Science Fiction
Tanuj and
Science Fiction
So why try to predict the future at all if it’s so difficult, so nearly impossible? Because making predictions is one way to give warning when we see ourselves drifting in dangerous directions. Because prediction is a useful way of pointing out safer, wiser courses. Because, most of all, our tomorrow is the child of our today.
A Few Rules for Predicting the Future by Octavia E. Butler
Sometimes, one needs to be emotionally invested in a hypothetical situation to fully appreciate its consequences. In such cases, fiction seems a better tool to explore the consequences of particular philosophical views than philosophical thought experiments.
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I’ve been mainlining Le Guin’s non-fiction writing. It strikes me reading this passage again that she’s bumping up against Harry Frankfurt’s definition of “bullshit.” To paraphrase, that bullshit doesn’t concern itself with the truth—it’s objective is outside the realm of information. I don’t think fiction is bullshit, obviously. But now I’m curious about the qualities of fiction as they relate to the qualities of bullshit.
I think of it as the difference between order and a different kind of order. Because there’s nothing chaotic in diversity. There’s nothing chaotic in a city with many different subcultures all interacting and going about their business. That is an order of its own. It’s just — it looks different from the suburbs.
‘The Ezra Klein Show’ • Opinion | A Legendary World Builder on Multiverses, Revolution and the ‘Souls’ of Cities
N.K. Jemisin speaking to Ezra Klein about world-building in her 2022 novel