[Meta: This is Max Harms. I wrote a novel about China and AGI, which comes out today. This essay from my fiction newsletter has been slightly modified for LessWrong.]

In the summer of 1983, Ronald Reagan sat down to watch the film War Games, starring Matthew Broderick as a teen hacker. In the movie, Broderick's character accidentally gains access to a military supercomputer with an AI that almost starts World War III.

“The only winning move is not to play.” After watching the movie, Reagan, newly concerned with the possibility of hackers causing real harm, ordered a full national security review. The response: “Mr. President, the problem is much worse than you think.” Soon after, the Department of Defense revamped their cybersecurity policies and the first federal directives and laws against malicious hacking were put in place.

But War Games wasn't the only story to influence Reagan. His administration pushed for the Strategic Defense Initiative ("Star Wars") in part, perhaps, because the central technology—a laser that shoots down missiles—resembles the core technology behind the 1940 spy film Murder in the Air, which had Reagan as lead actor. Reagan was apparently such a superfan of The Day the Earth Stood Still [...]

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Outline:

(05:05) AI in Particular

(06:45) Whats Going On Here?

(11:19) Authorial Responsibility

The original text contained 10 footnotes which were omitted from this narration.

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First published:
November 3rd, 2025

Source:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/uQak7ECW2agpHFsHX/the-unreasonable-effectiveness-of-fiction

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

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Images from the article: