Science Fiction

Two years ago I had the pleasure to take a short course entitled "How Physics Inspires Science Fiction" at the Vienna University of Technology. Later if suffered a subtle change towards the more accurate "How Science Inspires Science Fiction". Although it might seem a say-nothing title with the intent of coating a do-nothing course (which would still make an excellent excuse to travel to Vienna) the course revealed itself to be surprisingly interesting.

As the title suggests, the course was about the way actual/real Science influences Science Fiction. I was amazed to discover that many authors are extremely meticulous when writing their fiction stories, constraining them with the laws of Physics and others. Two examples, Rendezvous With Rama and The Wind From The Sun immediately come to mind. But if the stories are so accurate in Scientific terms, then why are they considered Science Fiction?

Catch is, even though the behaviour of objects (in its most general meaning) appears to be correct, there may be unfeasible underlying assumptions. An author may, for instance, speak about a realistic space ship which would cost 1e20€ to build, or made of materials with excessively high welding temperatures. In this sense, Science Fiction strolls ahead of Science, waiting for new technologies and procedures to make it possible.

Another possibility is to leave unmentioned important details (the ones that make something unthinkable at the time of writing), thus avoiding the necessity of lying / making things up. This is even more interesting, in that it allows the author to predict events far more distant in the future. I believe this to be the case of Jules Verne's Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea, as well as others.

In both cases it is clear that the inverse relation also exists; that is, one could take a course on "How Science Fiction Inspires Science". I was therefore excited to wait and see any of those stories come true, wondering how long it would take. Turns out the future was much closer than I'd thought.

The Wind From The Sun, already refered to hereabove, fantasised about space ships powered by solar energy, through the use of solar sails (thus the wind in the title). Believe it or not, a solar plane such as that already exists. The Solar Impulse is capable of carrying one passenger and has already proved itself capable of flying day and night (26 consecutive hours) without fuel. Current challenge is to achieve an all-around the globe travel in 2015. You can check the project here; I recommend watching some of the videos with the project's dreamers. They are truly inspiring.

So let's not make the same mistake as Philipp von Jolly when he stated that " (...) almost everything is already discovered (...) ". If running out of ideas, just pick a book and make it true.


Filipe Baptista de Morais