Why do so many skeptics like science fiction and fantasy?

[Paulhoff]

Contrary to popular belief, we is human.

Paul

 

[R.A.F.]

I would say skeptics like science. I think that we know science fiction and fantasy is just that, fiction and fantasy.

Exactly. For whatever reason, once a person becomes interested in science and how it "works", it's only natural for that person to become skeptical of things not evidenced.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Here's one (related to science fiction, no less):

Let's take those things as true.

1. Satan made those myth's to make jesus look less special, thus;
2. Satan can travel in time.
3. God didn't go back in time, because they don't say he did, thus;
Satan is more powerful than God, because he can go back and change things.

No wonder God needs all those humans to fight Satan; He can't handle it on his own.

Well, I'm probably just derailing the thread, but that's not necessarily a time travel scenario. Or, well, not how modern apologists understand it. Because, BTW, afaik "Satan did it" is still pretty much the #1 explanation. It's not a one-off thing thing that got buried with Justin Martyr.

The dominant version is more like Satan read the Bible, figured out what exactly God prophecised there since the beginning of time, then went and pre-emptively made a lot of gods and sons of gods that use the same hero tropes You know, so when Jesus comes, people would be more like, "pfft, we already have a bunch of those."

Of course, considering that actually there are no actual prophecies of Jesus there, it's just a bunch of phrases pulled out of context that wouldn't even start to be interpreted that way until LONG after "Satan" sired Hercules and Theseus and the whole gang of demi-gods... yeah, he'd need a time machine either way. Either to go back and sire those after people started doing that particular cherry-picking, or somehow go into the future and see exactly what will those guys come up with

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

This is also something that bugs me in science fiction (there's the relation). If you can go back in time to change things, and paradoxes don't exist (as is the case in many soft science fiction stories), then why (other than "the writer thought it would be a bad idea") don't they just do whatever?

Well, most science fiction doesn't take things to their logical conclusion, or needs convoluted setups that prevent using their futuristic gizmo to its logical application.

E.g., once you have a teleporter, effectively you don't have danger any more. You can't have the crew race to their shuttle from the Big Bad, when they can be beamed up from anywhere. Most of Star Trek had to invent convoluted scenarios for why this time the transporter doesn't work... AGAIN. Effectively it becomes the piece of equipment that malfunctions the most, is the easiest jammed or disabled, and has the most restrictions ever.

E.g., once you can do even impulse 9 (never mind warp speeds), any old cargo ship becomes a weapon of mass destruction. Why bother slugging it in orbit or building a massive cosmic death-ray like in the NX-1 series, when you can just bring an old cargo ship, fire up the thrusters on max impulse and smash into whatever city you wish to destroy (likely together with the rest of the state, and probably causing a complete extinction)?

And so it is with time travel too. Honestly, once you have time travel, almost every plot can be solved in 5 minutes. E.g., if you can go back in time to save the whales, you can go back in time to tell the federation how to build the latest trans-phasic torpedoes before they first tussle with the klingons.

You effectively have to invent some reason why nobody uses it that way -- or some kind of idiot plot where nobody out of billions of people even considers the obvious -- or you wouldn't have much of a story left to write.

 

[Bram Kaandorp]

Well, most science fiction doesn't take things to their logical conclusion, or needs convoluted setups that prevent using their futuristic gizmo to its logical application.

E.g., once you have a teleporter, effectively you don't have danger any more. You can't have the crew race to their shuttle from the Big Bad, when they can be beamed up from anywhere. Most of Star Trek had to invent convoluted scenarios for why this time the transporter doesn't work... AGAIN. Effectively it becomes the piece of equipment that malfunctions the most, is the easiest jammed or disabled, and has the most restrictions ever.

E.g., once you can do even impulse 9 (never mind warp speeds), any old cargo ship becomes a weapon of mass destruction. Why bother slugging it in orbit or building a massive cosmic death-ray like in the NX-1 series, when you can just bring an old cargo ship, fire up the thrusters on max impulse and smash into whatever city you wish to destroy (likely together with the rest of the state, and probably causing a complete extinction)?

And so it is with time travel too. Honestly, once you have time travel, almost every plot can be solved in 5 minutes. E.g., if you can go back in time to save the whales, you can go back in time to tell the federation how to build the latest trans-phasic torpedoes before they first tussle with the klingons.

You effectively have to invent some reason why nobody uses it that way -- or some kind of idiot plot where nobody out of billions of people even considers the obvious -- or you wouldn't have much of a story left to write.

That's exactly the conclusion I came to. It's too simple to think of a be-all end-all piece of technology and use it in its most extreme way (or even its most simple way in the case of time travel) without ending the story before it started.

[/derail]

 

[Noztradamus]

.

Well, most science fiction doesn't take things to their logical conclusion, or needs convoluted setups that prevent using their futuristic gizmo to its logical application.

~~~
. Most of Star Trek had to invent convoluted scenarios for why this time the transporter doesn't work... AGAIN. Effectively it becomes the piece of equipment that malfunctions the most, is the easiest jammed or disabled, and has the most restrictions ever.
~~~

No that was the holodeck. The transporter was at least a highly efficient form of transport, with a few glitches

But if the transporter was the automobile, the holodeck was an amusement park ride.
"Yes there have been a few incidents in our House Corridor of Whirling Knives, but people need to be entertained"

That the holodeck had not been instantly and totally banned in the controlled caring nerfworld society of the Federation was the most ludicrious anomoly.

“If government's purpose isn't to improve the health and longevity of its citizens, I don't know what its purpose is,” Mayor Blueburgh.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Well, ok, the holodeck is its own can of worms. I was picking on the transporter because its very existence as a vehicle could screw up a lot of plots, whereas you couldn't use the holodeck to prevent war with the Romulans. But yeah, the holodeck is its own can of worms.

That said, I'm not really sure if the holodeck wins the malfunction count. It doesn't even appear in the ST series until TNG, and beginning to spectacularly act above and beyond just a happy fun game is even later. By comparison, the transporter was getting jammed, disabled, or ran into some illogical limitation since the TOS, and thus was raking up points on its score card before the holodeck was even in the race.

Granted, though, I didn't exactly keep the score, so that's just a gut feeling. I could be wrong.

 

[xtifr]

Of course, some people who like "real" science fiction don't include Star Trek in that category. Yes, there's a bit of No True Scotsman there, but at the same time, complaining that science fiction is limited because Hollywood isn't very rigorous is a bit disingenuous as well.

We'd do well to remember Sturgeon's Law^WP.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

It's an example because it's well known. But paperback SF has the same limitations and tropes, ultimately, as they'd stop having much of a plot too if someone could just go back in time and shoot the Big Bad when he's still in kindergarten and that were the only effect. Plus, it's not exactly written by people with a Ph.D. in physics either.

 

[MG1962]

It's an example because it's well known. But paperback SF has the same limitations and tropes, ultimately, as they'd stop having much of a plot too if someone could just go back in time and shoot the Big Bad when he's still in kindergarten and that were the only effect. Plus, it's not exactly written by people with a Ph.D. in physics either.

Are you talking about written science fiction or something else?

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Yes?

 

[Bram Kaandorp]

Of course, some people who like "real" science fiction don't include Star Trek in that category. Yes, there's a bit of No True Scotsman there, but at the same time, complaining that science fiction is limited because Hollywood isn't very rigorous is a bit disingenuous as well.

We'd do well to remember Sturgeon's Law^WP.

Even Asimov didn't take many of his ideas to their logical conclusion, so it's not just Hollywood which I'm dissatisfied.

 

[arthwollipot]

E.g., once you can do even impulse 9 (never mind warp speeds), any old cargo ship becomes a weapon of mass destruction. Why bother slugging it in orbit or building a massive cosmic death-ray like in the NX-1 series, when you can just bring an old cargo ship, fire up the thrusters on max impulse and smash into whatever city you wish to destroy (likely together with the rest of the state, and probably causing a complete extinction)?

Babylon 5 handled the use of mass-impact weapons quite well. Basically, their use as weapons of mass destruction was about the most horrifying thing that any sentient race can do to any other. Well, until the Shadows and the Vorlons came along, that is. Using mass-impact weapons not only utterly destroys your enemy, it also shows everyone else that not only are you bad enough to actually use these shocking weapons, anyone who gainsays you is likely to be subjected to an orbital bombardment themselves.

 

[MG1962]

Yes?

I think you will there are more than a few authors with degrees in the hard sciences, at least enough to build a reasonable library have degrees, if that was a criteria to use

Asimov had a Masters in Chemistry and a Phd in Bio-Chemistry. Stephen Baxter is also a double in engineering and maths. Greg Egan also has one in maths. David Brin, Sir Fred Hoyle and Carl Sagan all held degrees in astronomy. Neil Stephenson has a minor in physics.

Between the authors of that incomplete list you would approaching a couple of hundred books as a starting point.

 

[MG1962]

Babylon 5 handled the use of mass-impact weapons quite well. Basically, their use as weapons of mass destruction was about the most horrifying thing that any sentient race can do to any other. Well, until the Shadows and the Vorlons came along, that is. Using mass-impact weapons not only utterly destroys your enemy, it also shows everyone else that not only are you bad enough to actually use these shocking weapons, anyone who gainsays you is likely to be subjected to an orbital bombardment themselves.

Whats the old military axiom, don't deploy a weapon you yourself have no defense against

 

[Bram Kaandorp]

Whats the old military axiom, don't deploy a weapon you yourself have no defense against

Unless of course if the weapon can annihilate your enemy before they can defend themselves. Then defence on your own side is not important any more.

 

[xtifr]

Even Asimov didn't take many of his ideas to their logical conclusion, so it's not just Hollywood which I'm dissatisfied.

You say "even Asimov" as if you think he's some sort of exemplar of hard SF? He was a biochemist who openly admitted that his inability to master calculus prevented him from going into a harder science, and he may have been a great of the pulp era, but standards (both literary and scientific) are a lot higher now.

(I should probably take a moment to mention at this point that I'm not one of the people who insist on extreme "hardness" in my SF. I like stuff that makes me go "hmm, interesting", but I don't insist on complete rigor in every aspect. In fact, I like Star Trek. But it's still a lousy example of the genre as a whole.)

As long as we're talking pulp-era hacks, though, I should point out that legendary editor John W. Campbell once said that the point of a science fiction story should be to explore one idea, and if you lose focus by exploring too many minor side-ideas in too much depth, the likely result is a story that doesn't hang together as well or hold the reader.

Complaining that even something as haphazardly scientific as Star Trek doesn't explore every possible aspect of every technology that appears on the show makes about as much sense to me as complaining that The Godfather doesn't explore every possible aspect of Italian-American life.

 

[Dinwar]

This issue was adequately addressed prior to science fiction even being a thing.

As long as we're talking pulp-era hacks, though, I should point out that legendary editor John W. Campbell once said that the point of a science fiction story should be to explore one idea,

Oddly enough, Ayn Rand said something similar: a novel is an integration of numerous aspects, and that integration is the theme. So if your theme is "The impacts of interstellar travel on humanity" and you either don't address that issue, or get lost in, say, local politics, you've failed. It doesn't matter how good your science is.

And I think that's an important point: science fiction is a setting, not a plot. ANY plot can be sci-fi. And for me, if the plot requires that scientific inaccuracies be included, I'm okay with that. I'd prefer they not be too egregious, and if they're in paleontology, evolution, or geology they're going to stick out pretty clearly to me (though I may still be able to enjoy the story), but it's a minor annoyance. Whether or not I like the theme, the characters, and the story is more important.

The X-wing series is not fine literature. It's pulp trash--brain candy. The authors knew that, though, and embraced the fact, so the story is actually pretty good. It's the interactions among the squadron (well, actually only ever among 3 or 4 main members of it) that are important, not the heavy physics of hyperspace travel or inter-species procreation.

 

[Bram Kaandorp]

@xtifr and Dinwar: I couldn't agree more. If A series like BSG (the remake) had used actual physics, the series would have lasted thousands of years, or the universe it plays in would have collapsed in on itself.

This is also why I think so many "epic fantasy" series fail, since they try to portray a comprehensive world with everything and the kitchen sink, but the story gets sidelined by readers in order to be able to fully understand the world.

It's also why the book "Foundation and Earth" by Asimov was good as a stand-alone, but not as a sequel to the Foundation series. It isn't related to psychohistory nearly as much as I'd wanted it to be.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

I think you will there are more than a few authors with degrees in the hard sciences, at least enough to build a reasonable library have degrees, if that was a criteria to use

Asimov had a Masters in Chemistry and a Phd in Bio-Chemistry. Stephen Baxter is also a double in engineering and maths. Greg Egan also has one in maths. David Brin, Sir Fred Hoyle and Carl Sagan all held degrees in astronomy. Neil Stephenson has a minor in physics.

Between the authors of that incomplete list you would approaching a couple of hundred books as a starting point.

I'll point you out at the concept of irrelevant authority. Having a degree on domain X doesn't mean one is even equipped to see the implications on domain Y, much less to do the relevant maths and come to the correct conclusion.

For example, Asimov's degree in chemistry is fully irrelevant to problems of physics in his settings. Not to mention stuff where a basic understanding of chaotic systems would have nixed the whole premise in the bud. E.g., the Foundation novels. Of course, he gets the excuse that such knowledge wasn't particularly scientific or widely available in 1942, but there we go, his degree in chemistry is fully irrelevant there anyway.

ETA: but if it makes you happier, I'm willing to amend my original statement to "MOST of SF isn't exactly written by people with a Ph.D. in physics."