Ray Bradbury once said, “I don’t try to describe the future. I try to prevent it.” Bradbury’s bent for creative destruction through literature gave the world not only a fun read but ideas for what the future should be.
Most detractors of ideas seem less interested in preventing a future than underestimating the capabilities of people. As proof, check out the blog Thought Mechanics offers some of history’s more egregious prognostications. Some favorites:
“I think there is a world market for maybe five computers.”
Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943
“Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible.”
Lord Kelvin, president, Royal Society, 1895.
“The bomb will never go off. I speak as an expert in explosives.”
Admiral William Leahy, US Atomic Bomb Project.
