Text: Predicting the Future ... "Man will never reach the moon regardless of all future scientific advances." -- Dr. Lee DeForest, Inventor of TV "The bomb will never go off. I speak as an expert in explosive." -- Admiral William Leahy, U.S. Atomic Bomb Project "There is no likehood man can ever tap the power of the atom." -- Robert Millikan, Nobel Prize in Physics, 1923 "Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons." -- Popular Mechanics, forecasting the relentless march of science, 1949 "I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." -- Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943 "640K ought to be enough for anybody." -- Bill Gates, 1981 "This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us." -- Western Union internal memo, 1876. "I'm just glad it'll be Clark Gable who's falling on his face and not Gary Cooper." -- Gary Cooper on his decision not to take the leading role in "Gone With The Wind." "We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out." -- Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles, 1962. "Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible." -- Lord Kelvin, president, Royal Society, 1895. "Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try and find oil? You're crazy." -- Drillers who Edwin L. Drake tried to enlist to his project to drill for oil in 1859. "Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau." -- Irving Fisher, Professor of Economics, Yale University, 1929. "Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value." -- Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure de Guerre. "Everything that can be invented has been invented." -- Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Office of Patents, 1899. "Louis Pasteur's theory of germs is ridiculous fiction." -- Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology at Toulouse, 1872 "The abdomen, the chest, and the brain will forever be shut from the intrusion of the wise and humane surgeon." -- Sir John Eric Ericksen, British surgeon, appointed Surgeon-Extraordinary to Queen Victoria 1873. and last but not least... "There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home." -- Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital, 1977

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