Thoughts on sci-fi

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MichaelPalin (1414) on 12/29/2007 9:37 PM · Permalink · Report

I was writing a review for Timeshift when I realized that the term "science-fiction" is being overused today. In my opinion, for a story to be science-fiction, there has to be an important amount of scientific development of one or some fictitious ideas. It's not enough to set a story in the future or in space or use some of the usual sci-fi topics like time traveling or teleportation. A good example of what I am saying is "Star Wars", which is usually referred as science-fiction (at imdb, for example). Well, it's not, there is no scientific development of any idea, there is no science at all actually but, it's galactic setting is enough to put it in the science-fiction genre. I think that many RPG fans feel the same way when any game with elves, dwarfs or orcs is considered an RPG.

I find it funny how mobygames have dealt with this problem merging "sci-fi" and "futuristic" in the same genre, which works for any Star Wars game, for example, as the setting is futuristic (yes it is, even if it happens "a long time ago", the technology, politics and other social fields are possible futuristic evolutions of our owns).

mobiusclimber (235) on 12/30/2007 7:37 AM · Permalink · Report

man sci-fi writers have had to grapple w/ this problem until they just said fuggit and called anything that dealt w/ the future, things that hadn't been invented, and all manner of other techno, post-apolsolpsistic shenigans sci-fi.

see, how do you classify someone like philip k. dick? he's sci-fi but usually doesn't bother even trying to explain his machines or whatever, let alone going into detail as far as how they work (and even going so far as to writing a short story about this very subject). now i could rattle off lots of other names, but most everyone admits that philip k. dick is in fact a science fiction writer. yet he doesn't write like isaac asimov (which is what you are describing as being the hard-line idea of what constitues science fiction). i certainly don't agree that there has to be lots of hard science in sci-fi. many of my favorite sci-fi writers would need to find a different nametag then.

Shoddyan (15004) on 1/2/2008 9:20 PM · Permalink · Report

[Q --start mobiusclimber wrote--]man sci-fi writers have had to grapple w/ this problem until they just said fuggit and called anything that dealt w/ the future, things that hadn't been invented, and all manner of other techno, post-apolsolpsistic shenigans sci-fi.

grin most of the high-end authors have abandoned the term "science fiction" and tried to move the abbreviation "SF" over to "speculative fiction". The idea is that the new definition gives a lot more freedom of expression within a story and isn't as limiting to people's expectations of "technothriller" or "space wars" in the work. I can tell you that I really enjoy those "Year's Best" SF anthologies of short stories... and many of the stories within can ignore the science aspect completely... instead focusing on some other "interesting" ideas. Heck, some of them just happen to be really interesting fiction, but happen to be classified as "SF" for one reason or another.

Keep in mind too that the normal fiction section of your library or book store now contains stuff like Tom Clancy talking about a fantastical unit of cybercrime detectives or spy thrillers involving (sharks with frickin) laser beams...

St. Martyne (3648) on 12/30/2007 9:30 AM · Permalink · Report

My opinion is that: "futuristic" notion has become redundant, since sci-fi substitutes it for all intents and purposes quite successfully.

Sci-fi has appeared as a natural effect of rapid scientific progress of the late 19th - 20th century. It's the same as magic-tales or fantasies of the previous century, however, with a suggested (even if not explained) scientific reasoning behind the mechanics of the worlds described in it.

What do I mean by "suggested"? Well, take Star Wars for example. Look at the light saber, it has little buttons and it looks like a technical device, a complete opposite to the wooden staff wielded by Gandalf. Look at Millennium Falcon -- it has different sub-systems, it looks very complex, and Solo is always complaining that something isn't working the way it should. Does it contain a scientific explanation to hyper-space travel? No. Does it suggest one? Certainly. Even Force is presumably has something to do with little microbes with an important-sounding name.

Science fiction at its best was never about science. The science is used in it to make the stories believable or the challenges interesting.

Sci-fi doesn't suggest a quality of the story, or the amount of cliches used in it. So even the story is the same ol' journeys through space with an alien with antennas and beaming down to planets: it's still sci-fi.

And lastly, sci-fi is not even a genre. Neither of literature, nor of films and of course games. Sci-fi is a theme. And usually it's impossible to give a clear definition of a work's theme in one word. So it's nothing wrong that the term Sci-fi embraced so many variations of it.

MichaelPalin (1414) on 12/30/2007 2:00 PM · Permalink · Report

Well, I've been thinking a lot and this is a complex theme. Let's see.

I understand your (of both of you) point of view, that sci-fi is a genre (or theme, but I'm pretty sure it is considered a genre, at least, as much as fantasy is) whose features are no longer tied to science at all, but to some topics that have build it. For example, space stuff is undoubtedly defined as science fiction, while dragons are going to be defined as fantasy. I understand this, but I find it is a pretty weak way of defining a genre. I'll explain.

A very good example of good genre definition, in my opinion, is that of videogames. If we consider genre as a basic way of classifying products of an artistic field (be it, games, films, paintings, furniture designing,...), this classification has to be directly tied to the nature of the field. With games, it's interactivity. This way, in action games you interact by fast reflexes, in adventure games you interact to discover/explore a virtual world, in RPGs you interact according to a role you give to your avatar, etc. Storytelling is only one of the main features of games (even if it's not actually necessary) like music or graphical design, and, therefore, game genres don't coincide with those of other artforms based on telling a story (like films, comics, etc.).

What I want to say with this, is that these genres are defined in a very solid way, so they don't change or evolve easily. If something, they just mix. Your definition of sci-fi (and that of most of the people, ok) is weak by these standards, as it is not prepared for changes, it's very close and arbitrary. I'll try to explain it clearer with some examples.

Fantasy is the genre in storytelling that deals with stuff that cannot be understand by reason, even if there may be rules in it. Would you call S.T.A.L.K.E.R.'s story a story of fantasy (in addition to sci-fi, of course)? I'd do, because, even if there is a scientific explanation for everything, the general approach of the stalkers is to think on the Zone as a magical place with it's own myths and legends. And what about the story of a zoologist that study dragons (in the universe of D&D, for example)? Would it still be fantasy just because there are dragons even if the approach is totally scientific? And "the Force" is NOT scientific, at least not in the movies (maybe in the expanded universe), but you and many people seem to need to have a scientific explanation for it, just because it's surrounded by robots and space ships (am I wrong?). This is exactly why I think these definitions are weak, because they are arbitrary and need to be revised every time somebody brake their arbitrary rules.

St. Martyne (3648) on 12/30/2007 2:59 PM · edited · Permalink · Report

Alright, first when talking about genres among story-telling media I prefer to stick to classic literature genre system. Like you said about video-games it's a perfect criteria by which a story can be judged.

So, in that sense, all that relates to setting, mood or format of the movie/story remains just that and can't be used as a genre-defining criterion. So, we can have a sci-fi drama, a sci-fi epic, a sci-fi romance. Sci-fi denotes setting (which can be very blurry at times), while genres (or primary genres) denote the intent of the story, which is much more simpler to define.

The same can be said about fantasy. For me it's just a setting. And there are light-years between Terry Pratchett, Tolkien and Sapkowski (a recent favorite of mine). More correct genre specification in these case would have been: Comedy, Epic (Myth) and Drama.

So, I do not see the need for definition of Sci-fi to incorporate the elements you're suggesting. It's just a setting, and the fact that stalkers consider Zone akin to a magical fairy-land (sarcasm intended) shouldn't make us jump over our head in order for the definition of Sci-Fi to incorporate all those nuances or devise a totally new term.

What is steam-punk? Is it sci-fi, or maybe a historical sci-fi?

The purpose of every classification system is to keep things as simple as possible. So it would be doubly pleasant to call some work of art "genre defying".

And a bit of a nerdy Star Wars speech (I am ashamed of it, really :)):

According to Wikipedia -- Obi-Wan refers to the force as "an energy field, created by all living things, that surrounds us, penetrates us, and binds the galaxy together.".

In episode I, Qui-gon speaks of midi-chlorians - "Force sensitivity has been defined as either having a high count of microorganisms called midi-chlorians — the more midi-chlorians, the greater the person's Force ability — or having a strong Force "aura"".

So, what do I have in mind, when I hear that the Force is "an energy field"? I am immediately reminded of unsuccessful attempt of Einstein to create a unified field theory, aimed to discover common grounds between electro-magnetic and gravitational fields. I have always considered the force to be a logical continuation of that theory. Just like a gravitational field it exists everywhere, in different amounts, and depending on your mass (or the amount of midi-chlorians) you can be either more or less receptive to those phenomena.

Of course, I don't suggest it's possible, I am just turning your attention to the fact that it was tried to be explained in the movies, and that the reasoning behind can be actually traced back to the factual scientific endeavors.

I've heard Star Wars called a space western a couple of times, you suggest a futuristic fairy-tale. I settled on sci-fi action/adventure. But that's arbitrary, just like any other classification.

mobiusclimber (235) on 12/31/2007 3:20 AM · Permalink · Report

and the mention of terry pratchet, no matter how brief, shows up the difficulty in classifying anything. would you call the discworld series sci-fi b/c it's set in space on a distant planet, or fantasy b/c it has most of the trappings of fantasy fiction? or simply humor? the problem w/ any classification system is that creative types always like to beat against it, mix things up, never stay within a well-defined box. it's what separates the hacks from the geniuses. this is true of literature, movies or videogames. you mentioned rpgs. never has a genre been as ill-defined as this one. what makes up an rpg? what separates adventure games from action-rpgs or puzzle games from... puzzle rpgs? (ok, not sure about that but look at a game like arkista's ring or lolo's adventure. ok those are more adventure type games but still. you get the idea.) in fact, i think videogames tend to be most genre-defiant. some of em simply refuse classification. wtf IS katamari damacy?

DJP Mom (11333) on 12/31/2007 5:00 AM · Permalink · Report

Genre theory is ultimately not set in stone, it changes as society and culture changes. One theorist describes genre this way: "A genre is ultimately an abstract conception rather than something that exists empirically in the world." I think the classical Greek writers found just three: drama, prose, and poetry, if I remember right, or was it two: tragedy and comedy? At any rate, it's an elastic idea that stretches to fit in more and contracts to fit less depending on the times and the places, and relying on a general consensus about what is meant by SF, or Fantasy, or Mystery. Marion Zimmer Bradley's Darkover novels are classified as science fiction because they take place on another planet, and there is spaceflight involved, but the majority of her books deal more with mental/psychic abilities than anything else - that's not science!

Anyway, all I'm saying is that most genre definitions are stretchable, a label like SF has to cover more than a little ground or you'll find yourself having to define more and more micro-genres until it's impossible to classify anything!

DreinIX (10446) on 12/31/2007 12:15 PM · Permalink · Report

Basically it was tragedy, comedy and satire all under the name of drama which meant something is happening. Now it's usually used as a genre.

If sci-fi was more hardcore in its probably actual definition or on how it should be (in order to define this book for example as belonging in the sci-fi genre), wouldn't it be too confusing or even something that not many people would bother reading? And how many writers would be able to write sci-fi novels or whatever?

Black_Rose (33) on 1/2/2008 12:05 AM · Permalink · Report

Sci-fi?

Pseudo_Intellectual (66362) on 1/4/2008 9:12 AM · Permalink · Report

often the terms "sci-fi", "science fiction", and "SF" are used non-interchangeably to denote the amount of hard science content in a futuristic or speculative work (with "space opera" for those like Star Wars with precisely none 8)