Well, computers were anticipated in 1671, and
The origins of the Internet reach back to research of the 1960s, commissioned by the United States government in collaboration with private commercial interests to build robust, fault-tolerant, and distributed computer networks. The funding of a new U.S. backbone by the National Science Foundation in the 1980s, as well as private funding for other commercial backbones, led to worldwide participation in the development of new networking technologies, and the merger of many networks. The commercialization of what was by the 1990s an international network resulted in its popularization and incorporation into virtually every aspect of modern human life.
The term "cyberspace" itself was coined by William Gibson in his 1982 short story "Burning Chrome", though it is indelibly associated with his later novel Neuromancer (quoted above). The setting in this story involves computer networks whose operating system is now a virtual reality simulation of a TRON-like "world in the computer".
Jules Verne didn't anticipate Submarines: there were already quite a few of those back then although none as huge and NERV-Titanic (relative to the era) as the Nautilus.
But, IMHO, the ultimate example is:
Snow Crash is basically the tale of a sword-slinging hacker who teams up with a badass Kourier in a Post Cyber Punk disincorporated USA to fight "Snow Crash" - a computer virus for the brain. Oh, and there's a badass biker with glass knives and a nuclear bomb strapped to his motorbike, too.[...]The book is also notable for its uncanny prediction of future internet trends. While holographic web terminals have not yet come to pass, we do have heavily populated 3D virtual worlds, satellite photograph software, and a massive user-created online library. (Actually, Second Life and Google Earth were inspired by this book.)
So, the ultimate badass achievement for science-fiction writers isn't to just anticipate stuff, it's to have their anticipation cause the changes and inventions in the first place, as a self-fulfilling prophecy.
So, no, I'm not too worried about making stuff up, cuz that stuff might actually end up being made when it otherwise wouldn't be. We're free-roaming in Idea Space, man, let's just enjoy the ride and try to come up with something fun as well as pedagogic. Plus, the fun thing about Less Wrong is that our focus on human biases and systematic errors gives us foot to write plots that aren't all that sensitive to Zeerust, relying on deeply-seated human idiosyncrasies instead. Going that route is also the easiest way to appeal to the mainstream and to get the high-status "Literature" qualifier, which is always good publicity AND it would allow us to slip our Author Tract in a fairly honest and straightforward way without making it a heavy handed filibuster...
This misses the main issue: while some writers did correctly anticipate some technologies, as a whole the general accuracy of predictions was very weak. Even those who did make correct predictions they were often buried in a host of other predictions. For example, some of Arthur C. Clarke's short stories have an internet like thing, but the vast majority do not. Similarly, Gibson's cyberspace only has a rough similarity to the internet as we know it. So claiming that these were anticipated seems to be almost a file drawer effect.
So, the usual bet is that the GAI, both F and UF will be created at around that time at the latest. I'd like to set a novel, a thriller, right at that critical moment where everything could be lost or won, and humanity is in the balance. But human societies and the way they interact with each other will have changed a lot by then. So, well, I haven't read throughly enough here to understand how far we are anticipating what will happen. Not just the friendliness of AI development, but our own impact in the world, and how it will react when it finds out about us and our goals, and takes them seriously.
So I was wondering if you'd help me out here with some brainstorming. I'm looking for some seminal ideas for how the world will look like by then. We don't need to be 100% precise, although keeping the pieces of the setting vague by avoiding Burdensome Details is a way of avoiding glaring mistakes, and gives a Lord Of The Rings, Ruins In The Distance feel of false depth. Don't hesitate to suggest seemingly weird but actually reasonable ideas: the future I want to build is a Weirdtopia. The point is to frighten, wonder, and suck the reader in.
Let's see, for a start: cryogenics and cybernetics are a solved problem, and people's heads are being resurrected and put on mechanical bodies by default (they could ask for recreated biological bodies, but usually after the first tantrums... they don't ^_^). The audience can be given someone to identify with through a Temporal Fish Out Of Water, one of the resurrected Human Popsicles. The funny part is that, even though that person happens to be a transhumanist AND a singularitarian, they hadn't surpassed the Shock Level (I think that's what Yudkowsky called it when you were enthused with an idea because you don't think of it as normal yet?), and they are only marginally less freaked out by the world they find themselves into than the normal sci-fi fan readers (or even the mainstream ones, if this ends up so good as to have any).