posted
I have a question: How would Scifi look in the Star Trek (24th century) universe. If you would be an Scifi Autor and you live 2375 what about would you write your scifi storys/holostorys?
Lobo
-------------------- "I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die..."
Registered: Jul 2001
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posted
I think the alternative-history and fantasy subgenres would remain much as they are, only enriched by the mythologies of all the nonhuman cultures. Stories about the ancestral past of humans (and of other species and cultures) would gain in prominence since so much new material would be available and so many new questions would be raised.
Space adventures would no longer count as sci-fi, but would be more comparable to militaria novels and general action-adventures. Still, a saga like Star Trek would probably still be a popular form of sci-fi - an encounter with Andorians or Klingons would be dull politics or diplomacy, but an encounter with the fictional Higacho would still fascinate the readers, as long as the Higacho were portrayed as interesting enough a species.
Just like Star Trek portrays human issues through aliens, the future sagas could continue to portray real human/alien issues through fictional aliens. But perhaps a reverse form of storytelling would also emerge, one where entire alien species would be allegorically described through the use of fictional human characters!
Techno-oriented sci-fi would of course continue much as it is. The invention of things much more wondrous than those imagined by Jules Verne has not stopped sci-fi writers of the 20th and 21st centuries. And generally, Trek characters seem just as fascinated by technology and gadgetry as today's people are.
Medical science fiction and body transformations might lose some of their fascination when medicine already is capable of fulfilling the wildest dreams of mankind, probably up to and including eternal life and eternal youth (it's just that people aren't interested in those any more, or so some Crusher dialogue in 1st season TNG suggests).
And surely there would be some completely new venues of speculation as well. I just can't imagine what those would be. But new types of literature do keep emerging even today - not everything was invented by the ancient Greeks.
-------------------- "I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die..."
Registered: Jul 2001
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posted
Although they don't have TV, so there might have been a similar reduction in other sorts of entertainment. There have been comments I believe about "how can you just WATCH something and not interact", but by Harry, and he's a silly person.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
In Alan Moore's Watchmen, there were no comics about superheroes because the world the story was set in actually had them. Instead, pirate comics became big.
I don't know if this extends in a similar fashion to the Star Trek universe, but I do know that it seems that people don't read SF. Look at all of their Holodeck programs. With the exception of Tom Paris and his Chaotica game, all of the shown progs are based on "historical" fictions, period pieces, or combat.
Personally, I wonder where all the hackers and computer programmers and so on are at. In Star Trek only hardware engineers seem to have any work.
Maybe the fact that there is no sci-fi means nobody is interested in computers anymore.
Registered: Jan 2001
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posted
I've managed to go 22 years without ever bumping into a programmer or hacker in real life, so it's not that surprising that they're never seen in Trek, especially if the hackers are as anoraky as they are today.
-------------------- Yes, you're despicable, and... and picable... and... and you're definitely, definitely despicable. How a person can get so despicable in one lifetime is beyond me. It isn't as though I haven't met a lot of people. Goodness knows it isn't that. It isn't just that... it isn't... it's... it's despicable.
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
Right. But on a starship where everything from the toliets on up is run by computers, you would expect them to have something like a programming specialist onboard.
Probably more than one, actually. And probably, considering how sophisticated the computers are, there would be an entire branch of Starfleet devoted to it. They'd be in the Engineering department, but still, they'd be there.
Unless we are to believe that the computer OS's of the future are completely bug free, that is.
Registered: Jan 2001
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posted
Or that they're smart enough to rewrite theirselves...
-------------------- "This is why you people think I'm so unknowable. You don't listen!" - God, "God, the Devil and Bob"
Registered: Mar 1999
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EdipisReks
Ex-Member
posted
uh oh, computer rewriting themselves. getting a little too close to the singularity, aren't we?
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posted
Just watching the TNG episode with Dr. Stubbs and "The Egg".. Crusher orders "Computer, fix foodslot". Seems like Starfleet computers can do at least some reprogramming by themselves.
Edit: Data even says the computer can fix (don't remember if he literally said 'rewrite') itself. "There hasn't been a system-wide failure in 97 years".
capped
I WAS IN THE FUTURE, IT WAS TOO LATE TO RSVP
Member # 709
posted
if the computer rewrites and fixes itself, does that invalidate the warranty?
'fix foodslot' was probably a command to 'wipe this foodslot's programming and replaced it with an unmodified archive version'.. or maybe a physical maintenance/diagnostic request.
Registered: Sep 2001
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