The Skeptics’ Guide to the Future: What Yesterday’s Science and Science Fiction Tell Us about the World of Tomorrow

Neurologist Novella (The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe) and his siblings, cohosts of the podcast The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe, deliver an entertaining evaluation of futurism and an account of why the majority of predictions miss the mark. As they note, “predictions of the future are really just reflections of the present. And that means we’re really bad at predicting what the future will bring,” thanks largely to cognitive biases. The authors cite scientist and sci-fi author Isaac Asimov as a prime example: in the 1950s, his fiction imagined that in thousands of years, the future would be analog and consist of “hat-wearing, cigar-smoking, male domination.” As for what might actually come to be, the authors cover synthetic life (“still likely a few decades off”), artificial intelligence (there “does not appear to be any reason” human-level AI is impossible to achieve), and wearable tech (the “loader exosuit” in Aliens isn’t too far off). It’s a cogent look at what is and isn’t plausible, infused with plenty of sci-fi references, from Wall-E to The Matrix. The result is pop science done right. Agent: Rob Kirkpatrick, Kirkpatrick Lit. (Sept.)