Another year without a robot revolution or flying cars is about to pass. While we might not be living in a world as dark as predicted in novels such as “Brave New World,” some assumptions have come true, while others have not happened — yet.
And although some science fiction novels predicted total robot takeover by now, in many ways, technology has a ways to go, said Ray Walsh, owner of Curious Book Shop, 307 E. Grand River Ave.
“I don’t think we’ve really scratched the surface with what’s going to happen in the future,” said Walsh, who specializes in the study of science fiction. “But technology certainly is considerably different than any of us imagined 20 years ago.”
Back to the future
While the government hasn’t quite turned to Big Brother tactics like in George Orwell’s classic “1984,” there are political stories from the past that can be looked at to know what to expect in the future.
The MSU Museum currently has an exhibit titled “No Holds Barred: Political Cartoons of the Gilded Age.”
The display shows political cartoons from more than 100 years ago that are strikingly similar to those in the papers during this year’s election, said MSU Museum communications director Lora Helou. Past cartoons’ similarity to the present might indicate things won’t change much in the near future.
The cartoons, which were mostly in Puck magazine, use strong instances of satire to exaggerate the follies of presidential candidates of the day.
“The themes are reminiscent in terms of the hyperbole and the feistiness between candidates,” Helou said. “This is from the 1800s, yet there are still some of these same current issues that we experience today.”
The exhibit will be at the museum through the end of the year and is a way to connect what is going on in our world in the past and present, Helou said.
The final frontiers
Although society has come a long way in its technological advances, there still are some assumptions about the future that have not come to fruition.
The extent of space travel, for example, is not as advanced by 2008 as people thought it would be, Walsh said.
“Some people thought we’d be walking on Mars and thought we’d be progressing in space flight more than we have,” Walsh said. “And we haven’t perfected time travel.”
Kristen Anderson, a human biology freshman, said regarding drastic changes, society still has a ways to go when it comes to technological advances.
“It’ll probably take over 50 years for hover cars and all that stuff,” Anderson said.
Other guesses about the future that only seemed possible in science fiction novels have become more than accurate.
Sci-fi stories that made a TV in every room of the house seem like something from another planet were actually on track with what was to come, Lyman Briggs freshman Katelyn Nguyen said.
Other items, such as cell phones that are capable of accessing the Internet and taking pictures, are something that people never thought we’d have already, Nguyen said.
“That’s pretty advanced, I’d say,” she said.
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Back to the books
Even with all the futuristic advances in technology available now, some people still prefer old-school styles of entertainment.
Walsh said customers come in to Curious Book Shop to buy a novel instead of scrolling through one online because of the simple pleasure of holding a book in your hand.
“They enjoy the feel of a book, the texture,” he said.
People who peruse the shop can find things they didn’t know they were looking for, a concept that might be more difficult when searching online, he said.
“If you do a physical search with your eyes, you can come across things you didn’t even know existed,” he said. “You’re Googling in a different way.”
Walsh, a 1971 MSU graduate, said one of the surprises of today’s technology is the abundance of computers.
“We imagined it, but didn’t think there’d be a computer in so many homes,” he said.
Older generations may not feel as comfortable sitting behind a computer screen all day and still rely on older methods, Walsh said.
“They can’t understand it and don’t want to understand it. It seems threatening,” he said. “When you’re glued to your screen, flipping through pages is not quite the same.”
Because advances in science have become commonplace, people have turned their interest from science fiction and its focus on the future to fantasy, Walsh said.
“Especially with Harry Potter around, there’s a lot more availability of fantasy material,” he said. “It’s easier to adapt to and easier to imagine than science fiction.”
Regardless of what the future holds, Walsh said he hopes society won’t be changed as drastically as it is conveyed in the sci-fi classics.
“It will not be quite as dark as ‘1984’, I hope,” he said. “Although I’m beginning to wonder what with the way the economy is going.”
