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Silly Old SciFi
Apr. 13th, 2008 04:43 pmGoogle had led me to Jason Stoddard's blog and I was browsing past entries and ran across this. Not that it's terribly old. Not even a month. But a blog month is like 7 in human years.
Science Fiction Fails the Long View
He tells an amusing tale about a group of his friends and some old science fiction stories. Where they snicker over computers with tubes or computers the size of buildings, etc.
Yes, old science fiction is full of technology and politics and society that is clearly of the time it was written, or an extrapolation that didn't go far enough, fast enough, or in the right direction.
But what if it's also full of stuff that's right? And what if this stuff is invisible? Most of us can spot a cell phone that's ahead of its time if we turn on an original episode of Star Trek. But how good are we at spotting a pen that writes upside down as future tech?
Unfortunately, we'd still notice if an old story had a female/black/Buddhist/Deaf President of the United States. But how much notice do we take if there are Jewish astronauts? Or astronauts at all, for that matter!
When science fiction gets it wrong, we notice. If it's giant computers, we snicker. If it's flying cars, we shake our fists at a dream so far denied. When science fiction gets it right, we don't notice. Not unless we look. And it might help to have a history degree while you're doing the looking.
Science Fiction Fails the Long View
He tells an amusing tale about a group of his friends and some old science fiction stories. Where they snicker over computers with tubes or computers the size of buildings, etc.
Yes, old science fiction is full of technology and politics and society that is clearly of the time it was written, or an extrapolation that didn't go far enough, fast enough, or in the right direction.
But what if it's also full of stuff that's right? And what if this stuff is invisible? Most of us can spot a cell phone that's ahead of its time if we turn on an original episode of Star Trek. But how good are we at spotting a pen that writes upside down as future tech?
Unfortunately, we'd still notice if an old story had a female/black/Buddhist/Deaf President of the United States. But how much notice do we take if there are Jewish astronauts? Or astronauts at all, for that matter!
When science fiction gets it wrong, we notice. If it's giant computers, we snicker. If it's flying cars, we shake our fists at a dream so far denied. When science fiction gets it right, we don't notice. Not unless we look. And it might help to have a history degree while you're doing the looking.
