This is what might be coming in 2017: Cyberhacking, coffee shortages, and sex robots
Really? Enter Old Moore’s Alamanac.
The tome, now in its 253rd iteration, is a reliable stocking filler, even if you’re a sceptic when it comes to all things psychic. Its publishers are certainly happy with the strike rate of its most recent author, a mysterious man who is aged in his 50s, dabbles in the stock market, and has been forecasting the future for Irish readers since 2010.
First things first: It seems we are not all going to die in a nuclear fireball wrought by World War Three. So that’s positive.
Instead, we’ll have cyber hacking on an unprecedented scale, average weather (but a white Christmas next year), Antipodean property crashes, and the Dubs will win the football.
That one is probably less of shock.
We’ll have another global economic downturn and Tipp will win the hurling. Europe’s future of is right-wing. There’s more talk of a united Ireland within the EU, and of sex robots.
Less dystopian, but no less worrying, there will be an international coffee shortage. In an unrelated development, scientists will crack some reverse ageing techniques.
The Moore’s soothsayer is very specific about some people: Actress Amy Huberman uncharacteristically loses her cool, but it seems she’s right to do so. US actor Will Smith’s family is set for controversy and British high society’s Pippa Middleton’s wedding might be held up, or not go off as planned.
Ireland is in danger of a lone-wolf style attack, and the coalition lurches towards the possibility of a new election amid stalled economic growth. North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un, we are told, loses the plot.
Can we take any of this to the bank? That’s uncertain, but it seems Moore’s man has form. Last year, he predicted the death of Fidel Castro and the possible rowing back of Obamacare, but didn’t quite forecast a Trump presidency.
However, he did say: “Unfortunately 2016 will be tumultuous; it’s not a year that will be remembered fondly.”
It might be time to ask Moore for the Lotto numbers.
