A conversation I had over the weekend got me thinking about the future of humanity, the present of humanity, what this has to do with the genre and why there's lots and lots of hope in some ways, and things are worrying in another.
I have always believed - quite firmly - that humanity has only one future if it is to remain relevant, and that is the conquest of space. Humans have always been an exploring species, and this must continue. I have a hard time understanding people who believe that money spent on space exploration would be better employed elsewhere. No matter what example, humanitarian, infrastructure or whatever, they cite, I always end up thinking that the thinking behind it is completely limited, and shows a huge lack of big picture thinking. I have been told in no uncertain terms that I am completely wrong, but I still don't see it.
We live in a world in which the scientific achievements are such that much of our currrent tech wasn't even imagined by science fiction writers as late as the sixties, and yet, the things they saw as important have not come to pass. We still haven't even reached Mars... It's terrible to think that mankind's greatest achievement, the Apollo XI moon landing, ocurred before I was born. Nothing since has come anywhere near that. So much for progress.
Of course, there are reasons for this, and most of them have to do with tendencies in the western world. Consumers have come to expect comfort and entertainment, and the west's best minds have moved away from real engineering challenges to the safe confines of computer science. They don't care that another doubling of processor speed really doesn't matter - they just know that the sheeple buy into it and that they, the designers, get paid. Meanwhile, humanity has better video games and larger and more unwieldy operrating systems.
Another social tendency that is keeping the west back is the slashing of funding to go to social plans, wars or whatever other politically expedient issue comes along. This is the very definition of short-sighted. They go after immediate goals while forgetting the really important things. Particularly unsettling is the situation in the US, the traditional leader in space, where science has been under siege for years, and where any sense of adventure seems to have been crushed under the weight of the PC nightmare (TM). I don't think this will be reverted any time soon - most people just aren't interested.
This lack of interest is also affecting the genre. As people move away from an interest in science and progress, fantasy becomes more popular than science fiction (sound familiar?), and the genre suffers for it. You see, fantasy is fine (I personally love fantasy), but it isn't, in my opinion, as significant as SF, which requires knowledge and the capacity to work within a scientific restrictions to make it work. It's the difference between what might be, and what never will.
So, is the trend irreversible? Is there no hope?
Well... I would actually say that not only is the trend reverisble, there are people already working on it. Except that most of us won't be comfortable with the way it's being done.
You see, most of the world's people live in Asia. They do not speak English. They are not Europeans. And they are not constrained by western thinking on political issues. They are well on their way to leading the world economically, and after that they will do so politically.
The Western world will become irrelevant on a changed world slate (except as a problem, something akin to today's middle east). If China, for example wants to go to Mars as a question of national pride, they will (they have already sent men into orbit with no help from the west). If India wants to establish, in response, a base on the moon, they will as well. Eventually, someone will go beyond that.
The west and its limited imagination will be confined to Earth, and that is a good thing. The limited thinking that is leading to the decline is not something we want to take with us. I really hope that it isn't too late to revert it, but I see nothing coming out of the US or out of inward-looking Europe, spending more and more on social plans, to give me hope. All I can do right now is to root for the Taikonauts.
In spite of all this, I still wrote 600 words into
Siege last night. A science fiction novel! So I guess I should be looking for a good Chinese translator!