Defining "Science Fiction"

I have often heard that there is no real definition for what science fiction is, but surely, the collective intelligence of all of us on here should be able to work out something?

I doubt very much that we'll find a definition that is complete and consistent, but I think it's worth starting with the obvious: Fiction which postulates a change in technology and develops the ramifications of that change is certainly SF. I don't say that other things might not also be SF, and that such fiction might not also fit into some other category as well - ie, is Ishiguro'sNever Let Me Go a work of "science fiction" or of "straight fiction"? - but that'll get most of your easy cases sorted. The loose word here is "technology", of course. What's technology? Loosely, let's mean humanity's adaptation of nature. That'll get you both Haldeman's pulsar jumps and Heinlein's Menthuselahs. What it doesn't get you is Clarke's monoliths, or a lot of Hal Clement's fantastic creatures, so let's say "adaptation of nature by intelligence".
Does this get you, say, The Postman? I think so - it's certainly a change in technology to blow it all away and start over. What about Leiber's Fahfrd and the Grey Mouser books? Well, no, I'd say magic spells aren't an adaptation of nature, but a change to it, and that's the criterion I'd use for calling something a fantasy.
How's that for a start?

What about alternate history? Robert Harris' Fatherland, or Philip K Dick's The Man in the High Castle, or Christopher Evans' Aztec Century?

In fact, what about space opera? There's very little in that which is postulated from the ramifications of technological change...

>3 iansales: In fact, what about space opera? There's very little in that which is postulated from the ramifications of technological change...

We must be reading different space opera!!

Star Wars, however, is fantasy in my mind - not SF.

Why is Star Wars fantasy, but all other space opera sf? Just because it's bad space opera, you can't refuse to acknowledge it as part of the genre...

I'd say that space opera and SF are intersecting sets, but that space opera is not a subset of SF. It's likely I'm in the minority here.

Star Wars is fantasy rather than SF because it doesn't "postulate a change in technology and develop the ramifications of that change". That it's set in a technologically advanced society is irrelevant - it's a swords-and-sorcery epic, pure and simple.

Star Wars is perhaps evidence in favour of the "speculative fiction" label, but science fiction it is not. IMNSHO. ;)

Science fiction is a modernist genre as it takes it as axiomatic that the human condition and/or the human environment can be controlled. Even the "unknown" can be subjected to reasoning and control, although it may not produce answers.

Science fiction differs from mainstream modernist literature in that the tools used for control of the human condition and/or environment are figments. They either do not exist, do not operate in the real world as described in the text, or rely on science and/or technology which does not exist. Or their use presupposes, or leads to, a condition or situation which cannot or does not currently exist - such as a landing on Mars, or the Germans winning World War II.

Fantasy, on the other hand, is fiction in a fantastic mode. The human condition and/or human environment is subject to change or control by external forces which cannot be understood. The "unknown" remains just that, unknown. It cannot be reasoned, although it may allow some small measure of control over it.

So Star Wars fits the first definition, but not the second. Your definition of sf is way too narrow. A lot of sf features little or no technology or extrapolation - just look at the various novels in the SF Masterworks series. (On reflection, Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun is in the Fantasy Masterworks series, but it's clearly sf...)

I think in the end this is going to be a fruitless exercise.

Although Ian's definition in #7 is good it still isn't good enough.

Moorcock's Dancers At The End of Time for example seems to be written in a fantastic mode. No real attempt is made to reason and explain the situation. OK there are "power crystals", but they could quite equally function in a fantasy.

Then we have Fevre Dream by George R.R. Martin. Definitely marketed as fantasy however it does try and reason about the vampires in the world and tries to come up with a way to slake their thirst via scientific method. In fact it isn't a million miles away from Brian Stableford's The Empire of Fear which is usually considered science fiction.

I agree that we're pretty much tilting at windmills, but...

It doesn't matter if no attempt is made to "reason and explain the situation", as long as the situation is open to reasoning and explanation.

It's as much the process by which figments are used, and the intent of that process. But not the intent of the author - we can't know that from the text alone. But if the figments are instrumental in the control of the human condition and/or environment, and that is the intent of the figments in the text, then the text must be science fiction.

Which, I hope, handily, squeezes Dancers at the End of Time into science fiction.

As for Fevre Dream... The rigour and consistency with which the author introduces and uses the fantasy element in a text doesn't make it sf. Admittedly, I've not read Fevre Dream (I have the Fantasy Masterwork edition), and it's been a long time since I read The Empire of Fear...

Prediction- This thread will not hammer out an universal definition of science fiction. Not that that's bad. One of the most consistent mores of the SF community has been a never-ending debate of what science fiction is or is not. How many anthologies have you read with a definition of science fiction in the introduction? Or science fiction criticism? I think I'm up to having read about 1187 of them.

Almost every definition has a counterpoint. For example, upthread this partial definition was offered. ***Fiction which postulates a change in technology and develops the ramifications of that change is certainly SF.*** A counter argument could be made for some of the techno-thrillers that work this area pretty heavily but are not considered science fiction by the SF community. Should they be? I'd say no but couldn't defend that position with an unassailable argument. The boundary fences of science fiction are constantly being taken down and being erected on new borders and that's probably healthy for the genre long-term.

I think most people tend to focus on the furniture when trying to define sf - "it has spaceships in it!", "it has squids in space in it!", and so on. and yet it's easy enough to show that there's almost no commonality in furniture across works accepted as sf.

It is of course, like almost all things in life a scale - under the umbrella of speculative fiction.

On one side we have clear works that all accept are Science fiction, Foundation for example. On the other we have clear Fantasy Lord of the rings must be typical.

In the middle we have a big grey fuzzy area, some at the fantasyish side, some on the SciFi ish side, and a few deliberately astride the morgaine saga maybe.

Each reader forms there own opinions when necessary as to where to differenciate one side from other. But there is no clear line, no matter how finely you dice it.

The link between sf and fantasy is an accident of marketing. The two genres actually have very little in common. Yes, both (often) feature invented worlds - but how many mainstream novels take place in invented countries, cities, streets, hotels, hospitals, etc.?

I also hate the label speculative fiction. All fiction is essentially speculative. If it wasn't, it'd be, well, non-fiction. The term speculative fiction is a feeble attempt to "disguise" science fiction as something more deserving of mainstream acceptance. If zebras are cool and horses are not, painting your horse with black and white stripes is not going to make it cool...

#13 well yes sort of.

But I think there is a clear difference between a novel where there are slight differences in geography but every other facet of the world works precisely as we measure the real one to do so - a "normal" fiction novel. And a world where one or more of the physical rules are broken - fantasy and / or science fiction.

There are differences in expectations, and it seems reasonable to me to divide them with some form of name - even if again there are many grey cases, there are far more clearly in a specific camp.

True enough. But that's still not an argument for "speculative fiction" as a separate genre.

I think the term "spec fic" a cheat too...one I've used (I'm sad to say). Because people have a distorted view of what SF is/means (spaceships, time-travelling squids, etc.) I've never felt comfortable using that designation to describe my work. Spec fic is more wishy-washy and inexact, its net cast far wider.

It's likely impossible to properly define SF--maybe you're better off approaching it by pointing out what SF ISN'T? But it's still an interesting discussion and I like to see how folks are bending and stretching the genre (and various subgenres) to make the fit as snug and comfortable as possible...whereas it more resembles those giant kaftans over-weight people like to wear in lieu of circus tents...

That's interesting but I doubt we can find a really satisfying definition. I think there is one condition that is common to pretty much all SF and Fantasy:

The story happens in an alternate world that is different from ours in at least one way:
- Different universe, planet or world.
- Different time: distant unhistorical past, future or alternate timeline
- Based on reality but altered by a significant event: contact with an extra-terrestrial civilization, invention of new technology, nuclear war, ...
- Based on reality but assumes the existence of things or phenomenons that are highly speculative or not generally accepted as real: magic, ESP, mole people living under the surface of the earth, unconventional scientific theories...

By extension, we may include works that technically fail to meet this criteria but include such themes. (For example, a story about a SETI scientist who thinks he has made contact with aliens could be considered SF even if the end it turns out he was wrong and no "world changing" event has happened.)

This condition seems pretty strong but it's also very vague, it doesn't differentiate SF and Fantasy and includes many works that belong to different genres (For example, Horror though not all Horror would belong to that category). And it's probably not even 100% exhaustive.

From there, I think it's more a question of appreciation based on themes (such as magic vs technology, space travel and dragons and so on... ), style and whether an author belongs usually more to one school or the other.

"Science fiction" as a market genre is something we can't expect a consistent definition on; it will shift with marketers' perceptions of how they can best pitch books.

"Science fiction" as SF fans understand it has a better shot at being defined consistently, though there are still many competing views of what it should be.

When do we say that something is SF? It's more a matter of intent than content. If the writer is creating a world which is, in principle, amenable to explanation, then it generally counts as SF; if it's one which relies on magic or divine intervention, then it's fantasy. I haven't read a lot of techno-thrillers, but suspect that many of them would count, by any reasonable criterion, as SF.

Is degree of change the issue? In my vast SF writing career, I have two published stories in Analog. Both of them posit only slight, plausible changes in science and technology, and one of them has been surpassed by reality. Stanley Schmidt evidently thought they were SF. I think they count because the results of the change were the focus of the stories. The same changes, if just incidental to the plot, could have been in mainstream stories.

Star Wars is not SF - the opening screen says A long long time ago in a galaxy far far away. So it doen't even postulate a change in technology.

I tend to define Fantasy as that which is entirely impossible and does not/cannot conform to reality as we know it and Science Fiction as what could/might happen if something changed on earth. (Socialogical, Biological, and Technological - including invention of the impossible eg FTL, Time Travel, or it can be a small thing) it's not about the advance, it's about the effect.

That puts alternate histories/futures, in with fantasy - which some may disagree with - and all post apocalyptic in SF. But there are a lot of 'fantasy' books which put themselves in SF by virtue of being colonies. All SF is in the future (from when they were written) - (including time travel because by necessity the machine must be invented in the future regardless of the time it goes back to) which puts Star Wars in Fantasy because it's the past and Pern in the future because its a colony with geneticly created animals.

Re post 3: Ah, space opera. Well, for that I'd point you to the wonderful little story "Bat Durston, Space Marshall", which transfers the horse opera wholesale into a science-fiction milieu, with every cliche kept intact, down to the six-shooter and the hero's code of honor. Hilarious, and I think it answers your question: no, this is not science fiction, except by courtesy.

As for alternate history, I would distinguish between Harry Harrison's novel (the title of which I've forgotten) in which the bad guy goes back in time to bring the Sten gun to the civil war (American civil war, that is), and the hero is out to stop him. That's science fiction by the criterion suggested above, changing a technology and exploring the consequences. Another sort of story might postulate that Garibaldi fell into the Atlantic and drowned before the battle of San Antonio, and ring the changes (the Young Italy movement fails, no Mussolini, the Fiat is built by an Austrian conglomerate in Tuscany and actually works, etc.). Would this be SF? Not by the criterion sugggested above, but as I said, I didn't mean for that to be the sole criterion, it's just the lowest-hanging fruit. If it fits there, it's SF, easily. We can add to that - a work which postulates a change in history as recorded and explores the consequences is also science fiction. Easy enough - I don't really see alternate history of this sort as science fiction, but it's certainly under the larger umbrella of "speculative fiction", and if you want to call it science fiction I won't argue much unless we do it over a beer and enjoy ourselves.

I agree with much of what's been said here. I don't think SF is easy to define, more of an "I know it when I see it" kind of thing. I think many good books straddle multiple genres, and that there are plenty of books not considered to be SF which would qualify for the label if they sought it.

I'm not attached to any particular definition, I just like playing devil's advocate ;)

However: "Star Wars is not Science Fiction" is a pet topic of mine.

In #7 iansales said "A lot of sf features little or no technology or extrapolation - just look at the various novels in the SF Masterworks series." I have (and have read) 33 of the SF Masterworks series so far, and while I might be convinced that technology is unnecessary I don't think extrapolation is optional.

This, for me, is the key difference between SF and fantasy. SF doesn't just consider some variation from reality, it considers the implications of the variation. Even when SF considers something we believe to be impossible, such as some form of psychic power which may as well be magic, SF looks at how this would affect society, people, institutions, technological development, etc. Fantasy needn't do this - fantastic elements of a story needn't be more than window-dressing.

Star Wars is a typical "farm boy makes good" fantasy. Our farm boy is an orphan with mysterious latent magic powers who is on a collision course with destiny. He meets an old magician who helps train him before placing him in apprenticeship to master sorcerer.

He has to learn to handle a sword as well, of course - it's a rough universe out there. And after all, if you pit two magicians against each other and one of them has a sword - it's got to be an advantage, right? ;)

So the farm boy heads off on his quest to confront the forces of evil and save the princess, having adventures with his trusty rogue companion along the way. His mysterious past is unveiled, his royal lineage revealed, and after a climactic battle in which both swords and spells fly through the air our hero finally saves the day.

I like Star Wars. I consider myself a fan. But I see no element of science fiction in it other than the fact that it's set in a technological society capable of interstellar travel. This is not sufficient for it to qualify as SF in my mind.

So I offer Star Wars as a counter example which says "science fiction is not about spaceships.".

Now if Star Wars were in some way about The Force and its effects on society, it might be closer to science fiction. I can picture, in fact, a plot arc that would follow the introduction of this Force, starting as the the sole possession of small cult, becoming an elite tool of power and eventually a technique available to the masses, and even necessary to daily life - sort of like reading, or computers. I could see that as a science fiction story, even though the "technology" would be essentially magic - Clarke's Law in action, I suppose.

Send it to George, your idea is better than the five movies which followed the original 1977 film...

> 19 setting the story in an entirely invented universe at an invented time has no effect on whether Star Wars is sf or not.

> 20 Bat Durston was a spoof used to advertise Galaxy magazine. It was an illustration of bad science fiction. Which sort of draws first and shoots down your argument.

> 21 a lot of sf features window-dressing. It could even be said that various literary devices such as FTL, time travel, AI and the like are no more than window-dressing.

The reason everyone falls back on Damon Knight's "it means what we point to when we say it" is that people get so caught up in the furniture, the technology, the extrapolation, and the window-dressing. Fantasy can be just as rigorous and internally-consistent (e.g., the AD&D magic system) as any idea used in a sf story. Fantasy can make a single change to an invented world, and extrapolate from that - Naomi Novik, anyone?

Sf is modernist - it is a positive response to a scientific and technological worldview. Fantasy is fantastic - it is a negative response to scientific and technological worldview. Both involve invented elements and elements extrapolated from known facts (in whatever science, hard or soft), however their position and intent within each type of text is different.

While it's fine to have our own definitions of what we consider true SF, there is no doubt in my mind that Star Wars is generally considered Science-Fiction. So if anything it shows that interstellar travel, robots and a few technological gadgets are enough to make it SF.

Also it's interesting that the Fantasy elements had to be disguised. What is essentially magic is called "the Force", the swords have been transformed to lightsabers... Episode I even introduced a kind of pseudo-scientific explanation for the origin of the Force.

But to be fair there are also themes that are more typical of SF and rarely found in Fantasy. The slow transformation of a democratic society into a totalitarian regime using fear and imaginary threats (a theme unfortunately very relevant to current world events), keeping's one humanity when parts of the body have been replaced by machines (a classic SF theme), relying on technology or using one's instincts (Luke turning off the targeting system).

So I think that saying Star Wars is not SF is really going against the usual meaning of the term.

#25 - Turning sociey into a totalitarian regime using fear and imaginary threats is exactly what every evil overlord does in Fantasy novels, keeping ones humanity when parts of the body are replaced by magic and using your instincts are in fantasy too.

#24 Setting stories in an entirely imaginary place and time is what (high) fantasy generally does, it's kind of definitive. And i've never seen FTL, time travel and AI as mere window dressing - its about the affect of invented technology regardless of the imposibility according to current theory - I prefer Le Guins "What if?" definition of SF combined with a general exploration of 'the future', its the one i've always used when categorising my books, and i've never had a problem.

#24

Ian:

"Sf is modernist - it is a positive response to a scientific and technological worldview. Fantasy is fantastic - it is a negative response to scientific and technological worldview. Both involve invented elements and elements extrapolated from known facts (in whatever science, hard or soft), however their position and intent within each type of text is different."

I like this very much. But is SF innately "positive"? Perhaps it's the word...but I find much more SF these days negative and fearful, warning of the singularity, loss of humanity...or nuclear war and its aftermath...genetic engineering, nanotechnology ("grey goo"), etc. Far more dystopias than utopia in SFdom.

But I'm reluctant to abandon this paragraph in toto because I think there's something there that DOES discriminate helpfully between the two genres, the best starting point I've seen thus far. Care to have another whack at it?

Science Fiction: Fiction set in an alternate version of the world which is theoretically scientifically possible, or thought to be at the time it was written.

This gets you dystopias like The Handmaid's Tale, where the scientific element (radically increased rates of infertility and birth defects) is deep in the background, space opera, and hard science fiction.

I'd consider Star Wars to overlap science fiction (specifically, space opera) and fantasy. It has interstellar travel and hyperspace technology, and I'd consider a distant galaxy to be a part of the "world" as I consider it in my definition. (Otherwise some of Star Trek is in trouble, too.) It also has magic, one of the basic elements of fantasy. There are plenty of books out there that illustrate that it's possible to belong in more than one genre.

> 26 "Turning society into a totalitarian regime using fear and imaginary threats is exactly what every evil overlord does in Fantasy novels". And in, um, 1984. Which isn't a fantasy. Besides which, most high fantasies are set in cod-mediaeval worlds, which are autocratic and feudal, not totalitarian.

> 27 Cliff - ah, you spotted the careful ambiguity I left in there... When I wrote "positive" I was aware that post-apocalypse stories and dystopias could hardly be considered positive results of technology or science, but... that such situations can be arrived at acknowledges that science and technology is capable of such effects and/or impact, and in that light has to be seen as a positive response to a scientific and technological worldview.

> 28 Have you ever read A Princess of Mars? Find me the bit of science in that which is "theoretically scientifically possible, or thought to be at the time it was written".

Again, most people seem to be confusing the furniture with the generic intent. So what if Star Wars features light-sabres? Swords do not a fantasy make. If there's science in there, it has to be sf because science is impossible without the accompanying intent.

>29 iansales:

No.

#26 Just because turning society into a totalitarian regime using fear and imaginary threats happens in many fantasy books doesn't make that part of the defininition. I was only pointing out that it happens, contrary to #25's assumption.

We have quite a disagreement between whenter science fiction is what it looks like or what it acts like - SW acts like fantasy and looks like SF - which is the generic intent? And theres the fact that I favour fantasy over SF and am generally defining SF in terms of F and you vice versa.

I like SF as a response to a technological worldview, but I don't like fantasy as "a negative response to scientific and technological worldview" or with "invented elements and elements extrapolated from known facts" because the point of fantasy in a way is to ignore what is known and it predates "technology" as we know it. You can't define one in terms of the other but both must be defined to know the boundary.

I'd put Princess of Mars as a Fantasy becuse it plays like one.

Is The Andromeda Strain fantasy or SF?

As I recall, many, if not all Sci-Fi writers of my youth (30's - 70's) wrote in a genre that called itself "F&SF", so it seems to me divvying these two into separate genres is a bit of a stretch. After all, all fiction, science or otherwise is a form of fantasy. It seems to me anything that isn't non-fiction, creates imaginary settings, imaginary characters, and tells an imaginary story is a fantasy. I know "Fantasy" as a genre has certain defining characteristics, I'm sure you can look them up.

Science Fiction seems to me to fit into a sub-genre of "Fantasy", rather than a genre of its own. This is what makes it so difficult to untangle the threads, a sci-fi thriller is going to have one foot in both camps. To divide the two into separate genres is an impossible exercise.

BTW, that was a serious question about The Andromeda Strain.

Thinking of Andromeda Strain also brought to mind The Hunt for Red October. Is Red October Fantasy or Sci-Fi? Or is it Adventure, High-Tech Adventure, Military fiction? What is it? Fantasy or Sci-Fi? Or not? And if not, why not?

> 31 Fair enough, but I still don't think dark lords are trying to create totalitarian regimes. It doesn't exactly fit in with divine right, and that's the paradigm high fantasies are playing off.

I disagree that Star Wars acts like fantasy. It acts like fiction, using tropes and archetypes Lucas ripped bleeding from a host of different genres.

By negative response, I mean that the world is seen as inherently mysterious and unexplainable. Things happen because they do, or because one or more deities has fixed it so they happen that way. In that way, it is a refusal to admit that a technological or scientific worldview exists.

Sf isn't a sub-genre of fantasy because it is an entirely separate mode of fiction. (Btw, you had a long youth - 40 years...)

The Andromeda Strain... what would make you think it was fantasy? It's about an alien disease. It's implicitly acknowledged that the disease has an origin and a cure can be discovered. Whether one is discovered or not is beside the point.

I like the term "Fantastic fiction"...except the quality of the writing in whatever genres fit into that rubric usually is anything but (so the term might be misleading, unless it was always printed in capital letters)...

I would classify The Andromeda Strain as SF. It uses a technique that is fairly common in SF which is to take some hypothesis proposed in science and consider the possibilities if that hypothesis were true. In this case it's a crystalline based form of life rather than a carbon based one. There are some theories that put forth the idea that crystal formation was a precursor to RNA and DNA.

It also deals with the messy question of 'What is life? Is a virus alive? Is a prion? Or do they just affect life? Recalling that the book came out in 1969 some things have changed since then. The pH balance in blood for one and the pH levels for killing germs are better understood, making the survival of the old drunk and the ever-crying baby more doubtful. But that's okay. A book written in 1940 with humans living at the poles on Venus without any life support systems is SF. It worked with the knowledge of the time. It might be hot and muggy there but livable. A book written in 2008 with humans living at the poles of Venus without life support would not be SF. However, if the book proposed a Venus-formed altered environment by humans, which put the living conditions into the human survivability zone, then it moves back into SF.

I think most people (and I am guilty of this too) see genre as far too black and white. It is either SF (by which I mean science fiction - the other expansions are all back-formations) or fantasy or horror or ...

This is far too simplistic. Texts can and do participate in more than one genre. I think this is one of the main tenets of modern literary theory. It is also quite obvious. We can have SF satires, SF thrillers, SF horror, SF mystery stories and so on even SF romance stories. It seems quite clear that The Caves Of Steel for example is clearly SF and it is clearly a detective mystery.

Also I think that genre is defined in terms of relationships between texts (and texts and readers) and not some objective definition. So in reality what we have is a complex set of 'likeness quotients' - these can both be on a content basis and a more philosophical level (like Ian's definition in #7 - although as a categorical definition that was bloody good). Obviously some texts will have high numbers for these values and be universally recognised as SF. Others will have lower numbers and be more problematical for some to call SF.

Now having said all that can we have a text that has SF and fantasy aspects of genre about itself. Now having said that genre is partly about a relationship with the reader we can look at how real people (on LT) tag a book. In this case I have chosen Ash: A Secret History.
Alternate History: 74, Alternate Reality: 2, Alternate Universe: 1 = 77
Fantasy: 73 (other tags with fantasy - 11) = 84
Science Fiction: 14 (sci-fi, sf etc - 15) = 29

Now I have tagged Ash as SF (and I do consider it science fiction). Ian's definition has it as SF (and luckily he has tagged it as SF). However most people here have tagged it fantasy. Some reviewers and critics pegged it as fantasy. Are they wrong or am I (and Ian)? From an interview Mary Gentle says "Ash, of course, isn't fantasy at all; but it moves through a number of modes -- ordinary historical fiction, conspiracy fiction, plain fantasy -- to arrive at SF." I guess both camps are correct - it is a text that functions both as fantasy and SF.

Mary Gentle is a strange case though both Ian and I agree that Rats And Gargoyles is fantasy however in the same interview Gentle says "The White Crow books, on the other hand, have a feel of fantasy, but they're science fiction -- if you allow that the science is the model before the one we currently use: Hermetic science, in which the universe is animistic, holistic, and not at all Newtonian. Hermetic science managed to prefigure quite a lot of post-Newtonian science, including the many-worlds version of quantum theory, while getting everything else spectacularly wrong. However, if the Valentine and Casaubon stories were published as SF, there'd be a lot of confused readers out there."

Great post, Andy, very thoughtful.

I think we're ALL guilty of applying our own definition and set of criteria for what is or isn't science fiction. As you can see from the responses so far, folks are all over the place on this one and a lot of posts end up asking more questions than they've answered (including mine).

Objective definition? Not likely, in this lifetime or any in the foreseeable future. But it's fun to talk about, fascinating to see what writers, readers and fans are saying on the subject...

I think any definition of Science Fiction that includes all the undisputed 'greats' of science fiction will have to have some "or" clauses in it. It's science fiction if it investigates the effects of technology on human society, or if it speculates about the structure of the universe and our place in it, or if it has space ships or aliens.

edit: I'm not claiming to have an exhaustive list of clauses here :)

#34 - there are people who consider SF as fantasy that tries to explain itself.

I just knew someone would mention Mary Gentle...

I'd call Rats & Gargoyles fantasy because hermetic science itself is fantastic. It is empirical, and causes are assumed to be unknowable. Which is sort of antithetical to science fiction, Just because Gentle wrote the book, that doesn't mean it's what she says it is, of course...

Ash: A Secret History is more problematical. It's framing narrative is clearly sf. But the worldview of the title character clearly partakes more of fantasy, with its references to the fantastical. However, I suspect the knowingness, the fact that Ash's story is a narrative embedded within a commentary, is enough to redefine it as sf.

This is an odd colloquium, in that "science fiction" would appear to be self-defining.

The "fiction" part doesn't seem to be in dispute. We're talking about stuff that's make believe, not real.

It's the "science" part that seems to be the sticking point. How about -- "something made up that is predicated on an existing (or potential or former) science"?

Or how about -- "something made up that is explicable in terms of an existing (or potential or former) science"?

Under either definition, Star Wars would be out (as would "Hansel & Gretel"), but most Star Trek would be in.

I might be a party of one but I've always considered Star Wars Sci Fi. Sci Fi pulls from many different literary genres as mentioned above including SF and fantasy but it's a visual medium primarily. It also pulls from the cinematic arch-types of heroes and villains and the cinematic ways of storytelling. SF can be and has been converted to film but Sci Fi has many more influences than just SF. To me, SF is still a mostly written genre not based on Sci Fi. The printed works arising from Sci Fi are Sci Fi not SF in my mind. Maybe others see it differently. Terms morph over time (space opera is the classic one) but Sci Fi and SF didn't used to mean the same thing.

"If there's science in there, it has to be sf because science is impossible without the accompanying intent."

But is there in fact any science in there? You have magical swords, magic carpets to ride on, plain old ordinary point-and-kill magic - but nowhere is there anything that looks like science, there are only the products of science. You might as well say that "The Devil Wears Prada" is science fiction because there are computers and cell phones and such in it.

Ian - just to clarify, I was not referring to the Galaxy ad, "You won't find any Bat Durston, Space Marshall stories here!" but to the hilarious story by G. Richard Bozarth in the November '78 Asimov's, inspired of course by that ad. The point of both ad and story was to poke fun at something which looked like science fiction, but in fact wasn't. Like Star Wars, you might say. I'm not sure what point you thought was shot down, but here it is in more explicit language: A story which does not do what science fiction does is not science fiction, no matter how many blaster cannons and robots it has in it. That's exactly the point of both the ad and the story, it's why both are funny.
And apparently you agree. As you say, spaceships do not make science fiction. So, that being agreed, what point was shot down? And, having settled that, what besides the space ships makes Star Wars a work of science fiction?

> 38 I accept that an sf text can show the characteristics of other genres besides sf - detective, thriller, romance, etc. But I'm only trying to nail down - however unsuccessfully - the sf part...

> 43 what is a "science"? There's a particular worldview associated with the acceptance or use of any science, and I think it is that which is important to sf.

> 44 Not sure what you're arguing - written sf predates media sf. Neither am I sure of the distinction you make between "sci fi" and sf.

> 46 "the draw first and shoot down" was a reference to six-guns and an attempt at humour. I wasn't aware someone had written a story based on the Galaxy ads. But... to me a good sf story can only take place in the world of that story. Bat Durston would be bad sf - AKA "skiffy". However, that doesn't mean it's not sf. The Sunday Sport is still a newspaper, although you'll not find any news in it.

Oh, and I should also add that I'm enjoying this discussion. I doubt we'll get a real live workable definition out of it, but we might get close.

#42

Absolutely authorial intent isn't the end of it, but it does count for something. I tend to come out a wee bit stronger than you for Ash: A Secret History being SF. As well as the framing narrative, the alternate history, the golems, and the breeding programme all help in pulling the text towards SF.

I'm in two minds about the authorial intent. I agree that Ash: A Secret History is sf, but I don't sure that what the author thinks is all that relevant.

I have finally got round to putting all of my books on LT, but as I was going I went past Terry Pratchett's Truckers, Diggers, and Wings *spoilers* and remembered, this is a trilogy about nomes who live in a department store, this department store is about to be demolished so they move to a building site, urban fantasy right? Well in the third one they find out that they are actually decendants of aliens with a space ship waiting in orbit which radically changes the face of the whole thing to SF, doesn't it?

Science fiction is what I point at when I say "That's science fiction."

Hey, it works for me.

I think that's probably what it comes down to in the end.

It's also what we're trying to get away from as it's completely meaningless.

...but still interesting to debate...

#47 -- what is a "science"? There's a particular worldview associated with the acceptance or use of any science, and I think it is that which is important to sf.

I'm wanting to be sure I understand your point. Are you referring to the scientific method? If so, that's a pretty slippery slope, since an author like Flaubert was extremely empirical in his approach to the craft of writing, as were les imagistes, but there not much sci fi about any of these.

Or are you talking about a melioristic viewpoint that holds that humans can, through their interference with processes that would otherwise be natural, produce an outcome which is an improvement (or perhaps, conversely, a disaster) as opposed to the natural one?

I think my point, Ian, is that even in the remote chance that we were successful at coming up with a definition of SF that was acceptable to the majority of the folks here--or out in the great, wide world--we would STILL never agree on what films/books/media fit whatever criteria we settle on. Witness the debate as to whether "Star Wars" is SF or fantasy or some weird hybrid or neither.

Sorry if I sounded flip, not my intention.

This has been a good discussion and I'd certainly like it to continue.

Sci Fi (pronounced as skiffy by those who didn't like it) started as a derogatory term. It referred to mainly the films and TV shows of the 1950s and 1960s that dealt with non-ordinary world. They borrowed from science, SF, fantasy, comics, westerns, mythology, horror, the Red Scare and the Cold War and anything else they could use. Sci Fi did not have any standards to meet, scientifically. The goal was to get to the visual image of fly/man hybrid. The reason offered as to how this came about did not have to be plausible, believable or even possible. The goals were visual not to be scientifically accurate. Science played little part in Sci Fi. Because of this the community drew a distinction between Sci Fi and science fiction. Stars Wars fit into the Sci Fi niche better than it did into the SF or fantasy niche.

Nowadays that distinction seems to be disappearing with some of the publishers even putting a Sci Fi essential logo on their SF books. Now debates like the one happening in this thread are trying assign Star Wars a home in the SF or fantasy camp when it fit quite well in the Sci Fi camp. Higher budget and more cinematic quality than the old Sci Fi stuff to be sure, but those two differences didn't make it transcend the Sci Fi label.

I'll have to ask the older users here and the younger ones; does Sci Fi and science fiction mean the same thing to you? Are the definitions synonymous?

I'm 44 and I don't give a darn if people call it SF, sci fi, sky fy, skiffy or Skippy Peanut Butter. I've never found any of those terms the least bit derogatory.

Nor did I ever find "Trekkie" or "Trekker" put-downs.

On the other hand, call me a Can-Lit writer and I'll strangle you slowly with a fine strand of piano wire...

> 57 Actually, "sci fi" was coined by Forrest J Ackerman, and he never meant it as derogatory. Fans of written sf, however, disliked it and so they turned it into "skiffy".

I thought the "Sci Fi Essential" stickers that Tor put on their books were branding by the Sci Fi Channel.

#59 Agreed. In 2008, are the terms Sci Fi and science fiction synonymous to you?

#59

On 'Sci Fi Essentials'.

Yep, that is my understanding too. They even put it on some fantasy books. The idea is that it is cross-promotion. One book a month gets singled out for the treatment and gets promoted on scifi.com, the SciFi newsletters and maybe even TV (I don't know, I live in the UK). It has been going on for some two and a bit years so it must be doing OK for both parties however I do feel a little uneasy about such marketing schemes.

#60

Yes, to me "sci fi" is just another way of referring to science fiction. Like "sf". It's a particularly ugly term, but it has no additional meaning.

#60

Sci Fi Essentials.... it's not that much different to Richard & Judy. Admittedly, the new Dune books were picked as Sci Fi Essentials and they're tripe. The only richard & Judy book I've read was Moon Dust* by Andrew Smith, and that's excellent.

* gah - stupid touchstones. Use "Moondust", and it gives you 13 possible books, none of which are the Smith one. Use "Moon Dust" and it gives you... "Moondust" by Andrew Smith. This touchstone thing is wank. About time it got sorted.

I had never heard before that Sci-Fi was originally derogatory. I always thought it was just an American way to shorten Science-Fiction to avoid a possible confusion. SF is more natural to me since that's what we use in French.

Don't forget that in 'Dune', there were swords and personal shields, and an adequately-argued reason for both.

And SF has never shied away from the non-rational; remmeber the sub-genre of "shaggy God story"...?

And then there is the argument that all literature is science fiction, and so-called 'mainstream literature' is merely a subset of SF as it takes place exclusively during the recorded history of a small, blue-green planet at the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral Arm of the Galaxy in one particular reality.

Which then poses this question: if we ever contact an alien civilisation, and they have literature at all like we do, will their "mainstream" fiction be recognisable as like our SF?

Thanks for all of the replies, really interesting to read. It still seems that we cannot figure out any definition, except for "If I call it SF, it is SF".

I have decided to go on another approach to defining SF, by listing what each SF book that I have read have in common, and this is all that I can come up with:

- There is at least one fundamental difference between our current knowledge of our world and/or universe and that of the world we read/see (the existence of interstellar spacecraft, telepathy, a totalitarian world government, etc). This difference has a major effect on all of society, not merely one minor part of it
- The book makes some attempt to explore the consequences that this difference has on the world
- There is some relation to our world or universe and that of the SF world (at least part of the history of this new world is the same, or it is set in the same universe)

Probably not as good as what everyone else will come up with, but it's a start.

Re #65

I think that their mainstream litreature will be just as insipid as ours - tepid romances, predictable coming-of-age stories, all of that rubbish we are mostly spared from by reading SF. Probably the only thing that would resemble SF would be any military stories, but military stories on Earth are starting to resemble the stuff of science fiction, anyway.

And perhaps this intelligent race will actually have a definition for SF.

"If we contact an alien life form, will their mainstream fiction read like our SF?"

Well, no. No more than 20K Leagues Under the Sea becomes the Hunt For Red October now that we have submarines. Their SF will read like our SF, only with different questions, such as "what is it like to be a carbon based oxygen breather?"
While the hardware in today's military fiction might resemble the stuff that appeared in the SF magazines fifty years ago, or stuff that would have appeared, had anyone thought of it, the hardware is really not the point. It's what the hardware does to the guy holding it.

The question seems to be difficult, perhaps more so than defining other genres. Defining, perhaps, is a bad word to begin with. We're more talking about recognizing the genre, I think. How do we know we're reading a science fiction story? What clues us in? Perhaps asking the question that way will help a little. By way of a hint as to my line of thought, I would suggest trying to consider what makes a Western a Western, or what makes a romance novel a romance novel. Having done that, go back to science fiction and see if any of the sort of things you thought about with regards to the other two genres (or any other genres) help you at all with science fiction. For me, they don't.

#69

What makes a western a western is that it is set in a rural or remote locality, there are bandits/robbers/evil indians. The evildoer does something wrong, (as they are prone to do, with little reason given), and the police/sherriff/deputy/wronged man/wronged woman has to fight said bad guys for what they have done, usually equipped with a projectile weapon, but we may be lucky enough to see the use of fists, a lasoo, and so forth.

A romance is a story with a heavy emphasis on emotion, relationship, and characterisation. Girl/woman meets boy/man, there is love/hate at first sight, there is conflict between the two, and emotional problems between characters are resolved/not resolved in end. The boredom that results from such a shallow plot is alleviated by using several different methods, such as setting this conflict in some modern-life/historical setting, writing the romance as a major sub-plot of a larger story, or having one or more character/s having to choose between two or more men/women. A really adventurous romance author will do several of these things at once.

However, SF gets what the other genres of reading reject, which is probably what makes it so hard to define. We get stories that range from alien encounters, future military conflicts, trippy stories where what we perceive is different to reality by authors like Philip K Dick, imaginings of histories that never happened, and a plethora of other ideas that do not fit into any other genre.

It certainly is a wide-ranging genre and, indeed, that's a major part of the problem re: "defining SF" with any degree of accuracy. The fun is in the bickering.

Which is why I suggest we all gang up on Ian...

Does being a 'western' or a 'romance' disqualify a story from being SF? I could go either way on that one.

I think a western is chiefly defined by its setting, whereas for a romance setting is immaterial (unless it's a Regency romance, of course).

I'd also disagree that sf covers subjects and themes that other genres reject. Mainstream fiction covers quite a breadth, and while it may not ask the same questions as sf - or provide the same answers - it can and does engage on occasion with similar subjects. I'm not referring here to sf-marketed-as-mainstream, by the way.

It's the SCIENCE part of "science fiction" that, I think, is either a red herring or a way to pare down possible candidates for inclusion...and I haven't yet made up my mind which it is. Maybe we should limit our terms so that any SF work has to be based on some extrapolation of science and everything that doesn't fit that rubric, dump it on those fantasy bastards and let them figure it out.

And, Ian, if you don't stop rolling your eyes, I'll...

Cliff, I'm writing up a set of plans for a perpetual motion machine. When I'm done would you consider them science, science fiction or fantasy?

...well...that would...clearly it would be...I see that...ahhhhh...

You evil swine, Gene.

>75 geneg: - fact! I've already built one using a slice of buttered toast and a cat.

Patent pending...

#72 -
I'd say the answer is no. For me, a story could easily be counted as both science fiction and, say, a mystery. In fact, I recall a collection of stories edited by Asimov called "The Thirteen Crimes of Science Fiction" which consisted of thirteen science fiction stories, each in a different sub-genre of mystery - whodunnit, howdunnit, procedural, and so forth. Great stuff, by the way, one of my favorite SF theme collections. There's also the Randall Garrett stories, which now that I think of it could be either SF or fantasy depending on how you look at them.
And that's what I was getting at in posing the question of defining other genres: science fiction is not like other genres in that the way it gets to be SF is not like the way a mystery gets to be a mystery. Thus, a story could be both at once, and good at both. Look at Asimov's collection "The 13 Crimes of Science Fiction" for thirteen good examples.

#75 - It depends on what justification you provide for your perpmachine, and how you use it in the story.

Re #74

Perhaps the Science part in SF is both a red herring and a possible way of defining science fiction.

Love the paradox involved.

>34 iansales: "I disagree that Star Wars acts like fantasy. It acts like fiction, using tropes and archetypes Lucas ripped bleeding from a host of different genres."

Well, that's a blurry line too, because a huge portion of fiction used to be fantasy, if you think about it. Our modern mainstream fiction seems like a relatively new phenomenon. Good point, though.

Definitions are important insofar as they are useful. Once they cease to be useful, you simply change the definition.

This holds for science fiction as well. What was once perhaps a defining characteristic of (at least definitions of) science fiction was their affinity to the 'romantic' compared to the 'novelistic'; that is, concern for plot and ideas rather than character. Certainly this isn't necessarily the case anymore (nor was it ever, one could argue). So, to the extent that this defining characteristic has ceased to be useful, it is no longer part of the definition.

In my mind, you are better off talking about 'elements' or 'characteristics' of science fiction as you then spend less time arguing over exceptions to (somewhat arbitrary) definitions.

You can get all the definitions you like here: http://www.panix.com/~gokce/sf_defn.html

And read some of the critics attempts to situate science fiction in fiction.

Just to make this simple for everyone, let's agree that SF is whatever I say it is.

There.

Now we can close this thread.

I admire a man who knows not only his own mind, but everyone else's too!

And I admire a man who recognizes a one-liner when he sees one.

Bless ya, Gene...

>83 CliffBurns:

Oi, Cliff! Stop stealing my lines!

(see post 51)

:P

Sorry, I see the plagiarism and heartily confess my crime.

Yours was first and far better phrased.

Mea culpa...

I accept your apology with good grace, Cliff.

(And I gloss over the part in which I stole the general idea from someone else first, probably Damon Knight.)

:)

So now if you and I could only agree on what SF REALLY means, we could impose our views on the others and...

Didn’t Kristofferson write a song in the 70s that said, “Lets all just settle down and steal each other’s songs”?

Don't know the song but it's a good quote.

Some sage once wagged; There are only two stories. Hero goes on a journey and stranger comes to town. Add some phallic symbols disguised as rocketships and there you are. Depends on whether the ships are coming or going to fit the pattern.

OK..this could go into Time travel, under appreciated authors, the new weird..many places..i thought about giving this bit of dialogue from Lisa Mason's "The Golden 90s" (1995) it's own thread..BUT..in 1895 SFransisco a high end madam is discussing art nouveau literature and HG Wells is brought up:
"The world can be such a cold, gray place. Look how life has changed Romance is gone....No one knows what to believe in. Everything a jumble. Maybe strange writers give us back the romance and the wonder. Maybe they can tell us what the world is like, or used to be like, or will be like, better than the newspapers. Maybe they tell us things no one else will, whether it's pretty as pink or black as death. What do you think of that Mr. Watkins?"

Yes, Mr. Watkins, how do you answer?

Nice bit...

>88 HoldenCarver: yup, that was from Damon Knight.

I enjoy reading and cogitating on definitions of science fiction but categorizing/defining is not imperative or even always useful.

Anyhow, I think David Ketterer's view of science fiction as 'apocalyptic' as laid out in his New worlds for old: The apocalyptic imagination, science fiction, and american literature is convincing and useful. A condensed form is found in Mark Rose's Science Fiction: A Collection of Critical Essays which I can highly recommend. I enjoyed the majority of essays contained therein.

I've always categorized something as science fiction if it's based on some kernal of science or scientific theory. Because what we believe and what we know changes over time, the theories themselves change - look at the SF fiction from the late 19th century and compare it to what is being written today - much of that old fiction looks "goofy" and wouldn't come close to what we now know, and how SF is currently expressed.

To me Fantasy includes genre that relies on devices more embued in the mystical and metaphysical - very contrary to scientific theory and method as it relies on belief's that science has found flawed. That's not to say Fantasy can't exist (as there are scientific theories that pretty much anything is possible in a myriad of dimensional worlds, where physical laws aren't consistent with our own).

I categorize anything in between as Science Fantasy - basically some science or pseudo-science to create a story setting - it doesn't have to be real or even founded on scientific principles - it's merely a device to help stage the opening sequences - to suspend the mundane reality of the physical world.

In the end it's all about the story anyway - so who cares if something is improbable? If the story is well written and memorable, there's little regard for how the story is marketed. JMHO