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It is remarkable how fundamentally optimistic both Lem and Stapledon (and most science-fiction authors) are about our long-term prospects! All of humanity lives
by javajosh 11y ago
It is remarkable how fundamentally optimistic both Lem and Stapledon (and most science-fiction authors) are about our long-term prospects! All of humanity lives on the thin slime on a tiny rock hurtling around an ongoing massive fusion event. There is no warp drive, no anti-gravity - and not even a glimmer of physical theory that will lead to it.
We send tiny rockets into space, sometimes with robotic probes. That is the limit of chemical rocketry, for now and for the foreseeable future. Founding a self-sustaining colony on Mars appears to be impossible - a colony might exist, with frequent deliveries from earth, but such a thing would hardly qualify as a "backup" for humanity, as it would die shortly after the Earth dies.
And of course interstellar travel is totally out-of-the question with chemical rockets.
Meanwhile, the world (especially the First World) consume the truly unique and precious life-support systems in the bonfire of consumerism. Not to mention that the threat of total nuclear annihilation is still present.
So, despite all the interesting talk about Stapledon, the fact remains that it is an optimistic fantasy that distracts us from the stark truth that the laws of physics conspire to prevent us from living anywhere but in this one biosphere, naked to whatever calamity befalls us.
- walterbell 11y agoStapledon is not exactly optimistic, his book has multiple descendants of humans coming close to extinction several times while still on this planet, as culture, technology and biology are manipulated.
- genmon 11y agoLast and First Men doesn't feel enormously optimistic to me... [Spoilers] It's a long history of struggle, humanity barely existing, occasionally bursting into brief civilisation before destroying itself through accident or hubris. And when humanity does finally attain some kind of peak existence, it finds it can't escape the solar system and is doomed anyhow. Despite its long history, humanity warrants only a footnote in history of the whole cosmos (sentient nebulae onwards) given in Stapledon's Star Maker. So given your pessimistic outlook, you might rather enjoy it :)
- javajosh 11y agoBut humanity a) survives long term, and b) he predicts extremely long-lived, stable societies between calamities. It's much more realistic to assume that no humans would survive a global extinction level event on Earth. Life itself would probably survive all but the most extreme events, but it would have to evolve into intelligent life for another species to attempt to spread life beyond earth.
- tnecniv 11y agoOptimistic SF was very much in vogue last century despite two world wars and the cold war. In contrast, early SF writers in the 19th century had a very dark outlook on the future. Despite the fact that Europe was at the peak of it's influence and the relatively small amount of conflict in the back half of the century (particularly compared to the era of turmoil in the first half), many writers thought the human race was done for and science was at it's limit (Kelvin didn't help that thought). Obviously there are outliers on both fronts (lots of Verne, Orwell, Ellison, etc)