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Mysticism vs. Science in Sci-Fi

October 2, 2009 by
2 Comments

Someone drew an article to my attention that explores the mystical and fantastic in recent sci-fi, and asks whether it is overtaking the scientific component, looking at the example of the recent movie 9.

I wonder if the “y” in SyFy (the new name of the Sci-Fi Channel) is from “mYsticism”…

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  • Interesting article, however those themes have been in fantasy and some SF for a long time. Star Trek did a number of episodes about "consciouness" being able to move out of the body. Most of the stories that talk about "souls" are usually more fantasy than SF. Although there has been a trend to blend fantasy and more mainstream stories, i.e "Dresden Files" and other "urban" fantasy. We had a fun panel on this at Diversicon 17 and came to the conclusion that Clarke's law sometimes make's telling fantasy from SF hard, depending on the author.

  • I am reacquainting myself with the work of Isaac Asimov and it confirms my memories of my youth reading science fiction: it was about science and its consequences. My current re-read, Robots of Dawn, explores the affects of alternate sexual mores, extended life span on scientific progress and, of course, the affects of artificial intelligence on human society. No room for oogity-boogity soul stuff here. Just science fiction.Although SF has largely written itself out, I still lament its passing.