His take on the future (now present) is inspiring. It is a world that could be achieved. Yet Asimov, much like his fellow technocrats, predicted only the future in regards to technological and economic advance. He was unable to predict the rise of authoritarian leftists, marxists, and gloablists in the west.  The technological and economic progress the west has seen was a product of the people of the west, not of the specific geography they occupied or of their governments. As the character of these nations has been shifted by waves of third world immigration and the corruption of political leadership so too has the aspirations for high technological achievement subsided. If we are to ever realize these ambitious visions of a space-faring people it would first require a renewal of the peoples that led to the prospect of that vision in the first place.