Spectral lines: The joys and hazards of looking ahead

1984. It's here. George Orwell, painting a picture of a perverted society based on a projection of a centralized economy that had "already been partly realized in Communism and Fascism" in his day, objected when readers interpreted his satirical novel as a forecast. "I do not believe that the kind of society I describe necessarily will arrive, but I believe ... that something resembling it could arrive."