Comments on: Why are scifi authors so pessimistic about the future?

By: Colum Paget

Colum Paget — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 01:36:10 +0000

Speaking as an ardent pessimist, I think one of the reasons for this, attitude, which may have swung the pendulumn too far, is that those of us who lived through the recent singularity feel betrayed by it. I grew up in a world where predictions like the ones you make were routine. Soon we would all be living in O’Neil cylinders in orbit, huge orbitting solar arrays would provide limitless power, or if not those, then fusion. Artificial intelligence would solve many of the world’s tricky problems. Soon we would be hit by ‘the leisure shock’ where we would all be free from daily drudge to take up fulfilling intellectual activties. Antibiotics would wipe out disease, and hydroponics would make the deserts bloom. In this world of plenty and better communications, war would be unthinkable.

I remember the pictures. You should have seen the pictures. I was quite sure that I’d be living like a god by the time I was 30. Our parents said to us “We had a rough time of it, growing up, there was a war on, and rationing, and stuff. But the world you’re going to see, it’s going to be fantastic.”

It never happened.

NONE OF IT.

Not one single thing. Instead, things that no-one saw coming happened instead, and most of those were bad. (Before you say ‘Well, mobile phones happened!’ those come under ‘bad’).

People writing now are pessimistic because they’ve been through all this once already, and it was a massive let-down. We’re still stuck on earth, most of us are still poor. Most of us are still starving. There are still wars. There is still disease.

However, it could be that this time is going to be different. But it might not be. If it’s not different, if we get fooled again, then how are we going to manage? Human civilisation is betting it’s near-term future on the hope that ’something will turn up’.

What if it doesn’t?

Ultimately though, so what? Yes, in the near term future there is going to be a massive mash-up and we are going to lose an awful number of people. But two generations after that, no-one will care. So the ozone layer goes, and white folks go extinct. So what? Two generations later, no one will care. So whales and bears go extinct. So what? No one will care. So western society collapses and is replaced with a different model. Those who come after us will be used to that model, and will like it just fine. So we lose the war against the monster trees. So what? Centuries from now hyperintelligent trees will be no more bothered about that than we are that cro-magnon man went extinct.

So, in the longer term, one can say ‘don’t worry, be happy’.

Colum

By: Colum Paget

Colum Paget — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 01:16:23 +0000

> I see a day where rain forests can be
> created in a few years using ultra-fast
> growing bioengineered plants.
You read my mind! Or you’ve read a time-slipped version of my future novel “The War against the Monster Trees”

Colum

By: Jeffrey

Jeffrey — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 23:54:41 +0000

To be fair, you did say “The truth is…” – seemed to be assuming that the optimistic possibilities of science fiction would take place in the real world. While I certainly agree that it’s quite possible technology will solve many of our problems, I also think it’s possible that it won’t. I doubt either of us can say for sure.

Science fiction, as a genre which describes our world and perhaps examines possible future, has to make a choice among the possibilities. To put it simply, better safe than sorry. If the truth really is that a given problem has no easy technological solution, it’s perhaps more responsible for science fiction to encourage us to see the problem and its ultimate consequences. Optimistic science fiction carries with it the danger of becoming escapist, assuring us that everything will be okay when no one really knows.

Perhaps the genre should seek a balance including more optimism. However, as the genre which can examine these issues, science fiction has a responsibility to keep asking the tough questions.

By: Sean

Sean — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 01:24:46 +0000

I was only asking about scifi stories, not about real life. Scifi used to be overwhelmingly optimistic.

By: Michael L

Michael L — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 18:31:09 +0000

I would like to think that that direction is where we are headed, but I’m afraid history says otherwise. Yes, we as a species, have taken great steps to eradicate some of the ills that have plagued us for centuries. But, we are still very far away from the Utopian world in which you describe. I really, really want to believe that what you say will come to pass, but, as I look around today, I still see the scourge of extreme poverty, the scourge of AIDS and other diseases, the scourge of war and it’s consequences upon society, with thousands left dead, and millions displaced in its wake.

I agree with you. Let’s band together to see what we can do to put an end to these things, so that we can make this planet a better place for our kids and grandchildren!
Thanks!

By: Sharon

Sharon — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 18:24:12 +0000

I think the reason many of these things aren’t happening in real life is that politics and political agendas get in the way of scientific achievement. While science shouldn’t necessarily just “jump forward in leaps and bounds” for science’s sake, we also shouldn’t allow the politicians (and others who hold the purse strings) to so thoroughly muddy up the waters of what should and should not be pursued. While, in general, I’m not for cloning humans or creating and destoying embryos for stem cells (too much like playing God), I think that other avenues like alternate energy research (or even possibly drilling in Alaska) have become so political and PC motivated that they are now being decided by people who have no real knowledge of the subject. Look at the debate over deciding whether or not polar bears are endangered! I could go on, but I won’t!