I just finished rereading Isaac Asimov's Foundation series for the first time in years, and was completely blown away by the philosophical depth behind it. There was complicated meditation on the progress of history, implied criticism of modern academia, and even some subtle, typically Asimovian rebellion against fate and predestination. I didn't see any of this when I first got the series and apparently had the critical reading ability of slug. All I remembered was the endings to all of the stories, because I was apparently an little asshole who wanted to ruin good literature for my future self. (This is also why I will never let my kids read Great Illustrated Classics. I remember about Tale of Two Cities two-thirds of the way through, and completely spoiled Dracula for myself.)
For those of you who are unfamiliar with it, the series revolves around the Foundation, a planet of the Galaxy's best and brightest created by mathemetician Hari Seldon to advance his meticulously calculated plan for the future of the galaxy. Seldon developed the science of psychohistory, through which the course of history can be predicted by simulating the reactions of vast groups of people, much like the average behavior of large volumes of gases can be predicted, though single molecules move at random. The stories are brief snapshots of different stages in the course of the thousand year long plan, and the ebb and flow of history is ultimately more important than any individual plot.
This idea latched onto me almost immediately, because I have long been preoccupied with the idea of building a fantasy world by a similar historically process: by starting with certain initial groups and allowing them to grow and interact as organically and free from artificial stimulation as possible. Asimov's description of Seldon's Plan used almost identical ideas, but for science-fiction, not fantasy. Those really got me thinking about the two genres, how they are closer than we usually think of them, and how the border lines between them can be as unclear as the difference between an extremely devoted secret admirer and a sex offender.
An obvious attempt to find the difference figures that it is primarily atmospheric. SF hides its nonsense under the guise of technology, while fantasy buries itself in the cloak of magic. Essentially, this view figures that a Vulcan is just an elf from space. It's a very popular way of looking at it, because it makes sense ("It is called Science-Fiction, ain't it?") and lends itself to easy classification ("Oh, look a wizard. This must be fantasy.") The trouble is that there are works that bridge the gap between the two, and don't fit firmly into one or the other. My favorite example is Star Wars. It has to be SF, right? It has robots, and lasers, and galaxies and stuff. It seems very clear cut, until you realize that there is practically no actual science in it. The parsec is a unit of distance, not time, for instance, so before many embarassed readers dove in with some creative retconning, legendary starship pilot Han Solo didn't even understand the rudiments of interstellar measurement. Similarly, you don't need a midichlorian count higher than master Yoda's to realize that the Force is a magic system with no scientific justification. In my book, Star Wars, at least the original trilogy, is clearly a fantasy set in a society with futuristic technology.
If we have booted Star Wars from the SF crowd because it doesn't talk about it's science, (You don't have to. You are welcome to disagree with me. Let's talk about it.) we arrive at a somewhat clearer distinction between the two genres. Our last definition only looked at the skins of the genres; we need to dig deeper. A couple of robots is not enough to justify a claim to Science Fiction; there are enough Golems, and Colossi, and even Warforged floating around the fantasy universe to prove that wrong. When you give those robots positronic brains, however, you clearly separate him from any counterparts animated by the word of a deity or the mental power of a mighty sorcerer. The difference between fantasy and SF lies not in the props the authors use, but in the reasoning behind those props and set pieces. Science-Fiction writers tend to build their worlds with empirical reasoning and scientific processes, while fantasy authors prefer more subtle, imaginative logic.
Now that we have that dichotomy set up, it is tempting to derive from this basic difference more observations and generalizations about the genres. Clearly, Science-Fiction has to abide by the laws of nature, and it is just shiny, metallic fantasy. Any author who tries to break the cosmic speed limit, whether with a Gravitic Hyperspace Engine, an advanced Warp Drive, or a Flux Capacitor deserves a fine and the suspension of his Science license. Any super advanced invention that cannot be explained to your average nerdy teenager is clearly just gobbledygook. That seems obvious, but many of the greatest science fiction writers of all time have begged to differ. Arthur C. Clarke, sick of second-rate hacks who thought that every teleporter and ray gun had to be explained in pseudo-physics, put forth as a countermeasure his famous Third Law: Any Sufficiently Advanced Technology is Indistinguishable from Magic. Basically, we don't understand the universe, so we are probably wrong about just about everything. Since trying to explain impossible things with our limited vocabulary is like trying to take a hike in the fourth dimension ("No, anytime you take a hike you are hiking through the fourth dimension, cuz it's time. Dur hur hur." Not necessarily), just let it go. This apology isn't the deviation from scientific logic it looks like. The man who constantly explains why the Muppet Show slash fiction he reads is not porn still has porn on the brain.
Holy shit, have I been rambling for too long. I learned long ago that when I start talking about Muppet porn someone needs to shut me up. Just stay with me a little longer, I swear I will wrap it up any minute now. I've just been talking more about science fiction than fantasy, and I need to give a shout-out to the genre I actually prefer. With all this talk of Science-Fiction strictly sticking to scientific logic, it might seem like Fantasy is full of nonsense and pixie dust, like sci-fi without the intellectual rigor to play by the rules. That's not the case. Fantasy is the rebel, the genre that breaks out of the rules others set for it. The history of Middle-Earth isn't written with comprehensive sociological factors in mind, but the mythic resonance throughout makes as much as sense as Heinlein's Future History. Of course, not every rebellion succeeds, and the lack of discipline inherent to fantasy can be its downfall. The freedom to create anything the author wants is a powerful invitation towards Mary-Sueism, and a lack of creativity can lead to disaster, as anyone who has ever seriously thought about Eragon or Twilight can certainly attest.
Anyway, I hope you thought that was mildly interesting and not just stupidly obvious. Join me next time for the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin and a threnody for the Renaissance Man.
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Interestingly, a lot of the American Old Guard of science fiction in the 70's--people like Leinster, Asimov, Brackett, and others who basically created the genre in the 20's, 30's, and 40's in the pulps--thought Star Wars was a great example of science fiction.
ReplyDeleteAnd I am sick and tired of the claim that science fiction should be limited to so-called hard sf. In my opinion, the quality of both the genre and real science has gone down since the Great Hangover--the disillusionment after the 60's and Nixon and lasting until the internet.
If we limit ourselves to what we know is possible we'll never get beyond it.
Really? I read a book by Asimov in which he made a clear distinction between "SF" - the sort of science fiction based scientific reasoning - and "Sci-Fi" - which is the sort of rayguns-and-robots stuff that sells movie tickets. I pretty clearly recall Star Wars being under Sci-fi, albeit an example that is still quality literature.
ReplyDeleteAnd I don't think science fiction should only include science we can justify using physics we understand to be possible, as I take it you mean by hard sf. I just think that anything that assumes strange and fanciful technology that seems blatantly impossible for the sake of plot points, and doesn't spend some time considering the scientific, social, and cultural ramifications of it isn't really science-fiction as I consider it. It might be worth writing, and could be damn good fiction, but I don't think it is sci-fi.
Of course, everything I write here is clearly just me talking out of my ass about something. And I also think genre definitions are a load of shit anyway. Great works of literature aren't built around the structure of a genre; the genres are developed to help classify the works, and good fiction is usually too unique to be well classified. But if we must classify, I like to think the differences should be based less on the external milieu of the work as on its internal logic.