[HN Gopher] Review of 1984 by Isaac Asimov (1980)
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Review of 1984 by Isaac Asimov (1980)
Author : doruk101
Score : 27 points
Date : 2026-02-05 21:39 UTC (1 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.newworker.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.newworker.org)
| tomhow wrote:
| Previously...
|
| _Isaac Asimov 's Review of "1984" (1980)_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26390752 - March 2021 (6
| comments)
|
| _Review of 1984 by Isaac Asimov (1980)_ -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18164679 - Oct 2018 (8
| comments)
| TMWNN wrote:
| Thank you for that. I agree with mannykannot, miesman, and
| Wildgoose. Asimov let his own leftist tendencies miss the
| forest for the trees.
| bitwize wrote:
| "1984? Yeah, RIGHT, man, that's a typo. Orwell's here now and
| he's living large. We have no names, man, no names. We are
| NAMELESS. Can I score a fry?" --Cereal Killer, _Hackers_ , whose
| words ring even more true today even as we watch tech
| billionaires attempt to build an all-watchful god _in silico_
| ninalanyon wrote:
| I wonder what Asimov would write if he were to re-do that review
| now? Now that we actually do have televisions that can hear us as
| well as show us ads and in which governments of every nominal
| political stripe are falling over themselves in the rush to buy
| Palantir's products and to inject monitoring software into every
| mobile phone and 3D printer.
| tenthirtyam wrote:
| One of my most fascinating reads of all time was "Brave New
| World Revisited" (1950s I think), a follow-up of "Brave New
| World" (1920s I think) by Aldous Huxley. Similarly, the point
| then was how the mass media and TV would eventually be used to
| mislead and deflect populations' attentions.
|
| Such innocent times when we thought the TV could be evil.
| TMWNN wrote:
| >Furthermore, he has a system of volunteer spies in which
| children report on their parents, and neighbours on each other.
| This cannot possibly work well since eventually everyone reports
| everyone else and it all has to be abandoned.
|
| Asimov was mistaken here. The East German Stasi did implement a
| system in which many, many people (not literally everyone, but a
| staggering percentage) reported on each other.
| elteto wrote:
| After reading Asimov's review, I think the book has aged much
| better to be honest.
| hleszek wrote:
| This is still so relevant now:
|
| > This Orwellian preoccupation with the minutiae of 'historical
| proof' is typical of the political sectarian who is always
| quoting what has been said and done in the past to prove a point
| to someone on the other side who is always quoting something to
| the opposite effect that has been said and done. As any
| politician knows, no evidence of any kind is ever required. It is
| only necessary to make a statement - any statement - forcefully
| enough to have an audience believe it. No one will check the lie
| against the facts, and, if they do, they will disbelieve the
| facts.
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