Three predictions made for the 21st century by Nikola Tesla
Nikola Tesla (July 10, 1856 – January 7, 1943) was one of the greatest inventors in human history who sought to make our world a better and safer place. However, the wealthy in power did not like the genius’s off-scale altruism, and they sought to turn his life into a nightmare, depriving ambitious projects of financing.
In the 1930s, journalists visited Nikola Tesla regularly, and the elderly inventor told them stories about early work and often shared his vision of the future of mankind.
Today we bring to your attention three Tesla predictions, which were first published on February 9, 1935 in Liberty magazine.
During a conversation with a scientist, journalists asked him to tell how he imagines the world in 100 years. Thus, before you are Tesla’s predictions for about 2035.
Education, information and war
Tesla envisioned a world in which scientific discoveries and the availability of information, rather than wars, would become a priority for humanity.
“Today, the most civilized countries in the world spend the maximum of their income on wars and the minimum on education. The twenty-first century will reverse this order. Fighting ignorance will be more glorious than dying on the battlefield. The discovery of a new scientific truth will be more important than the squabbling of diplomats. Even today, modern newspapers are beginning to treat scientific discoveries and the creation of fresh philosophical concepts as news [we are talking about the fact that earlier scientific discoveries were covered reluctantly and rarely]. In the newspapers of the twenty-first century, they will only mention crimes or political disagreements in passing, somewhere on the last pages, but on the first pages they will talk about scientific achievements, Nikola Tesla predicted.
Robots
Tesla got his start in robotics in the late 1890s when he patented his first ever remote-controlled boat, an invention that stunned audiences at the 1898 Electrical Exhibition at Madison Square Garden.
“At present, our civilization is going through a difficult time, because we have not yet fully adapted to the age of machines. However, we must understand that the solution to our problems is not in self-destruction, but in the mastery of machines.
The countless actions that are still performed by human hands will be performed by automata. Currently, scientists working in the laboratories of American universities are trying to create what has been described as a “thinking machine”. I expected such a development of events [yes, Tesla predicted the creation of artificial intelligence].
I did design robots, and today this is a generally accepted fact, but the main principle is still not realized. In the twenty-first century, robots will take over the place that slaves occupied in the ancient world. There is no reason at all for humanity to abandon robot assistants and production automation in the future, ”Tesla shared his vision of the future.
Cheap energy and rational use of natural resources
“Long before the dawn of the next century [before the 22nd century], systematic reforestation and the scientific management of natural resources will put an end to all devastating droughts, wildfires and floods. The universal use of hydropower and its transmission over long distances will provide every family with cheap electricity and eliminate the need to burn fuel. The struggle for existence will be minimized, which means that society will develop along an ideal, and not along a material path [if the struggle for survival and poverty are eliminated, then everyone will have equal opportunities for self-realization],” the inventor dreamed.
