I never really thought this show would have any real science of anything. Then agian, I find science boring usually which is why the sci-fi I like is usually light on the science.
See, that's the sad thing. Hard SF, scientifically accurate SF, is a great way to expose people to scientific concepts in an entertaining way -- a way to make science
not boring. And if some viewers don't care about the science, that's fine; they can just dismiss it as technobabble and enjoy the story. But those of us who do like science in our fiction will be satisfied as well, and those whose minds are open and curious can learn something even as they're entertained. It's not a zero-sum game. It's not like the only way to satisfy one segment of the audience is to deprive the others. A story that includes plausible science in a smooth, unobtrusive way can satisfy everyone.
Uhm. The entire premise of the show is the fact that it revolves around Mad Scientists practicing "science" that has been debunked/written off/proven wrong. Seriously. That's the premise of the show.
So why, then, get your feathers ruffled at them for making the show about the very thing it's supposed to be about?
No, that's not the premise of the show. The premise, as explicitly stated by characters in the show, is that they're dealing with science that is so advanced and progressing so rapidly that it's no longer possible to comprehend or control. There hasn't been one word said about the ideas being debunked or proven wrong; hell, obviously they haven't been proven wrong, because within the context of the show, they clearly work. Rather, they're ideas that have been abandoned or covered up by the establishment because they were too dangerous or controversial.
And as I've said, what's disappointing is that they could've done essentially the same show if they'd grounded it in the realistic concept of the Singularity, if they'd consulted with the futurists and scientists and authors who have been writing about the Singularity for decades now. They still could've made a show about technology running frighteningly out of control; the characters and drama and danger would've been the same; only the technical specifics would be different. But it would be grounded in ideas that actually make sense and would inform the public about a very real possibility for what the future may hold.
The power of science fiction, what makes it such a remarkable and important genre, is that it can actually anticipate future trends. It can't predict discoveries in exact detail, but it has often been on the right track, has often explored issues that real people have needed to contend with decades later. SF writers predicted the nuclear arms race before the first nuclear weapon had ever been detonated; they got the details of the technology wrong, but they anticipated the political dynamic and the moral quandary. Today, we face many difficult ethical questions about the possibility of human cloning and genetic engineering, but SF has been exploring those questions in depth for over three decades. SF can give us a headstart on figuring out issues that could genuinely affect our lives or our children's lives. That's potentially an immensely powerful tool. So it's a waste that most mass-media SF is content to be meaningless fluff. As I said, meaningless fluff is fine occasionally, but there's an opportunity to achieve so much more, and that opportunity is being squandered.
And just from the standpoint of personal taste... I didn't
want another
X-Files. I didn't particularly like
The X-Files. The writing was occasionally entertaining, but the premise was a pathetic joke. So I would've rather seen a show that wasn't just
The X-Files with the labels changed, but that had a substantive difference in approach.
