Do You Think Science Fiction Literature, Movies , TV Series, etc have Created the Modern World As We Know it?

The problem with the question is the word 'Created'.

Do You Think Science Fiction Literature, Movies , TV Series, etc have Created the Modern World As We Know it?

Maybe 'Influenced' or 'contributed to'.

we can go all the way back to Jules Verne’s 1865 novel, From the Earth to the Moon. That did happen.
And the submarine in 20,000 Leagues seems a lot like a nuclear sub.


Arthur C. Clark is one of my all time favorites. He used gravity assist in the 2001 series. He wasn't the first, but IMHO he was the best hard science-fiction writer of the time. And there is this:

I believe it inspires science minded people to think beyond the bubble so to speak, so my answer would be Yes, indirectly.
 
It's well past 2015 , no flying cars and no Mr Fusion to make my promised by never delivered flying car run and , where is the personnel Warp drive jet pack we were promised in 1985 in Back to the Future II and, why didn't we get Max Spielberg's 3 D Jaws sequel ? :mad:

And the Cubs won the World Series in 2016 and, not against ta Miami Gators American League franchise team which also hasn't materialized. :mad: :whistle:;)
 
I remember reading that around 7 out of 10 people worldwide live on less than $10 a day as of 2015, and that only around 7 pct of people worldwide have college degrees. Meanwhile, oil production per capita peaked back in 1979 and over fifty positive feedback loops involving climate change have been detected the past two decades. CO2 ppm has risen at 14 times the rate; the last time it was this high was around a million years ago, and even then it rose at a rate of 30 ppm every thousand years. Now, it's rising at 50 ppm every 50 years.
 
I remember reading that around 7 out of 10 people worldwide live on less than $10 a day as of 2015, and that only around 7 pct of people worldwide have college degrees. Meanwhile, oil production per capita peaked back in 1979 and over fifty positive feedback loops involving climate change have been detected the past two decades. CO2 ppm has risen at 14 times the rate; the last time it was this high was around a million years ago, and even then it rose at a rate of 30 ppm every thousand years. Now, it's rising at 50 ppm every 50 years.
Science fiction is causing CO2 to increase?
 
I think about when I was growing up in the 1950s and 60s, and how the 21st century was depicted in movies, comics, books etc. Then I look around me in 2022 and I see hardly any resemblance at all. I think that fiction in any media and any genre did a very poor job of picturing the future, and if it did such a poor job of imagining what it might be, how could it have shaped it?
 
Science fiction is causing CO2 to increase?
My post is in relation to the previous one: science fiction movies predicted flying cars, etc., and they didn't happen. But other science fiction movies predicted combinations of predicaments leading to societal collapse. Are we seeing signs of that now?

Even the 14-time increase in CO2 is unbelievable. To recap, around a million years ago, CO2 ppm reached around 800 (it maxes out at 300) and it increased at a rate of 30 ppm every one thousand years.

Now, it's rising at a rate of 50 ppm in only 50 years.
 
My post is in relation to the previous one: science fiction movies predicted flying cars, etc., and they didn't happen. But other science fiction movies predicted combinations of predicaments leading to societal collapse. Are we seeing signs of that now?

Even the 14-time increase in CO2 is unbelievable. To recap, around a million years ago, CO2 ppm reached around 800 (it maxes out at 300) and it increased at a rate of 30 ppm every one thousand years.

Now, it's rising at a rate of 50 ppm in only 50 years.
Wait a minute! Are you saying CO2 levels are rising dangerously?!
 
if it did such a poor job of imagining what it might be, how could it have shaped it?

That all depends on who you read, what you watched, and who you paid serious attention to. Science fiction shapes views, it doesn't build monuments. There are two levels of understanding, what is physically happening and what people want to see happening. Plus the reader needs to extrapolate information that authors are presenting the reader because it is very difficult to nail down future views. A lot of the information was presented as warnings, such as Brunner's works, which just about everyone ignored. People used to filter out negative views and dwell on positive aspects that supported what they wanted to see regardless of where the highway was taking them. It was my experience that authors quit warning people because no one was paying serious attention, it was depressing, and instead pursued fantasy because that's where the money was. Consequently the book shelves filled up with fantasy and feel good science fiction. In my opinion Dhalgren was a particularly potent jab at perceived reality and where the highway was taking society because it was science fiction without spectacular science fiction with just a smattering of techno props. Ironically many asked what kind of vision was a smoldering city (which did exist in real time), while we were all standing on the edge of one of history's most slippery slopes which has turned into an ocean that can take people anywhere they want to go.
 
I think we have to consider if the authors are actually predicting a future, or simply offering an alternative one? Quite often I think that it resembles an idealised present (for positive futures) and dystopian for the opposite. Then like a Christmas list we internally tick the things we want to be. Unfortunately whilst we'd all like hoverboards and 3 sea shells, we usually end up with the equivalent of socks.

With exception of certain visionaries such as Arthur C Clarke (who amongst other things envisaged the end of cigarettes at a time when nearly everyone smoked), I think that - just as often happens with historical fiction - the 'future' is determined by what is best for the movie/book.
 
Well said @paranoid marvin. I also think that "predicting" the future --- which I doubt any author really sets out to do. --- is almost impossible because some things are just totally unpredictable. I would never have in a 100 years predicted the rise of texting to communicate. Texting would seem to be a regression in technology without a reason. Now, Dick Tracy was so right with "wrist radios" and later "wrist televisions." But so wrong with Moon Maidens and anti-gravity space ships.
 
Predicting the future is difficult without abandoning the banality of reality so you can offer the drama and adventure that is necessary for narrative entertainment.

So many many things people , places and events large and small , seen and unseen ,imagine and unimagined, predicted and unforeseen create the future we end up in.
 

Back
Top