There Can Be Only One - SciFi or Fantasy

[Pariah]

10 hours ago, Pariah said:

My third period underachievers routinely turn in science fiction that clearly demonstrates how little they know.

 

6 hours ago, Bazza said:

They should switch majors to English. 

 

Or political 'science'.

[Bazza]

Political science is an actual discipline. 

[Bazza]

2 hours ago, Starlord said:

 

Isn't fake false science just...science?  ?

 

Depends on if it is for you or against you. 

[Starlord]

6 minutes ago, Bazza said:

Political science is an actual discipline. 

 

Except scientists deal in facts and politicians, y'know, don't.

[Bazza]

1 hour ago, Pariah said:

 

Now we're talking about anti-vaxxers and homeopathic medicine.

 

With the first one there are two seperate issues:

- trust in vaccine science.

- trust in Big Pharma. 

 

You can have number one but not number two.

 

Eg: The initial trial of Salk's Polio vaccine that was distributed across America was doctored by the authorities. Meaning: Salk's vaccine was changed. Now this didn't affect the trial but went Salk found out he was outraged. And to point out, Salk's science was solid; we have nearly wiped polio from Earth because of him. He is a legend. 

[Bazza]

18 minutes ago, Starlord said:

 

Except scientists deal in facts and politicians, y'know, don't.

 

Political scientists don't have to be, and probably aren't politicians.  

 

You are probably thinking about political philosophy. Not that politicians use this either. 

[Starlord]

2 hours ago, Pariah said:

 

Wait, what?

 

Pseudo- and fiction = double negative

[Pariah]

What were we talking about, again? I forgot.

[Cancer]

Fictions.  Science fictions, like Lysenkoist evolution, fantasy, like faster than light travel, and dark fantasy, like trickle-down economics.

[RDU Neil]

I dunno... Lysenkoism is pretty damn dark.

Seriously, it would be exactly the kind of thing I'd expect to hear from a specially appointed Trumpist, especially in a second term.

[Doc Democracy]

I prefer reading sci-fi, prefer playing fantasy...

 

Too hard.  But I read more than I play...

[death tribble]

Technically Highlander is Scifi and Fantasy so you can have both.

[Cassandra]

Scifi takes place in the "real" world, even its the future or an alternate reality.  Fantasy takes place in another reality entirely.

[Doc Democracy]

I think the problem is in coming up with a decent hard distinction between "alternate reality" and "another reality entirely".   :-)

 

Most often these things are very much, I know it when I see it.  Each has a spectrum of stories and they do overlap (IMO).  I prefer both my science fiction and fantasy stories to be on the harder end of the spectrum, though I am a sucker for a fairy tale (superheroes! :-) )

 

Doc

[RDU Neil]

It is an interesting question... "When does sci-fi become fantasy?"  If science fiction is usually based on "take a sound, scientific concept and extrapolate What if?"... at what point does "What If?" become so ridiculous as to become fantasy?

 

Take the X-Men. The idea of genetic mutation is a clearly established scientific fact. The idea that mutations could provide a "beneficial advantage" has pretty much been established as a part of accepted evolutionary theory, etc. In that mode, the "What if?" mutations created people with super-powers?" question is science fiction.

Except that most folks of any real knowledge would understand that "beneficial advantage" is really more like "slightly more likely to regurgitate toxins faster" and not "LASER EYES!" and that going "too far" turns s-f into fantasy.

 

But that line of "too far" is what is hard to define. A fourteen year old with passing science knowledge might feel X-Men is s-f, but seven years later, graduating with a degree in molecular biology, they don't think that any more. Sci-fi tends to deal with "what could be" if even not especially probable... and it is this acceptance of what might be "probable" that is pretty personal... based on a person's own experience and knowledge of the subject.

 

Alternate Earth's is another good one. (Anyone watching the brilliant new show "Counterpart" on Starz? JK Simmons in an excellent political action thriller between two versions of Earth) in that the Many Worlds theory is pretty well accepted, but it also pretty much defines the fact that those many worlds can not interact. So is a show like Counterpart fantasy, by asking "What if?" they did interact?  To me it is science fiction, but I'm sure some hard core physicist would disagree.

[Cancer]

Originally, hard sci-fi involved minimal invocation of unknown physics, except for exploring one particular speculative case.  Hal Clement's Mission of Gravity (originally published 1953 or 1954) may be the best example.  Clement did not even speculate about beamed energy weapons (the armored tank the human rode in on the surface of Mesklin was armed with a slugthrower); lasers had not yet been invented at the time the story was written, and Clement wanted to explore other issues.  That story was definitely set in something that might possibly be our Universe, using physics as we knew it then, completely passing over how interstellar travel worked and just positing that humans had arrived at the 61 Cygni system and found a high-mass rapidly-rotating planet, with a vaguely vermiform intelligent race.  Other old-time sci-fi titans, Asimov, Clarke, and Heinlein, tended towards the hard end (though they were not as determinedly wedded to keeping to known physics as Clement), and their fiction was intended to be glimpses of possible futures of the universe we live in.

 

Hard sci-fi was never really that commonly written (it takes a dedication to real physics, and an understanding of how that works, to write it well).  Robert L Forward's Dragon's Egg is just as hard as Clement's stuff was, albeit 40 years later with much lots of very new physics, but that fiction also is intended to be a plausible future of the one we live in.

 

Alternate-universe stories by the definitions I'm used to are really fantasy, but the line gets blurry in a hurry if the alternate world has, as far as the reader can tell, the same physics as ours, aside from a small number of speculative alterations which are part of the basis for the story.

[RDU Neil]

16 minutes ago, Cancer said:

Originally, hard sci-fi involved minimal invocation of unknown physics, except for exploring one particular speculative case.  Hal Clement's Mission of Gravity (originally published 1953 or 1954) may be the best example.  Clement did not even speculate about beamed energy weapons (the armored tank the human rode in on the surface of Mesklin was armed with a slugthrower); lasers had not yet been invented at the time the story was written, and Clement wanted to explore other issues.  That story was definitely set in something that might possibly be our Universe, using physics as we knew it then, completely passing over how interstellar travel worked and just positing that humans had arrived at the 61 Cygni system and found a high-mass rapidly-rotating planet, with a vaguely vermiform intelligent race.  Other old-time sci-fi titans, Asimov, Clarke, and Heinlein, tended towards the hard end (though they were not as determinedly wedded to keeping to known physics as Clement), and their fiction was intended to be glimpses of possible futures of the universe we live in.

 

Hard sci-fi was never really that commonly written (it takes a dedication to real physics, and an understanding of how that works, to write it well).  Robert L Forward's Dragon's Egg is just as hard as Clement's stuff was, albeit 40 years later with much lots of very new physics, but that fiction also is intended to be a plausible future of the one we live in.

 

Alternate-universe stories by the definitions I'm used to are really fantasy, but the line gets blurry in a hurry if the alternate world has, as far as the reader can tell, the same physics as ours, aside from a small number of speculative alterations which are part of the basis for the story.

 

Would like to know what your take on authors like Peter Hamilton and Stephen Baxter are, as I feel they start (especially Baxter) in the hard realm, but then really push the "What if?" aspects. One of my top 10 favorite authors, C.J. Cherryh, eschews delving into the exact physics of some of her science, but keeps it well grounded in what it would be like to actually live on a space station, experience high-g burn maneuvers in extremely hazardous space travel, etc. She crosses the line from hard SF with her myriad of fascinating alien species, but grounds the stories in very realistic day-to-day life and socio-political events, etc. based her knowledge of linguistics, archeology, sociology, etc. Love her stuff, but could understand why someone would say it isn't HARD science fiction, but I'd still definitely call it science fiction, not fantasy.

 

And your thoughts on Kim Stanley Robinson? Especially his Mars trilogy?

[Cancer]

I can't answer what you ask, as I more or less stopped reading new sci-fi around the time when my kids were born (mid-1990s).  Sad but true, and I haven't picked it up again.  I haven't read much new fantasy since then either, except for the "young adult" stuff my wife pushed toward them: authors like Mercedes Lackey, Tamora Pierce, the inevitable J K Rowling Harry Potter stuff (though I think I only read the first and last books front-to-back), a couple of other things I can't dredge out now.  Kids kind of diminish your reading time, and my discretionary reading got narrowed to nonfiction.

[Matt the Bruins]

The pinnacles of Fantasy stories (Tolkein, Lewis, LeGuin, Bellairs, Howard, Beagle, Gaiman, and I'd include L'Engle) are nearer and dearer to my heart than those of Sc-fi. That said, the quality curve drops very quickly in Fantasy, more than half of which seems to be formulaic Lord of the Rings rip-offs. I've found a lot more not-brilliant Sci-fi that's at least an enjoyable read. So I'd give Science Fiction the better average even if the icons of Fantasy reach greater heights.

[RDU Neil]

1 hour ago, Matt the Bruins said:

The pinnacles of Fantasy stories (Tolkein, Lewis, LeGuin, Bellairs, Howard, Beagle, Gaiman, and I'd include L'Engle) are nearer and dearer to my heart than those of Sc-fi. That said, the quality curve drops very quickly in Fantasy, more than half of which seems to be formulaic Lord of the Rings rip-offs. I've found a lot more not-brilliant Sci-fi that's at least an enjoyable read. So I'd give Science Fiction the better average even if the icons of Fantasy reach greater heights.

 

I'm assuming you mean... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bellairs

 

I'd honestly never heard of him. The rest, of course, but he was brand new to me. Interesting stuff.

[Starlord]

Robert E. Howard, who did modern fantasy pretty much before everyone, is the best ever IMO.

[zslane]

I'm still burned out on your standard swords and sorcery, "medieval" fantasy genre, particularly when it comes to gaming. I prefer science fiction (i.e., science and technology instead of spellcasting and magic items).

[Matt the Bruins]

On 3/1/2018 at 2:44 PM, RDU Neil said:

I'm assuming you mean... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bellairs

 

I'd honestly never heard of him. The rest, of course, but he was brand new to me. Interesting stuff.

 

His novel The Face in the Frost is an immensely enjoyable read. It strongly reminds me of Neil Gaiman's more whimsical work (or I suppose I should say Gaiman reminds me of Bellairs), with a darker core hiding underneath the fairytale trappings.