Futuristic Predictions That Came True in 2016

The replicant Pris from Blade Runner. Could synthetic humans be right around the corner?

Gizmodo: The Most Futuristic Predictions That Came True in 2016

Another year has passed, which means we’re another step closer to the tomorrow of our dreams. Here are the most futuristic developments of 2016.

An artificial intelligence finally defeated a grandmaster at Go

In a tournament that rivaled the historical importance of Deep Blue vs chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov in 1996 and Deep Blue vs the best Jeopardy champs in 2011, Google’s AlphaGo won four of the five games it played against Go world champion Lee Sedol. Going into the tournament, some experts naively presumed that the machine wouldn’t have a chance against a human in a game notorious for its complexity and sophisticated gameplay.

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CSN Editor: The quick development of driver-less cars is what surprised me.

The Quest: Energy, Security And The Re-Making Of The Modern World (Video)

Five Predictions From IBM

IBM's Five Predictions For The Next Five Years -- Bloomberg

Biometric passwords? Mind-reading headsets? Junk mail you'll look forward to? As with all predictions, the answer is "maybe".

In each of the past five years, IBM has come up with a list of five innovations it believes will become popular within five years. In this, the sixth year, IBM has come up with the following technologies it thinks will gain traction. Hold on to your sci-fi novels, because some of these are pretty far out there. And some of them, well, I wish we had them today.

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The CIA Predictioneer: Using Games To See The Future

Three decades of getting it right (Image: Ethan Hill/Contour by Getty Images)

From New Scientist:

MY HOROSCOPE this week says that now is the perfect time to relocate, or at least de-clutter. I know it's nonsense, but I can't help wishing there was a genuine way to predict the future.

Perhaps there is. One self-styled "predictioneer" believes he has found the answer. Bruce Bueno de Mesquita is a professor of politics at New York University and a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University in California. In his new book, The Predictioneer (The Predictioneer's Game in the US), he describes a computer model based on game theory which he - and others - claim can predict the future with remarkable accuracy.

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My Technology Predictions For 2010

I'm not forecasting flying cars this year - but will we have them by 2015?

From The Guardian:

It's prediction time again! Yes, I know that January is half-over already, but that gives me less time to make it all happen, doesn't it?

And remember, fully two-thirds of these should be correct, going by past performance. Although please remember that your home may be at risk if you bet it on any single one of these things happening.

So without further ado, let's get under way …

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