Back when my father was a kid science fiction was all about rockets to Mars, flying cars and atomic power.\u00a0 The world would march forward in the same way that it had after science advanced in the generations before.\u00a0 It would engineer applications for atomic power in the same way that earlier generations applied knowledge of chemistry and physics to create the internal combustion engine and airplanes.<\/p>\n
When I was a kid science fiction had progressed to where relativity and quantum physics were assumed to be susceptible to human genius and no barriers were too tall to prevent humans from colonizing the stars, travelling through time and even traipsing into other dimensions.\u00a0 Now this made for a lot of interesting stories about universes where humans could meet up with all kinds of amazing creatures and events.\u00a0 But at some point, you have to wonder if the word \u201cscience\u201d in the name science fiction should be changed to fantasy.\u00a0 And that\u2019s fine.\u00a0 Having faster than light (FTL) travel opens up so many story lines for an author that it\u2019s hard to resist.\u00a0 Otherwise, we\u2019re stuck with multi-generational ships depending on relativistic time dilation to reach the nearest stars in one or two hundred years.\u00a0 Which, by the way, makes for a lot of very interesting sociological phenomena on the ship.\u00a0 But anyway, you can see how FTL travel would be a very desirable pseudoscientific device.<\/p>\n
But here we are something like a hundred years on in the \u201cmodern\u201d science fiction timeline and we\u2019re still engulfed in the FTL travel trope.\u00a0 And we\u2019re still nowhere near any kind of science that would lead us to believe that FTL travel is even remotely possible.\u00a0 So, in my mind maybe science fiction needs to start looking at science again for inspiration for new themes.<\/p>\n
Thinking about this, it\u2019s not like there aren\u2019t all sorts of scientific discoveries and avenues for new technologies that are not only possible but also exciting building blocks for science fiction stories.\u00a0 In biology we have gene therapy and longevity research.\u00a0 In computer science there is artificial intelligence and cybernetics.\u00a0 The reality of atomic power as a replacement for fossil fuels is not really science fiction as much as fact but there are enough questions about how it will change the present world that it could provide plenty of fodder for stories.\u00a0 And human exploration of the solar system is now much better understood than it was even back during the Apollo program.\u00a0 Reimagining the directions that something like landing on Mars will take has already been a successful idea for one author who even saw it turned into a successful movie.<\/p>\n
Perhaps some of this sounds a little tame for science fiction readers.\u00a0 On the contrary, sticking to the reality of what it would take to put a small colony on Mars should allow a good author to engineer in plenty of human interest and adventure.\u00a0 I could see how a story based on capturing and harvesting an asteroid filled with gold and platinum would make a very exciting tale.\u00a0 A good author would include the part of the story that involves very rich and powerful individuals scheming to hold onto the profits from a mission that might include the most powerful nations on Earth claiming the assets as the \u201clegacy of all mankind.\u201d<\/p>\n
So, this is something I\u2019ve been thinking about lately.\u00a0 Now I like space opera as much as the next guy.\u00a0 I\u2019m very comfortable with galactic empires and multiverse.\u00a0 They\u2019re great fun.\u00a0 But I also think it\u2019s time for some of the most creative writers to start adding some real science back into science fiction.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Back when my father was a kid science fiction was all about rockets to Mars, flying cars and atomic power.\u00a0 The world would march forward<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[241,2510,1289,237,4,242],"tags":[38,1355,265,1176],"class_list":["post-20460","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-book-reviews","category-literature","category-fiction-by-me","category-reviews","category-sff","category-sff-book-reviews","tag-review","tag-reviews","tag-science-fiction","tag-science-fiction-and-fantasy"],"yoast_head":"\n