Sir Arthur Clarke - The Futurologist

Being a futurologist is like ropewalking.
It's highly likely that people mistake you for astrologer or a supernatural power holder with an adept skill for predicting.
Yet, futurology is based on Science and facts, and the extraordinary power of extrapolation.

Excerpts from Raymond Whitaker's article in The Independent, Sunday, 23 March 2008

See what Sir Arthur Clarke had predicted. These five things have become taken-for-granted facts today:

1. Geo-Synchronous satellites - The ones that always seems over our heads like the sword of Damascus!
Clarke was the first to suggest that satellites which remain at a fixed point relative to Earth could be used for worldwide communications. The geostationary orbit is now known as the "Clarke orbit".

2. The Internet - Wherever you go, you follow the network!
The father of the internet, Sir Tim Berners-Lee credits Clarke's short story, Dial F for Frankenstein, as an inspiration.

3. Spaceguard - The Asteroid Tracking System
In his novel Rendezvous With Rama, Clarke created "Project Spaceguard", a system to track asteroids that might collide with Earth. When such a system was set up in 1996, it was called "Spaceguard", in homage.

4. The Space Station - 'I told you so....'
The space station, now under construction, was put on screen in 1968 by Clarke and Stanley Kubrick in 2001: A Space Odyssey.

5. N-Powered Spacecrafts - Reactors on board
In 1951 Clarke envisaged nuclear-powered spacecraft, a prediction that came true with several satellites, launched by the Soviet Union, which had small reactors on board.

Cool! What's coming next?
Well... Here's the list:

1. Space Ladder
In his 1979 novel, In The Fountains of Paradise Sir Arthur Clark suggested a "space lift", a geostationary satellite tethered to the Earth's surface, that allows men and materials to travel up and down without having to blast into orbit. Advancements in Carbon nanotube technology may make the 22,000-mile-long tether feasible.

2. Prince Harry will be going into Space in 2013. That's more than possible.

3. Virtual Reality will be more real. By 2025 the brain's functions will be fully mapped, allowing us to experience full sensory immersion.

4. There will be two intelligent species on Earth - one biological, and the other non-biological. The so-called artificial intelligence will at least catch up with the natural intelligence.

5. The Universal Replicator. By 2040, a "universal replicator" will be made and it will be capable of cloning anything from caviar to diamonds.