The future of the past
BROWSING a street market in London’s East End, Feedback’s eye was caught by two slim volumes entitled The World in 1984. They turned out to contain predictions published in New Scientist, the first printed 50 years ago this week, about how the world might look 20 years on. Of the 99 contributions many were by Great Men, and six-and-a-half by women (taking account of a wife-and-husband team).
In retrospect, 1964 was a watershed. On one side lay the techno-optimism of the 1950s: though we spotted no mention of personal jet packs, some pieces debunked the idea that the future of food was “a pill on a plate”. On the other side… President Kennedy had been assassinated in November 1963.
But what first struck Feedback was the number of contributors who shared the fears of Professor Lord Todd (who we would now name simply Alexander), the then chair of the UK government advisory committee on scientific policy. Opening the collection, he wrote that he would “start on the assumption… that there will be no world war during the period we are considering”. The world had come within a hair’s breadth of conflagration in the October 1962 Cuban missile crisis.
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Sixteen more pieces mentioned the threat of annihilation, if we include one by the sociologist and criminologist Barbara Wootton. She rather approved of the preference of some young people for “Aldermaston marching” – the UK’s Atomic Weapons Research Establishment at Aldermaston having been a focus for nuclear disarmament protests.
Meurig Hughes’s computer helpfully informed him that his download of iTunes would take “about 1193046 hours” – 136 years – and also that it had received 243 of 223 megabytes
Armageddon postponed
MARCHES for disarmament have relocated since the 1960s, but how much has the threat itself changed? Sadly, we found a of Stanford University in California, concluding that a child born today has at least a 10 per cent chance of dying prematurely due to nuclear war. Given the chance, then, we hope to bring you more from the delightful document that is The World in 1984 in the future.
Another apocalypse?
APOCALYPSE comes in many flavours – which may be considered an advantage of a globalised society with a variety of traditions. Having survived the last page of the Mayan calendar in 2012, Feedback is now that Ragnarok, the Viking day of doom, is coming on 22 February 2014.
“Ragnarok is the ultimate landmark in Viking mythology, when the gods fall and die, so this really… should not be underestimated,” explains Danielle Daglan, director of the in York, UK – the finale of which just happens to be on that date.
The answer is still ‘no’
BACK in mid-November, the above press release for the Viking festival led the UK’s Daily Mail newspaper to ask: “” Feedback consulted the , the collection of Viking lore compiled in the 13th century. It seems to say clearly that Ragnarok will follow three consecutive years without a summer. (See the article on AD536 in next week’s New Scientist for a discussion of what that might have been about.)
We contacted the festival and Samantha Orange from its PR agency replied that they “have taken some creative licence”, linking the weather portents to “predictions that we are heading into a mini-ice-age” – although she rather blots her copybook here by referencing a .
So the answer to the Mail‘s questioning headline is – not for the first time – “no”.
Software sampling silliness
OUR discussion of taking software through customs posts back in the day has jogged more memories (30 November 2013). Rod Ward used to carry magnetic data tapes through customs in the early 1970s. He “soon learned to place the start-recording-here marker well down the tape” in case officials demanded to clip off a sample of the initial portion.
Andrew Colin used to distribute software on floppy discs, later versions of which, younger readers may like to know, came in crunchy shells. A client in Norway more than once had to return discs that had been cracked open.
“It dawned on us,” Andrew recalls, “that the problem might be caused by customs officers looking for illegal shipments of drugs. So we attached a note to each disc, saying, ‘There are no drugs in this disc. If you break it open you will ruin it.'” There was no more trouble.
By looking at this you agree
FINALLY and alarmingly, the email that Ian Beaver forwards declares: “You acknowledge by the receipt of this that you have read the terms and conditions.” He is concerned: “They don’t explain how I may un-receive their email, should I wish to not so acknowledge.” We skimmed all 3400 words and advise that we would want to read them at least twice more before accepting them.
As Ian notes, “writing to you – and thus proving I have received the email – could be a mistake”. So this is just between us, OK?