When I consider the thought-problem of whether I’d go back in time for a do-over, I always conclude that hell no, I wouldn’t repeat the second half of the twentieth century. That would be long stretches of boredom punctuated by intense disgust.

So, too, I wonder: Are we really disappointed that we’re not living in the world predicted by mid-twentieth science fiction? Wouldn’t foreknowledge make this world, too, boring?

Another Gedankenexperiment: I’ve put myself back into the head of a sci-fi soaked teenage, and considered how this world with it’s global ubiquitous digital network talking to plastic slabs in everybody’s pockets, would look to me. Particularly the kind of society it’s wrought, with its goods and its horribles (I also don’t think I could’ve imagined Donald Trump…that one would’ve been just too ridiculous). And (to finally bring it home), the idea that this internet would let me look at a DSN display showing status of communications with effing interstellar spacecraft, now that’s sublime. I can ride along on some of humanity’s most epic journeys, on my phone. What a crazy world.

Well the day came and went, and before I knew it here we are well into a new century, a new millennium. I know these even-number boundaries are strictly arbitrary, but still, it always seemed like each century had its characteristic “feel” to it, and that there would be a period of transition between centuries; you know, the 19th century was about horses and telegraphs, the 20th about cars and telephones.

I can remember when television was something you read about in magazines (my Uncle Frank was the only person I knew who had one). He was a radio ham and hip to all things electric.

But the 21st is all about spacecraft and computers. And the transition period is over. A hundred years ago women were about to get to vote, hemlines were rising, and aircraft were a novelty–but an accepted and familiar one.

Yeah, there are no flying cars, or commercial space travel, or walking, talking robot butlers, but we are now deep into a new century. A sci-fi century. And just like in the last century, we can’t even begin to imagine what the next one will be like.

Nice. Thanks.