Predicting the Future

[dajarrel]

Statements by very notable individuals regarding the future.....

"Man will never reach the moon, regardless of all future scientific advances."

-- Dr. Lee DeForest, Father of Radio & Grandfather of Television

"The bomb will never go off. I speak as an expert in explosives."

-- Admiral William Leahy, US Atomic Bomb Project Manhattan

"There is no likelihood man can ever tap the power of the atom."

-- Robert Millikan, Nobel Prize in Physics, 1923

"Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons."

-- Popular Mechanics, forecasting the relentless march of science, 1949.

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."

-- Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943

"I have traveled the length and breadth of this country and talked with

the best people, and I can assure you that data processing is a fad

that won't last out the year."

-- The editor in charge of business books for Prentice Hall, 1957

"But what is it good for?" commenting on the microchip.

-- Engineer at the Advanced Computing Systems Division of IBM, 1968.

"640K ought to be enough for anybody."

-- Bill Gates, 1981

Kinda blew that one, didn't he?

"This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously

considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no

value to us."

--Western Union internal memo, 1876

"The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value.

Who would pay for a message sent to nobody in particular?" In response

to urgings for investment in the radio in the 1920s."

-- David Sarnoff' Associates

"The concept is interesting and well-formed, but in order to earn

better than a 'C', the idea must be feasible,"

-- A Yale University management professor in response to Fred

Smith's paper proposing reliable overnight delivery service. Smith

went on to found Federal Express.

"I'm just glad it will be Clark Gable who falls on his face,

not Gary Cooper,"

-- Gary Cooper on his decision not to take the leading role in

Gone With The Wind.

"A cookie store is a bad idea. Besides, the market research

reports say America likes crispy cookies, not soft and chewy cookies like

you make,"

Investment house response to Debbi Fields' idea of starting

Mrs. Fields' Cookies.

"We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out."

-- Decca Recording Co. Rejecting the Beatles, 1962

"Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible."

-- Lord Kelvin, president Royal Society, 1895

"If I had thought about it, I wouldn't have done the

experiment. The literature was full of examples that said you can't do this."

-- Spencer Silver on the work that led to the unique adhesives

For 3-M "Post-It" Notepads.

"Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try and find

oil? You're crazy,"

-- Drillers who Edwin L. Drake tried to enlist to his project

to drill for oil, 1859

"Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high

plateau."

-- Irving Fisher, Professor of Economics, Yale University, 1929

"Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value."

-- Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Ecole

Superieure de Guerre, France

"Everything that can be invented has been invented."

-- Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, US Office of Patents, 1899

"The super computer is technologically impossible. It would

take all of the water that flows over Niagara Falls to cool the heat

generated by the number of vacuum tubes required."

-- Professor of Electrical Engineering, New York University, 1955

"I don't know what use any one could find for a machine that

would make copies of documents. It certainly couldn't be a feasible

business by itself. "

-- The President of IBM, refusing to back the idea, and

forcing the inventor to found Xerox.

"Louis Pasteur's theory of germs is ridiculous fiction."

-- Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology at Toulouse, 1872

"The abdomen, the chest, and the brain will forever be shut

from the intrusion of the wise and humane surgeon."

-- Sir John Eric Ericksen, British surgeon, appointed Surgeon-

Extraordinary to Queen Victoria 1873

"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home."

-- Ken Olson, president, chairman, founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1977.