Modern Good Reads discussion

Which authors/series have done the best job of 'predicting' the future? Who do you think hit upon our current situation(s) worldwide most accurately? I'd say William Gibson and George Orwell were uncomfortably close to the mark...time to weigh in!

Michelle wrote: "Which authors/series have done the best job of 'predicting' the future? Who do you think hit upon our current situation(s) worldwide most accurately? I'd say William Gibson and George Orwell were u..."

Aldous Huxley, in my opinion. Granted, we aren't living in a World State and aren't exactly being birthed from test tubes and popping Soma. But the philosophy of pacification through pleasure, a culture of legal drugs, drowning truth in a sea of irrelevance, and distraction as a means of compliance are all the norm. Far more than governance through brutality, fear, censorship and violence, I would say.

At least Farenheit 451 has not come true.

Brave New World was an interesting book, in that some things that were arguably beneficial, such as the breakdown of racial barriers and more open sexuality, came with the price tag of illusiory freedom. Social deviations from the norm were strictly punished. I would not say the caste system is in full effect, though.

Which other authors hit on the modern tone a little too wel for comfort? Phillip Dick's predictions seemed pretty distant, but this scuffle over Snowden is a little too WWIIIish for my comfort.

H.G. Wells. Netflix says so.

Robert Heinlein predicted many inventions that came true. Check out The Past Through Tomorrow . Some of his predictions about society were grim. In Time Enough for Love he suggested that America would one day become an armed camp. He was a great believer in gun rights, but he did not ignored the implications of those rights. His most famous predictions were probably the people mover, Waldos, and nuclear weapons.

Jules Verne's Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea!

I did a double take at that last one, and then I remembered all the little details in the book!

Michelle wrote: "I did a double take at that last one, and then I remembered all the little details in the book!"

Verne was a very insightful and prolific writer, and was writing extensively on the subject of going into space roughly a century before it was happening.

I was mainly thinking "submarine" but I know he's regarded as one of the most prophetic of sci-fi writers. I would like to reread the book now.