Prediction: An end to "most" disease by 2000 So says the article: "By the year 2000 cures for most of the diseases of man will have been discovered." It's true we're better off than we ever have been, disease-wise. (Unless treatment causes some virus to mutate into, you know, a world-ending super virus or something.) Still, we're far from being masters of our medical domain. Futurists in 1952, for instance, would have probably predicted cancer to be a worry of the past. [Picture]

Prediction: Interplanetary space travel will be common "Journeys through space in rocket ships will be an established form of transportation," the article reads, "with regularly scheduled trips to the various planets." The article even cites Von Braun, who "said that most of the problems of space navigation will have been solved during the 1950s." We've made leaps to be sure, but we're still cradle-bound. [Picture]

Prediction: Space stations (the size of the Moon?) will surround Earth "A number of man-made moons will be circling around the earth," the article reads, putting a picture in one's head about massive Death Star-like space stations. Even in the 1970s, NASA was still thinking along these lines. The International Space Station is no slouch, but we have a research station, not the orbital habitats our predecessors envisioned. [Picture]

Prediction: We'll have bases on the moon, too "The first step toward true space navigation were earth moons — man-made satellites high in the earth's atmosphere," the article reads, evoking Von Braun. "Persons stationed on these earth moons continuously circulating around the world, will be able to observe and report any unusual activity that threatens peace on earth." Peace on Earth is a huge theme of '50s futurism and space exploration, on both sides of the Cold War, even. [Picture]

Prediction: We'll have mastered birth control From the article: "There will be no danger of world overpopulation. The size of families and nations will be regulated at will. The world population will controlled through improved birth control methods, with cheap, harmless and temporarily effective anti-fertility compounds added as one saw fit to the diet." The burden of birth control still rests largely on women and, though I'm no expert, whatever progress we've made since 1952 has us way off this target, still — though there are promising developments in the works. [Picture]

Prediction: Solar is the new atomic "In the 1970s atomic energy was replaced by solar energy as an inexhaustible source of new power," reads a prediction, looking back from some point in time. Atomic energy changed the world, and solar was imagined as the next leap there — and as a technology more powerful than atomic, "beyond comprehension" in fact: "The amount of sunshine energy, which yearly falls on only a few acres of land, when converted into man-made power was sufficient to supply enough electricity for a city of a million inhabitants." [Picture]

Prediction: We'll all be living a life of leisure With the great power that solar energy would bring (as well as what must have been seen as the beginning of endless technological discovery and triumph), "the world at last realized its age-old dream of lifting most of its labor from the backs of man," the article states. In fact, it pins this not to the year 2000, but the year 1985. Yeah, that didn't pan out. Pictured above is perhaps the grossest and most awesome visualization of this: a giant atomic-powered cross-country rolling hotel. [Picture]

Prediction: We'll have mastered our planet Here's one of the ultimate dreams of '50s futurism — having control over our planet. Not only the land, but the water, too: "With the abundant and almost costless power of solar energy it will be possible to mine the minerals and harvest the green growth that teems in the ocean." Even more, we'd be able to turn the desert green: "Fresh water will be obtained from the ocean and great deserts that are near the sea, like the Sahara in Africa, will become garden spots." [Picture]

Prediction: There will be peace on Earth By 1952, and even before the Internet or personal computer, technology was already greatly changing the world. It had been used for horrors in two world wars, but now, futurists predicted — hoped, even — that humanity would enter something of a technology-driven renaissance. Having improved birth control, for instance, would curb overpopulation and "remove one of the greatest dangers to world peace since the dawn of civilization." Sadly, we're still pretty far off from this dream, aren't we? [Picture]

Prediction: "There will not be another world war during this century." While world wars seem (and hopefully truly are) a thing of the past, seven short years separated the article and the end of the second World War in 1945. This is a fine place to start as it puts the time and predictions in context. After fighting and winning a war to end war (after the first World War, which was billed as the same), rapid gains in technology filled the globe's leading nations with optimism. Thankfully, perhaps even impossibly, the world has managed to hold it together. (I'm knocking on wood right now.) [Picture]