To some extent musing on the future has traditionally been the speculative realm of science fiction.  But our current 2007 views of the future, not only in fiction, but in economic and scientific predictions, take a step back from the grand panoramas envisaged.

During the 19th century and continuing on into the 20th, visions of the future involved ideas such as travelling faster, communicating with people at greater distances, exploring the planets and the nature of the subatomic realm and generally providing a greater access to technology for the common man. Flying cars, robot servants, vacations on the moon, underwater cities – it was all going to happen, and soon. It seemed at the time, that we were living on the cusp of a golden age which could be delivered to us through the combined might of science, technology and industry.

While from one perspective the future was envisaged as being one of nearly unlimited human power and potential, increasingly as we approached the present day, warnings grew in literature, film and non-fiction media of possible negative outcomes for human beings.

Distopian images of the future are now common. Most of us are aware of the almost standardised concepts of industrial wastelands, diseased and starving populations, countries ravaged by high-tech wars and so on. It seems as if we no longer believe as strongly in a shiny silver future.

Today, what is far more common is a toned down, muted prediction where people don’t wear red capes and boots with lightning-bolts blazing on them. We appear to be more likely to stay at home, rather than roaming the stars – content to be tending our vegetable gardens and more concerned for spare parts for our windmills and solar panels rather than the price of nuclear fuel for our rocket cars.   A recent book by Daniel H. Wilson, in many ways, is about this very idea. It sports a cheeky title ‘Where’s My Jetpack?: A Guide to the Amazing Science Fiction Future that Never Arrived.

The group of people now entering their forties could be looked upon as being the last ‘jet pack’ generation. Some of this group may be lucky enough to remember watching the end of the NASA moon missions with Apollo 17 departing the surface of our dusty neighbour in December of 1972.

In many ways, the end of Apollo and the apparent lack of anything to replace it signalled the end of an era – and the associated concepts of a technological utopia. The entire programme started in 1961 – and NASA cites it as costing US$ 25 billion at the time (or US$ 135 billion in 2006 dollars). The top 20 national defence budgets add up to a whopping US$ 862.3 billion a year – of which the United States is responsible for nearly half. Clearly the will and ability exist for extraordinary achievements – and potentially the funding could too.