HOW PREDICTIONS MISSED THE MARK

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SINCE the turn of the century, there have been countless outlandish claims made about how we would live our lives in the third millennium.
 Some predicted doom with the outbreak of worldwide famine. But others believed humans would prosper, with robots doing all the work while we shuttled to the moon and back on private space crafts.
 The famine prediction came to light in 1971, on the BBC programme Horizon. It reported the beliefs of a professor from Stanford University in America that millions would die when global food supplies ran out by 1999.
 British professor Paul Erlich went even further and predicted that mankind had only a one per cent chance of surviving into the next millennium. Others thought that we wouldn't be eating proper food by now at all. In 1966, Tomorrow's World presenter Raymond Baxter said that we would only be swallowing nutrient pills by the 90s.
 Travel was another aspect which was expect to change drastically by the year 2000. Touring the solar system was considered a probability and collapsed airline Pan Am actually advertised hypersonic jets capable of going to the moon. Of course, it didn't become a reality.
 Even the government made some appalling mistakes. In the 60s, the Department of Trade and Industry predicted that every home would have an "Able Mabel" - a robot housewife.
 The experts got it wrong on personal computers, too. They never predicted the huge explosion of interest in PCs or the Internet.
 Incredibly, even IBM's own president once predicted that the total global sales of computers would amount to FIVE.
 Our homes haven't changed in the way experts believed they would, either. In 1964, we were told that we would be living in shining new cities on the Polar ice caps. There was also mention of homes under the sea and, of course, in space.
 Even the renowned architect Sir Hugh Casson had a vision that we would live in white plastic pods with enough space inside to park a hovercraft.
 Incredible claims were also made for the uses of nuclear energy. Robert Ferry of the US Institute of Radiator Manufacturers, for instance, thought every home would be powered by a nuclear reactor.
 On the health front, there was a widespread belief that we would live to be at least 200 by the turn of the century.
 As far back as 1928, one paper predicted that the average person would live to be 150. In fact, the average life expectancy, although it has steadily risen, is still just 76 for men and 80 for women.
 Perhaps the oddest predictions of all, however, were over fashion. Everyone seemed to think that we would be wearing zip-up latex catsuits similar to those worn by Jane Fonda in Barbarella.
 Designer Elizabeth Gibson said: "I thought that by 1999 everyone would look the same and be dressed in all-in-one metallic outfits, looking very futuristic."
 And designer Andrew Groves added: "I grew up with images of white catsuits in my head - like something out of the film 2001."
 Despite all these bizarre and embarrassingly incorrect views of the future, however, we're still at it. Only this week, science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke said he believed holidays in space would be big business from 2010.
 Engineers in America are also seeking cash to open a hotel in orbit above the Earth, made out of empty space shuttle tanks welded into a ring.
 For the time being, however, we will just have to wait and see what develops. By now, we should have learned not to believe anything until we see it with our own eyes.