An American engineer called John Elfreth Watkins has been receiving posthumous plaudits for the accuracy of predictions he made in the year 1900 about how the world would be in the early 21st century.
Among his "strange and impossible prophecies" were the mobile phone, digital photography, television, webcams and ready meals.
Inspired by Mr Watkins, here is our forecast of how humankind will be living in the year 2100:
TV sets, computers, game consoles, phones and other devices have been replaced by a silicon chip inside the head. With so much information bombarding the brain, the silicon chip will often get switched to overload. Nobody's gonna go to school, she's gonna make them stay at home.
A reader intervenes: "Didn't Bob Geldof already predict most of this in the song I Don't Like Mondays?"
Yes, but he missed out the bit where 99% of the films and TV programmes streamed straight into the brain are repeats. The BBC and the US networks have been taken over by Dave. They're re-running Have I Got News for You from 2012 when David Cameron resigned as prime minister. There's only the Danes left making the 102nd series of The Killing.
The reader asks: "Will we able to read all about it in the newspapers?"
No, the last edition of the last printed newspaper, the Daily Mail, ceased in 2050. Couldn't get their delivery vans through congested traffic on the M25 caused by immigrants.
"What will the weather be like?" says the reader trying to change the subject.
Mainly cloudy. In fact, there is a computer cloud over everyone's head. It's very handy, containing all your phone numbers, Facebook profile, details of bank overdrafts, and your latest score on Angry Birds. If you look closely at the cloud, you can see what you're having for your tea.
The reader asks: "So what's likely to be for tea in the year 2100?"
Search me. Or better still search tesco-greggs.com on Google. But be assured your tea is ready-made.
"What will happen, this persistent reader says, when the electricity and silicon runs out?"
Scientists are working on alternatives. A phone which comes in a red box the size of Dr Who's Tardis. It's pay-as-you-go with two buttons, A and B. And there's an exciting new cloud device called steam radio.
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