How to define Science Fiction

[CorporalCaptain]

The boundaries of the content can certainly evolve over time; the example of the New Wave-type of subversive SF in the 60s demonstrates that. But the genre itself can't become something it's not. Kung Fu is a classic Western that was unique for its inclusion of Eastern mysticism and martial arts. That expanded the boundaries of the Western genre, but does that mean Enter The Dragon is now a Western?

Of course not.

Upthread, it sounded to me like you wanted the definition of science fiction to have an essentially static quality.

The thing itself doesn't change if you describe it accurately.

As far as I can tell, this would require the category of science fiction to be prescriptively defined.

What I actually meant by that is that specific things don't change. Star Wars is still Star Wars whether you call it Science Fiction or Space Opera.

Ah, I see. You mean that the thing itself doesn't change, no matter how you describe it.

That may be true, but now we have the issue of the significance of interpretation. Revisions notwithstanding, the text of a work is indeed static. But without dynamic interpretation in the minds of those who read the text, the text is completely inert and it is not being experienced. Furthermore, the significance that certain elements are believed to have can change over time.

An example before us is the Force in Star Wars. Despite what I think are reasonable arguments on both sides of the issue, I don't believe everyone in this thread agrees whether the Force is an element of science fiction.

Personally, I think it is an element of science fiction that serves a role also occupied by certain kinds of magic in fantasy adventures. Lucas very creatively imported magic into the genre of science fiction. Others disagree.

Such disagreement supports the idea that the ultimate accuracy of a description of a work of literature is subjective. I suspect that eliminating disagreements arising out of purely subjective evaluations is a motive for allowing the genre of science fiction to be much more inclusive than it would be if one limited it to what is now qualified as hard science fiction. No one reasonable is carrying it to the extreme where one would claim that The Red Badge of Courage is science fiction, just because An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge might arguably be. Jumping to that sort of absurd extreme wouldn't give the arguments for why Owl Creek might be SF enough credit.

Well the argument is that the quality of the science doesn't matter in identifying the work's genre. By the same token, a historical novel with a fairly loose attention to historical fact is still a historical novel.

This is a really good point.

Lord of the Rings and Star Wars are very much the same story

I don't think so. There are of course some similarities. You might find something similar between Gandalf's arc and Obi-Wan's arc, but Frodo's arc and Luke's arc are very dissimilar, and I'm having a great deal of trouble figuring who the parallel to Anakin in LotR is supposed to be. If you say Gollum, I'm going to say, "No way." And who's parallel to Leia? These xkcd movie narrative charts at http://xkcd.com/657/ are actually pretty accurate. The right edges showing character outcomes are completely dissimilar. Perhaps you could elaborate by what you mean, which episodes of Star Wars you are referring to, etc.?

 

[issreliant]

Robots and hot alien chicks!

 

[xortex]

A good word to use here is extrapolation. It's fantastic science but what isn't a science? Even art is a science.

 

[Ubik]

The boundaries of the content can certainly evolve over time; the example of the New Wave-type of subversive SF in the 60s demonstrates that. But the genre itself can't become something it's not. Kung Fu is a classic Western that was unique for its inclusion of Eastern mysticism and martial arts. That expanded the boundaries of the Western genre, but does that mean Enter The Dragon is now a Western?

Of course not.

What I actually meant by that is that specific things don't change. Star Wars is still Star Wars whether you call it Science Fiction or Space Opera.

Ah, I see. You mean that the thing itself doesn't change, no matter how you describe it.

That may be true, but now we have the issue of the significance of interpretation. Revisions notwithstanding, the text of a work is indeed static. But without dynamic interpretation in the minds of those who read the text, the text is completely inert and it is not being experienced. Furthermore, the significance that certain elements are believed to have can change over time.

An example before us is the Force in Star Wars. Despite what I think are reasonable arguments on both sides of the issue, I don't believe everyone in this thread agrees whether the Force is an element of science fiction.

Personally, I think it is an element of science fiction that serves a role also occupied by certain kinds of magic in fantasy adventures. Lucas very creatively imported magic into the genre of science fiction. Others disagree.

Such disagreement supports the idea that the ultimate accuracy of a description of a work of literature is subjective. I suspect that eliminating disagreements arising out of purely subjective evaluations is a motive for allowing the genre of science fiction to be much more inclusive than it would be if one limited it to what is now qualified as hard science fiction. No one reasonable is carrying it to the extreme where one would claim that The Red Badge of Courage is science fiction, just because An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge might arguably be. Jumping to that sort of absurd extreme wouldn't give the arguments for why Owl Creek might be SF enough credit.

Well the argument is that the quality of the science doesn't matter in identifying the work's genre. By the same token, a historical novel with a fairly loose attention to historical fact is still a historical novel.

This is a really good point.

Lord of the Rings and Star Wars are very much the same story

I don't think so. There are of course some similarities. You might find something similar between Gandalf's arc and Obi-Wan's arc, but Frodo's arc and Luke's arc are very dissimilar, and I'm having a great deal of trouble figuring who the parallel to Anakin in LotR is supposed to be. If you say Gollum, I'm going to say, "No way." And who's parallel to Leia? These xkcd movie narrative charts at http://xkcd.com/657/ are actually pretty accurate. The right edges showing character outcomes are completely dissimilar. Perhaps you could elaborate by what you mean, which episodes of Star Wars you are referring to, etc.?

Anakin is Saruman, of course: the Wizard's old friend who turned to the dark side.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Anakin is Saruman, of course: the Wizard's old friend who turned to the dark side.

No. Not so much, really.

Saruman, a relatively minor character, was Gandalf's boss. Gandalf was never in the service of Sauron in any form. Gandalf's arc is to attain the stature that Saruman would have had, had he not fallen. Saruman dies unredeemed, stripped of his powers, at the hands of Gríma Wormtongue, after being defeated in the Shire, having played no direct role in the destruction of the Ring or in Sauron's defeat.

On the other hand, Darth Vader/Anakin Skywalker is a major character. Obi-Wan was Anakin's master, and both were in the service of Palpatine. Obi-Wan's arc is never to take up the task of bringing balance to the Force, something ordained for Anakin. Anakin dies redeemed, through his own heroic sacrifice in directly defeating the Emperor himself, achieving a place of honor in the hereafter next to Yoda and Obi-Wan.

 

[Klaus]

Any similarity between SW and LotR is so superficial as to be meaningless... Luke and Frodo have some harmonics at a Joseph-Campbell kind of level, but not really. Luke is hardly pining for the good old days and drifting off hoping to be healed from his physical and psychic wounds at the end. And from the Brin yearning-for-the-past focus, SW is about the fall of an evil empire and perhaps a new republic growing from its ashes.

I also think the "golden age" aspect of so much older f/sf is because of when they were written. In the middle of the 20th century it wasn't unreasonable to think that the trends weren't too good and that our best days may have been behind us.

 

[Set Harth]

You might find something similar between Gandalf's arc and Obi-Wan's arc

Because I was reading LOTR between the releases of TESB and ROTJ, I saw the cloaked figure entering Jabba's palace in the ROTJ trailer and my first thought was, "That's Obi-Wan coming back from the dead Gandalf style".

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Yeah, the fact that Obi-Wan was not physically resurrected is one of the crucial differences.

Although I am (no doubt unfortunately) unfamiliar with the "Brin" and "Joseph-Campbell" references, I think I understand what Klaus is saying, at least in part. The OT Star Wars trilogy is about the overthrowing of the Empire and the order of the Jedi coming back to life. Lord of the Rings, on the other hand, is not about restoration, but rather it is about the defeat of a dark lord who is trying to return to power, and about the fading away into mythology of all relics and remnants of an earlier, greater, and more magical time.

LotR has a much sadder ending than the SW OT.

 

[captcalhoun]

i'm still waiting for someone to refute my definition.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

LOTR and the SW OT seem to be the same story because of all that Joseph Campbell path of the hero stuff.

You can also draw a lot of parallels between SW and The Wizard of Oz: young protagonist on the brink of adulthood who goes on a journey, who meets a magical mentor who gives him/her a token of power and must defeat a threatening figure in black with the help of a group of colorful friends he/she meets along the way. The key to the protagonists' success is realizing the battle was internal the whole time, which represents the transition to adulthood.

But Anakin isn't a traditional Joseph Campbell hero, at least not one I've ever heard of. Maybe there are some similarities to Hercules, who murdered his family after being driven mad by the gods, and went on a quest to redeem himself, but in Anakin's case, he wasn't putting much effort into redemption until his son showed up, and even then, that wasn't the plan. Anakin strikes me as a very modern type of anti-hero character. (For argument's sake, I'm pretending that Lucas didn't screw up his story massively and it all panned out like it should have.)

The OT Star Wars trilogy is about the overthrowing of the Empire and the order of the Jedi coming back to life.

Eh? The fate of the Jedi and the Empire are incidental to the core story. I think the OT is the Wizard of Oz-like coming of age story I described above, with a parallel story for Anakin - the fallen angel redeemed by the unselfish love of his son (a story that certainly has Christian resonances but that I can't think of any direct antecedent for.) The OT is Luke's and Anakin's stories, running in parallel. At the end, their arcs finally meet and each resolves the other's dilemma - Luke gains true maturity and Anakin redeems himself.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

i'm still waiting for someone to refute my definition.

Well I had to dig for it.

science fiction is anything which uses fictional science or science fictionally.

simple really.

Okay I can dispute that: how does it encompass Nineteen-Eighty-Four, a work that is unquestionably one of the classics of science fiction? Science doesn't play any particularly important role in that novel.

Here's a better definition: "science fiction is the branch of speculative fiction that is governed by a rational universe, as opposed to the other branch - fantasy - governed by an irrational universe."

 

[CorporalCaptain]

i'm still waiting for someone to refute my definition.

science fiction is anything which uses fictional science or science fictionally.

simple really.

To prove that that is what science fiction equals, there are two things that must be proven:

1. If something is science fiction then it uses fictional science or science fictionally.
2. If something uses fictional science or science fictionally then it is science fiction.

With respect to the first issue, should works such as An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge be considered science fiction? Personally, I would say "no" in that particular case, but I know others would say "yes". To me, Owl Creek is more properly simply fantasy. To use another example adapted for The Twilight Zone, what about the The Howling Man? You see, there is very little if anything specifically scientific in these works. What makes them arguably science fiction though is that they are set in the natural world. In terms of the stories, everything that occurs is (at least arguably) a natural phenomenon.

With respect to the second issue, consider Lord of the Rings. Personally, I do not think LotR is science fiction. However, it does depend centrally on fictional technology. Furthermore, the book has a conceit that it occurs on our Earth in the distant past; from that point of view it is arguably historical fiction, in addition to science fiction. As much as it deals with fictitious science it deals with fictitious history.

None of this refutes your definition, necessarily, but rather, I think the ball is back in your court now to clarify what you mean.

The fate of the Jedi and the Empire are incidental to the core story.

Wha-what? Luke becomes a Jedi, Anakin is restored to the Jedi. How are the Jedi incidental? As an expression of what it means to be good in that galaxy, the Jedi are essential to the story. The whole goal is to defeat the Empire, the symbol of evil. Defeat evil, restore good.

Here's a better definition: "science fiction is the branch of speculative fiction that is governed by a rational universe, as opposed to the other branch - fantasy - governed by an irrational universe."

This gets some mileage, but the gaping hole there is the rational vs. irrational dichotomy. Rationality is relative; FTL and transporters are as inexplicable as Rings of Power.

Personally, I consider all science fiction also to be fantasy.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Luke becomes a Jedi, Anakin is restored to the Jedi. How are the Jedi incidental?

The core story is about the characters. Anakin redeemed himself and Luke became an adult, because those things allow the characters to fulfill their personal journeys. The Jedi are just a "thing" in the story, like the Death Star or Ewoks. They help the characters along in their personal journeys but it's the main characters, not the things and people they interact with along the way, that are the point of the story.

Being part of the Jedi allows Luke to gain maturity and Anakin to gain redemption, but if they could have done that by joining the Girl Scouts, the purpose of the story would still have been achieved (albeit in a very silly way).

The other interpretation is that the characters aren't the point of the story (even tho characters and their personal journey are the point of almost all stories), and the true point is doing what the Force wants, which is "restoring balance" (whatever that means). So making Luke a "true" Jedi and "redeeming" Anakin is a good thing because it serves the Force. But again, the Jedi are incidental. They are good because they serve the Force and are just a thing that helps to achieve the point of the story.

The Jedi really can't be the point of the story because they're important only because of either the main characters' relationship to them, or the relationship of the Force to them. They aren't important in their own right.

The whole goal is to defeat the Empire, the symbol of evil. Defeat evil, restore good.

If Luke had become evil or remained immature and Anakin not been redeemed, then it wouldn't have mattered if the Empire was defeated. The point of the story would not have been achieved. Stories are about individual people, not about organizations or societies, because readers and audiences relate to individual characters.

Rationality is relative; FTL and transporters are as inexplicable as Rings of Power.

In that case, it's intention that makes the difference. Star Trek doesn't present FTL and transporters as irrational; there are characters that understand these things and they were constructed by normal people, not magical elves or wizards. But the Rings of Power have a very magical, irrational origin and mere mortals or hobbits cannot understand and control them.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Luke becomes a Jedi, Anakin is restored to the Jedi. How are the Jedi incidental?

The core story is about the characters. Anakin redeemed himself and Luke became an adult, because those are good things for the characters to do. They didn't do it for the good of the Jedi, did they? The Jedi aren't the point of the whole universe!

I clarified what I meant by indicating that I consider the Jedi to be the symbol of good (which it is). The Jedi have no other core significance than as the symbol of good, as far as I can tell.

But the Rings of Power have a very magical, irrational origin and mere mortals or hobbits cannot understand and control them.

Ah, but Elves and Sauron can. In Star Trek, there are plenty of warp incapable species.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Science fiction is fiction first and foremost - the "science" is not of equal weight; it's a modifier like "gothic" in "gothic horror fiction."

If the "science" mattered half so much as apologists for the genre sometimes insist then the majority of the most popular and well-remembered examples of the genre would be neither.

 

[Ubik]

Luke becomes a Jedi, Anakin is restored to the Jedi. How are the Jedi incidental?

The core story is about the characters. Anakin redeemed himself and Luke became an adult, because those are good things for the characters to do. They didn't do it for the good of the Jedi, did they? The Jedi aren't the point of the whole universe!

I clarified what I meant by indicating that I consider the Jedi to be the symbol of good (which it is). The Jedi have no other core significance than as the symbol of good, as far as I can tell.

But the Rings of Power have a very magical, irrational origin and mere mortals or hobbits cannot understand and control them.

Ah, but Elves and Sauron can. In Star Trek, there are plenty of warp incapable species.

Temis is right. Science and magic are clearly different, and here's the difference: with science, anyone can replicate the phenomenon or experiment, if they have the knowledge and instruction booklet. It has nothing to do with the person doing it. So, any warp-incapable species who receives the instruction booklet could learn it. Magic, however, is dependant on the skill/personality/power of the user - even if someone, some random dude, found Gandalf's spell book, he could never replicate Gandalf's power. Because only Gandalf is Gandalf. That's the difference between science and magic.

 

[Vulagr]

Temis is right. Science and magic are clearly different,

One of my favorite quotes:

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

Arthur C. Clarke.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Temis is right. Science and magic are clearly different, and here's the difference: with science, anyone can replicate the phenomenon or experiment, if they have the knowledge and instruction booklet. It has nothing to do with the person doing it. So, any warp-incapable species who receives the instruction booklet could learn it. Magic, however, is dependant on the skill/personality/power of the user - even if someone, some random dude, found Gandalf's spell book, he could never replicate Gandalf's power. Because only Gandalf is Gandalf. That's the difference between science and magic.

Actually, everything I've said today on the dichotomy between science and magic is within the context of the following.

With respect to the second issue, consider Lord of the Rings. Personally, I do not think LotR is science fiction. However, it does depend centrally on fictional technology. Furthermore, the book has a conceit that it occurs on our Earth in the distant past; from that point of view it is arguably historical fiction, in addition to science fiction. As much as it deals with fictitious science it deals with fictitious history.

So, I agree they're different. However, Ubik, I'm not convinced that what you said there nails why they are different. If I can better express what my trouble is with what you say here, I will. For right now, this is the best I can do.

Part of the problem with what you are saying is that, according to The Silmarillion, the source of Gandalf's power is something very specific: it is in essence God-given, from being one of the Maiar. The reason why someone without that power cannot equal Gandalf is simply because they lack the attributes that Gandalf has been created with. Here's the rub, though: any being which has been created with those attributes does have that power. This is why the Balrog is able to defeat Gandalf. So, there is a very specific notion of cause and effect. There are rules of cause and effect, and they are never violated.

---

Temis, please don't over-interpret my condensation of Star Wars into a single sentence! I didn't intend that nutshell of broad strokes to encompass every significant aspect of the story. I expressed it simply to make a distinction between SW and LotR readily apparent.

However, I really do believe the OT is fundamentally about defeating evil and restoring good, because all of Luke's and Vader's choices are made with respect to that contextual backdrop. Luke's arc is about giving himself to a higher purpose, even at the possible expense of his friends and himself. Vader's arc is about giving himself to a higher purpose too, indeed at the expense of himself. Luke and Vader are both vulnerable only when they are selfish with respect to their own personal desires.

 

[Whofan]

Regarding the Obi-Wan as Gandalf thing, Lucas's original draft for ROTJ had Obi-Wan actually be physically ressurected. This is also the same draft that had Luke battle Vader and the Emperor in a volcanic cave as well, with Vader and the Emperor's death somewhat similar to Gollum's.

However Kasdan I think thought it was a stupid idea, so Obi-Wan remained a ghost (Although he seems to be able to move around and sit on a log, unlike ESB where he was kind of stuck in place). Heir to the Empire (EU novel) does have him (and possibly Yoda and Anakin) ascending to a plane of higher existence though.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

However, I really do believe the OT is fundamentally about defeating evil and restoring good, because all of Luke's and Vader's choices are made with respect to that contextual backdrop.

That's different from saying it's all about the Jedi. For instance, if Luke's maturity had led him to conclude that the real problem is the existence of two eternally warring factions, then he could have decided not to become a Jedi and not to help resurrect them, in fact to do everything to prevent that. And that would have represented both maturity for Luke and the triumph of good, but the death of the Jedi.

The Jedi are just an element in the story, to be used or discarded as needed. They can be used as a symbol of good, or they can be revealed not to be a symbol of good, but rather just a neutral element that was unwittingly contributing to a bad situation. But Luke can't be exposed as a symbol of evil, or even just neutral. That would wreck the story because then there would be no point.

Ditto for Anakin's redemption. Perhaps he decides that the greatest redemption is to admit once and for all, he was never Jedi material (and there's a very strong case to be made for that), so that he goes off to his eternal reward after casting off his Jedi-hood for good.

So if you really want to reduce things down to the barest of bare bones, sure, the OT is about good vs evil (despite what Lucas claims) but a lot of stories are about that. I find it more interesting that the OT (and the PT, if it had been done right) together are the story of how good triumphs over evil, specifically through the personal journeys of two heroes, one who is on the typical coming-of-age path and the other on a very atypical redemption path. I can't think of any other story with a structure like that.

Ah, but Elves and Sauron can. In Star Trek, there are plenty of warp incapable species.

Like Ubik said, you have to be a magical, special person to control a Ring of Power - it's not something anyone can just learn to do, by reading "Rings of Power for Dummies." But anyone can learn to be warp capable (unless they're simply too stupid like Pakleds).

Which raises the problem of Star Wars - that fits more into the fantasy camp because not everyone can become a Jedi. So I'm just booting the whole mess over to the "what the author intends" camp. Lucas wants his fairy tale to be sci fi, then it's sci fi. And one thing you can say for the godawful midichlorians is that they were an attempt to sci-fi-ize the Jedi by providing a rational explanation. Presumably then, everyone can become a Jedi by getting a midichlorian injection, which is about all I want to say about that horrible idea.