Does science fiction help kids learn to like science?

[dann]

Please do so! Start another thread about christian serial killers!
There just might be a couple who were inspired by the Bible. I don't know, but let's say that you can find a quotation where somebody in Bible study says something along the lines of:

'We read a lot of the New Testament, a lot of the Old Testament, it's just, to us, it's just like going on a holodeck. We've been training on a holodeck . . . [and] now it's time to stop. The game's over. It's time to put into practice what we've learned. And we do so by killing people.'

In that case you would have discovered somebody who was inspired by the Bible to kill other people (not for the first time, by the way!), and I would use it any day in a situation where a Bible study group claimed that reading the Bible tends to make people very, very nice.

Being an SF fan, you don't take offence at claims that reading SF tends to make people study science. But you are upset by a couple of quotations from SF fans showing (!) that, at least to them, SF is escapism.
You should grow up, GreyICE, and start living in the real world.

 

[technoextreme]

You did notice that! All is not lost!

I was being a sarcastic *** to prove how stupid that statement is. Admittedly though I'd being hanging from the wall like a gecko because their isn't a better wall hanger than the gecko. Get me some genetically modified goats and I'll be well on my to being your friendly neighborhood Spider Man. So that's why I stopped caring. Because you think something is absurd and then you idiotically get proven wrong. Lord knows we are well on our way to breaking the Treaty of Algernon .

Being an SF fan, you don't take offence at claims that reading SF tends to make people study science. But you are upset by a couple of quotations from SF fans showing (!) that, at least to them, SF is escapism.

Because you picked the quotes from a cult. Do you know how idiotic that is?

 

[dann]

Which statement is absurd? This one?

If you’ve read just a little science fiction, you already know that it is full of nonsensical concepts such as telepathy, teleportation etc.

Where is the absurdity in that? It is a fact that's very easy to prove.

 

[technoextreme]

Which statement is absurd? This one?



Where is the absurdity in that? It is a fact that's very easy to prove.

No not really. You moronically fell for my bait though apparently you couldn't bother to read my post. Heh... I knew science had a plausible form of teleportation working.
Beam me up Scotty.
So great. The only thing that really isn't all that plausible with the Enterprise is warp drive. Everything else has analogs to it in real life.

 

[dann]

”moronically”??! You are too full of yourself for your own good, tecnobabble!
You do realize that there’s a very big difference between “Beam me up, Scotty” and “Entangled particles can therefore be used to "teleport" information”, i.e. between teleportation and “teleport” in quotation marks and only of information, don't you?!
Well, I guess that you probably don’t know the difference … which is a little … not moronic, but ignorant.
There is a big difference between science fiction and science. Some people claim that Jules Verne predicted the missions to the moon of the late 1960s in his From the Earth to the Moon, but he used a (albeit fictitious) cannon to shoot his bullet/capsule to the moon, which, of course, would instantly have killed any living organism onboard.
Dreaming of going to the moon and actually doing so are two very different things, but being a resident of dreamland you probably don’t know the difference.

 

[GreyICE]

Huh, and when Campbell published a story about a bomb that used not conventional explosives, but powered by the destruction of the very building blocks of the universe, dreamland?

And Gibson's vision of a worldwide computer network, dreamland?

 

[dann]

This is why discussions with scifi fans are actually worse than discussions with astrologers. They have even more difficulties distinguishing between reality and dreamland.

 

[GreyICE]

This is why discussions with scifi fans are actually worse than discussions with astrologers. They have even more difficulties distinguishing between reality and dreamland.

Um... sure. What?

Care to even clarify how your statement relates to what were obviously predictions of technological developments?

 

[dann]

I met William Gibson once when he was in Copenhagen to promote the Danish translation of one of his books, and I had a problem with the glossary for his short story New Rose Hotel, which I used in my anthology.
He seems to be a nice guy, he is famous for coining he phrase cyberspace, “And they’ve never let me forget it”, he said in Wild Palms (if I remember correctly), but his “consensual hallucination” does not have much in common with the internet as we know it. (And I don't think that it bothers him. He seems to be well aware that he is writing science fiction!) But, of course, scifi fans interpret the relationship between the ‘predictions’ of SF and reality as if they were followers of Nostradamus …
Neal Stephenson’s imaginary metaverse in Snow Crash comes much closer to certain contemporary real-life phenomena, e.g. Second Life.

 

[dann]

Care to even clarify how your statement relates to what were obviously predictions of technological developments?

No, not really.
1) They weren't predictions.
2) They weren't obvious.
3) They were fictitious and not meant to be more than fantasies. This is why it's called science fiction.
Intelligent writers and readers of the genre are aware of the fact that the fictitious science of science fiction is just the "fetish stuff" used to help the readers suspend their disbelief, i.e. they no longer believe in magic, but they believe in science. Only the most pretentious fans are unable to distinguish between reality and the escapist fantasies of the genre.
That you are unable to grasp the concept makes it very boring to discuss anything with you. That you are arrogant and ignorant makes it even worse.

 

[dudalb]

Ted Sturgeon's is the most objective and accurate if you just add "and novels sold and marketed as Science Fiction" to it.

As for the quote from Dann's thesis, a good example of why academic writing is held in so little respect. One would think that people studying literature would have a more graceful style, but English Professors have been responsible for some of the worst prose ever written.
And it reeks of Deconstructionism, the biggest intellectual con of recent years.

 

[dudalb]

There is a big difference between science fiction and science. Some people claim that Jules Verne predicted the missions to the moon of the late 1960s in his From the Earth to the Moon, but he used a (albeit fictitious) cannon to shoot his bullet/capsule to the moon, which, of course, would instantly have killed any living organism onboard.

But Verne correctly predicted the shape a space capsul would have to have, and also predicted that a moon shot would have to be made from a limited choice of latitude and longitude. His choice of Florida was, of course, dead on . And it was not from gueswork, but logic and factual information.
Give the man a little credit.

 

[GreyICE]

No, not really.
1) They weren't predictions.
2) They weren't obvious.
3) They were fictitious and not meant to be more than fantasies. This is why it's called science fiction.
Intelligent writers and readers of the genre are aware of the fact that the fictitious science of science fiction is just the "fetish stuff" used to help the readers suspend their disbelief, i.e. they no longer believe in magic, but they believe in science. Only tthe most pretentious fans are unable to distinguish between reality and the escapist fantasies of the genre.
That you are unable to grasp the concept makes it very boring to discuss anything with you. That you are arrogant and ignorant makes it even worse.

The FBI had no trouble grasping how a short story about a bomb made from shattering atomic nuclei in 1944 might somehow relate to reality. Total fantasy, that.

But sure, keep insulting me. Speaking about boring, your insults pretty much qualify as such. Addressing the argument, not the arguer, might be considered a staple of debate in the real world. Of course then you might associate the fact that everyone is avoiding you in the real world with your style of discourse.

Fortunately, on the internet, italics make you look smart.

 

[uruk]

Easy. When it becomes a study. NEVER before then.

How about these studies on the influence of science fiction on choice of careers?
http://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward.do?AwardNumber=0731819
http://jameswharris.wordpress.com/2007/03/17/science-scientists-and-science-fiction/
http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~turners/research/women.pdf

Observe: Every gay and lesbian person I've talked to is out of the closet. Ergo, there are no gay and lesbians in the closet.

Not quite the same thing. It depends on relation the conclusion has to the statement.

I don't think anyone is saying that all scientist and engineers have been influenced by Sci-Fi Just there is a correlation. So you statement would more accurate to the point if it said "Every gay and lesbian person I've talked to is out of the closet. Ergo there are gays and lesbians who are out of the closet.

The plural of anecdote is not data. I can link to Christian serial killers until we conclude Christianity causes serial murder. Or I can link to atheist suicides until we all agree atheism makes you suicidal. Or we all can avoid anecdotes like they're the black plague.

True, But anecdotes can be the beginning of data when the anecdotes are collected, verifed, and evaluated in context.

 

[uruk]

You are really slow, aren't you?
Let me repeat my question: Where exactly do I insinuate that SF fans are just a few steps away from Heaven's Gate cult members?

Oh, I see! You think that my quotation from the actual Heaven's Gate cult members insinuates that, don't you? (I think that you should look up the word insinuate too!)
Being a scifi fan ("apparently we're (!) learning to kill ourselves") you appear to become paranoid when somebody brings up proof that science fiction does not necessarily inspire people to become engineers (the myth), but sometimes instead turns them on to self-mutilation, suicide or mass murder.

And the bible sometimes inspires people to turn to to self-mutilation, suicide or mass murder.

It's not the genera it's the person.

The literature does not inspire them, they find the inspiration in the literature.

 

[Lithrael]

You are really slow, aren't you?

You are really a dick, aren't you?

Being a scifi fan (...) you appear to become paranoid when somebody brings up proof that science fiction does not necessarily inspire people to become engineers (the myth), but sometimes instead turns them on to self-mutilation, suicide or mass murder.

Look, it's just a general group-insult thing. If I was talking about how great clowns are and all you wanted to do was talk about John Wayne Gacy I'd be pissed in exactly the same way. You have some points but yeah, bringing up all the sad folks in fandom is just going to make half of everyone *else* in fandom feel defensive. How would it not?

 

[uruk]

D'oh!!!!!!

 

[GreyICE]

How about these studies on the influence of science fiction on choice of careers?
http://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward.do?AwardNumber=0731819
http://jameswharris.wordpress.com/2007/03/17/science-scientists-and-science-fiction/
http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~turners/research/women.pdf

The second is a blog, the third is a few anecdotes as part of a larger study that doesn't even really touch on the influence, and the first is a proposed study (As in, hasn't been conducted yet).

Sorry, I'd love to believe its true (and honestly, if you were to ask me to gamble, I would gamble that it is true), but if I don't maintain a consistent standard of evidence, I'm just as bad as any other woo monger who doesn't need studies to show them that homeopathy or prayer or astrology work. I can't pick and choose which ideas I will believe because of anecdotes and which anecdotes I will discard because they don't fit my prejudice.

Not quite the same thing. It depends on relation the conclusion has to the statement.

I don't think anyone is saying that all scientist and engineers have been influenced by Sci-Fi Just there is a correlation. So you statement would more accurate to the point if it said "Every gay and lesbian person I've talked to is out of the closet. Ergo there are gays and lesbians who are out of the closet.

Are there scientists and engineers who have been inspired by science fiction to go into their field? Perhaps. We tend to romanticize our motivations, so the concept that inspiring stories inspired us to go into a field is exactly the sort of historical revisionism we'd mentally love to engage in.

As I said, I have nothing against the idea, but I will always maintain a consistent standard of evidence, and I have never seen good evidence for that idea. Some day it might exist, at which point well and good, and unlike a certain poster here, I definitely don't think Science Fiction is a bad thing, so I see no harm, and certainly interesting discussions might arise. So encouraging people to read it might lead to interesting thoughts and discussions (always worthwhile), might lead to more reading (certainly not a bad thing), but I won't ascribe life-changing choices to it.

True, But anecdotes can be the beginning of data when the anecdotes are collected, verifed, and evaluated in context.

Anecdotes certainly can lead to people conducting studies, but they are never a substitute for said studies. They are the occasional inspiration for data collection, never the beginning of it.

 

[uruk]

So great. The only thing that really isn't all that plausible with the Enterprise is warp drive. Everything else has analogs to it in real life.

*cough* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive *cough*
*Haaaackkkkk* http://members.shaw.ca/mike.anderton/WarpDrive.pdf *wheeze*

 

[uruk]

The second is a blog, the third is a few anecdotes as part of a larger study that doesn't even really touch on the influence, and the first is a proposed study (As in, hasn't been conducted yet).

Actually the study concluded or expired in July so it should be or is already available.
The second is an essay with anecdotes. The third was a report which stated that there were women who were inspired to thier career by scienfiction.

Sorry, I'd love to believe its true (and honestly, if you were to ask me to gamble, I would gamble that it is true), but if I don't maintain a consistent standard of evidence, I'm just as bad as any other woo monger who doesn't need studies to show them that homeopathy or prayer or astrology work. I can't pick and choose which ideas I will believe because of anecdotes and which anecdotes I will discard because they don't fit my prejudice.

Realize that a study of this nature necessarily has to build its statistics on anecdotes, or specifically, personal anecdotes. When a scientists or engineer goes on record to say that he was influence by science fiction in the direction of his choice of career, that is a data point in such a study. How else would you gather that kind of data?

Are there scientists and engineers who have been inspired by science fiction to go into their field? Perhaps. We tend to romanticize our motivations, so the concept that inspiring stories inspired us to go into a field is exactly the sort of historical revisionism we'd mentally love to engage in.

There are scientists and engineers who have gone on record to say so.
Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, Herman Oberth, Robert Goddard, and Werner Von Braun have stated in biographies and interviews to have been inspired by Jules Verne.
http://www.meaus.com/spacePioneer.html
http://inventors.about.com/od/bstartinventors/a/Von_Braun.htm
http://www.amazon.com/Robert-Goddard-Unlocking-Secrets-Science/dp/1584151072

And Scientists have even become science fiction writers. i.e. Isaac Asimov and Author C. Clark.

As I said, I have nothing against the idea, but I will always maintain a consistent standard of evidence, and I have never seen good evidence for that idea. Some day it might exist, at which point well and good, and unlike a certain poster here, I definitely don't think Science Fiction is a bad thing, so I see no harm, and certainly interesting discussions might arise. So encouraging people to read it might lead to interesting thoughts and discussions (always worthwhile), might lead to more reading (certainly not a bad thing), but I won't ascribe life-changing choices to it.

Well that report in the first link is defintely a study concerning the link between science fiction and directions in careers.

Anecdotes certainly can lead to people conducting studies, but they are never a substitute for said studies. They are the occasional inspiration for data collection, never the beginning of it.

As mentioned before a study of this nature would necessarily rely on personal anecdotes from scientists who would relate thier experiances concerning science fiction and thier choices of careers.