Quote:
Originally Posted by starrigger
... But I think an equally valid way to look at it is to say that it's all fantasy--set in worlds that aren't our world, and with rules that may be different--and science fiction is a subset of fantasy in which there's an assumption that science and/or logical extrapolation is an essential part. We can envision these settings and stories being real based on the world and the science we know, with perhaps some bending of the science allowed in the course of the extrapolation.
If you really want to start an argument, ask for a definition of hard SF.  |
That'd be SF with really long words, yes?
Some care is needed here, you could argue that all fiction is fantasy. Romance is a really easy to understand example of what I mean, but almost any fiction
could come under the heading of being the author's fantasy. Such broadening of the definition doesn't really help much. The more I read here the more I come back to that elusive "feeling" I get when I read a book: either the author has tried hard to have me believe the story is (at least mostly) possible according to what we know now (when the book was written), or whether the author couldn't care how many rules of physics they break as long as it seems reasonable while you read.