Isaac Asimov's Trip to 2014: What He Thought The World Would Look Like

Science-fiction writer Isaac Asimov died more than two decades ago, but that did not stop him from writing about a trip to the World’s Fair of 2014.

Fifty years ago, Asimov walked into the GE exhibition at the 1964 New York World’s Fair in Queens and declared that “the direction in which man is traveling is viewed with buoyant hope, nowhere more so than at the General Electric pavilion.” What he saw inspired him to imagine the world in 2014 in an essay for the New York Times.

His predictions of underground suburban homes with glowing walls, kitchens that can prepare “automeals” to order and appliances powered by nuclear batteries are still over the horizon.

But Asimov was also smitten with GE’s take on the classroom of the future and he put emphasis on science education. “It is not only the techniques of teaching that will advance, however, but also the subject matter will change,” Asimov writes. “All the high-school students will be taught the fundamentals of computer technology, will become proficient in binary arithmetic and will be trained to perfection in the use of the computer languages that will have developed out of those like the contemporary Fortran.”

To him, such skills were not a choice. He said that “the lucky few who can be involved in creative work of any sort will be the true elite of mankind, for they alone will do more than serve a machine. Indeed, the most somber speculation I can make about A.D. 2014 is that in a society of enforced leisure, the most glorious single word in the vocabulary will have become work!”

To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the 1964 New York World’s Fair, we recently took a trip out to the borough of Queens to create a then-and-now look at the fairgrounds. From top to bottom is the GE Pavilion, the New York State Pavilion, and the Unisphere.

GE created its Progressland pavilion in partnership with Disney. We made it fade in and out because in 1967 it moved to Disneyland. It became “The Carousel of Progress.” It then moved once again, to Disney World’s Magic Kingdom, where it remains today. 

At 1964 World’s Fair, the pavilion displayed an animatronic family enjoying the benefits of modern technology, beginning with the advent of electricity. Today it remains largely the same, although it has been updated five times to keep pace with the evolution of technology. 

Images credit: Chris New