Stuff sci-fi got right

[Ethilrist]

Not just the existence of cellphones or handheld computers, but in The Mote in God’s Eye, Niven & Pournelle foresaw a handheld device that was so compact and dense that they were basically unrepairable–it wasn’t worth the time, effort or money to fix them, and so they were disposable. Much like the new touchscreen Blackberries et al…

[msmith537]

In the old 1980s Inspector Gadget cartoons, Gadget’s niece had a book with an internal digital display she used for looking up all kinds of crap. Basically similar to a Blackberry or laptop with a wireless internet connection. Just bulkier.

The military uses a lot of the same gadgets the Space Marines from Aliens used. Small cameras and tactical lights mounted to weapons and helmets. Body armor. APCs filled with electronic sensors and whatnot.

[Icerigger]

I have three from Arthur C Clarke.

In A Fall of Moondust written 1961 he has the Chief Engineer of farside dictating a letter to a computer that checks spelling and punctuation automatically but he reads the letter before sending it because the device sometimes makes grammatical mistakes, just like modern spell check and word processing.
In the novel 2001 written 1964 On Dr Floyd’s trip to the moon he is using a good approximation of the internet. The description has Floyd reading newspapers on a computer screen with the headlines in large fonts and to read the rest of the article instead of a mouse he punches in a code number on a pad to bring up the rest of the articles he wants to read from any major paper in the world. I’d say that’s pretty close to surfing the web.

In Imperial Earth written in 1976 ACC has a device called a mini-sec which could be a copy of a laptop or more recently an I-Phone. The mini-sec is used to store music, pictures, sounds, used as a voice recorder and many other functions that we would use our hand held devices for. Also people have elaborate passwords to prevent unauthorized people from accessing their machines. Again, close to what we now use.

[Annie-Xmas]

Not really science fiction, but I am amazed at George Orwell’s passage about the lottery in 1984:

@George Orwell

In an angle formed by a projecting house-front three men were standing very close together, the middle one of them holding a folded-up newspaper which the other two were studying over his shoulder. Even before he was near enough to make out the expression on their faces, Winston could see absorption in every line of their bodies. It was obviously some serious piece of news that they were reading. He was a few paces away from them when suddenly the group broke up and two of the men were in violent altercation. For a moment they seemed almost on the point of blows.

‘Can’t you bleeding well listen to what I say? I tell you no number ending in seven ain’t won for over fourteen months!’

'Yes, it ‘as, then!’

'No, it 'as not! Back 'ome I got the 'ole lot of ‘em for over two years wrote down on a piece of paper. I takes ‘em down reg’lar as the clock. An’ I tell you, no number ending in seven-’

'Yes, a seven ‘as won! I could pretty near tell you the bleeding number. Four oh seven, it ended in. It were in February – second week in February.’

‘February your grandmother! I got it all down in black and white. An’ I tell you, no number-’

‘Oh, pack it in!’ said the third man.

They were talking about the Lottery. Winston looked back when he had gone thirty metres. They were still arguing, with vivid, passionate faces. The Lottery, with its weekly pay-out of enormous prizes, was the one public event to which the proles paid serious attention. It was probable that there were some millions of proles for whom the Lottery was the principal if not the only reason for remaining alive. It was their delight, their folly, their anodyne, their intellectual stimulant. Where the Lottery was concerned, even people who could barely read and write seemed capable of intricate calculations and staggering feats of memory. There was a whole tribe of men who made a living simply by selling systems, forecasts, and lucky amulets.

That could have been written today.

[Munch]

@astro

20,000 Leagues under the Sea - Submarines

20,000 Leagues was published in 1870. Submarines first appeared in 1620. They were used in both the Revolutionary War (1776), War of 1812 (1812) and the Civil War (1863). The Nautilus was the first well-known submarine to carry multiple people, and it was built in 1800.

[cochrane]

In a 1962 Jetsons cartoon, one of Elroy’s friends got into trouble in class for watching the Flintstones on a wristwatch TV. Today, you can actually buy one. The only trouble is, it’s analog, so it’ll be obsolete in just a few weeks. That’s OK, I can watch TV on my cell phone. Which can also browse the internet and play YouTube videos. Even children today have handheld electronic devices, such as DVD players, video games, and cameras that outperform many larger devices adults used a decade ago.

[MrDibble]

@Annie-Xmas

Not really science fiction, but I am amazed at George Orwell’s passage about the lottery in 1984:
That could have been written today.

Lotteries of that sort have existed since Elizabethan times (with a gap from around 1900 to the 60s), so hardly Sci Fi.

Bruce Sterling’s 1994 book Heavy Weather has storms and climate change that create internal refugees in the United States, dependent on the Government for their survival. Sure, and extrapolation from the Dust Bowl, but I would have said that was not on the cards in the current US…until Katrina.

[SpectBrain]

In the movie “The Time Machine” when the time traveler gets to the future and is wandering around a museum, he finds some silver disks which he spins on a glass table (which gives some expository information). CD’s in other words.

[Sam_Stone]

Robert Heinlein also invented the Remote Manipulator, in his short story “Waldo”. And in fact, these manipulators are routinely called “Waldos” in his honor.

[BrotherCadfael]

I still think that the single best science fiction prediction is one of Heinlein’s. In Lost Legacy and other stories (some of which are referenced above), he foresees that the cell phone would become a royal pain in the ass, and that people would deliberately leave them behind in order to take a break from being constantly available. Predicting the cell phone? Trivial. Predicting the societal reaction to the cell phone? Nothing less than brilliant.

[sqweels]

@Raguleader

Battlestar Galactica portrayed female combat pilots back in the late 70’s, which didn’t happen IRL until a few decades later (even on the show, it was far from the norm). There had already been women serving in uniform as pilots as far back as WWII though, so not a huge prediction.

But we’re still waiting for co-ed showers like in Starship Troopers.

[BrainGlutton]

The simulated space-ark we’re all living on now was predicted by Harlan Ellison in Phoenix Without Ashes.