h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

NaNoWriMo is coming up next month, and this year I'm writing a science fiction novel so I'm doing a bit of "research" by reading some (a lot) of Philip K Dick's short stories because I consider him to be one of, if not the, best science fiction writers there ever was.

In the introduction to the first volume of his collected stories, he defines science fiction:

"We have a fictitious world; that is the first step: it is a society that does not in fact exist, but is predictated on our known society; that is, our known society acts as a jumping off point for it; the society advances out of our own in some way, perhaps orthogonally, as with the alternate world story or novel."
...
"This world must differ from the given in at least one way, and this one way mustbe sufficient to give rise to events that could not occur in our society - or in any known society present or past."

He goes on a lot more, but that's the essence of it. He also says that the only difference between science fiction and fantasy is the viewpoint of the reader.


Now, I've a bit of a problem with this definition. Mostly with the second part of that quote: "that could not occur in our society."
For years, science fiction writers have written about fantastic things, and then scientists have made them happen. Satellites are a classic example of this, Arthur C Clarke wrote about the idea of geostationary satellites back in 1945. When he wrote it, it was science fiction, now it's science. But according to Philip K Dick, if it *was* science fiction, it couldn't happen.


So, what *is* science fiction?

Personally I'd say it's science that has not yet happened but could come into fruition when our technology is more advanced

But what about the alternate world stories? With technology we don't have, in the time/era we do?

I'm not sure that it is really definable.

At one end of the spectrum we have futuristic stuff involving space ships and computers that talk (all obviously wildly improbable stuff - "Siri, where's my nearest Starbucks?" "I really can't tell you that Dave!") and at the other end stories about dystopian societies. And loads of spurs and cul-de-sacs in between.

2001 - Dune - 1984.

And as time passes, that which was written and was mind blowing in it's time can end up looking quaint and plain daft (e.g. Journey to the Centre of the earth).

(By the way, I would thoroughly recommend the short story 'Roog' by Philip K Dick - originally published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction - but hardly science fiction OR fantasy. Spoilers available on Wikipedia).

PP.

Much of the science in sci-fi may never come true. Time travel and hyperspatial travel are pretty incomprehensible, but would you call that fantasy rather than sci-fi? I don't think so.

There has to be a context in which the knowledge within the fictional world has been attained using scientific principles (hypothesis - research - experimentation - realisation) or by figures we would see as reflecting scientists in our existing world (Doctor Who rather than Gandalf). We know of scientitsts who have uncovered new truths in our understanding of space and time, of the fundamentals of matter, and of the origins of the universe. We do not recognise disciplines like alchemy and divination.

But this is a definition of the genre of fiction, not of scientific futurology. In our world we label anything we can't understand using the scientific method as mumbo jumbo. There are frontiers of science we haven't yet conquered (the workings of the brain, for example) which may eventually make some of these acceptable as scientific fact, or as subjects within the sci-fi genre.

1984.



PP.

The best - and most popular - science fiction is just a good story about humans, but set in a futuristic (usually technologically environment. Popular culture picks up on this invented environment, (who doesn't covet Dr Who his sonic screwdriver, or even Marty Fly his hoverboard?) but is drawn to the stories by the doings, reactions and interrelationships of the people (human or alien) involved.

At the other end of the scale, fantasy stories deal with the same situations, but in a completely non-technological setting.

The stories still all evolve around the old tropes of unrequited love, oppressed poor majorities finding a hero and winning through, outsiders fighting prejudice, Parent/Child relationships, the underdog winning the day.....

Now how do we define these hybrids? I am referring to strange mixtures that have been cropping up recently. The Hunger Games - one part of the society is completely technified, whilst the others still live on what they can kill with their bows and arrows. Elysium: the slum dwellers with their chickens and goats in the street, whilst the "elite" have created themselves a new sci-fi world in a completely man-made satellite.

Anyway - my point is that the environments created by science fiction writers are only credible if the people who inhabit them behave in a recognisable way.

Or maybe my point is that there are two aspects to science fiction which have to be fulfilled: The technology has to be one that could foreseeably be developed from what we have at present, and the people have to react like real people.

Whoops - forgot to finish brackets (lunch break was broken off abruptly by a phone call.)

.... (usually technologically ADVANCED) environment

Science fiction is a way of saying what if if the world continues in the technological and political direction we are presently heading..It's basically our story projected into the future.The best should feature human dilemmas and moral choices and people/beings we can care about.

Leave out the science and you have fantasy..and damned orcs and elves..

I would class Douglas Adams (at least the h2g2 series) as science fiction, and Terry Pratchett as fantasy.

But am I right?

Deb

Personally I agree with Philip K Dick's view that Science Fiction and Fantasy are one and the same, with the difference being the view of the reader, can they suspend their disbelief that far.

If a reader believes it to be possible, it's science fiction, if not, it's fantasy.

The problem though with saying that science fiction is in the future, totally leaves out the alternate reality stories, a lot of which are definitely science fiction.

"according to Philip K Dick, if it *was* science fiction, it couldn't happen."

I think that has been clarified - science fiction looks at the past and present of society, not at the future, so he acknowledges that.

In relation to alternate reality, if it is our society with technology we don't have, is it actually our society? It could be that the technology would also be in the future, even though the story is set in the present...

My view of Science Fiction is much like TC's though

>>what *is* science fiction?

Defining a genre seems like a futile exercise, since there will always be examples which don't fit.

Are you suggesting we don't define anything? Because that wouldn't work.

"For years, science fiction writers have written about fantastic things, and then scientists have made them happen. Satellites are a classic example of this, Arthur C Clarke wrote about the idea of geostationary satellites back in 1945. When he wrote it, it was science fiction, now it's science. But according to Philip K Dick, if it *was* science fiction, it couldn't happen." [Pastey]

But Dick was telling the truth. In the world of 1945, geostationary satellites could not happen because the technology for it did not exist and didn't seem likely to exist in the future. But some people made the breakthroughs necessary to make it possible. Almost 70 years later, some developments that no one expected had come along to make it possible. if you want to split hairs, you could call Clarke's stories about geostationary satellites "historical science fiction." "Brave new World" and some of Jules Verne's books would deserve the same description.

I would not reclassify these older science fiction books out of the science fiction genre. I think that they clearly still belong there.

I definitely believe that they *are* science fiction, Jules Verne was a wonderful thinker and writer who imagined some great stories.

Twenty years ago, I tried to find discussion of the difference between science fiction and fantasy. At that time, the preponderance of opinion was that science fiction emphasized technology, while fantasy emphasized magic and/or paranormal phenomena. Twenty years later, so many writers have come along with a blend of technology and magic that other distinctions have had to be made. I think that Piers Anthony got in trouble for being one of the early ones to blend the two, but nowadays his work would arouse no such controversy.

>>Are you suggesting we don't define anything?

No.

There's that (in)famous quote about any sufficiently advanced technology being indistinguishable from magic. I think it's about right, and I think that's what Philip K Dick was getting at when he was saying that Science Fiction and Fantasy are only different according to how the reader interprets them.

I think 'science fiction' is best restricted to scenariosvthat can potentially become realities, while 'fantasy', in the strict sense, is restricted to events that cannot become actual events.

On the other hand, if one makes 'fantasy' a tale of events not real and present, or historical, nearly all science fiction can be classified as fantasy.

How would you classify the Tom Hanks film, "Apollo 13"?

http://www.universetoday.com/101531/ken-mattingly-explains-how-the-apollo-13-movie-differed-from-real-life/