Imagining 2014.

• Position: SCIENCE FICTION - Isaac Asimov - Brief article

Scientist and sci-fi writer Isaac Asimov published more than 400 books during his lifetime, including the classic L Robot. But he still found time to set down his predictions for the future, and many of his guesses were spot-on. In a 1964 article for The New York Times, Asimov looked ahead to 2014 and predicted video phone calls (think Skype and FaceTime), 3-D movies, "miniaturized" computers, e-readers, and GPS. He also foresaw many of the world's current challenges, like overpopulation and the depletion of Earth's resources. Asimov, who died in 1992, thought these...