James Canton (1) (1951–)

Written by a renowned futurist, adviser to presidents. Well, that explains a lot. This book is utter lunacy. But wait, you say, you're laughing now, but you'll see! Well, dear reader, I write to you from the future! And let me tell you, in year 2020, so often portrayed by this book, these predictions are only more ridiculous. The author shows zero grasp of science, or even basic reality of the world. I could quote some of the dumber things, but why, pick a page at random and find your own.

And now I have to go back to my world of 2020, where I watch live 2-way TV that manipulates my brain directly through audio waves so I can put in my shift as a nano-alchemist working together with my colleague who is a an AI on creating new virtual experiences for the hordes of boomers revitalised to be in their 40s. We've got access to one of those new version of quantum computers that can bend time and access its versions from other dimensions. Later I have an appointment with my robo doctor (so much more reliable than those fleshy meatbag ones) through the Internet 4 (so excited by the coming Internet 5!). Maybe I can get him to prescribe me some of those nanobots to give me an edge at work.

Forgive the poor satire, the book does it so much better. But it might cause you to alternate between laughing and screaming.

The funny thing about this book is that it also "predicts" many things which were already a reality in 2006 when it was published as if the author was not just terrible at predictions but also hopelessly uninformed. It also predicts multiple futures. I imagine so that later he can take out that particular quote and say that he got it right. Yes, whilst also getting it completely wrong one sentence later. Seriously, this book contains amounts of bullshit visible from space.… (mehr)

The predictions and forecasts are the usual mix of "that seems obvious" and "are you serious?" which I've encountered in similar books. The timelines for various technological innovations were very aggressive, we've already passed the date on many of them.

It was interesting to see his predictions for America in 2015 and how the worst case scenario - putting a halt to immigration and drawing inwards among other aspects - matched the Trump 2016 platform.

The single star is because the prose is horrible. Compared to more readable works by Toffler or, say, "The Year 2000" by Kahn and Weiner, this is full of marketing speak, completely nonsensical PowerPoint-style slides, buzz words, digressions, and so forth. There was a noticeable lack of citations and use of "anecdata" throughout.

I wouldn't have bothered finishing it if I didn't read futurology as a hobby.… (mehr)