It’s now a quarter of a century since Y2K, which means we’re well into the futuristic age imagined by the science-fiction writers of the 19th and 20th centuries. And while we’re yet to populate the cosmos or invent robot butlers, the predictions made about the year 2025 by one scientist were remarkably accurate.
Professor Archibald Montgomery Low – who used the title despite not being a real professor – was among the most prominent inventors of his time. Born in London in 1888, Low created the earliest prototype of the television in 1914 before going on to develop the world’s first uncrewed aircraft during World War I.
Nicknamed the “father of radio guidance systems”, the visionary engineer was also a prolific writer and futurist, with his predictions appearing regularly in British newspapers of the age. In 1925, he even published a book called The Future, in which he forecast the ways in which new technologies would transform the lives of the world population in 2025.
Delving into some of Low’s most interesting predictions, researchers from Findmypast have compiled a series of newspaper clippings in which the self-titled professor is quoted giving his take on life in the modern age. Among these is an allusion to smartphones, which Low describes as “automatic telephones [that] get the right number every time” – supposedly in reference to the difficulty of dialling correctly using the rotary dial phones of the 1920s.
The same scrap of newspaper hints at the “moving sidewalks” which are now commonplace in shopping malls and airports, along with their vertical counterpart the escalator. In another clipping, Low predicts that “a television machine will replace the picture paper” and that the daily news will be delivered over “a loud speaker”.
Another prophecy involves the invention of wireless alarm clocks to wake us up, although Low optimistically suggests that these will all be set to 9.30 am in the year 2025. He also correctly envisions the development of renewable energy, stating that “wind and tide are also to be harnessed to the service of man”.
Funnily enough, Low isn’t the only scientist from this period to have made such a prediction. Also to be found in Findmypast’s archive is a newspaper excerpt from 1923 which quotes a scientist named J.B.S. Haldane as saying that the UK will one day be covered in wind turbines, which would “supply current at very high voltage to great electric mains.” However, Haldane did also predict that babies would be manufactured in laboratories by 2023, so his crystal ball clearly wasn’t always so reliable.
Low, meanwhile, was equally fallible, incorrectly suggesting that the whole world would be wearing synthetic felt onesies in 2025. He did, however, predict the invention of online banking while also envisioning the ways in which modern technology might be employed for nefarious means by increasingly sophisticated criminal gangs.
Another of his predictions involves the use of special viewing glasses that would enable cinema audiences to choose which movie to watch. We’re still waiting for that prophecy to be fulfilled, although with virtual reality headsets already in use, you could argue that he got that one right too.
