Science Fiction

Science fiction (often called sci-fi or SF) is a popular genre of fiction in which the narrative world differs from our own present or historical reality in at least one significant way. more...

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This difference may be technological, physical, historical, sociological, philosophical, metaphysical, etc, but not magical (see Fantasy). Exploring the consequences of such differences (asking "What if...?") is the traditional purpose of science fiction, but there are also many science-fiction works in which an exotically alien setting is superimposed upon what would not otherwise be a science-fiction tale.

Definition

Science fiction includes such a wide range of themes and subgenres that it can be difficult to define. Author and editor Damon Knight has summed up the difficulty of defining science fiction by stating that "Science fiction is what we point to when we say it". Similarly, critic Bonnie Kunzel: "Science fiction has been called the books that science fiction writers write! In other words, it can be about anything in or out of this world."

Vladimir Nabokov argues that if we were rigorous with our definitions, Shakespeare's play The Tempest would have to be termed science fiction.

According to science-fiction writer Robert A. Heinlein, "a handy short definition of almost all science fiction might read: realistic speculation about possible future events, based solidly on adequate knowledge of the real world, past and present, and on a thorough understanding of the nature and significance of the scientific method." Heinlein immediately adds that if you "strike out the word 'future' it can apply to all and not just almost all SF."

Science-fiction author Theodore Sturgeon wrote that "a good science-fiction story is a story about human beings, with a human problem, and a human solution, that would not have happened at all without its science content." Frank Herbert has stated that "...science fiction does help, and it points in very interesting...relativistic directions...that we have the imagination for these other opportunities, these other choices." Herbert pointed out that while "Humans tend not to see over a long range. Now we are required, in these generations, to have a longer range view of what we inflict on the world around us."

Science fiction and other genres

Science fiction and fantasy

A science-fiction story may be firmly rooted in real scientific possibilities (see Hard science fiction) as they are understood at the time of writing, as in Arthur C. Clarke's novel A Fall of Moondust, or highly imaginative, set in an extraterrestrial civilization or a parallel universe, as in Isaac Asimov's novel The Gods Themselves.

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