This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | ← | Archive 5 | Archive 6 | Archive 7 |
Don't know why I didn't notice this long ago, but the "Science Fiction as a literary genre" section is getting wonky. I haven't managed to track it back to its origins, but seems to have been tendentious from the start, an excuse to inject one of Orson Scott Card's anti-literary-culture rants. Now it has attracted a contrary or refining section, and neither passage is a good match for the heading, which should be something more like "Science fiction as serious literature." (SF "as" a literary genre would be a discussion of how it fits into our understanding of genres, how it is distinct from neighboring genres, and so on.) This article does not seem to me to be the place for an argument over how "literary" SF is, particularly one that starts with Card's brand of undergraduate defensiveness. I'd say, relabel this and rework it, or work some of the material into the "Definitions" section, or just cut it. RLetson ( talk) 23:16, 18 September 2010 (UTC)
I'd still recommend a re-titling of the section, since the topic would seem to be the status of SF as literature or, to put it a better way, the literary status of SF. RLetson ( talk) 20:56, 24 September 2010 (UTC)
To my mind, The Handmaid's Tale, Oryx and Crake and now The Year of the Flood all
exemplify one of the things science fiction does, which is to extrapolate imaginatively from current trends and events to a near-future that's half prediction, half satire. But Margaret Atwood doesn't want any of her books to be called science fiction. In her recent, brilliant essay collection,Moving Targets, she says that everything that happens in her novels is possible and may even have already happened, so they can't be science fiction, which is "fiction in which things happen that are not possible today". This arbitrarily restrictive definition seems designed to protect her novels from being relegated to a genre still shunned by hidebound readers, reviewers and prize-awarders.
She doesn't want the literary bigots to shove her into the literary ghetto.
I agree with RLetson that this is probably best referenced in the 'definition of SF' section since Le G. herself makes the connection. ? Carey McCarthy ( talk) 11:18, 26 September 2010 (UTC)
If you look at the edit summary of the deletion you will see the word 'unsourced', which means that the editor in question thinks that you should have quoted some reliable source for the information which you added. As an encyclopedia, Wikipedia is not a place to add your own thoughts (original research); instead it is a place to use the works of others, preferably from a reliable source, to form a compedium of accepted knowlege.
If you think that you might want to continue editing and improving Wikipedia then you should consider registering as an editor, possibly under some pseudonym. This makes it easier for you to build up a reputation as a good editor, and also gives you access to a few other features.
One final point: when you write something on a 'discussion' page, it is considered good manners to sign your post by finishing with four tildes. This automatically adds your name or internet address and the date and time. Murray Langton ( talk) 23:17, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
I don't think this is right. It doesn't even seem to fit the definition given just prior -- the emphasis is on all those themes listed, not just action. Also, there's tremendous characterization. I've therefore removed it. Any thoughts?
The quote, for reference:
"Space opera is adventure science fiction set in outer space or on distant planets, where the emphasis is on action rather than either science or characterization. The conflict is heroic, and typically on a large scale. The best-selling science fiction book of all time[63] (with 12 million copies) is a space opera: Frank Herbert's Dune (1966), which sprawls over thousands of years, a multitude of planets in and beyond an Imperium, and themes as diverse as environmentalism and ecology, empires, religion and jihad, gender issues, and heroism."
- The Fwanksta ( talk) 06:57, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
At Sindinero's suggestion (see last paragraph of quoted dialogue below), I'm putting the issue of a disputed sentence up for discussion on the talk page. The issue arises under the "Fantasy" heading (one short paragraph). The issue is whether a quoted sentence by Frederick Jameson is accurate and clarifies the distinction between science fiction (SF) and fantasy. My position is that Jameson's statement is (1) in some aspects too ambiguous to convey any meaning, (2) is extremely inaccurate of "mode of production" and "historical materialism" are given the Marxian interpretations that Jameson, a Marxist theorist, seems to intend, (3) also inaccurate in it's asserting that religious content is a valid criterion for distinguishing between between SF and fantasy, (4) largely inaccurate in asserting that good-versus-evil is a valid criterion (although fantasy does have good-versus-evil plots oftener than SF does). The main issue is whether "mode of production" and "historical materialism"--or even just plain "materialism" (the Marxian opposite of Hegel's focus on nonmaterial ideas)--are defining characteristics of SF but are absent from fantasy.
Here, copied and pasted, is our dialogue (or you can go to my talk page to get it in more readable form):
My first concern is in exaggerating Jameson's importance as a critic; he's no Darko Suvin (not that I necessarily worship Darko' approaches either). Thus, is the prominent inclusion of this minor figure's ideologically-formed position giving undue emphasis to the opinion of somebody that the editors at Baen, Tor, Ace, DelRey, etc., to say nothing of the attendees at a WorldCon or the readers of Locus & NYRSF, neither seriously heed nor particularly respect? -- Orange Mike | Talk 17:24, 27 June 2011 (UTC)
"Paranormal abilities such as mind-reading, mind control, mental telepathy, telekinesis, and self-teleportation." I was curious as to what the implied distinction was between "mind-reading" and "mental telepathy," so I clicked the links. "Mind-reading" links to a page about stage magic. It seems inappropriate here. Also, "mental telepathy" is redundant; is there any other kind of telepathy? And the prefix in "self-teleportation" is unnecessary, as any form of teleportation should qualify as a paranormal ability. WaxTadpole ( talk) 20:56, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
I just massively revamped the Template:Science fiction, my largest effort at editing a somewhat well known page on WP. (most of my edits are to less trafficked pages). I have not begun to link it to all the articles it now contains. I do welcome feedback, and I will strive to not "own" this new version. If people feel some reverts are needed, I would understand (ouch!), but i would appreciate discussion at the template talk page, where i started the discussion a few days ago. at least one editor did encourage me to go forward, though they were not aware of exactly what i had planned. significant changes: no more links to categories (except 1, which i am planning to turn into a list, that being SF publishers), many links to smaller, less notable articles removed, and i added "works" and "people".This was fun, hope it shows. Mercurywoodrose ( talk) 09:03, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
That is a new one to me. Apparently sourced to an Orson Scott Card book... Puddytang ( talk) 03:01, 25 January 2012 (UTC)
...was royally screwed up. I've restored several threads and adjusted the archive template to work correctly now. However,
these threads have not been recovered. If they are important to the editors here, you may restore them to this page and let the bot archive for you.
⋙–Berean–Hunter—►
02:54, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
In the "Hard SF" subsection of the "Subgenres" section, should Asimov not be mentioned alongside the "working scientists" category, similar to Benford et al.? After all, while doubtlessly more prominent as an author, he was a biochemist, and held tenure at Boston University, for several years in a teaching capacity. FungusFromYuggoth ( talk) 21:44, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
I added the following under the subtitle of "criticism":
"
G. K. Chesterton wrote that "...this cult of the future is not only a weakness but a cowardice of the age...The modern mind is forced towards the future by a certain sense of fatigue, not unmixed with terror, with which it regards the past...it is a fear of the past; a fear not merely of the evil in the past, but of the good in the past also...so many...faiths we cannot hold; so many ...heroisms we cannot imitate; so many great efforts of monumental building or of military glory which seem to us at once sublime and pathetic. The future is a refuge from the fierce competition of our forefathers. The older generation, not the younger, is knocking at our door...It is pleasant to play with children, especially the unborn children. The future is a blank wall on which every man can write his own name as large as he likes; the past I find already covered with illegible scribbles, such as Plato, Isaiah, Shakespeare, Michael Angelo, Napoleon. I can make the future as narrow as myself; the past is obliged to be as broad and turbulent as humanity...[men] look forward with enthusiasm, because they are afraid to look back."(ref)
Chesterton, G. K. (1910). What's Wrong with the World. {{
cite book}}
: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors=
(
help)(endref)"
First, there is already criticism in the "serious literature" subsection, except that it has WP:UNDUE response from LeGuin.
Second, I suppose that the genre is too weak and unimportant, and its adherents too sensitive to be criticized. A detailed criticism of "Miss Midville 1996" might fall into that category, assuming she/it was otherwise notable. Just too lightweight to criticize. Is this the general opinion of all? Student7 ( talk) 19:53, 6 August 2012 (UTC)
Shouldn't we better make it "per language" section? It makes more sence to have sections such as "Francophone SF" or "Russophone SF", rather than a list of countries where the respective language is\was spoken. Also, this will fix a dillemmma of listing Quebec under "Europe". Garret Beaumain ( talk) 09:11, 30 November 2012 (UTC)
Hello, I'm working with OCLC, and we are algorithmically generating data about different Genres, like notable Authors, Book, Movies, Subjects, Characters and Places. We have determined that this Wikipedia page has a close affintity to our detected Genere of science-fiction. It might be useful to look at [3] for more information. Thanks. Maximilianklein ( talk) 23:45, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
The first line reads: "settings in the future, futuristic science and technology, space travel, parallel universes, aliens, and paranormal abilities". I know that the SyFy channel (formerly SciFi) includes the paranormal in their definition of "science fiction", but they also include wrestling, make up, and gameshows in their programming as well. The paranormal is supposed to lie outside the realm of science, as stated on its page: "designates experiences that lie outside 'the range of normal experience or scientific explanation'". As the Science Fiction page states: "Science fiction is largely based on writing rationally about alternative possible worlds or futures. ... within the context of the story, its imaginary elements are largely possible within scientifically established or scientifically postulated laws of nature." Thus, they are two completely different things. Mind control, mind reading, and telekinesis are technically impossible. If you were to explain these as technology, it makes sense, but as it is described here, no. I move that the reference to the paranormal be removed from the page, as it seems to be something more related to fantasy. Talvieno ( talk) 13:17, 24 December 2012 (UTC)
My section on SF poetry (there had been nothing about this in the entire article) was removed with a comment about "as before" (I don't know what "before" is being referred to), only one ref was used. What's wrong with one good ref? I've not seen a policy in Wikipedia that says we need two (three, four,??)refs for noncontroversial material. I specifically picked the most authoritative sources rather than loading up the ref section. Any-way, I actually used more than one source. In addition, I linked to at least two Wik articles dealing with SF poetry. For some-one with access to the great Clute and Nichols encyclopedia of SF, that could be used; There is also The Speculative Muse: An Introduction to Science Fiction Poetry by Eng. But I don't have access to either one, so I can't specifically quote them. To the person who reverted: if you don't agree, why not put a "ref wanted" tag on instead of ruthlessly cutting? Kdammers ( talk) 13:22, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
Not mentioned, but earlier than Twain comes Dickens' Christmas Carol which I rather imagine is the first major appearance of time travel — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.34.13.209 ( talk) 23:36, 25 February 2013 (UTC)
As it stands, this article's lead begins with: "Science fiction is a genre of fiction with imaginative but more or less plausible content such as settings in the future, futuristic science and technology, space travel, parallel universes, aliens, and paranormal abilities." I'm going to call the use of the phrase "more or less plausible" here. Many famous works of science fiction lie outside the realm of "more or less plausible"—the universe of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy being a prime example. I realize that many definitions of science fiction either implicitly or explicitly exclude works that are incredibly implausible. However, many definitions don't exclude works based on implausibility, as is evident by the fact that Hitchhiker's and other highly implausible works are widely considered to be science fiction.
So what I'm proposing is this: We take the phrase "more or less plausible" out of the opening sentence of the article. We then expand the lead's second paragraph to make clearer the fact that some definitions allow for implausibility, while others limit things to the "more or less plausible" realms of speculation. I think the "definition of science fiction" section could use a little expansion to touch on this, as currently it's just a couple of quotes by different authors strung together rather than actual encyclopedic text. (Erff. Not sure how to word that. What I meant was that the section shouldn't just be a few people's individual opinions on the definition of science fiction. Ideally, we'd find a reliable source that discusses different views on the definition of science fiction and maybe gives us an idea of how commonly these views are held.) Cymru.lass in America ( talk) 16:17, 19 June 2013 (UTC)
Rereading the "history" section, a few names seem to be out of place, notably:
Stanislaw Lem included in the same group of writers as Heinlein and Van Vogt.
Pohl mentioned as the editor who took Galaxy away from the Campbell model, rather than H. L Gold.
Poul Anderson included with Larry Niven. (Anderson came much earlier.)
Thoughts?
Rick Norwood ( talk) 12:46, 12 July 2013 (UTC)
I had previously placed Star Trek in the space western sub genre but now I'm not really sure if that's the right label for it. Time travel seems like a possible candidate but the thing is it doesn't always occur in the franchise. Any input would be appreciated. Please contact me on my talk page if you have the right label. Thanx.- Taeyebaar ( talk) 07:39, 12 July 2013 (UTC)
Well there isn't one here mentioned. I'll do some research and find sources on creating an article for a missing sub-genre clearly not mentioned on the list.- Taeyebaar ( talk) 02:12, 14 July 2013 (UTC)
Star Fleet is explicity not a military organization. It's mission is to explore, not to enter into conflicts. It is expressly forbidden to enter into conflicts; that is its prime directive. As for "action", while many episodes feature action, others don't. Measure of a Man comes to mind. Rick Norwood ( talk) 23:22, 15 July 2013 (UTC)
Duh! With the ability to change subject matters for every episode no series really belongs to just one sub genre. When they fix the warp drive (again) it's hard fiction, when they go on the holodeck it's cyberpunk, when they battle hostile aliens it's military sf, when they encounter odd cultures it's soft fiction,… (continue as you please) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.115.125.89 ( talk) 09:32, 28 November 2013 (UTC)
There seems to be a few issues that require community consensus. I don't think we can discuss so many issues on the various talk pages but because they're mentioned here on the sci-fi page I'd prefer to discuss here. There's been edit warring (both intentional and unintentional) without discussion. So I wanna go step by step.
Re:Smallville. I don't think this should be listed as a sci-fi TV show. I had a dispute with a user over this and I think is belongs under superhero fiction or science fantasy. I'd like some insight to this. All the movies regarding marvel and DC heroes go under super hero fiction, I can't seem understand how smallville is an exception since it's a superheros TV show, which have been listed under superhero fiction.
So can we please clear it up here?
-Since Smallville goes under science fiction/fantasy as you and the source stated, it's better placed under science fantasy, though i'd prefer superhero fiction. But I'll wait for other members to make an opinion 69.165.246.181 ( talk) 05:40, 10 March 2014 (UTC)
This section has some original research, unsourced, in poor English. Can I edit or delete it?
"Even though from the end of the Fifties science fiction became in Italy one of the mosto popular genres, its popular success is not followed by the critics success; in spite of an active and organized fandom we haven0t had, if not rarely, an authentic interest on the part of the Italian cultural élite, reluctant if not intolerant towards Sci-Fi" — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ultan42 ( talk • contribs) 13:10, 11 July 2014 (UTC)
This article is begging for a filled out lead section. Any suggestions if I were to start? Dontreadalone ( talk) 06:08, 27 July 2014 (UTC)
There's been a recent bit of back-and-forth about whether Doctor Who should be included in the "History" section. The justification for its exclusion, which is reasonable enough on its own terms, was that the rest of the paragraph was about North American science fiction television. But that paragraph sits oddly with the rest of the "History" section, which is otherwise entirely about literary science fiction. It's also odd to mention all those science fiction series of the 1990s and early 2000s when there's no mention of The Twilight Zone, The Outer Limits, or even the original Star Trek.
I suggest that the entire section, from "The television series Star Trek: The Next Generation..." to "a record later broken by Smallville" be removed, and instead a brief section be added to the article summarizing the history of science fiction on television, with a global perspective. A survey article like this shouldn't go into such specific details as naming particular direct-to-DVD Stargate films. (I do think that the " most successful sci-fi series" of all time deserves coverage beyond being an example of the time travel subgenre.)
I'm tempted to be bold and make this change right away, but it would probably be better to wait for some feedback from active editors of this page. Also, I'd like to work from good reliable sources instead of presenting what I assume to be "common knowledge" — can anyone recommend a particular source (perhaps a book) which presents a thorough overview of science fiction on television? — Josiah Rowe ( talk • contribs) 15:55, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
I think these are different themes and do not need to be merged. People also substitute these with space Opera which I think is wrong. Space Western, Sci-Fi Western, Space Frontier, Sci-Fi opera are all different themes I have not examined these pages yet, but Space Western and Space Frontier keep getting tagged as unverified. I think the sources need to be discussed here before they are tagged. If a user has a problem with the sources and tags the article, it has to be debated first. I'd prefer to hit 2 targets with one stone so let's discuss here only 69.165.246.181 ( talk) 23:51, 4 March 2014 (UTC)
So they all go under space opera? That cannot be. 69.165.246.181 ( talk) 00:41, 12 March 2014 (UTC)
In a footnote, we have Science Fiction at Large (ed. Peter Nichols). I can't find a reference to this work (It doesn't come up in Amazon and Worldcat isn't working for me now). If the title is correct, my guess is that the editor is probably Peter Nicholls. Kdammers ( talk) 10:56, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
@ Nadirali: — Regarding this edit: It would be preferable to add citations at the same time you add new information. That way, it won't get reverted (at least not as fast). Also, you might want to consider introducing your topic further on in the article; the "Definition" section is more of an overview, and the list of paranormal abilities is pretty generic. Adding narrow specifics that don't apply to the field in general should come later. — Gorthian ( talk) 03:53, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
Gorthian OK I will add it. And just to point out, all those paranormal abilities are practiced by force users, but I'll add the citation as you wish, not just for that article, but also sections on The Force article. I don't think expanding information on The Force for a section in this article is a good idea because that's not what it's about. I was just adding The Force as an example, which is good enough and as you requested, I will cite it.-- Nadirali نادرالی ( talk) 05:36, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
@ Taeyebaar: The term "space opera" has nothing to do with whether the fiction is "hard" or "soft". It is its own sub-genre. The name started out being pejorative—read the article Space opera—and the sentence you keep trying to move is not applicable to "soft" science fiction.— Gorthian ( talk) 05:05, 28 February 2016 (UTC)
@ Gorthian:, I did read it. You're the one who missed it. Check the article again, the subgenre can also be hard sci-fi or a mix of both. Examples and works are clearly given, so it is wrong to call it soft science fiction.-- Taeyebaar ( talk) 23:32, 29 February 2016 (UTC)
The term in that sentence means "space opera", not "soft science fiction". Yet you want to move that sentence from the "space opera" section to the "soft science fiction" section. Why?The term is sometimes used to describe improbable plots, absurd "science", and cardboard characters.
I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Science fiction's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.
Reference named "Hanson":
I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 20:24, 3 April 2016 (UTC)
I think the Definition section needs a complete rewrite. I don't think it is possible to separate sf from fantasy. Although a few works of "pure" sf could probably be clearly distinguished from fantasy, almost ALL sf written today contains contradictions to many of the known Laws of Physics (eg conservation of momentum, conservation of energy, speed of light) as well as being self-contradictory. I don't think it is USEFUL to use quotes from 40 or more years ago Knight?? to define the genre today. To my best understanding, the biggest difference between sf and (other) fantasy is that (most) sf avoids the use of (existence of) "personal" magic (Supernatural effects created by the mind, speech, writings, or gestures of a person (or animal)) AND attempts to apply any new/different physics consistently to the whole world/universe. Nanotechnology is a good example of sf. Virtually ALL nt written about today violates conservation of mass, energy, momentum Laws in a very physically inconsistent way (no waste heat generated when work is done, mass created from nothing, microscopic nanobots can create huge structures in seconds, etc.) and yet such a book would be labeled sf. Abitslow ( talk) 22:31, 23 February 2016 (UTC)
Fred Hoyle and
Carl Sagan wrote very carefully scientific fiction.
Isaac Asimov also was a professor of biology, and a prolific writer of more than science fiction.
Hoyle in particular had at least four novels, one of them a BBC TV series, that strictly eschewed the notion of faster-than-light travel or communication.
I suspect that all of them violated the now established existence of what Hoyle called the Big Bang, which he found incredible and had devised an alternative theory.
Perhaps the most radically plausible departure from prevailing popular scientific understanding was fictional experimentation with non-chemical living intelligences, starting with "The Black Cloud".
Hoyle also produced a collection of short fantasy and science fiction stories, the fantasy usually involving ancient mythology.
DaveyHume (
talk)
15:53, 16 April 2016 (UTC)
@ NadirAli: I reverted your edit because you removed a cited source and inserted a different source, with no explanation or discussion. Was there a reason you could not leave that source in place and add the new one? — Gorthian ( talk) 22:43, 16 May 2016 (UTC)
Some of these sub-genres are not sufficiently differentiated to include in the list. Specifically, Steampunk and Dieselpunk. I suggest Dieselpunk be mentioned under Steampunk, since the latter is the more common label. User talk:Hookandloop
To editor Hookandloop:, I agree. Derivatives should not be listed there, just we need to add the main subgenre and put a link to diriviates , like what I did with cyberpunk on the article.-- Taeyebar 01:13, 18 July 2016 (UTC)
Does anyone know where it is supposed to be linked? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.92.45.202 ( talk) 21:12, 29 July 2016 (UTC)
Which link? In the [ examples] section? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hookandloop ( talk • contribs) 22:45, 29 July 2016 (UTC)
Yes in the World-wide examples section. The link to American science fiction just redirects to the same article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.92.45.202 ( talk) 18:19, 4 August 2016 (UTC)
So I guess this is intended? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.92.45.202 ( talk) 19:04, 7 September 2016 (UTC)
Please contribute to these article drafts Maritime science fiction and List of maritime science fiction works-- Taeyebar 17:45, 11 October 2016 (UTC)
Alternate history seems to be just another fiction. Some other history that is not ours would be considered fiction, but is the scientific setting really different?-- Taeyebar 18:04, 11 October 2016 (UTC)
D Suvin - Science Fiction Studies, 1983 - JSTOR
Darko Suvin. La science-fiction victorienne, 1871-1885: l'émergence du sous-genre de l'uchronie.-L'année 1871 marque un soudain développement de la SF au Royaume-Uni, ouvrant une période de l'histoire du genre qui s' étend, selon les points de vue qu'on adopte, Kdammers ( talk) 10:28, 25 December 2016 (UTC)
I think alternate history is a genre of speculative fiction.Because alternate history is not about non-existent technology.Alternate history is about "what if" scenario.Not all alternate hisotry works are not about fictional technology.So that's why alternate history is a genre of speculative fiction. luaza1313 ( talk) 08:09, 26 December 2016 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 13 external links on Science fiction. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
{{
dead link}}
tag to
http://www.nvcc.edu/home/ataormina/scifi/history/When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
This message was posted before February 2018.
After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than
regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors
have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the
RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{
source check}}
(last update: 5 June 2024).
Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot ( Report bug) 17:44, 26 July 2017 (UTC)
@ NewYorkActuary: @ User17625: Being somewhat of an SF-fan, I rather side with User17625 description. Wormholes, for instance, are in line with General Relativity. Creating, or even finding one is pure science fiction, but that's the point. Good SF (Asomov, A.C. Clark) extrapolates science, but does not flatly contradict it. The fans would not stand for it. Kleuske ( talk) 00:49, 14 August 2017 (UTC)
At 07:33:42 on 2016-09-13 user NadirAli added a link to an image file at the very top of this article. The file was: BrainCloud-and-scientist_mango_concept-art_04.png and contained the caption:
While the scene depicted in the image definitely had a strong Science Fiction flavor to it, the Edit Summary comment for that version of this article contained no explanation as to why the image was added to this article(it was, in fact, a blank comment), and no text was ever added to this article referencing the image or explaining it's presence in this article. A Random image shouldn't be added to this article merely because it contains a scene or depicts materials of a science fiction nature, *unless* it is captioned with text explaining that it is being used as an example to depict a theme, technology, situation, trope, etc, etc, that is commonly used or seen in science fiction. Or that the image is included to further enhance or explain a section of this article and that the section in question references the image. The image should be germane to the section it which it is included. Furthermore, this image's particularly prominent position at the very top of the article requires that it should be an image that carries a very strong and unambiguous connection with the concept of Science Fiction in general. This particular image did not. In fact, the image that was added appeared to have been done so solely to promote or advertise a particular film or imaging technique or process. As such, the image's inclusion in this article is completely inappropriate and I plan to remove it in a few days unless someone can provide a very good reason for keeping it. Gcronau ( talk) 14:03, 14 April 2017 (UTC)
I've been making some changes, but mostly just for style. I haven't been adding material, or taking out very much. Please let me know, or just change things back, if anyone disagrees. PopSci ( talk) 20:13, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
There is another article Sense of wonder which is about an important aspect of science fiction. I'm suggesting that it be merged here so that readers interested in science fiction would be able to read it here. There is also an article Wonder (emotion) on the general topic of wonder. PopSci ( talk) 04:43, 7 November 2017 (UTC)
There is an article on Christian science fiction. Would there be a problem adding it to the list of sub-genres? PopSci ( talk) 17:09, 7 November 2017 (UTC)
There is an article Future history, but it is really an essay and mostly unsourced. Should we mention and link it somewhere in this article? PopSci ( talk) 16:45, 16 November 2017 (UTC)
I'm removing this, put it back if you disagree. Its own article Supernatural fiction is very short and is tagged for lack of sources. Also it does not really seem to be its own genre, but a label put on several of the genres that already have their own sections. PopSci ( talk) 22:13, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
How about a section on the influence of science fiction on culture and society? WildWookiee ( talk) 05:18, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
The history section is mainly focused on books. What do you think of a subsection of that for the history of SF in film and TV? WildWookiee ( talk) 16:48, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
There are a few mentions of video games in the article. Should we have a section for them? I'm kind of reluctant since I'm sure every aspect or subgenre of SF has at least one video game. To me they are not "fiction" and probably shouldn't be in the article at all, but I'm kind of old-school. PopSci ( talk) 15:05, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
That would make sense to me. I'm going to give it a try. PopSci ( talk) 22:59, 22 December 2017 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 5 external links on Science fiction. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
This message was posted before February 2018.
After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than
regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors
have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the
RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{
source check}}
(last update: 5 June 2024).
Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot ( Report bug) 23:52, 22 December 2017 (UTC)
I am concerned that the increase (seemingly) in subgenres may include original research by editors rather than being correctly cited from reliable sources. I don't have time at the moment to check all the subgenres and their sources to see that the sources explicitly state the name of the subgenre. If no explicit subgenre name is available and defined that the subgenre should not exist in this article. Just a concern. I will most likely, due to time pressures, depend on other editors to do this checking but thought I would flag up my concern. Thanks Robynthehode ( talk) 14:38, 5 December 2017 (UTC)
Steampunk, although I am not an expert on it, seems to be as much an artistic and cultural movement as a genre of literature. SF itself has these same aspects (for instance art and fashion) but we don't go into those in this article. Since we are not talking about those aspects of SF here should we even have a section for Steampunk? PopSci ( talk) 00:16, 23 December 2017 (UTC)
I had been thinking about a section for Comic science fiction. One problem is that the "main article" is so poor. (I have just redirected it to List of comic science fiction - which I also added to the See Also section here- but that might not hold up.) Another is that, well, there is comedy about just about everything so how is comic SF so remarkable? Also bookstores do not have a separate section for comic SF. There are some good examples, probably Discworld being the most famous. Besides a lot of space opera is really comedy. Certainly the original Star Wars movies had a lot of comedy, even Star Trek. PopSci ( talk) 16:28, 28 December 2017 (UTC)
I took out Space Western from the list of sub-genres. It is really very minor. Check out its article and you can see how few examples there really are. 2601:648:8000:9CF0:948B:4333:15D4:C385 ( talk) 16:49, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
Why was this done? It looks quite de-graded. Many explanatory images that were added have now been removed and added with bad quality, mostly recycled images, also in a "decorative" magazine style. For what reason has this been done?-- NadirAli نادر علی ( talk) 16:59, 15 November 2017 (UTC)
These are not necessarily science fiction. They simply indicate positive/negative aspects of society which may or may not occur in a science fiction. I'd recommend a search for them so people can see for themselves. I'll even add a list of examples in the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Posuydon ( talk • contribs) 23:45, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
I suggested in a previous thread that these to topics be placed in a new section called "related topics". There's nothing in these two sections and their "main articles" to suggest that they constitute genres. They seem more like topics related to science fiction, but not "subgenres". Mind you I don't refer to the "related genres" section to place them in as there's nothing here to indicate that they are indeed genres, just topics related to science fiction and it's main family tree, speculative fiction (which science fiction is a branch of as stated in the intro) I'd appreciate some feedback while I'm away for the time being. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Posuydon ( talk • contribs) 22:56, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
Someone suggested earlier to move the sub-genres and related genres lists to the end of the article. That makes more sense to me, both because it slow down readers and it might send them off to other articles before they had finished this one. WildWookiee ( talk) 16:39, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
Here is a source which says that Historical fiction and SF are related genres: Future Perfect: American Science Fiction of the Nineteenth Century: An Anthology, Howard Bruce Franklin, Rutgers University Press, 1995, pages 7-8 PopSci ( talk) 13:34, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
@ PopSci When making such a large series of edits, especially when you are removing content it is a good idea to apply the Template:In_use template. It helps those of us checking the recent changes page to not jump all over large changes. :) Zchrykng ( talk) 17:57, 26 April 2018 (UTC)
Even though this has an article is it really a sub-genre of SF? Other political ideologies do not and they are also sometimes expressed in SF stories. Does that really create a sub-genre? Should we have "communist SF", "socialist SF", "democratic SF", etc? PopSci ( talk) 02:31, 19 November 2017 (UTC)
The introduction's classification doesn't match with the sub genres, some sub-genres are very small (cli-fi), mundane seems to be a sub sub genre, Alternate history is classified as a related genre but we have steampunk and diesel punk as a sub genre, some are not sub genres but presentations ( Opera, films), some are not precise or too precise(Star Wars is both a Space Western and a space opera), we keep on getting requests for new ones, Some are cultures (Black science fiction), we also have hard and soft science fiction as a category but we don't explain how they link to subgenre. So I looked around to find some taxonomies Amazon has one Amazon and /info/en/?search=Category:Science_fiction_genres and /info/en/?search=Category:Science_fiction_by_genre and /info/en/?search=Outline_of_science_fiction. Wakelamp ( talk) 13:51, 5 December 2017 (UTC)
boxed [d]efinitions of science fiction are not so much a series of logical approximations to an elusive ideal, as a small, parasitic subgenre in themselves." Parrinder, Patrick (1980). Science Fiction: Its Criticism and Teaching. London: New Accents.
in 1926 , in what is considered the "pulp era" Amazing Stories magazine suggested SF was "a charming romance intermingled with scientific fact and prophetic vision... Not only do these amazing tales make tremendously interesting reading—they are always instructive. They supply knowledge... in a very palatable form"[3][4], In the "golden age, the instructive and romantic was not enough. Stories were that if they were to "contain a miracle, it ought at least not to contain a whole arsenal of them.", " the reaction of human beings to changes in science and technology"[Asimov] was important, as was a thorough understanding of the nature and significance of the scientific method."[Heinlien], and Galaxy magazines Focus on "not on the adventurer, the inventor, the engineer, or the scientist, but on the average citizen,"[Gunn, James. "Alternate Worlds: 1949–1965", in Alternate Worlds. The Illustrated History of Science Fiction (N.J.:Prentice-Hall, 1975) - stolen from New Wave article]
The "New wave" of the 1960s and 1970 expanded on the Galaxy definition, Now "there are no easily delineated limits to science fiction." {ldR], and now "the one field that reached out and embraced every sector of the human imagination, every endeavor, every idea, every technological development, and every dream." (bradbury 1974)
What changes do people want to this section Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 12:41, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
A possible suggestion is to mention world events that had an impact on SF. For instance the end of World War Two including the atom bomb, the exposure of the Holocaust, and establishment of the United Nations. The flying saucer craze of the 1950s. Sputnik and the space race and Apollo. The Vietnam War and the popularity of drugs. The fall of the USSR and (for most people) of Marxist theories of the future. The Internet and the information revolution. I personally like the way the section is now with readers' knowledge of these things being assumed. PopSci ( talk) 18:30, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
What changes do people want to this section Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 12:42, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
What changes do people want to this section Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 12:45, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
Look if we need more white space to avoid WP:CLUTTER so be it. Spacing out and intersecting sections and subsections if needed only improves the qualify of the articles, not deteriorates it.-- NadirAli نادر علی ( talk) 04:57, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
"A famous Hard SF book is Mission_OF_gravity, but the criticism of it seems to be on the lack of characterisation"
This is a frequent criticism on hard science fiction in general, as the writers of this genre often de-emphasize proper characterization in favor of the technology and science concepts they have in mind. See here: http://bestsciencefictionbooks.com/hard-science-fiction.php
I think the hard and soft science fiction no longer deserves a separate section as its original meaning was the pejorative distinction between hard and soft science. This article giving the views of modern SF writers is quite negative about it [7]. The SF encyclopedia people are also lukewarm about it and think it is about author self promotion, fans, right wing agendas,and knocking soft science.. [8] Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 12:30, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
: There seems to be some cite errors, but I don't know what causes them and how to fix them Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 14:17, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
This is the project plan for Science fiction. Please feel free to make suggestions.
What changes do people want to this section Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 12:43, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
So to make it B class I think we need some interesting illustrations. Which ones do people like and dislike. What areas needs more illustration! Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 04:03, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
This sentence doesn't match up with the history "Historically, science-fiction stories have had a grounding in actual science, but now this is only expected of hard science fiction". Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 08:42, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
{{u|
zchrykng}} {
T|
C}
15:18, 9 May 2018 (UTC)
There is an article on Definition of science fiction. IMO some of the quotes there are better than some that are used here. PopSci ( talk) 14:37, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
What changes do people want to this section Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 12:42, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
I'm concerned that this section is basically rife for WP:FANCRUFT - it's basically just a list of authors who the editors think belong in that category at this point and there's no citations. I mean it's common knowledge that Isaac Asimov is considered a hard SF author, but there's got to be a WP:RS somewhere, right? I'm very tempted to restructure this to focus more on the social and cultural queues that led to the subgenre split between "hard" and "soft" and do away with the lists altogether. But in case this is retreading old ground I thought it prudent to check here first. Simonm223 ( talk) 19:45, 22 August 2018 (UTC)
i think we need purge out of the article most of the definition debate to Definitions_of_science_fiction. Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 15:23, 14 January 2020 (UTC) Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 15:30, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
The Template:Science fiction is very different from the article. What should we do? Outline Sub genres Cultures - miscellaneous - region - awards --Multimedia -- cinematic -- literary art audio Media - literature - stage - film - Television Themes -Applied -Formal -Life -Physical -social Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 14:13, 13 May 2018 (UTC)
What is this trying to accomplish? The list is hardly exhaustive and is unlikely to be representative of any accepted list of genre defining games. This seems like a good place for a link to another article exploring this topic in more depth. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.176.196.206 ( talk) 12:28, 19 September 2018 (UTC)
This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | ← | Archive 5 | Archive 6 | Archive 7 |
Don't know why I didn't notice this long ago, but the "Science Fiction as a literary genre" section is getting wonky. I haven't managed to track it back to its origins, but seems to have been tendentious from the start, an excuse to inject one of Orson Scott Card's anti-literary-culture rants. Now it has attracted a contrary or refining section, and neither passage is a good match for the heading, which should be something more like "Science fiction as serious literature." (SF "as" a literary genre would be a discussion of how it fits into our understanding of genres, how it is distinct from neighboring genres, and so on.) This article does not seem to me to be the place for an argument over how "literary" SF is, particularly one that starts with Card's brand of undergraduate defensiveness. I'd say, relabel this and rework it, or work some of the material into the "Definitions" section, or just cut it. RLetson ( talk) 23:16, 18 September 2010 (UTC)
I'd still recommend a re-titling of the section, since the topic would seem to be the status of SF as literature or, to put it a better way, the literary status of SF. RLetson ( talk) 20:56, 24 September 2010 (UTC)
To my mind, The Handmaid's Tale, Oryx and Crake and now The Year of the Flood all
exemplify one of the things science fiction does, which is to extrapolate imaginatively from current trends and events to a near-future that's half prediction, half satire. But Margaret Atwood doesn't want any of her books to be called science fiction. In her recent, brilliant essay collection,Moving Targets, she says that everything that happens in her novels is possible and may even have already happened, so they can't be science fiction, which is "fiction in which things happen that are not possible today". This arbitrarily restrictive definition seems designed to protect her novels from being relegated to a genre still shunned by hidebound readers, reviewers and prize-awarders.
She doesn't want the literary bigots to shove her into the literary ghetto.
I agree with RLetson that this is probably best referenced in the 'definition of SF' section since Le G. herself makes the connection. ? Carey McCarthy ( talk) 11:18, 26 September 2010 (UTC)
If you look at the edit summary of the deletion you will see the word 'unsourced', which means that the editor in question thinks that you should have quoted some reliable source for the information which you added. As an encyclopedia, Wikipedia is not a place to add your own thoughts (original research); instead it is a place to use the works of others, preferably from a reliable source, to form a compedium of accepted knowlege.
If you think that you might want to continue editing and improving Wikipedia then you should consider registering as an editor, possibly under some pseudonym. This makes it easier for you to build up a reputation as a good editor, and also gives you access to a few other features.
One final point: when you write something on a 'discussion' page, it is considered good manners to sign your post by finishing with four tildes. This automatically adds your name or internet address and the date and time. Murray Langton ( talk) 23:17, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
I don't think this is right. It doesn't even seem to fit the definition given just prior -- the emphasis is on all those themes listed, not just action. Also, there's tremendous characterization. I've therefore removed it. Any thoughts?
The quote, for reference:
"Space opera is adventure science fiction set in outer space or on distant planets, where the emphasis is on action rather than either science or characterization. The conflict is heroic, and typically on a large scale. The best-selling science fiction book of all time[63] (with 12 million copies) is a space opera: Frank Herbert's Dune (1966), which sprawls over thousands of years, a multitude of planets in and beyond an Imperium, and themes as diverse as environmentalism and ecology, empires, religion and jihad, gender issues, and heroism."
- The Fwanksta ( talk) 06:57, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
At Sindinero's suggestion (see last paragraph of quoted dialogue below), I'm putting the issue of a disputed sentence up for discussion on the talk page. The issue arises under the "Fantasy" heading (one short paragraph). The issue is whether a quoted sentence by Frederick Jameson is accurate and clarifies the distinction between science fiction (SF) and fantasy. My position is that Jameson's statement is (1) in some aspects too ambiguous to convey any meaning, (2) is extremely inaccurate of "mode of production" and "historical materialism" are given the Marxian interpretations that Jameson, a Marxist theorist, seems to intend, (3) also inaccurate in it's asserting that religious content is a valid criterion for distinguishing between between SF and fantasy, (4) largely inaccurate in asserting that good-versus-evil is a valid criterion (although fantasy does have good-versus-evil plots oftener than SF does). The main issue is whether "mode of production" and "historical materialism"--or even just plain "materialism" (the Marxian opposite of Hegel's focus on nonmaterial ideas)--are defining characteristics of SF but are absent from fantasy.
Here, copied and pasted, is our dialogue (or you can go to my talk page to get it in more readable form):
My first concern is in exaggerating Jameson's importance as a critic; he's no Darko Suvin (not that I necessarily worship Darko' approaches either). Thus, is the prominent inclusion of this minor figure's ideologically-formed position giving undue emphasis to the opinion of somebody that the editors at Baen, Tor, Ace, DelRey, etc., to say nothing of the attendees at a WorldCon or the readers of Locus & NYRSF, neither seriously heed nor particularly respect? -- Orange Mike | Talk 17:24, 27 June 2011 (UTC)
"Paranormal abilities such as mind-reading, mind control, mental telepathy, telekinesis, and self-teleportation." I was curious as to what the implied distinction was between "mind-reading" and "mental telepathy," so I clicked the links. "Mind-reading" links to a page about stage magic. It seems inappropriate here. Also, "mental telepathy" is redundant; is there any other kind of telepathy? And the prefix in "self-teleportation" is unnecessary, as any form of teleportation should qualify as a paranormal ability. WaxTadpole ( talk) 20:56, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
I just massively revamped the Template:Science fiction, my largest effort at editing a somewhat well known page on WP. (most of my edits are to less trafficked pages). I have not begun to link it to all the articles it now contains. I do welcome feedback, and I will strive to not "own" this new version. If people feel some reverts are needed, I would understand (ouch!), but i would appreciate discussion at the template talk page, where i started the discussion a few days ago. at least one editor did encourage me to go forward, though they were not aware of exactly what i had planned. significant changes: no more links to categories (except 1, which i am planning to turn into a list, that being SF publishers), many links to smaller, less notable articles removed, and i added "works" and "people".This was fun, hope it shows. Mercurywoodrose ( talk) 09:03, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
That is a new one to me. Apparently sourced to an Orson Scott Card book... Puddytang ( talk) 03:01, 25 January 2012 (UTC)
...was royally screwed up. I've restored several threads and adjusted the archive template to work correctly now. However,
these threads have not been recovered. If they are important to the editors here, you may restore them to this page and let the bot archive for you.
⋙–Berean–Hunter—►
02:54, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
In the "Hard SF" subsection of the "Subgenres" section, should Asimov not be mentioned alongside the "working scientists" category, similar to Benford et al.? After all, while doubtlessly more prominent as an author, he was a biochemist, and held tenure at Boston University, for several years in a teaching capacity. FungusFromYuggoth ( talk) 21:44, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
I added the following under the subtitle of "criticism":
"
G. K. Chesterton wrote that "...this cult of the future is not only a weakness but a cowardice of the age...The modern mind is forced towards the future by a certain sense of fatigue, not unmixed with terror, with which it regards the past...it is a fear of the past; a fear not merely of the evil in the past, but of the good in the past also...so many...faiths we cannot hold; so many ...heroisms we cannot imitate; so many great efforts of monumental building or of military glory which seem to us at once sublime and pathetic. The future is a refuge from the fierce competition of our forefathers. The older generation, not the younger, is knocking at our door...It is pleasant to play with children, especially the unborn children. The future is a blank wall on which every man can write his own name as large as he likes; the past I find already covered with illegible scribbles, such as Plato, Isaiah, Shakespeare, Michael Angelo, Napoleon. I can make the future as narrow as myself; the past is obliged to be as broad and turbulent as humanity...[men] look forward with enthusiasm, because they are afraid to look back."(ref)
Chesterton, G. K. (1910). What's Wrong with the World. {{
cite book}}
: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors=
(
help)(endref)"
First, there is already criticism in the "serious literature" subsection, except that it has WP:UNDUE response from LeGuin.
Second, I suppose that the genre is too weak and unimportant, and its adherents too sensitive to be criticized. A detailed criticism of "Miss Midville 1996" might fall into that category, assuming she/it was otherwise notable. Just too lightweight to criticize. Is this the general opinion of all? Student7 ( talk) 19:53, 6 August 2012 (UTC)
Shouldn't we better make it "per language" section? It makes more sence to have sections such as "Francophone SF" or "Russophone SF", rather than a list of countries where the respective language is\was spoken. Also, this will fix a dillemmma of listing Quebec under "Europe". Garret Beaumain ( talk) 09:11, 30 November 2012 (UTC)
Hello, I'm working with OCLC, and we are algorithmically generating data about different Genres, like notable Authors, Book, Movies, Subjects, Characters and Places. We have determined that this Wikipedia page has a close affintity to our detected Genere of science-fiction. It might be useful to look at [3] for more information. Thanks. Maximilianklein ( talk) 23:45, 5 December 2012 (UTC)
The first line reads: "settings in the future, futuristic science and technology, space travel, parallel universes, aliens, and paranormal abilities". I know that the SyFy channel (formerly SciFi) includes the paranormal in their definition of "science fiction", but they also include wrestling, make up, and gameshows in their programming as well. The paranormal is supposed to lie outside the realm of science, as stated on its page: "designates experiences that lie outside 'the range of normal experience or scientific explanation'". As the Science Fiction page states: "Science fiction is largely based on writing rationally about alternative possible worlds or futures. ... within the context of the story, its imaginary elements are largely possible within scientifically established or scientifically postulated laws of nature." Thus, they are two completely different things. Mind control, mind reading, and telekinesis are technically impossible. If you were to explain these as technology, it makes sense, but as it is described here, no. I move that the reference to the paranormal be removed from the page, as it seems to be something more related to fantasy. Talvieno ( talk) 13:17, 24 December 2012 (UTC)
My section on SF poetry (there had been nothing about this in the entire article) was removed with a comment about "as before" (I don't know what "before" is being referred to), only one ref was used. What's wrong with one good ref? I've not seen a policy in Wikipedia that says we need two (three, four,??)refs for noncontroversial material. I specifically picked the most authoritative sources rather than loading up the ref section. Any-way, I actually used more than one source. In addition, I linked to at least two Wik articles dealing with SF poetry. For some-one with access to the great Clute and Nichols encyclopedia of SF, that could be used; There is also The Speculative Muse: An Introduction to Science Fiction Poetry by Eng. But I don't have access to either one, so I can't specifically quote them. To the person who reverted: if you don't agree, why not put a "ref wanted" tag on instead of ruthlessly cutting? Kdammers ( talk) 13:22, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
Not mentioned, but earlier than Twain comes Dickens' Christmas Carol which I rather imagine is the first major appearance of time travel — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.34.13.209 ( talk) 23:36, 25 February 2013 (UTC)
As it stands, this article's lead begins with: "Science fiction is a genre of fiction with imaginative but more or less plausible content such as settings in the future, futuristic science and technology, space travel, parallel universes, aliens, and paranormal abilities." I'm going to call the use of the phrase "more or less plausible" here. Many famous works of science fiction lie outside the realm of "more or less plausible"—the universe of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy being a prime example. I realize that many definitions of science fiction either implicitly or explicitly exclude works that are incredibly implausible. However, many definitions don't exclude works based on implausibility, as is evident by the fact that Hitchhiker's and other highly implausible works are widely considered to be science fiction.
So what I'm proposing is this: We take the phrase "more or less plausible" out of the opening sentence of the article. We then expand the lead's second paragraph to make clearer the fact that some definitions allow for implausibility, while others limit things to the "more or less plausible" realms of speculation. I think the "definition of science fiction" section could use a little expansion to touch on this, as currently it's just a couple of quotes by different authors strung together rather than actual encyclopedic text. (Erff. Not sure how to word that. What I meant was that the section shouldn't just be a few people's individual opinions on the definition of science fiction. Ideally, we'd find a reliable source that discusses different views on the definition of science fiction and maybe gives us an idea of how commonly these views are held.) Cymru.lass in America ( talk) 16:17, 19 June 2013 (UTC)
Rereading the "history" section, a few names seem to be out of place, notably:
Stanislaw Lem included in the same group of writers as Heinlein and Van Vogt.
Pohl mentioned as the editor who took Galaxy away from the Campbell model, rather than H. L Gold.
Poul Anderson included with Larry Niven. (Anderson came much earlier.)
Thoughts?
Rick Norwood ( talk) 12:46, 12 July 2013 (UTC)
I had previously placed Star Trek in the space western sub genre but now I'm not really sure if that's the right label for it. Time travel seems like a possible candidate but the thing is it doesn't always occur in the franchise. Any input would be appreciated. Please contact me on my talk page if you have the right label. Thanx.- Taeyebaar ( talk) 07:39, 12 July 2013 (UTC)
Well there isn't one here mentioned. I'll do some research and find sources on creating an article for a missing sub-genre clearly not mentioned on the list.- Taeyebaar ( talk) 02:12, 14 July 2013 (UTC)
Star Fleet is explicity not a military organization. It's mission is to explore, not to enter into conflicts. It is expressly forbidden to enter into conflicts; that is its prime directive. As for "action", while many episodes feature action, others don't. Measure of a Man comes to mind. Rick Norwood ( talk) 23:22, 15 July 2013 (UTC)
Duh! With the ability to change subject matters for every episode no series really belongs to just one sub genre. When they fix the warp drive (again) it's hard fiction, when they go on the holodeck it's cyberpunk, when they battle hostile aliens it's military sf, when they encounter odd cultures it's soft fiction,… (continue as you please) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.115.125.89 ( talk) 09:32, 28 November 2013 (UTC)
There seems to be a few issues that require community consensus. I don't think we can discuss so many issues on the various talk pages but because they're mentioned here on the sci-fi page I'd prefer to discuss here. There's been edit warring (both intentional and unintentional) without discussion. So I wanna go step by step.
Re:Smallville. I don't think this should be listed as a sci-fi TV show. I had a dispute with a user over this and I think is belongs under superhero fiction or science fantasy. I'd like some insight to this. All the movies regarding marvel and DC heroes go under super hero fiction, I can't seem understand how smallville is an exception since it's a superheros TV show, which have been listed under superhero fiction.
So can we please clear it up here?
-Since Smallville goes under science fiction/fantasy as you and the source stated, it's better placed under science fantasy, though i'd prefer superhero fiction. But I'll wait for other members to make an opinion 69.165.246.181 ( talk) 05:40, 10 March 2014 (UTC)
This section has some original research, unsourced, in poor English. Can I edit or delete it?
"Even though from the end of the Fifties science fiction became in Italy one of the mosto popular genres, its popular success is not followed by the critics success; in spite of an active and organized fandom we haven0t had, if not rarely, an authentic interest on the part of the Italian cultural élite, reluctant if not intolerant towards Sci-Fi" — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ultan42 ( talk • contribs) 13:10, 11 July 2014 (UTC)
This article is begging for a filled out lead section. Any suggestions if I were to start? Dontreadalone ( talk) 06:08, 27 July 2014 (UTC)
There's been a recent bit of back-and-forth about whether Doctor Who should be included in the "History" section. The justification for its exclusion, which is reasonable enough on its own terms, was that the rest of the paragraph was about North American science fiction television. But that paragraph sits oddly with the rest of the "History" section, which is otherwise entirely about literary science fiction. It's also odd to mention all those science fiction series of the 1990s and early 2000s when there's no mention of The Twilight Zone, The Outer Limits, or even the original Star Trek.
I suggest that the entire section, from "The television series Star Trek: The Next Generation..." to "a record later broken by Smallville" be removed, and instead a brief section be added to the article summarizing the history of science fiction on television, with a global perspective. A survey article like this shouldn't go into such specific details as naming particular direct-to-DVD Stargate films. (I do think that the " most successful sci-fi series" of all time deserves coverage beyond being an example of the time travel subgenre.)
I'm tempted to be bold and make this change right away, but it would probably be better to wait for some feedback from active editors of this page. Also, I'd like to work from good reliable sources instead of presenting what I assume to be "common knowledge" — can anyone recommend a particular source (perhaps a book) which presents a thorough overview of science fiction on television? — Josiah Rowe ( talk • contribs) 15:55, 9 September 2014 (UTC)
I think these are different themes and do not need to be merged. People also substitute these with space Opera which I think is wrong. Space Western, Sci-Fi Western, Space Frontier, Sci-Fi opera are all different themes I have not examined these pages yet, but Space Western and Space Frontier keep getting tagged as unverified. I think the sources need to be discussed here before they are tagged. If a user has a problem with the sources and tags the article, it has to be debated first. I'd prefer to hit 2 targets with one stone so let's discuss here only 69.165.246.181 ( talk) 23:51, 4 March 2014 (UTC)
So they all go under space opera? That cannot be. 69.165.246.181 ( talk) 00:41, 12 March 2014 (UTC)
In a footnote, we have Science Fiction at Large (ed. Peter Nichols). I can't find a reference to this work (It doesn't come up in Amazon and Worldcat isn't working for me now). If the title is correct, my guess is that the editor is probably Peter Nicholls. Kdammers ( talk) 10:56, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
@ Nadirali: — Regarding this edit: It would be preferable to add citations at the same time you add new information. That way, it won't get reverted (at least not as fast). Also, you might want to consider introducing your topic further on in the article; the "Definition" section is more of an overview, and the list of paranormal abilities is pretty generic. Adding narrow specifics that don't apply to the field in general should come later. — Gorthian ( talk) 03:53, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
Gorthian OK I will add it. And just to point out, all those paranormal abilities are practiced by force users, but I'll add the citation as you wish, not just for that article, but also sections on The Force article. I don't think expanding information on The Force for a section in this article is a good idea because that's not what it's about. I was just adding The Force as an example, which is good enough and as you requested, I will cite it.-- Nadirali نادرالی ( talk) 05:36, 28 December 2015 (UTC)
@ Taeyebaar: The term "space opera" has nothing to do with whether the fiction is "hard" or "soft". It is its own sub-genre. The name started out being pejorative—read the article Space opera—and the sentence you keep trying to move is not applicable to "soft" science fiction.— Gorthian ( talk) 05:05, 28 February 2016 (UTC)
@ Gorthian:, I did read it. You're the one who missed it. Check the article again, the subgenre can also be hard sci-fi or a mix of both. Examples and works are clearly given, so it is wrong to call it soft science fiction.-- Taeyebaar ( talk) 23:32, 29 February 2016 (UTC)
The term in that sentence means "space opera", not "soft science fiction". Yet you want to move that sentence from the "space opera" section to the "soft science fiction" section. Why?The term is sometimes used to describe improbable plots, absurd "science", and cardboard characters.
I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Science fiction's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.
Reference named "Hanson":
I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 20:24, 3 April 2016 (UTC)
I think the Definition section needs a complete rewrite. I don't think it is possible to separate sf from fantasy. Although a few works of "pure" sf could probably be clearly distinguished from fantasy, almost ALL sf written today contains contradictions to many of the known Laws of Physics (eg conservation of momentum, conservation of energy, speed of light) as well as being self-contradictory. I don't think it is USEFUL to use quotes from 40 or more years ago Knight?? to define the genre today. To my best understanding, the biggest difference between sf and (other) fantasy is that (most) sf avoids the use of (existence of) "personal" magic (Supernatural effects created by the mind, speech, writings, or gestures of a person (or animal)) AND attempts to apply any new/different physics consistently to the whole world/universe. Nanotechnology is a good example of sf. Virtually ALL nt written about today violates conservation of mass, energy, momentum Laws in a very physically inconsistent way (no waste heat generated when work is done, mass created from nothing, microscopic nanobots can create huge structures in seconds, etc.) and yet such a book would be labeled sf. Abitslow ( talk) 22:31, 23 February 2016 (UTC)
Fred Hoyle and
Carl Sagan wrote very carefully scientific fiction.
Isaac Asimov also was a professor of biology, and a prolific writer of more than science fiction.
Hoyle in particular had at least four novels, one of them a BBC TV series, that strictly eschewed the notion of faster-than-light travel or communication.
I suspect that all of them violated the now established existence of what Hoyle called the Big Bang, which he found incredible and had devised an alternative theory.
Perhaps the most radically plausible departure from prevailing popular scientific understanding was fictional experimentation with non-chemical living intelligences, starting with "The Black Cloud".
Hoyle also produced a collection of short fantasy and science fiction stories, the fantasy usually involving ancient mythology.
DaveyHume (
talk)
15:53, 16 April 2016 (UTC)
@ NadirAli: I reverted your edit because you removed a cited source and inserted a different source, with no explanation or discussion. Was there a reason you could not leave that source in place and add the new one? — Gorthian ( talk) 22:43, 16 May 2016 (UTC)
Some of these sub-genres are not sufficiently differentiated to include in the list. Specifically, Steampunk and Dieselpunk. I suggest Dieselpunk be mentioned under Steampunk, since the latter is the more common label. User talk:Hookandloop
To editor Hookandloop:, I agree. Derivatives should not be listed there, just we need to add the main subgenre and put a link to diriviates , like what I did with cyberpunk on the article.-- Taeyebar 01:13, 18 July 2016 (UTC)
Does anyone know where it is supposed to be linked? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.92.45.202 ( talk) 21:12, 29 July 2016 (UTC)
Which link? In the [ examples] section? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hookandloop ( talk • contribs) 22:45, 29 July 2016 (UTC)
Yes in the World-wide examples section. The link to American science fiction just redirects to the same article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.92.45.202 ( talk) 18:19, 4 August 2016 (UTC)
So I guess this is intended? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.92.45.202 ( talk) 19:04, 7 September 2016 (UTC)
Please contribute to these article drafts Maritime science fiction and List of maritime science fiction works-- Taeyebar 17:45, 11 October 2016 (UTC)
Alternate history seems to be just another fiction. Some other history that is not ours would be considered fiction, but is the scientific setting really different?-- Taeyebar 18:04, 11 October 2016 (UTC)
D Suvin - Science Fiction Studies, 1983 - JSTOR
Darko Suvin. La science-fiction victorienne, 1871-1885: l'émergence du sous-genre de l'uchronie.-L'année 1871 marque un soudain développement de la SF au Royaume-Uni, ouvrant une période de l'histoire du genre qui s' étend, selon les points de vue qu'on adopte, Kdammers ( talk) 10:28, 25 December 2016 (UTC)
I think alternate history is a genre of speculative fiction.Because alternate history is not about non-existent technology.Alternate history is about "what if" scenario.Not all alternate hisotry works are not about fictional technology.So that's why alternate history is a genre of speculative fiction. luaza1313 ( talk) 08:09, 26 December 2016 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 13 external links on Science fiction. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
{{
dead link}}
tag to
http://www.nvcc.edu/home/ataormina/scifi/history/When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
This message was posted before February 2018.
After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than
regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors
have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the
RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{
source check}}
(last update: 5 June 2024).
Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot ( Report bug) 17:44, 26 July 2017 (UTC)
@ NewYorkActuary: @ User17625: Being somewhat of an SF-fan, I rather side with User17625 description. Wormholes, for instance, are in line with General Relativity. Creating, or even finding one is pure science fiction, but that's the point. Good SF (Asomov, A.C. Clark) extrapolates science, but does not flatly contradict it. The fans would not stand for it. Kleuske ( talk) 00:49, 14 August 2017 (UTC)
At 07:33:42 on 2016-09-13 user NadirAli added a link to an image file at the very top of this article. The file was: BrainCloud-and-scientist_mango_concept-art_04.png and contained the caption:
While the scene depicted in the image definitely had a strong Science Fiction flavor to it, the Edit Summary comment for that version of this article contained no explanation as to why the image was added to this article(it was, in fact, a blank comment), and no text was ever added to this article referencing the image or explaining it's presence in this article. A Random image shouldn't be added to this article merely because it contains a scene or depicts materials of a science fiction nature, *unless* it is captioned with text explaining that it is being used as an example to depict a theme, technology, situation, trope, etc, etc, that is commonly used or seen in science fiction. Or that the image is included to further enhance or explain a section of this article and that the section in question references the image. The image should be germane to the section it which it is included. Furthermore, this image's particularly prominent position at the very top of the article requires that it should be an image that carries a very strong and unambiguous connection with the concept of Science Fiction in general. This particular image did not. In fact, the image that was added appeared to have been done so solely to promote or advertise a particular film or imaging technique or process. As such, the image's inclusion in this article is completely inappropriate and I plan to remove it in a few days unless someone can provide a very good reason for keeping it. Gcronau ( talk) 14:03, 14 April 2017 (UTC)
I've been making some changes, but mostly just for style. I haven't been adding material, or taking out very much. Please let me know, or just change things back, if anyone disagrees. PopSci ( talk) 20:13, 30 October 2017 (UTC)
There is another article Sense of wonder which is about an important aspect of science fiction. I'm suggesting that it be merged here so that readers interested in science fiction would be able to read it here. There is also an article Wonder (emotion) on the general topic of wonder. PopSci ( talk) 04:43, 7 November 2017 (UTC)
There is an article on Christian science fiction. Would there be a problem adding it to the list of sub-genres? PopSci ( talk) 17:09, 7 November 2017 (UTC)
There is an article Future history, but it is really an essay and mostly unsourced. Should we mention and link it somewhere in this article? PopSci ( talk) 16:45, 16 November 2017 (UTC)
I'm removing this, put it back if you disagree. Its own article Supernatural fiction is very short and is tagged for lack of sources. Also it does not really seem to be its own genre, but a label put on several of the genres that already have their own sections. PopSci ( talk) 22:13, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
How about a section on the influence of science fiction on culture and society? WildWookiee ( talk) 05:18, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
The history section is mainly focused on books. What do you think of a subsection of that for the history of SF in film and TV? WildWookiee ( talk) 16:48, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
There are a few mentions of video games in the article. Should we have a section for them? I'm kind of reluctant since I'm sure every aspect or subgenre of SF has at least one video game. To me they are not "fiction" and probably shouldn't be in the article at all, but I'm kind of old-school. PopSci ( talk) 15:05, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
That would make sense to me. I'm going to give it a try. PopSci ( talk) 22:59, 22 December 2017 (UTC)
Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 5 external links on Science fiction. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
This message was posted before February 2018.
After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than
regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors
have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the
RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{
source check}}
(last update: 5 June 2024).
Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot ( Report bug) 23:52, 22 December 2017 (UTC)
I am concerned that the increase (seemingly) in subgenres may include original research by editors rather than being correctly cited from reliable sources. I don't have time at the moment to check all the subgenres and their sources to see that the sources explicitly state the name of the subgenre. If no explicit subgenre name is available and defined that the subgenre should not exist in this article. Just a concern. I will most likely, due to time pressures, depend on other editors to do this checking but thought I would flag up my concern. Thanks Robynthehode ( talk) 14:38, 5 December 2017 (UTC)
Steampunk, although I am not an expert on it, seems to be as much an artistic and cultural movement as a genre of literature. SF itself has these same aspects (for instance art and fashion) but we don't go into those in this article. Since we are not talking about those aspects of SF here should we even have a section for Steampunk? PopSci ( talk) 00:16, 23 December 2017 (UTC)
I had been thinking about a section for Comic science fiction. One problem is that the "main article" is so poor. (I have just redirected it to List of comic science fiction - which I also added to the See Also section here- but that might not hold up.) Another is that, well, there is comedy about just about everything so how is comic SF so remarkable? Also bookstores do not have a separate section for comic SF. There are some good examples, probably Discworld being the most famous. Besides a lot of space opera is really comedy. Certainly the original Star Wars movies had a lot of comedy, even Star Trek. PopSci ( talk) 16:28, 28 December 2017 (UTC)
I took out Space Western from the list of sub-genres. It is really very minor. Check out its article and you can see how few examples there really are. 2601:648:8000:9CF0:948B:4333:15D4:C385 ( talk) 16:49, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
Why was this done? It looks quite de-graded. Many explanatory images that were added have now been removed and added with bad quality, mostly recycled images, also in a "decorative" magazine style. For what reason has this been done?-- NadirAli نادر علی ( talk) 16:59, 15 November 2017 (UTC)
These are not necessarily science fiction. They simply indicate positive/negative aspects of society which may or may not occur in a science fiction. I'd recommend a search for them so people can see for themselves. I'll even add a list of examples in the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Posuydon ( talk • contribs) 23:45, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
I suggested in a previous thread that these to topics be placed in a new section called "related topics". There's nothing in these two sections and their "main articles" to suggest that they constitute genres. They seem more like topics related to science fiction, but not "subgenres". Mind you I don't refer to the "related genres" section to place them in as there's nothing here to indicate that they are indeed genres, just topics related to science fiction and it's main family tree, speculative fiction (which science fiction is a branch of as stated in the intro) I'd appreciate some feedback while I'm away for the time being. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Posuydon ( talk • contribs) 22:56, 20 January 2018 (UTC)
Someone suggested earlier to move the sub-genres and related genres lists to the end of the article. That makes more sense to me, both because it slow down readers and it might send them off to other articles before they had finished this one. WildWookiee ( talk) 16:39, 28 January 2018 (UTC)
Here is a source which says that Historical fiction and SF are related genres: Future Perfect: American Science Fiction of the Nineteenth Century: An Anthology, Howard Bruce Franklin, Rutgers University Press, 1995, pages 7-8 PopSci ( talk) 13:34, 22 February 2018 (UTC)
@ PopSci When making such a large series of edits, especially when you are removing content it is a good idea to apply the Template:In_use template. It helps those of us checking the recent changes page to not jump all over large changes. :) Zchrykng ( talk) 17:57, 26 April 2018 (UTC)
Even though this has an article is it really a sub-genre of SF? Other political ideologies do not and they are also sometimes expressed in SF stories. Does that really create a sub-genre? Should we have "communist SF", "socialist SF", "democratic SF", etc? PopSci ( talk) 02:31, 19 November 2017 (UTC)
The introduction's classification doesn't match with the sub genres, some sub-genres are very small (cli-fi), mundane seems to be a sub sub genre, Alternate history is classified as a related genre but we have steampunk and diesel punk as a sub genre, some are not sub genres but presentations ( Opera, films), some are not precise or too precise(Star Wars is both a Space Western and a space opera), we keep on getting requests for new ones, Some are cultures (Black science fiction), we also have hard and soft science fiction as a category but we don't explain how they link to subgenre. So I looked around to find some taxonomies Amazon has one Amazon and /info/en/?search=Category:Science_fiction_genres and /info/en/?search=Category:Science_fiction_by_genre and /info/en/?search=Outline_of_science_fiction. Wakelamp ( talk) 13:51, 5 December 2017 (UTC)
boxed [d]efinitions of science fiction are not so much a series of logical approximations to an elusive ideal, as a small, parasitic subgenre in themselves." Parrinder, Patrick (1980). Science Fiction: Its Criticism and Teaching. London: New Accents.
in 1926 , in what is considered the "pulp era" Amazing Stories magazine suggested SF was "a charming romance intermingled with scientific fact and prophetic vision... Not only do these amazing tales make tremendously interesting reading—they are always instructive. They supply knowledge... in a very palatable form"[3][4], In the "golden age, the instructive and romantic was not enough. Stories were that if they were to "contain a miracle, it ought at least not to contain a whole arsenal of them.", " the reaction of human beings to changes in science and technology"[Asimov] was important, as was a thorough understanding of the nature and significance of the scientific method."[Heinlien], and Galaxy magazines Focus on "not on the adventurer, the inventor, the engineer, or the scientist, but on the average citizen,"[Gunn, James. "Alternate Worlds: 1949–1965", in Alternate Worlds. The Illustrated History of Science Fiction (N.J.:Prentice-Hall, 1975) - stolen from New Wave article]
The "New wave" of the 1960s and 1970 expanded on the Galaxy definition, Now "there are no easily delineated limits to science fiction." {ldR], and now "the one field that reached out and embraced every sector of the human imagination, every endeavor, every idea, every technological development, and every dream." (bradbury 1974)
What changes do people want to this section Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 12:41, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
A possible suggestion is to mention world events that had an impact on SF. For instance the end of World War Two including the atom bomb, the exposure of the Holocaust, and establishment of the United Nations. The flying saucer craze of the 1950s. Sputnik and the space race and Apollo. The Vietnam War and the popularity of drugs. The fall of the USSR and (for most people) of Marxist theories of the future. The Internet and the information revolution. I personally like the way the section is now with readers' knowledge of these things being assumed. PopSci ( talk) 18:30, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
What changes do people want to this section Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 12:42, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
What changes do people want to this section Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 12:45, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
Look if we need more white space to avoid WP:CLUTTER so be it. Spacing out and intersecting sections and subsections if needed only improves the qualify of the articles, not deteriorates it.-- NadirAli نادر علی ( talk) 04:57, 22 January 2018 (UTC)
"A famous Hard SF book is Mission_OF_gravity, but the criticism of it seems to be on the lack of characterisation"
This is a frequent criticism on hard science fiction in general, as the writers of this genre often de-emphasize proper characterization in favor of the technology and science concepts they have in mind. See here: http://bestsciencefictionbooks.com/hard-science-fiction.php
I think the hard and soft science fiction no longer deserves a separate section as its original meaning was the pejorative distinction between hard and soft science. This article giving the views of modern SF writers is quite negative about it [7]. The SF encyclopedia people are also lukewarm about it and think it is about author self promotion, fans, right wing agendas,and knocking soft science.. [8] Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 12:30, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
: There seems to be some cite errors, but I don't know what causes them and how to fix them Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 14:17, 4 May 2018 (UTC)
This is the project plan for Science fiction. Please feel free to make suggestions.
What changes do people want to this section Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 12:43, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
So to make it B class I think we need some interesting illustrations. Which ones do people like and dislike. What areas needs more illustration! Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 04:03, 8 May 2018 (UTC)
This sentence doesn't match up with the history "Historically, science-fiction stories have had a grounding in actual science, but now this is only expected of hard science fiction". Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 08:42, 6 May 2018 (UTC)
{{u|
zchrykng}} {
T|
C}
15:18, 9 May 2018 (UTC)
There is an article on Definition of science fiction. IMO some of the quotes there are better than some that are used here. PopSci ( talk) 14:37, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
What changes do people want to this section Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 12:42, 29 April 2018 (UTC)
I'm concerned that this section is basically rife for WP:FANCRUFT - it's basically just a list of authors who the editors think belong in that category at this point and there's no citations. I mean it's common knowledge that Isaac Asimov is considered a hard SF author, but there's got to be a WP:RS somewhere, right? I'm very tempted to restructure this to focus more on the social and cultural queues that led to the subgenre split between "hard" and "soft" and do away with the lists altogether. But in case this is retreading old ground I thought it prudent to check here first. Simonm223 ( talk) 19:45, 22 August 2018 (UTC)
i think we need purge out of the article most of the definition debate to Definitions_of_science_fiction. Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 15:23, 14 January 2020 (UTC) Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 15:30, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
The Template:Science fiction is very different from the article. What should we do? Outline Sub genres Cultures - miscellaneous - region - awards --Multimedia -- cinematic -- literary art audio Media - literature - stage - film - Television Themes -Applied -Formal -Life -Physical -social Wakelamp d[@-@]b ( talk) 14:13, 13 May 2018 (UTC)
What is this trying to accomplish? The list is hardly exhaustive and is unlikely to be representative of any accepted list of genre defining games. This seems like a good place for a link to another article exploring this topic in more depth. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.176.196.206 ( talk) 12:28, 19 September 2018 (UTC)