 Why does everyone in the future have hyphenated names?
A gun is an interesting weapon; it can be hired, of course, and naturally doesn't care who hires it. The evening was dark, it was unlikely that the other even saw the circle of steel that was the mouth of the shotgun barrel, now resting on the car's window ledge. And at that moment, the universe caved inward upon Joseph Marie Prantera. There was a falling through all space and through all time. The other spoke precisely and slowly, the way a highly educated man speaks a language which he reads and writes fluently but has little occasion to practice vocally. Two were seated there now, papers, books and soiled coffee cups before them. The maternal linage was almost universally ignored." Whatever the something else was, a slot opened in the middle of the table and a glass, so clear of texture as to be all but invisible, was elevated. "What is the date, Old Calendar?" "2133," Reston-Farrell said. Briefly, we have transported you, I suppose one might say, from your own era to ours." Reston-Farrell said, "Suffice to say, you are now one hundred and seventy-three years after the last memory you have." The two men of the future said nothing more for long minutes while Joe Prantera's mind whirled its confusion. And already he was beginning to long for the things he knew—for Jessie and Tony and the others, for his favorite bar, for the lasagne down at Papa Giovanni's. Just as we are today and just as nations were a century or a millennium ago." I know whatcha mean—like wars, and depressions and dictators and like that." "That we confront you now indicates that the problems of your day were solved. Our pedagogues are hard put to convince their students that such ever existed. More than a century and a half ago our society eliminated the reasons for international conflict. For that matter," he added musingly, "we eliminated most international boundaries. Depressions? Shortly after your own period, man awoke to the fact that he had achieved to the point where it was possible to produce an abundance for all with a minimum of toil. Overnight, for all practical purposes, the whole world was industrialized, automated. The second industrial revolution was accompanied by revolutionary changes in almost every field, certainly in every science. Your ancestors found, Mr. Prantera, that it is difficult for a man to be free so long as others are still enslaved. "So everybody's got it made.
 In the future, they honor the maternal lineage.
 Everyone in the future is pretentious.  In the future, they honor the maternal lineage.  In the future, they have such a large population it was necessary to differentiate between citizens.  Everyone in the future uses the name of both spouses.