Novelists Who Saw Our Future: From Borges to Atwood

Some of today's biggest ideas were first imagined in fiction. Writers like George Orwell and Margaret Atwood predicted mass surveillance and social control long before they became reality. Now, a key story is having an anniversary. 2026 marks 85 years since Jorge Luis Borges published "The Garden of Forking Paths." This 1941 story describes a novel where every possible choice happens. This creates endless parallel stories. Experts often say Borges foreshadowed a major theory in quantum physics. This is the "many worlds" idea, where every possible event creates a new universe. It was formally proposed years after Borges wrote his story. A physicist once asked Borges about this link. Borges claimed he knew almost nothing about science. He found the connection amusing, calling physicists "so imaginative." The story makes us wonder: do novelists predict the future, or do they simply imagine possibilities so compelling that science later follows?