Bertrand Russell, a famous philosopher, said in 1944, “The one thing the study of the past teaches us is that the future is never how people imagine it will be.” In 1946, physicists predicted that within twenty years, most of the world’s energy would be supplied by nuclear power. __________ (46) In 1951, a famous surgeon said that he and his colleagues were confident that “by the end of the 1950s, a cure for most if not all cancers will have been found.” In 1954, an American economist predicted Americans would go on getting richer and richer. ___________ (47). In the year 1969, an automation engineer working for Max Factor Cosmetics in Britain said that “within twenty or twenty-five years factories that today employ hundreds of workers will need only five or ten computer technicians to run them.” _____________ (48). In the early 1970s, there were many predictions that before the end of the century most homes in the United States, Europe and Japan would have computers in them. ___________ (49) Long before 1980, it was predicted that instead of letting nature and luck choose their children’s characteristics, people would have to decide which characteristics they wanted their children to inherit from them and previous generations in their families. ____________ (50) We may be able to have “undesirable” characteristics changed or destroyed through genetic therapy. Perhaps we may even begin to wish that Bertrand Russell was right when he said that history teaches us that the future is never like that future we imagine.

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