Isaac Asimov's Death and AIDs

I have read a lot about Isaac Asimov over the years often written by Isaac Asimov himself, but last night when I was browsing the web I came across a very interesting piece of information that I had never heard. It seems that Isaac Asimov had AIDS and it contributed to his death.

According to what I read he had contracted aids from a blood transfusion during a heart bypass in 1983, largely due to the inability of the tests to find HIV and a general misunderstanding of AIDs which kept him from being diagnosed as early as he could have been.  He also kept his disease a secret on the advice of doctors who likely recognized that the fear of AIDS at that time would make everyone knowing he had it a bad idea.

As everyone who grew up in the 80’s and 90’s I heard a lot about AIDs, and there were celebrities which had AIDS, but the truth is that they were people I had no connection to. I don’t really care about sports. Still the idea of connecting Isaac Asimov and AIDs is one that I never would have connected until yesterday and today I wonder how many more stories he would have written had he not died due to AIDS.



Isaac Asimov on the golden age of science fiction

It is hard to imagine anyone more qualified than Isaac Asimov to discuss the golden age of science fiction. This discusses the change of science fiction from pulp to magazine and is very interesting.

A discussion on Psychohistory

This is an interesting discussion on reddit about the possibilities of psychohistory and the current science that attempts to do similar things. If you found the ideas of Hari Seldon as interesting as me this is a good discussion. It naturally has the people who believe that anything that hasn't already been done is impossible, but there are others with interesting points of view.

 Check it out here.

An interview with Isaac Asimov

An interesting interview. This is mostly about science fiction in general and perhaps the best part is the graphics at the beginning. Once you get past that there is a lot of interesting points here. It also explains while he might be the author I'd most like to read he is one that I'd be least interested in spending much time around.