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All Science Fiction writers miss big trends. Asimov missed computers. Whoops! This makes it all the more impressive when they do hit it. And the greatest sc
by mathattack 15y ago
All Science Fiction writers miss big trends. Asimov missed computers. Whoops! This makes it all the more impressive when they do hit it. And the greatest science fiction renders technology irrelevant. When Star Trek broke racial stereotypes and attacked bigotry - that was a cultural message.
- groby_b 15y agoUh, what? Asimov writes a _lot_ about U.S. Robots and positronic brains amongst other things. He's exploring the idea of increasingly powerful computers in 'The Last Question'. And those are just off the top of my head. I really don't see how you can claim Asimov missed computers///
- snowwrestler 15y agoThe robots in Asimov's stories don't much resemble computers as we know them--they're more like characters. His computers tend to be massive centralized things, as computers were in his day. Compare to the pocket computers in The Mote in God's Eye, which are eerily similar to today's smartphones. Niven apparently thought the idea was one of the most fantastical aspects of the book.
- groby_b 15y agoUnless I'm mistaken, at the very least "The End of Eternity" features pocket computers, too. And to say robot brains don't count because their AI is so advanced that they are more like characters is kind of disingenuous :)