Elements of Science Fiction
I'm not going to try to explain or justify the elements of SF below. I'm just saying that these are elements of SF. If you think of others which should be included or you disagree with the inclusion of an element, please write a comment or send an email. Remember, not all the elements are found in every story.
These interfaces are fairly straightforward. They’re generally linked to some type of communication device and synched to the individual user’s access rights and levels. The user sees the interface via the visual connection which is part of the design of the communication device in their world.
In movies they’re visible to an outside observer so that the viewer can see what’s going on, and they make for cool graphics.
Aliens
All manner of aliens from humanoid, insect, formless and machines have been presented, some are serious, many are humorous. There aren’t many stories that postulate that we’re the first intelligent lifeforms and humans always seem to have a lot of neighbours in SF.
Androids
Many authors and writers portray androids as mobile robots with a human form, without concerning themselves with the extent to which the android is autonomous or has strong AI, it just needs to look human enough for us to anthropomorphize it.
You can take a look at my detailed definitions for androids, cyborgs and robots in my SPECIATION blog.
Artificial Intelligence
Artificial intelligence is often the main subject of the story but that's not what I'm referring to here. AI as an element of SF refers to its presence within the world we're visiting in the story. AI exists within our civilisation today, we see it in phones, cars, computers and a number of products.
Here are a few technologies which must have integrated AI to function:
- Universal translators
- Biometrics
- Tricorders and other medical devices
- Replicators
- Virtual reality and holodecks
- Teleportation devices
- Ship's computer, usually with a voice activated AI
Cyborgs
There's better consensus around cyborgs than androids. A cyborg is a biological body that has been enhanced with technology in order to function better or to repair a damaged component. A body with a cybernetic prosthesis is a cyborg. A glass eye doesn’t make one a cyborg, but a sophisticated artificial eye does.
A popular late 1900s TV series starring a cyborg was the Six Million Dollar Man and who could forget the Borg in Star Trek.
You can take a look at my detailed definitions for androids, cyborgs and robots in my SPECIATION blog.
Enhanced Mental Abilities
ESP and various paranormal abilities was very popular in the mid 1900s. Science Fiction from that period has a lot of mind reading and similar things going on.
- Telepaths (The Demolished Man by Alfred Bester)
- Vulcan mind melds
Faster Than Light Displacement
Star Trek warp technology is well known but there are numerous variations, most with little or no scientific explanation or hypothesis. The most scientifically plausible, and therefore most entertaining, is the warp drive.
In SPECIATION: Homo sapiens apparatus, I use something called the spacetime drive which is essentially a warp engine. (If you're up for it, the concept of the spacetime drive was inspired by the work of Dr. Miguel Alcubierre (The warp drive: hyper-fast travel within general relativity. Classical and Quantum Gravity.11 (5): L73– L77).) A propulsion system that’s powered by dark energy. It expands spacetime behind the ship and contracts it in front. It can be used without inertial dampers since the ship doesn’t move in space, it’s displaced in spacetime, inside a bubble. Also, the ship can’t hit anything because, technically, it isn’t moving. An external observer will see the ship only if they’re moving at the same rate along a parallel path. The ship can cover distances at relative velocities much faster than the speed of light.
Gravity
Gravity aboard ships appears in almost all SF. Mostly, it's driven by the need to make TV shows and movies on Earth in a studio with Earth gravity. There's almost never a lack of gravity on spaceships or space stations. In the last few years, a half-hearted attempt has been made to explain it away with scenes where the 'gravity function' of the ship fails and everyone floats around the ship, usually during a battle.
Holographic Environments and Virtual Reality
My favourite is the holodeck in Star Trek: The Next Generation. Virtual reality shows up in different forms with various goals like simulation, entertainment, remote control to name a few. While holograms are real, those found in SF are enhanced. We are making inroads however.
Medical Miracles
Miraculous devices abound which can diagnose and treat various ailments. Some machines can operate while others require the human to be immersed in magic fluids or within special rooms.
Memory Wipe Devices
Another tech that's short on explanation but fun is the ability to wipe someone's memory. It's usually used to add drama. We already have a mechanical version of this called the lobotomy which was popular in the mid 1900s. Men in Black had the neuralyzer (see weapons).
Nanotechnology
Replicators (food and materiel)Nanites are the overwhelming favourite nanotech in SF. The other nanotechnology which we see is nanotech materials, both programmable and basic.
Robots
Today, robots are prevalent in our society. They're sophisticated high tech machines full of powerful computers and A.I. that perform work of various kinds.
Back in the mid 1900s, authors like Isaac Asimov wrote about robots. Philip K. Dick often used the term simulacrum to label what many since have called androids.
You can take a look at my detailed definitions for androids, cyborgs and robots in my SPECIATION blog.
Shields / Force Fields
Shields and force fields are a staple of SF, especially in space, but also on a planet to protect buildings or people. There are even personal shields as those in DUNE by Frank Herbert.
The technology behind shields has been quite varied and the list is long.
Singularity
Many foresee a point in history when the overall human technological footprint will take prescience over humans per se; they call this point the Singularity. It is also closely associated with the advent of a technology-based mind or consciousness which would be superior to human intellect.
A technology-based intellect with this kind of abilities is known as an artificial superintelligence or ASI. It is this type of entity which is created in SPECIATION (see Background for details). You should keep in mind that my book is a novel. As such, it is a fictional story and not a futurist's prognostication.
Ray Kurzweil (The Singularity is Nearer) and James Barrat (Our Final Invention) both speak to the Singularity with varying degrees of optimism.
Spacesuits
Spacesuits in the 1950s were nylon and rubber with an aluminum coating, comfy. Spacesuits in TV and film tended to run the gamut depending on the budget.
The latest generations of spacesuits in SF film and TV are taking advantage of 3D animation. A cool example is the use of animation to create helmets which emerge from the shoulders of suits; some of the propulsion capabilities are also very nice.
Stasis Pods
There's a lot of variety in design and technology and a lot of vomiting when people awaken. The two main types are cryogenic and time-based i.e. time slows down and you don't age much in the pod.
Teleportation
Terraforming
Terraforming most often takes the form of technological manipulation, usually some kind of bio-engineering, which transforms a planet to make it physically habitable by humans. In many cases it is extremely rapid, like firing a missile at the planet and watching it transform into a beautiful verdant paradise ready for us humans to plunder. In others, such as Ridley Scott's Alien from 1979, it takes years.
Another approach, put forward by Kim Stanley Robinson in his series; Mars Trilogy, is to prepare a planet for habitation by humans without any magical bio-engineering.
An interesting book on the subject is Climate and Literature by Chris Pak, published by Cambridge University Press. Chapter 12 deals specifically with terraforming in SF.
Weapons
There's a plethora of weapons in the SF realm: ray-guns of all types, phasers (I love the 'stun' setting), lasers, planet destroying canons, transformative gases and mind altering insects and potions.
Men in Black had some very interesting weapons like the neuralyzer. This device could erase someone's memory and then the agent could 'reprogram' a new memory in order to protect the agency's secrecy.
One of the coolest weapons for me is the hunter-seeker found in DUNE. It comes out of the wall in Paul's room after he first arrives on Arrakis. It's purpose is to silently zero in on its target and kill them.
Wormholes
Now here's a cool use of astrophysics. They're usually used as shortcuts through the Universe, handy if it's possible. Wormholes are based on science but it doesn't look very promising for now.
The Beyond is a science fiction movie which came out in 2017. Humans have perfected a way to take an astronaut's brain and transplant it into a synthetic body in order to send them on missions which would otherwise kill them. The reason they do this in the movie is to send the astronauts through a wormhole to see what's on the other side. The downside to the procedure is that once the brain has been removed from the human body, there's no going back to life as a human. The movie is shot as a type of documentary, as if members of the space agency sending the astronauts into the wormhole were interviewing the personnel during events leading up to the mission.
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