As the founder of a think tank and having a mind of a futurist or technologist I am constantly involving myself in conversations both on and off-line about the future.
Not just the near future, that is to say in 3 to 5 years, I think we all can see what is coming.
That eventually we will have holographic video cell phones, more multimedia books, and cars which practically drive themselves.
But what about in the year 2050, that is a long way off.
Will we finally have flying cars by then? We will certainly have cars which drive themselves, or are able to 100% of the time without crashing.
What else will we have in the way of things which fly, how about our airliners for instance? Well, we will probably have supersonic airliners and hypersonic aircraft which can fly halfway around the world in two hours.
In other words, in plus or minus about two hours you can be anywhere on the planet.
The aircraft which go slower will most likely have transparent skin so the entire fuselage becomes a window.
That will really be something for the airline passengers.
It might be like sitting on a giant flying carpet traveling at over the speed of sound.
These aircraft will look like a giant flying wing, whereas the hypersonic craft will be more like a flying dart.
These aircraft will be very light weight, extremely strong, and completely safe.
Most likely they will not have a human pilot or copilot as they will be flown autonomously, and by remote as they enter the airspace of the airport at which they are going to land.
It might be possible that you will stay in your seat, and that group of passengers you are with will be transferred robotically to a tram and taken to the airport terminal, where you will disembark.
The aircraft itself may not take off on a runway as we know runways to exist today.
Rather, the aircraft will be hooked on to some sort of trolley mechanism, advanced very quickly to flying speed, and launched into the air to save fuel and weight on the aircraft.
You might be thinking that it would be unsafe not have a pilot aboard, and with today's technology you might be correct, but I assure you things are getting much safer, and these systems more robust and safer each and every year.
Today, you may not wish to fly in airliner without a pilot, but the general public will feel safer with a robotic pilot than a human pilot 35 years from now.
Indeed I hope you will please consider all these predictions and think on it.