A futurist who changed his name to FM-2030 died last weekend of pancreatic cancer. FM-2030 was originally named F.M. Esfandiary. In 1977, he predicted scientists would one day correct people’s genetic flaws. In 1980, he predicted telecommunications technology would change the way people shop. Noah talks with Flora Schnall, an attorney and longtime friend of […]
Category: Press & Reviews
F.M. Esfandiary; Futurist Predicted Immortality
F.M. Esfandiary, who legally changed his name to FM2030 because of his confidence that he would live to 100 and beyond, has died at 69. The “chronic optimist,” who believed age was irrelevant because a person might have artificial body parts of many different ages–he had a hip that was only 2 years old–died Saturday […]
Back to the Future…
“I am a 21st century person who was accidentally launched in the 20th,” he writes in his books about the future. When he’s not making a living writing about the future, he’s getting paid to make speeches about it. In his latest lecture series, set for takeoff early next century at the Wolfsonian at Florida International University, 1001 Washington Ave., Miami Beach, he will tell people to get ready for families based on the Club Med model, and genius machines that do our work for us, and space travel and immortality, too.
Beyond 2000: Three Views of What’s Ahead
Cloning, brain transplants, laser-guided cybersoldiers, gene-altered cucumbers; in the past two weeks alone, these future-shock topics have made newspaper headlines around the world. Suddenly, it seems, the future is rushing at us. And we can’t tell whether to cheer or huddle deeper into our mental caves. For good reason. Top futurists’ current theories of how […]
FM-2030 on Change
I imagine a half-human, half-machine robot, perhaps stitched together by a futurist Newt Gingrich in some sterile, state-subsidized, private, for-profit R&D facility, a sort of Frankenstein for the brave new world, when I consider the author of “The Only Real Trend is Fast-Forward,” FM-2030 (Commentary, Dec. 18). FM-2030 has apparently been programmed to feed back […]
FM-2030 on Government
Re “Why Worry About Government? We’re on Automatic Fast Forward,” Commentary, Nov. 25: FM-2030 (what a droll name, sounds like an e-mail nickname) raises important ideas on “traditional values” that need rethinking as we approach the 21st Century. Among them are traditional values about work and the work ethic. Business is downsizing and automating, government […]
Orange County 1990 Life in the Year 1999
The 1990s, futurists say, will be a decade in which the technologies already in place will become highly sophisticated and refined: American families can expect to see a tremendous amount of computer and robotic technology in the home. Based on 35 interviews with futurists and experts as diverse as automotive designers and sociologists, we offer […]
Command College Pointing Cops Toward 21st Century
The futurist who goes by the name FM-2030 appears before California’s emerging police leaders during the first week of Command College, offering a rap they’ll never hear in the squad room. Wearing a silk shirt open to the waist, he declares that patriotism, family and religion are passe, soon to be replaced by “telecommunities,” personal […]
Stop With the Predictions
We do indeed live, as (author) FM-2030 points out, in a fast-changing, electronically interlocked world (“Are You Ready?” by Connie Koenenn, Jan. 11). One thing that hasn’t changed, apparently, is that a crank with a gimmick and a penchant for holier-than-thou jargon can make lots of money, even in our “post-industrial” society. What FM-2030 has […]
Part Trans and Another Part Human
I stand uneasily astride the past and the Brave New World envisioned by the futurist who has changed his name from F. M. Esfandiary to FM-2030. Evidently FM-2030 adopted his new name to be more in keeping with the digital society we live in. (Our recent story about FM-2030, by Connie Koenenn, didn’t say whether […]