Isaac Asimov — Investigation
Status: Open Purpose: Study Asimov’s literature for clues relevant to the timeline — predictive programming, empire collapse, AI/robotics, psychohistory, encoding of real history or suppressed knowledge.
Note on full text: Asimov’s works remain under copyright. This investigation provides bibliography, summaries, themes, and analytical angles. Full texts must be obtained from libraries, used bookstores, or licensed editions. Where legally available online (e.g. some older stories), links are noted.
Contents
- 01 Biography and Context — Life, Russian roots, Philadelphia Navy Yard, DARPA, institutional connections
- 02 Bibliography and Major Works — Foundation, Robots, Multivac, key short stories
- 03 Themes for Timeline Study — Predictive programming, empire collapse, psychohistory, encoding angles
- full/foundation-index.md — Clue index for the Foundation Trilogy (
foundation.txt) - full/magnificent-possession-index.md — Clue index for “The Magnificent Possession” (1940): discovery suppression, corporate interference
- full/lets-get-together-index.md — Clue index for “Let’s Get Together” (1956): We/They, humanoid infiltration, Cold War, double agent
- full/everest-index.md — Clue index for “Everest” (1953): Martians on Everest, Tibetan “mountain of the gods”
- full/youth-index.md — Clue index for “Youth” (1955): Beforethewars, atomic war, aliens as “animals”
- full/i-robot-index.md — Clue index for I, Robot (1950): Three Laws, “slave complexes”, “no soul,” Susan Calvin
Full texts and indexes: wget/azimov/full/; see full/README.md.
Investigation threads: 04-investigation-threads.md — robots/slaves/Golem, Mars, suppressed tech (Visi-Sonor), Marxism.
Timeline article: Asimov: Marx in Space! — Three Laws as slave code, Golem without soul, Marxist encoding. Investigator sentiment: Asimov did not know what a robot was; his writings read like an ignorant slave driver’s; he comes across as soulless — a robot himself.
Quick Summary
Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) was born in Petrovichi, Soviet Russia (Smolensk Oblast), emigrated to the US at age 3 (1923), and became one of the “Big Three” science fiction writers. He wrote 500+ books, coined “robotics” and “psychohistory,” and created the Three Laws of Robotics and the Foundation series. Key angles for this timeline:
- Russian/Soviet origin — Born in Russia; family fled post-revolution instability. Connects to Rus-Horde, Romanov, Soviet historiography themes.
- Foundation = empire collapse — Inspired by Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire; Galactic Empire parallels British/Roman decline; psychohistory predicts collapse.
- Robots / AI — Three Laws; positronic brains; Multivac as predictive supercomputer (“All the Troubles of the World” — crime prediction before it happens).
- DARPA — Declined to join but submitted “On Creativity” paper; proximity to classified work.
- Philadelphia Navy Yard — Worked with Heinlein and de Camp during WWII.
References
- Wikipedia: Isaac Asimov, Foundation series, Robot series
- ISFDB: Isaac Asimov bibliography
- Asimov Online: Robot & Foundation history
Keywords: #Isaac #Asimov
Folder contents
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