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Originally Posted by nabsltd
Generally, "hard" science fiction means the author has attempted to work out the "rules" of the science developments and explain them with as little hand-waving and technobabble as possible.
So, "discovered a new element that enables faster than light travel" == "soft" (or maybe even fantasy), while "discovered a new element that is more stable than other transuranic elements and allows this previously impossible chemical process" == "hard".
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I appreciate the examples, but as someone who used to be a nuclear physicist, I'd say a new element that is stable is as much fantasy as Star Trek's "warp factor 10".
That's the trouble with most science fiction, the technological innovations required to make the stories interesting (faster-than-light travel and communications, cryogenics, transporter beams, tractor beams, hand-held weapons containing immense quantities of energy,...) are considered to be impossible today for very good scientific reasons. Why worry about hand-waving when the whole premise is fantasy to begin with?