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c/til · by LincolnsDogFido@lemmy.zip · 174d

TIL Ronald Reagan was deeply influnced by SciFi when implementing policy. He reportedly initiated cybersecurity changes within the DoD after watching the movie WarGames and asking if it was plausible.

https://www.newamerica.org/weekly/how-sci-fi-wargames-led-real-policy-during-reagan-administration/

333 points · 34 comments · view on lemmy.world

34 Comments

baggachipz@sh.itjust.works · 112 pts · 174d (2 replies)

His economic and social policies were informed by dystopian sci-fi

CosmoNova@lemmy.world · 43 pts · 174d (1 reply)

Much like MAGA is doing it today. The more things change the more they stay the same or something.

MunkyNutts@feddit.online · 26 pts · 174d

Even worse, Trump is informed by social media influencers and sycophants, some of the dumbest mother fuckers in our society.

Last Week Tonight did a good piece on it recently: https://youtu.be/p7ZG_xWYLzI

homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world · 74 pts · 174d (2 replies)

Ronald Reagan?! The actor?!?

Maiq@piefed.social · 28 pts · 174d

Then who's vice-president, Jerry Lewis?

SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca · 17 pts · 174d

With dementia?

IWW4@lemmy.zip · 63 pts · 174d

WarGames pretty much defined what hacking was until the late 90s. Any business and organization that didn’t change policy because of WarGames was going to feel pain.

spittingimage@lemmy.world · 54 pts · 174d (1 reply)

Yeah, speculative fiction causes people to speculate. That's what it's for.

GraniteM@lemmy.world · 10 pts · 173d

That's arguably one of the greatest values of scifi, to get people to ask what might happen in a world where plausible technological or cultural changes take place, or what we could learn about our own world from such possibilities.

bufalo1973@piefed.social · 37 pts · 174d (4 replies)

Are they saying that the president that named the Strategic Defense Initiative as "Star Wars" was deeply influenced by sci fi?

SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca · -1 pts · 173d (3 replies)

Star Wars is not sci fi. It's religious fantasy.

RampantParanoia2365@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 173d (2 replies)

... With space ships, lasers, and aliens. Is this like when people say heavy metal isn't rock?

SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca · 1 pts · 173d (1 reply)

yeah....you think space ships, lasers, and aliens is science?

How do you focus a laser to project a meter only?

uselessartifact@lemmy.zip · 4 pts · 173d

Well, it wouldn't be a laser, more something like magnetically confined plasma.

hOrni@lemmy.world · 20 pts · 174d (2 replies)

Too bad he didn't watch Star Trek. Fucking cunt.

Wataba@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 173d

Apparently he picked up Gene Roddenberry's cane for him when he visited the set of Trek one time.

Bastards look out for bastards.

tigeruppercut@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 172d

Given that trek has a contingent of right wing chud fans, it probably wouldn't have helped

rayyy@piefed.social · 18 pts · 174d

Both Reagan and the orange pedophile are severely demented.

possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip · 14 pts · 173d

Honesty there are worse things

Tollana1234567@lemmy.today · 14 pts · 174d (2 replies)

he also early onsent alzheimers dementia at the time too, so that played a part.

SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca · 7 pts · 173d (1 reply)

It wasn't early onset. He was fucking old.

AngryRedHerring@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 173d

I've read reports that his mind started to noticeably go south after he got shot. Yes, he was fucking old, and that shock to his system did not help. He came very close to death, and many people who knew him said he was never the same after that.

And that happened two months into his first term.

etherphon@piefed.world · 12 pts · 174d (1 reply)
[ removed ]
mojofrododojo@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 174d

Also - real genius - crossbow (the program name for the laser system) has SDI and CIA vibes everywhere.

hodag@lemmy.ml · 10 pts · 174d (1 reply)

You should check out him and his wife and their psychic.

prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 1 pts · 173d

Nancy AKA the throat goat

grubberneonbelly@lemmy.world · 9 pts · 173d (2 replies)

When he started his presidency he also asked White House staff where the war room was, like the one from Dr. Strangelove

prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 11 pts · 173d (1 reply)

I mean, valid question lol

Buddahriffic@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 173d

He probably just wanted to get away from all the fighting.

Manjushri@piefed.social · 5 pts · 174d

Yep. He even requested recommendations from SciFi authors of the time who were part of the Citizens' Advisory Council on National Space Policy.

Reagan's search for space-based options to enhance America's military had context prompted the Citizens' Advisory Council on National Space Policy to convene at [Larry] Niven's house. [Jerry] Pournelle chaired the meeting, and the result of a three-day weekend was an ominously titled document: "Space: The Crucial Frontier."

Pournelle's preamble for the policy, published in 1981, calls space "our most valuable natural resource" and a place that opens up "significant and possibly decisive military and economic advantages."

"We worked all weekend and produced a paper for the transition team, then at the president's request we started in on a plan for after inauguration at another meeting," Pournelle wrote on his blog. "The president read the full reports, which strongly recommended Strategic Defense. In 1983 he made his Star Wars speech. It included several phrases from the Council reports."

Zwuzelmaus@feddit.org · 2 pts · 174d (3 replies)

At that time, nobody had an idea how much time there would be left until AI could have such abilities as shown in the movie.

quick_snail@feddit.nl · 5 pts · 174d (2 replies)

AI is dumb tho. It would never conclude that the only way to win is not to play. It would destroy all life on earth first.

AngryRedHerring@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 174d (1 reply)

There are stories out there from just the past week about how in war simulations AI launches the nukes something like 90% of the time.

quick_snail@feddit.nl · 1 pts · 174d

See also the genocide committed by AI in Gaza

Cnote5@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 159d

Ronald Reagan Ruined Everything.