15 quotes
The world of fantasy and myth isn’t really that large.
A View from the Stars (2024)
Exploring the secrets of the universe is the basic instinct of all intelligent life.
A View from the Stars (2024)
(Personally, I’ve never thought it’s sci-fi’s job to represent reality or human nature.)
A View from the Stars (2024)
The glories and obstacles of the past are just a speck compared to the vastness of the future.
A View from the Stars (2024)
The products of modern science have already surpassed the wonders of magic.
A View from the Stars (2024)
Quantitative change eventually gives way to qualitative change.
A View from the Stars (2024)
Numbness to the universe is pervasive in society.
A View from the Stars (2024)
That humans will biologically alter themselves is inevitable, which makes life sciences the most terrifying of the sciences.
A View from the Stars (2024)
The worlds described in today’s sci-fi are entirely different from those of a few decades ago, whereas today’s fantasy worlds aren’t so different from those of the Middle Ages.
A View from the Stars (2024)
It’s an interesting thing, really: The rigorous, science-based predictions of scientists and futurologists and the spirited “flights of fancy” of sci-fi writers are just about equally (in)accurate!
A View from the Stars (2024)
A professor of philosophy once said that lesson one for freshman in his field should consist of a long, hard look late at night at the stars. I think this would be an even more apt first lesson for aspiring writers of sci-fi.
A View from the Stars (2024)
The truth is that sci-fi and fantasy have many more similarities than differences. They have the same goal: both strive to create ethereal, free worlds of the imagination from which readers can derive the shocks and delights of beauty. (Personally, I’ve never thought it’s sci-fi’s job to represent reality or human nature.) The only difference between the two is the source of their imaginings.
A View from the Stars (2024)
The cosmos had not chosen humanity after all. In the old timeline, humans had created the apex civilization on earth, but that had been a one-time and accidental chance. In our human conceit, we’d taken the accidental for the inevitable.
A View from the Stars (2024)
Mind you, what we are discussing isn’t religion, per se, but religious feeling. This isn’t the feeling someone has toward God—it’s atheistic, and not in the complicated way of Spinoza or whomever. The religious feeling of science fiction is a deep sense of awe at the great mysteries of the universe.
A View from the Stars (2024)
Contemporary China is a complex society in transition. The kinds of technological and social changes that took societies in the west centuries to move through have sometimes been experienced by a mere two generations in China. The anxiety of careening out of balance, of being torn by parts moving too fast and too slow, is felt everywhere.