September 2003 Predictions

"Many cultural ideas are based on ignorance and fear and a dread of what might happen if we lose the tight grasp that keeps everything in what we perceive to be a secure state of equilibrium."
- O'Murchu, 'Reclaiming Spirituality'

[YOUR FUTURE - INVENTIONS THAT WILL CHANGE YOUR LIFE]
A new, really small battery - 40 can be stacked on the width of a human hair - could help power the future.

Don't throw that wrapper away - eat it. Researchers have created edible food packaging made of fruits and veggies.

Scientists have found a way for people to sign their name online using a mouse instead of a pen.

An Australian gun maker and a New Jersey technical college say they will create a "smart gun" that can only be fired by its owner.

Will software cast our future votes? The future of high-tech balloting? How about machines that figure out how we'd vote - and then cast the ballot automatically.

A small startup has developed a wearable camera that remembers what you saw, that could literally give anyone instant, photographic memory.

A bacterium found in marine sediments may be the basis for future battery systems powered by sugar, researchers say.

Scientists have chilled a gas to the lowest temperature ever recorded. The feat could lead to more precise clocks, perhaps even superfast computers.

[HOT TRENDS]
Workers dealing with the aftermath of the World Trade Center attacks operated in an atmosphere polluted by 'brutal' fumes, say scientists.

Police are to work with scientists to find new ways of tagging household items so they alert their owners when they are stolen.

As the cold and flu season approaches, health officials worry that anyone who sneezes will ask to be tested for SARS.


[ASTRONOMICAL EVENTS]
The U.S. space agency publishes a plan of action which may lead to the space shuttle flying early next year, probably in March.

We're at the beginning of a ten-year-long cosmic dust storm and we don't know what the consequences will be. The Sun's magnetic poles have flipped, as they do periodically, so now some of the dust that floats around in our galaxy will be sucked into our solar system. The Sun used to act as a shield, protecting us from it. Cosmic dust bombardment in the past may have caused ice ages and mass extinctions.

[BIOLOGY PREDICTIONS]
Scientists say hunting one kind of animal — the whale — may have led to a widespread decline in ocean species.

Parents spend $2.8 billion per year on educational toys for infants and preschoolers. But do these products really make children any smarter? Many experts are dubious.

It may be possible to predict the average weight of people in a particular district - simply by looking at an aerial photo - urban sprawl piles on the pounds.

Spider silk is so strong that some have suggested a pencil-thick strand of it could halt a 747 in flight. Now scientists are getting close to learning how to make it themselves.

A study predicts a massive wave of extinctions of hundreds of species in the next 20 years if more land is not set aside to protect them.

[HEALTH PREDICTIONS]
Sunscreen lotions may not protect against skin cancer, according to a study by British doctors. Tests showed that while the lotions prevented the sun from burning the skin, they did not stop them from penetrating the skin.

Mothers of children with cancer are more likely to develop breast cancer themselves, researchers find.

Stress doubles a woman's risk of developing breast cancer, scientists have found.

A common infection could cause brain and lymphatic cancers in children, researchers have suggested.

Gulf war veterans are more likely to develop motor neurone disease, according to a U.S. study.

Just three servings of fruit and vegetables a day may be enough to protect against heart disease, according to a study.

Coughing vigorously until an ambulance arrives could save the lives of heart patients who are going into cardiac arrest, a Polish doctor says. The technique, called cough CPR, forces blood to the brain while the heart is starting to fail and keeps patients conscious long enough to call for help. It may also rectify their heart rhythm.

Being exposed to even a small amount of second-hand tobacco smoke may increase your chances of developing heart disease, a study suggests.

Pouring your emotions out on paper could help wounds heal quicker, researchers suggest. High stress levels mean people recover more slowly.

The U.N. Food and Agricultural Organisation warns that Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, SARS, could reappear, and the danger would remain as long as the source of the coronavirus that causes it remains obscure.

Fears that animals carrying Sars-like viruses could trigger another outbreak were heightened by a testing program which found Sars-like viruses in animals in China.

Women of all ages can reduce their risk of breast cancer by exercising regularly, a study suggests.

Vaccinations could one day come in the form of a tasty morsel of fish, rather than via an injection, researchers claim.

Children are at high risk of developing skin cancers because of the decline in the Earth's protective ozone layer, the World Health Organization warns.

[LONG-TERM CLIMATE PREDICTIONS]
Europe this year experienced its hottest summer for at least 500 years, providing further evidence of man-made global warming, Swiss university researchers said.

In Alaska, permafrost is becoming soggy, temperatures are increasing, icebergs are thinning, roads are collapsing and entire villages are being forced to move as the ground beneath homes melts and erodes away. And scientists say the changes in Alaska may be a sign of what's coming in the lower 48 and elsewhere in the world. Nearly 98 percent of glaciers and sea ice at Alaska's coast are in a state of melting. That has contributed to a sea level rise of nearly a foot over the last 100 years.

Half the world's coral reefs could disappear within a generation, victims of disease and global climate change.

Predictions are that within 30 years, almost all the glaciers will be gone from Glacier National Park. Scientists say the glaciers are melting at an alarming rate - some 7,000 years after glaciers sculpted the landscape at Glacier, they've all but disappeared. There were about 150 glaciers 100 years ago and today they estimate there are about 26.

In the last two decades the Earth's average temperature has been the highest for about two thousand years, climatologists say. The Earth appears to have been warmer since 1980 than at any time in the last 18 centuries.

In Alaska's arctic, where mosquitoes swarm thick and wet tundra makes for strenuous walking, a hard-core crew of researchers are detecting signs of a warming climate.

Computer users across the globe are being urged to join a huge U.K. experiment to predict the new century's climate.

[ODDITIES]
Reports are coming in from around the world about UFO sightings, primarily from Canada, the U.S. and England, where the Midlands are experiencing an extensive UFO wave. In addition, they are continuing to receive close encounter reports. These are concentrated along the U.S. west coast and in British Columbia. Quite a number of these encounters involve multiple witnesses and physical traces, and some doctors in British Columbia have reported patients appearing with injuries that look like skin sampling wounds, but which the patients cannot explain. Click here to read an interview with two witnesses who experienced an abduction that left physical injuries and involved numerous witnesses to a UFO in the area at the time. Click here to read the latest about the UFO wave.

In the coming years, the skies are going to be increasingly dotted with all types of uncanny aircraft. But interstellar travelers won't be piloting these vehicles. UFOs vs. UAVs: how to tell friend from faux.

In addition to close encounter reports, Unknowncountry is receiving reports of electronic devices such as remote control units and cordless telephones malfunctioning, of electronic watches acting strangely, and of batteries discharging suddenly and without warning. If you want to report a close encounter, have acquired a UFO video, or have had an electromagnetic incident send an email to: incidentmail@yahoo.com.

Some scientists think giant gas bubbles in the Bermuda Triangle could be what is sucking ships down into the deep.

An Aboriginal spirit woman and a second psychic have failed in a bid to locate the body of British tourist Peter Falconio, whose July 2001 disappearance in the Australian outback remains a deep mystery.

A kangaroo helped rescue a farmer knocked unconscious by a tree branch during weekend storms in north-eastern Victoria, Australia. The kangaroo kept banging on the door of the family's house after discovering the farmer lying unconscious.

A Japanese mountaineer is attempting to settle once and for all the decades-long debate over the existence of the Abominable Snowman of the Himalayas, claiming that his years of study have shown that the legendary apelike monster is in fact a brown bear.

[POLITICAL PREDICTIONS]
The FBI is warning that terrorists might try to poison food or water supplies, and senior bureau officials say al-Qaeda is determined to attack Americans at home even though the organisation appears to have a relatively small U.S. presence.

Looming crisis in North Korea? There is war talk in Washington calling for action if talks with North Korea in Beijing next week fail. U.S. hardliners fear that impoverished North Korea could become a global nuclear production line.

Could terrorists hijack a commercial ship and turn it into a weapon of mass destruction? Counter-terrorism experts say it's possible.

U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has predicted that the people of North Korea will cast aside the communist dictatorship that has ruled the country for more than half a century.

[SEASONAL WEATHER PREDICTIONS]
On Monday, September 15th, a Japanese researcher caused a stir in Tokyo with a prediction based on his study of radio waves that a major, destructive magnitude 7 earthquake was highly likely to hit the city on Tuesday the 16th or Wednesday the 17th. Forecasting quakes is generally considered to be impossible with current technology, and his method of using anomalies in the VHF range of radio waves to predict the timing and intensity of tremors had not gained many believers in the scientific community.
On Saturday the 20th, a strong 5.5 earthquake rocked the Tokyo area, with reports of seven people with injuries and it was strong enough to sway buildings.
A strong quake with a mgnitude of 8.3 on the Richter scale rocked the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido early Thursday (9/25) morning, and government authorities warned local residents to avoid coastal areas due to the possibility of tsunami. Almost 500 people were injured and there was scattered damage. A series of large aftershocks has followed.

[SPIRITUAL PREDICTIONS]
Churchgoers who feel a sense of spirituality may be reacting to the bass sound from organ pipes, a study suggests.

We all like to think we'd step up to the plate and help out someone in need. But researchers say factors like looks, gender, race, even the weather can affect whether we'll help out — or get help ourselves. In experiment after experiment, the same result: the greater the number of people around, the less likely anyone is to act. Yet once one person helps, you have all the other people helping. Who can you count on?

Scientists have devised an experiment to test whether out-of-body experiences close to death are a real phenomenon or just a trick of the mind.

What do your dreams mean? Psychologists say they all carry their own message — if you can remember them.

[STOCK MARKET PREDICTIONS]
For a change, the outlook for the future of the high-tech world is bright.

The number of bankruptcies are escalating, rising 400 percent in the past 25 years. By the end of the decade, an estimated 6 million families with children — one in every 7 such families — may declare bankruptcy. This year, more children are going through their parents' bankruptcies than their parents' divorces.