Along the way, the science fiction stories I'd been writing since I was 13 began to grow more believable. With my BS in biology and a fascination with genetics, I started to use more science in my fiction.
After reading hard SF for the past 50 years, and writing hard SF successfully for the past 20, I've started to dig deeper into what it takes to create realistic alien life forms. In the following series, I'll be sharing some of what I've learned. I've had some of those stories published, some not...I teach a class to GT young people every summer called ALIEN WORLDS. I've learned a lot preparing for that class for the past 25 years...so...I have the opportunity to share with you what I've learned thus far. Take what you can use, leave the rest. Let me know what YOU'VE learned. Without further ado...
Let me say first that I don’t believe that there is any chance left that an “honest politician” exists. I don’t care who they are or who they claim to be. Politicians (even our “best and brightest”) have one word in mind: Power. They desire above everything else to get power, keep power, and use power to help a) themselves; b) people they consider family; c) people in my party who think very much the way I do; d) (which normally doesn’t happen) “serve” my city/district/county/state/country/world.
Now that I have that cleared up (and I am uninterested in seeing your arguments unless you can offer me undeniable proof that I am wrong), how can I tell any kind of story about any kind of future I’d like to live in?
Star Wars? No – that’s just 20th Century Earth spread like manure over other planets.
Star Trek? No – that’s just a single man’s absurd belief that the universe would work the way HE wanted it to and that anyone who disagreed in any detail was wrong.
Babylon 5? It’s already just Earth written…well, not larger but spread farther than is believable but during which absolutely nothing changes.
Other Interplanetary Fictions that other people besides geeks read are irrelevant because not enough people know about them or read them (in any visual format that involves visible words) to take the tenets and apply them to reality. The only exception is George Orwell’s 1984, and as we have read (those of us who still read) it’s already been and is gone.
Dune? It offers absolutely nothing new or applicable to human existence – even at its simplest form, we can say that it’s here already (but without sandworms).
Fewer people read because first of all, reading is expensive: doesn’t matter what you read ON, you have to first be able to afford it and all the accoutrements that go with it (NOT including affordable electrical energy whether generated, stored, or created by some kind of chemical reaction.) cost some amount of money or trade.
Religion is unprovable. I happen to be an evangelical Christian myself, but I cannot in any convincing way offer you proof of my faith. The same goes for anything else based on something invisible – which also includes political systems: republic, democratic (true or any one of its various hybrid forms), theocratic, communist, or anarchy, or socialism (which inevitably devolves into dictatorship); or thought or emotion, neither of which is quantifiable in any way. (Of COURSE some aliens somewhere can quantify thought and emotion…it’s what we hope. It’s why Humans created every science fiction world – we want SOMEDAY to be better than we are.
BTW: Fantasy doesn’t count because ALL of it is based on thought or emotion, neither of which is quantifiable in any way.
So, is there any way for the Human organism to create an interplanetary society, explore space, and expand our place in the universe WITHOUT resorting to force?
Because that was the ONLY way Humanity could have evolved/was created – I can’t think of any way Humanity came to be. Every science fiction writer who has ever created a universe based on some science principle or another (or group of them) are only ENTERTAINING THEMSELVES AND EVENTUALLY OTHERS who choose to join them in their fun.
So, is there anywhere for Humanity to go? Once we create the energy to “get to the stars”, we’ll just transport all of the above off Earth and nothing will change; nothing will be different.
NOW, if you want to keep trying, that is up to you…well, not you PERSONALLY! YOU as a single person can’t do anything that would effect the future of Humanity. You’ll be dead in a genetically predetermined amount of time. You can certainly try and “make a difference” – but after watching the fantastical “Monuments Men”, it’s once again clear that Adolph Hitler CERTAINLY did make a difference.
So, what is my reason for writing science fiction? Sometimes I write it long; sometimes short. I certainly want people to READ what I write, but few people have published my writing, so a very small number had READ what I have to say; of course some have read it, but as far as I can tell, my writing hasn’t made any kind of difference in their lives. I haven’t converted anyone to my point of view.
How can I create a world people want to read about as avidly as I read about Anne McCaffery’s world of PERN (which stands for, apparently, Parallel Earth Negligible Resources – now isn’t THAT a joke on me!)?
I can’t be any more sure of my writing leaving a lasting impression on a young person’s mind and heart than she did, or Frank Herbert did, or JK Rowling did (ignore what I said about fantasy, it’s important! Just not my pot of tea!).
Every year fantasy and science fiction is written AROUND THE WORLD. In how many languages? A Western newspaper writes with self-assured authority (and jabs at people who disagree with it as NOT as superior as they are!) here: https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2015/sep/11/seek-out-new-worlds-of-science-fiction-damien-walter#:~:text=Seek%20out%20new%20worlds%20of%20science%20fiction,a%20global%20language%20describing%20our%20shared%20future.
They self-righteously concluded in 2015: “If any single theme unites…African folktales to Chinese legend – into to the science fiction canon…science fiction has become the mythology of today’s…world…embrac[ing] the rich and valuable world mythologies that came before it.”
Sources: Image: https://image.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/alien-human-600w-136457129.jpg
After reading hard SF for the past 50 years, and writing hard SF successfully for the past 20, I've started to dig deeper into what it takes to create realistic alien life forms. In the following series, I'll be sharing some of what I've learned. I've had some of those stories published, some not...I teach a class to GT young people every summer called ALIEN WORLDS. I've learned a lot preparing for that class for the past 25 years...so...I have the opportunity to share with you what I've learned thus far. Take what you can use, leave the rest. Let me know what YOU'VE learned. Without further ado...
Let me say first that I don’t believe that there is any chance left that an “honest politician” exists. I don’t care who they are or who they claim to be. Politicians (even our “best and brightest”) have one word in mind: Power. They desire above everything else to get power, keep power, and use power to help a) themselves; b) people they consider family; c) people in my party who think very much the way I do; d) (which normally doesn’t happen) “serve” my city/district/county/state/country/world.
Now that I have that cleared up (and I am uninterested in seeing your arguments unless you can offer me undeniable proof that I am wrong), how can I tell any kind of story about any kind of future I’d like to live in?
Star Wars? No – that’s just 20th Century Earth spread like manure over other planets.
Star Trek? No – that’s just a single man’s absurd belief that the universe would work the way HE wanted it to and that anyone who disagreed in any detail was wrong.
Babylon 5? It’s already just Earth written…well, not larger but spread farther than is believable but during which absolutely nothing changes.
Other Interplanetary Fictions that other people besides geeks read are irrelevant because not enough people know about them or read them (in any visual format that involves visible words) to take the tenets and apply them to reality. The only exception is George Orwell’s 1984, and as we have read (those of us who still read) it’s already been and is gone.
Dune? It offers absolutely nothing new or applicable to human existence – even at its simplest form, we can say that it’s here already (but without sandworms).
Fewer people read because first of all, reading is expensive: doesn’t matter what you read ON, you have to first be able to afford it and all the accoutrements that go with it (NOT including affordable electrical energy whether generated, stored, or created by some kind of chemical reaction.) cost some amount of money or trade.
Religion is unprovable. I happen to be an evangelical Christian myself, but I cannot in any convincing way offer you proof of my faith. The same goes for anything else based on something invisible – which also includes political systems: republic, democratic (true or any one of its various hybrid forms), theocratic, communist, or anarchy, or socialism (which inevitably devolves into dictatorship); or thought or emotion, neither of which is quantifiable in any way. (Of COURSE some aliens somewhere can quantify thought and emotion…it’s what we hope. It’s why Humans created every science fiction world – we want SOMEDAY to be better than we are.
BTW: Fantasy doesn’t count because ALL of it is based on thought or emotion, neither of which is quantifiable in any way.
So, is there any way for the Human organism to create an interplanetary society, explore space, and expand our place in the universe WITHOUT resorting to force?
Because that was the ONLY way Humanity could have evolved/was created – I can’t think of any way Humanity came to be. Every science fiction writer who has ever created a universe based on some science principle or another (or group of them) are only ENTERTAINING THEMSELVES AND EVENTUALLY OTHERS who choose to join them in their fun.
So, is there anywhere for Humanity to go? Once we create the energy to “get to the stars”, we’ll just transport all of the above off Earth and nothing will change; nothing will be different.
NOW, if you want to keep trying, that is up to you…well, not you PERSONALLY! YOU as a single person can’t do anything that would effect the future of Humanity. You’ll be dead in a genetically predetermined amount of time. You can certainly try and “make a difference” – but after watching the fantastical “Monuments Men”, it’s once again clear that Adolph Hitler CERTAINLY did make a difference.
So, what is my reason for writing science fiction? Sometimes I write it long; sometimes short. I certainly want people to READ what I write, but few people have published my writing, so a very small number had READ what I have to say; of course some have read it, but as far as I can tell, my writing hasn’t made any kind of difference in their lives. I haven’t converted anyone to my point of view.
How can I create a world people want to read about as avidly as I read about Anne McCaffery’s world of PERN (which stands for, apparently, Parallel Earth Negligible Resources – now isn’t THAT a joke on me!)?
I can’t be any more sure of my writing leaving a lasting impression on a young person’s mind and heart than she did, or Frank Herbert did, or JK Rowling did (ignore what I said about fantasy, it’s important! Just not my pot of tea!).
Every year fantasy and science fiction is written AROUND THE WORLD. In how many languages? A Western newspaper writes with self-assured authority (and jabs at people who disagree with it as NOT as superior as they are!) here: https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2015/sep/11/seek-out-new-worlds-of-science-fiction-damien-walter#:~:text=Seek%20out%20new%20worlds%20of%20science%20fiction,a%20global%20language%20describing%20our%20shared%20future.
They self-righteously concluded in 2015: “If any single theme unites…African folktales to Chinese legend – into to the science fiction canon…science fiction has become the mythology of today’s…world…embrac[ing] the rich and valuable world mythologies that came before it.”
Sources: Image: https://image.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/alien-human-600w-136457129.jpg
