FAR BETTER DAYS

Waipukurau Press, Volume XXIX, Issue 213, 17 September 1934, Page 2

FAR BETTER DAYS

ABE SEEN COMING IN CENTURY HENCE Challenging commentators, who see civilization on the decline, Prof. William Feilding Ogburn, authority on social trends, yesterday envisaged a society 100 years from now which will be more advanced in every way, living in a land of plenty, and leaping the fruits of far greater wisdom and economy. Speaking on the Chicago Woman’s Club lecture series at a Century of Progress exposition. Professor Ogburn picked up the new theme of the exposition by looking ahead 100 years instead of only back over the last century. He was chairman of the Hoover Committee on Social Trends and is professor of sociology at the University of Chicago Fewer but finer children, longer and more useful lives with greater intelligence and insight coming with advanced age, better education, greater opportunity for women to perform useful work, and at the same time a higher respect for motherhood, were among trends which Professor Ogburn anticipated. Accompanying these he said, should be the development of the most revolutionary inventions, which would enable mankind to snatch energy from the air instead of manufacturing it from coal and oil and which would give each individual a theoretical 1000 slaves instead of the 100 he is supposed to have by the use of present mechanical energy. If there is sufficient atomic energy in a pound of

water to drive an ocean liner across the Atlantic and back, as has been calculated, Professor Ogburn said, it is almost too much for the human imagination at the present time to picture the advances which will be made when atomic energy is even partially released. He preferred to give most of his attention, however, io social advances, disagreeing with prognosticators who declare that the "standing room only” sign will be

banging out 100 years from now. On the other hand Professor Ogburn believes that families will prefer to have fewer children and give them better opportunities so that longer

and more useful lives should result. It may not be that people will live to be 150 years old, as some students think, he said, but as they approach a longer life they will gain greatly in wisdom and understanding so that many of the world’s social problems will be easier of solution. —“Christion Science Monitor.”