You need only cast a quick glance over the considerable career of someone like Isaac Asimov to note the prescient and directive power of science-fiction. The man who popularised the idea of robotics in his classic I, Robot and, in his 1964 article, Visit to the World’s Fair of 2014, foresaw everything from kitchen top coffee makers and microwave meals to satellite phones.
And then consider that Asimov’s predictions, as impressive as they were, cannot even be considered unusual amongst the sci-fi writing fraternity.
Ray Bradbury prefigured the advent of earphones in his best known novel, Fahrenheit 451. Whilst HG Wells, as far back as 1899, was imagining automatic doors in The Sleeper Awakes. In fact, everything from bionic limbs (The Six Million Dollar Man) to credit cards (Edward Bellamy’s 1888 novel, Looking Backwards), to the now commonplace Skype-style video calling we all use and love has been prophesied one way or another by the heady imaginations of science-fiction.
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Micah Yongo 