What has SF NOT predicted?

[Lacedaemonian]

Originally Posted by iansales

Seems a bit of a pointless argument. Science fiction is not futurism. You might as well ask why techno-thrillers never predicted 911.

This was predicted. They never predicted the car crash that iced (one time princess) Diana though.

Science often tries to capture the human imagination with things we had hoped for in the past. Scientists try to develop many things that can take many years to come into fruition. Takes an author five minutes to create those things in their works, especially when they give no indication on how they might work. When they do try to detail how they work, they just bore us senseless. I am a great believer in different kinds of people - ie a literary mind and a scientific mind - seems a rare thing that the two combine.

[Steve Jordan]

Originally Posted by Anatedhrai

The Pill.

Well, genre SF did have the excuse that it was generally quite prudish about sex until at least the mid 60s, although Philip José Farmer did break a few taboos the decade before.

Hmm... I thought Huxley's Brave New World specified that its Soma drug was a contraceptive, as well as a mood-altering drug. This, in the 1930s. (Unless it was added in the 1958 rewrite. Anyone?)

[NDHansen-Hill]

Interesting question, but scientific methods and research are spawning grounds for SF. In order to avoid making SF appear outlandish - at least, those books set in contemporary society - predictions and persuasive arguments would seem to need grounding in reality. I have to agree a little with the poster who suggests SF isn't futurism. It's entertainment. Predictions aren't nearly as important as the way they're manipulated in fiction, to appear "real".

Cheers,
ND

[John Jarrold]

Sigh. SF is not about prediction.

[Steve Jordan]

Originally Posted by John Jarrold

Sigh. SF is not about prediction.

No... but by virtue of the intent of the subject, it tends to speculate on future events on which to base its setting, such as a period when a newly-invented propulsion system has given us flying cars. It's a fringe benefit.

[dustinzgirl]

I was having a sort of argument with my hubby about something similar. I stated that sci fi has done more for modern science than he thinks, and while we aren't colonizing mars or the moon yet, I believe we could if we weren't so reliant on the concept of money, if Nasa and other nations had unlimited research and development capacity rather than being restricted by the amount of money they receive we would be on the moon by now. Its possible, scientifically, just not doable yet, monetarily.

[Amalthea]

I don't think it predicted epigenetics. I could be wrong. I haven't read every science fiction book out there.

[Teresa Edgerton]

Originally Posted by John Jarrold

Sigh. SF is not about prediction.

No, it's not about prediction, but since much is made of instances when it has made accurate predictions, I think it's interesting to reflect on developments nobody, including SF writers, ever dreamed of ... as well visions of the future that didn't come to pass. It's not a knock on science fiction, but it does give an idea of what our expectations were, 40, 50, or 60 years ago.

In my youth, most people believed that by the year 2000 practically everyone would be living in towering skyscrapers, driving air cars, waited on by robots, and running their households with wall-sized computers, which would also allow us to press a few buttons and produce a fully cooked dinner of synthesized food. (No, I'm not just thinking of The Jetsons.)

[JoanDrake]

Originally Posted by andrew.v.spencer

Nobody predicted my development of the snorkwrangler.

How dare you, I patented the snorkwrangler in 1952, under the pseudonym Tobias P. Augustipas.

It revolutionised the adult dwarf bondage industry.

I'd sue for copyright infringement, but it's since been declared illegal, and it's use a crime against nature, so that seems a little moot.

[Vladd67]

Seems a bit of a pointless argument. Science fiction is not futurism. You might as well ask why techno-thrillers never predicted 911.

It wasn't predicted perfectly though Tom Clancy did have a Japanese pilot crash a 747, I think, into the Capitol building killing the President and the Government in 1994

[Interference]

Science Fiction has failed to predict the political clout weilded by software dog-in-a-manger Microsoft and the unwarranted disrespect for open-source programming and operating systems. In that sense, yet again, Science Fiction has failed to factor human greed into its conjectures and propositions.

Originally Posted by Vladd67

It wasn't predicted perfectly though Tom Clancy did have a Japanese pilot crash a 747, I think, into the Capitol building killing the President and the Government in 1994

Also in an episode of Lone Gunmen, as noted elsewhere on these boards (I think), there was a terrorist hi-jacking of a plane - but in each of these cases, the writer failed to appreciate the epic grandeur of the assaults which were ultimately made, and the heightened level of disbelief that would still prevail, even this long after the event, allowing conspiracy theorists to theorise about their conspiracies.