The Internet makes censorship impossible and will bring down corrupt regimes around the world. It will lead to an era of absolute transparency, which will inevitably lead to more equality and more justice. Disagree? Try this, then – the Internet means none of us need to know anything, because we can look anything up in a matter of moments. We’re all becoming stupid because the machines do all of our thinking for us. Which of these arguments are correct? Time will tell, but if the past is anything to go by neither prediction will ultimately come true. So long as humans have created new things we’ve predicted fantastic and terrible things about them. It’s true of the web, and it’s true of many technologies from our past. Machine Guns Will Make War Impossible Hiram Maxim, the inventor of the machine gun, was asked in 1893 whether his creation will make wars more terrible. “No,” he responded. “it will make war impossible.” The First World War â€" and the advent of trench warfare â€" would ultimately prove this prediction wrong. It’s a great example of how hard it is to predict how any given technology will be used â€" even for the person who created it. Maxim sincerely thought his invention would be so effective on the battlefield that no one would bother to fight a war again. He was wrong. But it’s not the only time a given technology was predicted to end war forever only to become a part of war. “The inven
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