January 2004 Predictions

"The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance - it is the illusion of knowledge."
- Daniel Boorstin

[YOUR FUTURE - INVENTIONS THAT WILL CHANGE YOUR LIFE]
The tech of tomorrow - what gadgets will be hot for 2004?

New underwater vehicles are in development or just going into service that will make discoveries deep in the oceans.

Fast-food technology - where Popsicles now glow in the dark and doughnuts dunk themselves in coffee.

The next generation of hi-definition TVs displays a visionary future for home entertainment.

A New Brunswick inventor thinks he has found a new, cheap way to produce hydrogen gas. If he's right, we may someday use old pop cans to help fuel cars.

Israel has come up with a new system of sensors to stop suicide bombers boarding buses before blowing themselves up.

[HOT TRENDS]
British Airways has held talks with BAE Systems about arming its 300 aircraft with lasers to deflect terrorist missiles, a British newspaper said.

U.S. soldiers in Iraq are killing themselves at a high rate despite the work of special teams sent to help troops deal with combat stress, the US Defence Department's top doctor said.

Doctors find more evidence to suggest a growing number of men may have problems conceiving children. Sperm counts have fallen by almost a third since 1989, with factors such as drinking and obesity possibly to blame.

Health-related junk e-mails topped the most common list of spam subjects in inboxes for 2003, says AOL.

The internet is set to become the basis for just about every form of communication, says net pioneer Vint Cerf.

AOL's Instant Messaging will fail predicts a PC Magazine writer. He gives it another five years before virtually everyone stops using it, due to its intrusive behavior.

Blood shortages during January are common, but national inventories have dropped well below a safe level, with some critical blood types nearing depletion and many elective surgeries having to be postponed, say officials.

Procter & Gamble has assembled a stealth sales force of hundreds of thousands of teenagers to push products on friends and family. A brilliant move - or marketing gone amok?

A spam-free online world by 2006? That's what Microsoft chairman Bill Gates is promising.


[ASTRONOMICAL EVENTS]
Scientists say a tenth of the stars in the Milky Way may have planets that support advanced life.

The Nasa probe Stardust has had a dramatic encounter with Comet Wild-2, passing just 240 km away from the mountainous ball of ice, rock and dust. The craft sent back startling images of the object and grabbed particles streaming away from its nucleus for return to Earth in two years' time.

If Earth had been somewhat larger, it's possible that it would not have survived tides induced by its moon or even by an encounter with a passing asteroid. That's one scenario suggested by a recent investigation of a venerable equation that serves as a model for planetary tidal effects.

A meteorite hit northern Iran causing minor damage to property but there were no immediate reports of casualties.

Spanish police are combing parts of the country after thousands of people reported seeing a "ball of fire" in the sky, prompting astronomers to speculate fragments had broken off a large meteorite. Behind a disco in Castellon province the fireballs started a small fire.

[BIOLOGY PREDICTIONS]
Demand for herbal remedies threatens 10,000 of the world's 50,000 medicinal plant species, conservation group WWF says.

Environmental charities say that plans for so-called "super-ports" will put rare coastal habitats at risk.

Numbers of some farmland birds in Europe have fallen by a third in 25 years because of modern farming, campaigners say.

Scientists in Australia warn fish piracy is damaging the Southern Ocean, with many of its animal species being pushed to the brink.

Antarctic organisms face an onslaught by prospectors anxious to exploit their unique nature, the United Nations says. The UN University says "extremophiles", creatures adapted to life in the polar wastes, are being relentlessly hunted in what is virtually a new gold rush.

Danish scientists say they have developed a genetically modified plant that will detect unexploded landmines.

[HEALTH PREDICTIONS]
People who eat lots of highly salted food double their risk of stomach cancer, research suggests.

Regular long-term aspirin use may be linked to an increased risk of pancreatic cancer in women, research suggests.

A blood test for a natural body chemical could predict whether a woman has a high risk of suffering miscarriage.

A single injection could be all it takes to halt heroin addiction, after a trial showed the potential new treatment prevented addicts' withdrawal symptoms for six weeks.

Chemicals from underarm deodorants and other cosmetics can build up inside the body, according to a study.

Women who take vitamin D supplements are 40% less likely to develop MS, research suggests. Eating a diet rich in vitamin D alone was not enough to provide the same protection.

Scientists may have found a way to harness the immune system and strike at hidden tumours throughout the body.

An herbal tea used widely in China to treat jaundice could soon be used by doctors in the West.

A new radio wave technique heats water molecules in the skin to clear wrinkles and crow's feet.

Juggling, and probably any other visual skill that takes time to master, increases the size of your brain.

Obese people can now have a pacemaker implanted into their stomach to help them lose weight.

Babies conceived artificially face a far higher risk of premature birth, low birthweight and early death than counterparts conceived naturally, according to a key study.

Researchers have found more signs of a possible link between the use of hair-colouring products over a long period of time and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. Those who used darker, permanent hair-coloring products for at least 25 years - eight times or more a year - had double the chance of developing the cancer. The risk did not increase for those using non-permanent, light-toned dyes.

A new study finds that unrestrained car passengers, or objects such as cell phones, can kill other passengers, even if they're buckled up. If you are in a car crash, your chance of dying increases by as much as 25 percent when another person in the same car is not strapped in. Everything from luggage to soda pop cans that were not tied down were responsible for more than 13,000 injuries in accidents nationwide in just one year.

Scientists claim to have found evidence that the emotion of disgust evolved to protect us from the risk of disease.

A strange affliction called "nodding syndrome," is apparently unique to southern Sudan. Its young victims tend to nod vigorously at the sight of food. The condition often progresses to severe seizures, mental retardation and death. Experts say a few children recover. Doctors with WHO think the disease may be related to a disorder seen in Uganda called Nakalanga syndrome, which also has symptoms of convulsions, stunted growth and sometimes nodding.

Malaria, diarrhea, malnutrition and respiratory infections are biggest killers in southern Sudan, as in most of Africa, but the area also has unusual concentration of diseases that are rare or nonexistent elsewhere.

Walking is excellent for your health, but talking at the same time may do you more harm than good, a study has found. Talking while walking results in conflicting demands on deep abdominal muscles that can threaten spinal stability.

Do migraines lead to brain damage? Doctors say migraine is not a simple headache. It's a chronic disorder that could have serious consequences on brain health.

Outbreaks of the Ebola virus in animals in West Africa may predict an outbreak in humans, researchers say.

Three weeks after the discovery of the United States' first known case of mad cow disease, officials had found only 14 of the 81 cows that came into the country from Canada with the infected Holstein.

Experiments suggest it may be possible one day to alter human sperm genes and eradicate genetic diseases.

Animal diseases could be the biggest threat to human health in the years ahead, scientists warn.

[LONG-TERM CLIMATE PREDICTIONS]
A quarter of all land animals and plants could be wiped out by warming global temperatures, scientists say.

The heatwave which scorched much of Europe in 2003 could become a frequent event, Swiss scientists believe.

Australia will become hotter and more prone to drought over the next 70 years, leading climatologists say.

Those wispy cirrus clouds that float high in the sky may be thinning out because of nitric acid pollution, a change that scientists say could affect climate.

Climate change is a far greater threat than terrorism, the UK Government's chief scientific adviser says.

[ODDITIES]
Doomsday quake fear spreads among Iranians, that what happened in Bam could occur on a far larger scale in Tehran, the capital of Iran. In February 2003, the head of the International Seismological Research Center made a stark warning that the fault lines around Tehran were sliding and accumulating energy. He made an ominous prediction: "There is a strong likelihood of an earthquake striking the Iranian capital … the probability of a quake above seven degrees on the Richter scale in the next 10 years currently stands at 65 percent, and this is expected to increase with the passing of time."

Scientists have known for some time that the Earth's magnetic field is fading. Its strength has steadily and mysteriously waned, leaving parts of the planet vulnerable to increased radiation from space. It is uncertain whether the weakened field is on the way to a complete collapse and a reversal that would flip the North and South Poles.

For the doom merchants amongst us, 2004 showed its fearsome teeth before it was even 10 days old, with three ominous predictions about the future of our planet.

While man is making his mark on Mars, some humans are wondering if aliens have zoomed into Melbourne, Australia. A mysterious photograph has sparked a UFO frenzy in the city.

According to a recent statement made by the Scientific and Research Institute of Applied Esotericism in Russia, Iraq's invasion by the U.S. caused major disturbances of Earth's energy and triggered the massive earthquake in Iran.

[POLITICAL PREDICTIONS]
George W. Bush will be re-elected in a "landslide" next November, a University of Massachusetts political scientist predicts.

[SEASONAL WEATHER PREDICTIONS]
Concerned people believe that there is now a definite possibility that the entire planetary system of ocean currents could change its configuration abruptly, with a consequent dramatic change in global climate, possibly including extraordinarily violent weather during the initial period of transfer between climates, which could last anywhere from months to a period of five to ten years.

Major earthquakes can be predicted months in advance, argues a UCLA seismologist and mathematical geophysicist. Borok's team now predicts an earthquake of at least magnitude 6.4 by Sept. 5, 2004, in a region that includes the southeastern portion of the Mojave Desert, and an area south of it. UCLA says the team's current predictions have not missed any earthquake, and its two most recent ones have come to pass.

What will warn of a Yellowstone super volcano eruption? A dramatic increase in seismic activity in the area of the park will be the early warning sign, followed by larger and larger quakes and significant increases in ground temperatures and outgassing over wider areas. Right now, we appear to be in the early stages of this, and nobody knows whether current activity will subside or get worse.

[SPIRITUAL PREDICTIONS]
The Worldwatch Institute says more than 25% of the world's people now enjoy the style which used to belong to the rich. Yet it is a lifestyle that leaves them dissatisfied and the Earth impoverished, U.S. researchers say. Worldwatch says consumption by the wealthy elites, and increasingly among the middle class as well, has gone beyond satisfying needs to become an end in its own right.

From global predictions to personal forecasts, Chinese fortune-tellers have advice for everyone in the coming Year of the Monkey. We can expect many international conflicts due to a volatile balance of the five core elements of life - wood, fire, earth, metal and water. The Chinese New Year falls on January 22 this year, supplanting the Year of the Goat.

[STOCK MARKET PREDICTIONS]
The IMF warns that a weakening dollar and U.S. deficits could have serious effects on the world economy.

U.S. data on retail sales, consumer prices and unemployment provide further evidence of recovery in the world's largest economy.