
Science Fiction’s Wonderful Mistakes - benbreen
https://newrepublic.com/article/155978/science-fictions-wonderful-mistakes
======
tkgally
When I think back on the science fiction I read and enjoyed as a child and
teenager a half century ago, the wrong predictions that amuse me most are two
central plot elements in Robert Heinlein’s 1953 “Starman Jones” [0]. Faster-
than-light travel through interstellar space is now routine, but the
“astrogators” who guide the starships must refer to coordinates that appear in
a set of printed manuals. When a starship gets lost and those books are
stolen, the ship is able to return to Earth only because our hero, who has an
eidetic memory, is able to recall all of the coordinates from memory.

In 2019, of course, the information in all of those printed manuals could be
put into a wristwatch with room to spare, while manned interstellar travel is
nowhere in sight.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starman_Jones](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starman_Jones)

~~~
KineticLensman
> must refer to coordinates that appear in a set of printed manuals

Why weren't they equipped with a twenty-inch deci-trig duplex slide rule, like
Seaton, in the Skylark of Space [0]?

"All right—let's see. Radius of rotation here in Washington would be cosine
latitude times equatorial radius, approximately—call it thirty-two hundred
miles. Angular velocity, fifteen degrees an hour. I want secant fifteen less
one times thirty-two hundred. Right? Secant equals one over cosine—um——m—one
point oh three five. Then point oh three five times thirty-two hundred.
Hundred and twelve miles first hour. Velocity constant with respect to sun,
accelerated respecting point of departure. Ouch! You win, Mart—I'd step out!
Well, how about this, then? I'll put on a suit and carry rations. Harness
outside, with the same equipment I used in the test flights before we built
Skylark One—plus the new stuff. Then throw on the zone, and see what happens.
There can't be any jar in taking off, and with that outfit I can get back U.K.
if I go clear to Jupiter!"

[0]
[http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/astrodeck.php](http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/astrodeck.php)

~~~
gumby
With a username like yours you probably memorized that passage!

~~~
pcnix
For people intrigued by this comment, check out the Galactic Lensman series.
Solid science fiction.

~~~
KineticLensman
My username is indeed a reference to the Lensman series although I first used
it on Flickr. The 'Kinetic' part is a reference to a company I used to work
for, intended to be recognised by one of our customers who was also active on
Flickr.

My enjoyment of the Lensman series has lasted longer than my enjoyment of
Flickr! One of the other superb old tech images I have from the series is a
spaceship pilot 'playing arpeggios' on the massive bank of the controls of his
starship.

------
RichardCA
"Show me one novel that predicted something like Fox and Friends, or The View.
You can’t do it."

The Machine Stops, by E.M. Forster.

[https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-
arts-36289890](https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-36289890)

~~~
Animats
I wouldn't have chosen "The Machine Stops". The movie "Network", (1976) is
rather close to "Fox and Friends".[1] "The Space Merchants" (C. M. Kornbluth,
1952) is more about the advertising business but has aspects of that.

[1] [https://youtu.be/2FOD1jZr-S4](https://youtu.be/2FOD1jZr-S4)

~~~
RichardCA
I'm due to re-read J.G. Ballard. "Crash" is a hard read but it predicted the
way porn alienates people from each other.

"The Subliminal Man" (written in 1963) touches upon some interesting themes
about manipulation via technology.

[http://search.lores.eu/opr0207B.htm](http://search.lores.eu/opr0207B.htm)

------
LiquidSky
I've always found the obsession some people have with "hard" SF utterly
ridiculous. The article alludes to this when discussing various fallacies
regarding SF. The strength of SF has always been exploring the relationship of
people and technology, and how technology will affect people and society. The
stories that continue to resonate and engage over time are the ones that do
this best. The details of the tech/science not only don't matter they're often
actively detrimental to the story's staying power (e.g., "The computer had a
blistering 100MB of RAM.").

~~~
saagarjha
“Hard” science fiction is a form of writing with constraints: in this case;
the constraints being that the physics have to be believable. It keeps the
genre separate from “science fantasy” e.g. Star {Wars, Trek}–which are
enjoyable in their own right, but quite different. You can assure yourself
that the standard science-related plot devices of time travel, superluminal
communication, or infinite energy aren’t introduced because they frequently
poke holes in the plot. And it’s often interesting to see how authors create
creative workarounds to stay within the bounds that hard science fiction
imposes.

~~~
YeGoblynQueenne
>> It keeps the genre separate from “science fantasy” e.g. Star {Wars,
Trek}–which are enjoyable in their own right, but quite different.

Being a staunch Trekkie, I protest. You can't put Star Wars in the same sub-
genre as Star Trek! For instance, a common categorisation would have to
explain the distinct absence of Ewoks or cute robots from Star Trek [1] or the
much reduced focus on technology in Star Wars [2]. While (according to the
wikipedia page on Science Fantasy) Star Trek is sometimes labelled as Science
Fantasy, it's clear the aim of the show is completely different than the aim
of Star Wars. I mean, one is an adventure with space swords and space knights,
the other is ... an adventure, but with space captains and space lieutenants.

So very different.

____________

[1] I doubt anyone would consider Lt. Cmndr. Data a "cute robot" and anyway,
he's an _android_.

[2] See: "the tech is overteching" (copied here so you can avoid opening that
atrocious syfy.com page):

 _" It became the solution to so many plot lines and so many stories," Moore
said. "It was so mechanical that we had science consultants who would just
come up with the words for us and we'd just write 'tech' in the script. You
know, Picard would say 'Commander La Forge, tech the tech to the warp drive.'
I'm serious. If you look at those scripts, you'll see that."

Moore then went on to describe how a typical script might read before the
science consultants did their thing:

La Forge: "Captain, the tech is overteching."

Picard: "Well, route the auxiliary tech to the tech, Mr. La Forge."

La Forge: "No, Captain. Captain, I've tried to tech the tech, and it won't
work."

Picard: "Well, then we're doomed."

"And then Data pops up and says, 'Captain, there is a theory that if you tech
the other tech ... '" Moore said. "It's a rhythm and it's a structure, and the
words are meaningless. It's not about anything except just sort of going
through this dance of how they tech their way out of it."_

[https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/ron_moore_calls_star_trek](https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/ron_moore_calls_star_trek)

P.S. I know my comment comes along as a bit ironic, but I really see a
difference between Star Wars and Star Trek and the kind of SciFi they
represent. My best attempt at an explanation: in Star Wars, starships are
cool. In Star Trek, how starships work is cool.

~~~
crdrost
So this in part comes down to what novelists call a “type of conflict” that
Trek makes great use of, but Wars does not. The term is usually “Man vs.
Technology conflict” but if I were writing it, I would call it “people versus
tools” to clarify that usually fighting off a robot counts as one of the other
conflicts. Like if you have to land a plane, that is PvTool conflict.

In Star Wars, this conflict is largely but not entirely absent. In a climactic
scene of A New Hope, the rebels get to blow up the Death Star, except—“It
didn’t go in. Just impacted on the surface.” Very short bursts in the middle
of other conflict. Similarly there is a short moment of Han Solo explaining
that he needs to give his computer time to make hyperspace calculations lest
they all die—it is another really tiny moment to enhance a larger existing
conflict.

Whereas with Trek it is usually more pronounced, “no one has ever done those
things with these tools, how do we even begin to do it?” ...

A lot of the rest of the apparent difference comes down to format. The Trek
that we remember had to be rushed and crushed. The episodes were short and the
TV stations reserved the right to show them out of order, so just like
virtually all TV off that time, there was typically a short circular arc by
which everyone at the end of the episode must more or less be however they
started.

One really interesting thing someone pointed out to me about reality TV was
that it was extremely cognitively complex for its time, and indeed this was
its selling point. People watched _Survivor_ because something changed as a
result of every episode and there was a lot of mental stimulation of the form
“ooh I wonder who would be the best strategic target for _him_ to take out?!”
. There was a little of this in other places; I like to think about how we
used to debate whether a French chef should really challenge Iron Chef French
Hiroyuki Sakai, or whether he should have the audacity to fight the nearly
undefeatable Iron Chef Japanese Rokusaburo Michiba. But even those shows
returned mostly to the same place week after week.

~~~
YeGoblynQueenne
Much more insightful than my lazy comment- thanks.

------
Iv
The one that amazes me the most is that I am not aware of any predictions that
AI would be developed by tech giant but be mostly open sourced and published.
It seems so counter-intuitive.

~~~
namibj
This might imply that the AI shown by Science Fiction won't be this visible
until it's too late.

Your point of view is much nicer, however.

------
forkLding
To those who have watched the 1988 Anime Sci-fi film Akira, it is set in 2019
aka the future and what they got wrong amuses me greatly

~~~
rolltiide
They got the Olympics right though

------
rini17
Apparently, no female SF authors have existed. Or anyone from outside
anglosphere.

~~~
mfarris
You might find it useful to read articles before indulging your urge to
sarcasm: one of the novels discussed is by Joanna Russ (female). Another is by
Samuel Delaney (African-American).

Oh, the name of the two-volume series is "American Science Fiction: Eight
Classic Novels of the 1960s". Maybe the specifics of criteria -- "America,"
"1960s" \-- influenced the choices?

