was a preferred method of birth control in ancient Jewish communities. The sponge itself would act as a pessary—a physical barrier between the sperm and the cervix. The great womanizer Casanova was said to have inserted the rind of half a lemon into his lovers as a primitive cervical cap or diaphragm, the residual lemon juice serving to annihilate the sperm. Lemon- and lime-juice douches following coitus were also recommended as a form of birth control, but this method was likely less effective, since sperm can enter the cervix—and hence out of reach of any douching—within minutes of ejaculation. Incidentally, some alternative medicine practitioners today suggest that megadoses of vitamin C (6 to 10 g a day) could induce an abortion in women under 4 weeks of pregnancy, but there’s no evidence that citrus fruits were used in this way in ancient times.
Queen Anne’s Lace
Queen Anne’s Lace is also known as wild carrot, and its seeds have long been used as a contraceptive—Hippocrates described this use over two millennia ago. The seeds block progesterone synthesis, disrupting implantation and are most effective as emergency contraception within eight hours of exposure to sperm—a sort of “morning after” form of birth control. Taking Queen Anne’s Lace led to no or mild side effects (like a bit of constipation), and women who stopped taking it could conceive and rear a healthy child. The only danger, it seemed, was confusing the plant with similar-looking but potentially deadly poison hemlock and water hemlock.
Pennyroyal
Pennyroyal is a plant in the mint genus and has a fragrance similar to that of spearmint. The ancient Greeks and Romans used it as a cooking herb and a flavoring ingredient in wine. They also drank pennyroyal tea to induce menstruation and abortion—1st-century physician Dioscorides records this use of pennyroyal in his massive five-volume encyclopedia on herbal medicine. Too much of the tea could be highly toxic, however, leading to multiple organ failure.
Blue Cohosh
Blue cohosh, traditionally used for birth control by Native Americans, contains at least two abortifacient substances: one mimics oxytocin, a hormone produced during childbirth that stimulates the uterus to contract, and a substance unique to blue cohosh, caulosaponin, also results in uterine contractions. Midwives today may use blue cohosh in the last month of pregnancy to tone the uterus in preparation for labour. The completely unrelated but similarly named black cohosh also has estrogenic and abortifacient properties and was often combined with blue cohosh to terminate a pregnancy.
Dong Quai
Dong quai, also known as Chinese angelica, has long been known for its powerful effects on a woman’s cycle. Women drank a tonic brewed with dong quai roots to help regulate irregular menstruation, alleviate menstrual cramps and help the body regenerate after menstruation. Taken during early pregnancy, however, dong quai had the effect of causing uterine contractions and inducing abortion. European and American species of angelica have similar properties but were not as widely used.
Common Rue
Rue, a blue-green herb with feathery leaves, is grown as an ornamental plant and is favored by gardeners for its hardiness. It is rather bitter but can be used in small amounts as a flavoring ingredient in cooking. Soranus, a gynecologist from 2nd-century Greece, described its use as a potent abortifacient, and women in Latin America have traditionally eaten rue in salads as a contraceptive and drunk rue tea as emergency contraception or to induce abortion. Ingested regularly, rue decreases blood flow to the endometrium, essentially making the lining of the uterus non-nutritive to a fertilized egg.
Cotton
In the ancient medical manuscript the Ebers Papyrus (1550 BCE), women were advised to grind dates, acacia tree bark, and honey together into a paste, apply this mixture to seed wool, and insert the seed wool vaginally for use as a pessary. Granted, it was what was in the cotton rather than the cotton itself that promoted its effectiveness as birth control—acacia ferments into lactic acid, a well-known spermicide—but the seed wool did serve as a physical barrier between ejaculate and cervix. Interestingly, though, women during the times of American slavery would chew on the bark of cotton root to prevent pregnancy. Cotton root bark contains substances that interfere with the corpus luteum, which is the hole left in the ovary when ovulation occurs. The corpus luteum secretes progesterone to prepare the uterus for implantation of a fertilized egg. By impeding the corpus luteum’s actions, cotton root bark halts progesterone production, without which a pregnancy can’t continue.
Papaya
In South Asia and Southeast Asia, unripe papaya was used to prevent or terminate pregnancy. Once papaya is ripe, though, it loses the phytochemicals that interfere with progesterone and thus its contraceptive and abortifacient properties. The seeds of the papaya could actually serve as an effective male contraceptive. Papaya seeds, taken daily, could cut a man’s sperm count to zero and was safe for long-term use. Best of all, the sterility was reversible: if the man stopped taking the seeds, his sperm count would return to normal.
Silphium
Silphium was a member of the fennel family that grew on the shores of Cyrenaica (in present-day Libya). It was so important to the Cyrenean economy that it graced that ancient city’s coins. Silphium had a host of uses in cooking and in medicine, and Pliny the Elder recorded the herb’s use as a contraceptive. It was reportedly effective for contraception when taken once a month as a tincture. It could also be used as emergency birth control, either orally or vaginally, as an abortifacient. By the second century CE, the plant had gone extinct, likely because of over harvesting.
Mercury
Civilizations the world over, from the ancient Assyrians and Egyptians to the Greeks, were fascinated by mercury and were convinced that it had medicinal value and special curative properties, using it to treat everything from skin rashes to syphilis. In ancient China, women were advised to drink hot mercury to prevent pregnancy. It was likely pretty effective at convincing a woman’s body that she wasn’t fit to carry a child, leading to miscarriage, so in that sense, it worked as a contraceptive. However, as we know today, mercury is enormously toxic, causing kidney and lung failure, as well as brain damage and death. At that point, pregnancy would probably be the least of your worries.
