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Will man dominate space one day? Did unknown beings from the infinite reaches of the cosmos visit the earth in the remote past? Are unknown intelligences somewhere in the universe trying to make contact with us? Is our age, with its discoveries that are taking the future by storm, really so terrible? Should the most shattering results of research be kept secret? Will medicine and biology discover a way of restoring deep-frozen men to life? Will men from earth colonise new planets? Will they mate with the inhabitants they find there? Will men create a second, third and fourth earth? Will special robots replace surgeons one day? Will hospitals in the year 2100 be spare-part stores for defective men? Will it become possible in the distant future to prolong man's life indefinitely with artificial hearts, lungs, kidneys, etc? Will Huxley's Brave New World come true one day in all it's improbability and chilling inhumanity? A compendium of such questions could easily get as big as the London telephone directory. Not a day passes without something brand-new being invented somewhere in the world—every day another question can be struck from the list of impossibilities as answered. Edinburgh University received a preliminary grant of £270,000 from the Nuffield Trust for the development of an intelligent computer. The prototype of this computer was put into conversation with a patient and afterwards the patient could not believe that he had been talking to a machine. Professor Dr Michie, who designed this computer, claimed that his machine was beginning to develop a personal life. The new science is called futurology! Its goal is the planning and detailed investigation and understanding of the future by all the technical and mental means available. Think tanks are springing up all over the world; what they amount to are monasteries of scientists of today, who are thinking for tomorrow. One hundred and sixty-four of these think tanks are at work in America alone. They accept commissions from the government and heavy industry. The most celebrated think tank is the Rand Corporation at Santa Monica in California. The US Air Force were responsible for its foundation in 1945. The reason? High ranking officers wanted a research programme of their own on intercontinental warfare. 843 selected scientific authorities now work in the two-storeyed magnificently laid-out research centre. The first ideas and plans for the foundations of mankind's most improbable adventures are born here. As early as 1946 Rand scientists evaluated the military usefulness of a space-ship. When Rand developed the programme for various satellites in 1951, it was called Utopian. Since Rand has been functioning, the world can thank this research centre for 3,000 accurate accounts of hitherto unobserved phenomena. Rand scientists have published more than 110 books, which have advanced our culture and civilisation immeasurably. Chapter Twelve - Tomorrow e Where do we stand today? There is no end in sight to this research work, and there is unlikely to be one. Similar work for the future is being done in the following institutes: