I'd been aware of the article from mentions by Isaac Asimov, who'd conducted much of the literature search for Stern while a student at Columbia, and mentions it in a few places. He based his short story "Trends" off the notion, as described here:
I find any number of aspects of the piece fascinating. Stern's own history, Asimov's involvement, the specific technologies listed, the dynamics and parties involved in resistance, the citations and references, the specific arguments made and raised (for and agaist technologies), and the depressing regularitty with which one period's tech maverick becomes the next's obstructor. Specific detail (the rationale against typesetting the Koran because of hog-bristle brushes, particularly).
I know Asimov resisted a word processor for years, and ended up switching to one from his typewriter and upping his revision speed a lot. Probably part of why he had such a huge body of writing and editing work.
Seems to hype 1990s SF while dissing 1950s SF more than I think is appropriate.
"Artificial intelligences trade stocks"
That use in SF dates from at least Cordwainer Smith's "Norstrilia" (1975), and likely "The Planet Buyer" (1964). In Norstrilia, the AI in a war computer - economics is a part of warfare - makes the main character the richest person in history. Overnight. By leveraging the futures market.
"A meme virus almost as crazy as the one in Snow Crash swept an insane man to the presidency of the United State"
How about this earlier meme virus: Heinlein's "If This Goes On—" (1940) concerns a televangelist named Nehemiah Scudder who rides a populist, racist wave of support to the Presidency in 2012, then becomes dictator.
(I'm pretty certain the idea comes from Sinclair Lewis' "It Can't Happen Here", which Wikipedia summarizes as "Berzelius "Buzz" Windrip, a politician who defeats Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) and is elected President of the United States, after fomenting fear and promising drastic economic and social reforms while promoting a return to patriotism and "traditional" values. After his election, Windrip takes complete control of the government and imposes a plutocratic/totalitarian rule ..")
"artificial pop stars"
Like the Monkees?
"The early industrial age saw sci-fi writers predict many inventions that would eventually become reality from air and space travel to submarines, tanks, television, helicopters, videoconferencing, X-rays, radar, robots, and even the atom bomb"
Okay, that's overly generous. A submarine was used in the US war for independence, and the word "helicopter" was coined in 1861, while the first working steam-powered helicopter was in 1878. What, by the way, is a robot? Are clock tower automatons "robots"?
"And their social predictions were pretty accurate, too"
Oh? To really judge this I'll need to know what counts as early industrial age SF. Verne didn't really make predictions.
"they anticipated consumer societies and high-tech large-scale warfare."
What is the prediction? They lived in a consumer society with high-tech large-scale warfare. Look at the US Civil War for an example. Overnight wooden warships became worthless.
"Most famously, the mid-20th century was full of visions of starships, interplanetary exploration and colonization, android servitors and flying cars, planet-busting laser cannons, energy too cheap to meter."
Yes, they were. So was the pre-war SF. Starships and interplanetary exploration? "The Skylark of Space" (1928). Also in the same publication of Amazing Stories? Armageddon 2419 A.D., with the character who became Buck Rogers.
Interplanetary colonization? "Last and First Men" (1930) The Fifth Men colonize Venus and the Eighth Men Neptune. And the android in Metropolis (1927).
"Why didn't we get the Star Trek future, or the Jetsons future, or the Asimov future?"
Or the Buck Rogers future? Or the Flash Gordon future?
I'm hard pressed to think of a pre-pulp author who really set stories in a near-term future.
"uranium is a horrible deadly poison"
Umm, not true. Quoting http://web.ead.anl.gov/uranium/guide/ucompound/health/index.... : "Once in the bloodstream, the uranium compounds are filtered by the kidneys, where they can cause damage to the kidney cells. Very high uranium intakes (ranging from about 50 to 150 mg depending on the individual) can cause acute kidney failure and death. At lower intake levels (around 25 to 40 mg), damage can be detected by the presence of protein and dead cells in the urine, but there are no other symptoms. Also, at lower intake levels, the kidney repairs itself over a period of several weeks after the uranium exposure has stopped. "
"pocket laser cannon"
Buck Rogers called it a raygun, back in the 1930s.
"Starting in the mid to late 1990s, until maybe around 2010, sci-fi once again embraced some very far-out future stuff ..."
I think there's a bias error. The far-out future stuff of the 1970s, like "The Shockwave Rider", no longer seems that far-out. ("The hero is a survivor in a hypothetical world of quickly changing identities, fashions and lifestyles, where individuals are still controlled and oppressed by a powerful and secretive state apparatus. His highly developed computer skills enable him to use any public telephone to punch in a new identity, thus reinventing himself, within hours.")
As for pre-cyberpunk examples of "Strong (self-improving) AI, artificial general intelligence" - Heinlein's "The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress" (1966) and D. F. Jones' "Colossus" (1966).
I think the argument is reasonable. We no longer have amazing stories about exploring the jungles of Venus because we know what Venus is like. But I really don't like the examples.
It's hard to know which science fiction story to quote here; The Machine Stops is the obvious choice, but more people may be familiar with the empire that Asimov's Foundation supplanted, who valued layers-removed "analysis" over original research.
Classic Harry Turtledove story from 1985, in the Golden Age SF vein (compare to Clarke's 'Rescue Party'). It's a prequel to Herbig-Haro, which mostly inverts the idea. You can also view it as a precursor to Turtledove's Worldwar series.
But as the pastebin is a blatant copyright infringement, and the story isn't new, I don't think it's appropriate for HN.
Something to keep in mind is that Asimov was very much a product of the age of pulp magazines, so early on in his career he was paid by the word for his work.
A side geek note: If you were active in NYC fandom from say the 50s on chances were very good that you would actually get to see Isaac in person at many local science fiction conventions. For some reason he disliked air travel, and would show up at almost any local convention that he was invited to.
If you want to read a really good book on being a geek from the depression era to about the 50s I would highly recommend reading The Way the Future Was by rederik Pohl.
A couple of years ago I wrote a lengthy deconstruction of a Heinlein story[1], and had to note a number of unfortunate anachronisms that result from the basic fact that this future world had no computers, none. Their absence shows up in so many subtle ways! So often you say, "wait, why don't they just look it up? ...check an app? ...ask Siri?" When Heinlein wrote that particular story there was no such thing as a graphics terminal, or a computer smaller than a refrigerator, and he didn't make the imaginative leap.
I'd been aware of the article from mentions by Isaac Asimov, who'd conducted much of the literature search for Stern while a student at Columbia, and mentions it in a few places. He based his short story "Trends" off the notion, as described here:
https://books.google.com/books?id=SWBqlnbIIqkC&pg=PA54&lpg=P...
I'd tracked down a portion of the article (published in three parts), and someone pointed me at the Internet Archive version earlier this year.
I found the quality wanting, so retyped it myself. Beware typos. I may have a cleaner version elsewhere.
https://mastodon.cloud/@dredmorbius/101929608999060831
I find any number of aspects of the piece fascinating. Stern's own history, Asimov's involvement, the specific technologies listed, the dynamics and parties involved in resistance, the citations and references, the specific arguments made and raised (for and agaist technologies), and the depressing regularitty with which one period's tech maverick becomes the next's obstructor. Specific detail (the rationale against typesetting the Koran because of hog-bristle brushes, particularly).
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