More than a century ago, different prophecies all made attempts at guessing what life would be like in the 2nd millennium. Some of these predictions really did come true but others were just too fantastical.
One of the boldest prognoses claimed that flies and mosquitoes would all be wiped off the Earth in the early 2000s, while humans would invent intelligent robots that would act as their servants in daily life.
In 1899 in France they issued a series of cards that were essentially pictures depicting what would happen in the 1st decades of the 21st century. The pictures were drawn by artist Jean-Marc Côté and his colleagues.
For the French, robots played a central role in the future, they would replace humans in doing daily tasks. It was also thought that people would get around with flying cars in the new millennium.
Even though these predictions aren't realistic from our current point of view, there were some among them that were accurate guesses about today. The creative cards show that the artists believed that in the future people would communicate a lot easier using futuristic devices.
The internet revolution and technologies related to it clearly show that those particular prophecies were not far from the truth.
A prediction made by German visionaries also came to be - they believed that in the 2000s we'd be able to travel much faster from one place to another but even they couldn't have guess that the trains they were familiar with could transform into a subway.
At the beginning of the 20th century, the Chinese believed that at the dawn of the new millennium mankind would be able to eliminate mosquitoes and flies. This did not occur but they did manage to predict the emergence of cell phones and webcams.
Americans' predictions 100 years back had to do primarily with the physical appearance of the people in the nation. Their calculations estimated that in the new millennium the average American would be 2″ (5 cm) taller, while life expectancy would increase due to healthy eating and an active lifestyle.
Data reveals that in 1900 the average American was 65″ (165 cm) tall, while today they are 67″ (170 cm). Life expectancy has increased from an average of 47 years to 76 years.
