Fiction in Science Fiction!
Like there are stars in the night sky, and there is a dominant gaze of beauty in the summer light, exactly like that, there is fiction in science fiction novels. But the way it blends in the fictitious plot of the story, always makes you believe in the fiction as if it were real. It flashes like a vivid dream with punctuations of reality, and as the dream progresses, the dreamer i.e. the science fiction reader, begins to believe in the reality of the fiction.
Eventually at the climax, the component of fiction blends with reality in such a way that fiction loses its identity and all that is left is reality. A reality that is a strong possibility, because it is still roaming within the boundary dominated by fiction, but as it begins to gather multiple threads of reasoning and logical validation, the fiction gradually takes its first step out of this fictitious realm, and warms up towards the reality that begins to manifest itself around it. While the reader who is intently observing its every moment of argument with reality. Is sometimes left with no option but to think that all this is a masquerading act, where the victor is neither reality nor fiction. And then there are moments where the reader is convinced that what appears to be fiction, is actually part of reality, because it meets all logical and scientific criteria. And it is at this point the reader cannot eschew fiction because now it grows over the reader's mind like a reality that seeks root in the nucleus of logic.
There are many science fiction novels where the potential to prove a science fiction based idea or concept, supplants the potential to discard the idea, because it fulfils the logical requirement when assessed in reality of scientific inspection. So, what appears to be a story based on fiction is actually a window of reality that is imploring to be opened to let the new light of reality spread everywhere and illuminate the dark corners, where undiscovered scientific realities lie hidden. And science fiction novels work like flashlights designed to discover new scientific realities covered with darkness. And sometimes these phantoms of reality become victims of a sort of scientific euphemism, and one tends to ignore them. But a science fiction writer who is unafraid, logically sound, always manages to shine the flashlight of reality on these phantoms of reality. And when that happens, it is like discovering a new planet of reality where everything that appeared fictitious now leaves the veil of obscurity and emerges on the screen of reality, to be further probed by scientific scrupulousness, and if I may say, necessary scientific stubbornness.
And do you know what happens at this stage?
You witness scientific revelations. Where all of a sudden you understand why the apple fell and did not remain suspended in the air. You realise, why if I move to a far off planet I age slowly compared to others on Earth. You realise solar energy can be a great source of renewable energy. You realise you can now control the movement of clouds. Your mind begins to overflow with new realisations, which just a while ago seemed fictitious, but now they are real because they appear scientifically viable.
And this is what great science fiction can do. It can add a new dimension of reality to the already known scientific idea or experiment. When this happens, the fiction in science fiction, no longer remains fiction. It becomes a reality that can now withstand any test of reality.
A well written science fiction always manages to inspire the mind of a thinking man and a thinking woman as well. At this point quoting Mr. Patrick White, An Australian writer, would be justified, because it will dispel the misconceptions and excessive expectations people associate with inspiration and its source.
“Inspiration descends only in flashes, to clothe circumstances; it is not stored up in a barrel, like salt herrings, to be doled out.”
Wow, that was like hitting the nail right in the head.
Why?
Because science fiction novels are like the field of scientific ideas, but it is upto the reader, to tend to this field via his/her scientific knowledge, and then harvest the crop of ideas that he/she thinks would sustain the checks of logic driven reality. Science fiction novels carry ideas based on fiction, but a mind with burning passion for science, would be able to seek enough inspiration and make this seemingly imaginary concept grow on the solid ground of reality and bear fruit. The fruit of being able to convert fiction into reality.
At this point many of you might be thinking that transforming fiction into reality is the work of Gods alone, and no human is capable of achieving anything of this sort. Really!
Please do not be surprised. Here is the list of scientifically proven and developed realities today, that once were a part of science fiction and were predicted by the master science fiction writers who never let fiction leave the boundaries of reality.
If you you want to know more, please refer to my older blog post:
https://best-selling-books-scifi.blogspot.com/2023/06/science-fiction-in-2075.html
Now, fiction is beginning to appear real and you are beginning to believe, indeed fiction can be real. As real as reality can be. I was completely left in a state of shock when I first saw a science documentary where they were growing meat in a laboratory. Then, when I came across Mizro, a science fiction novel written in 1880, I too became a firm believer that the fiction in science fiction novels is not all fiction, there is a large part of the fiction that can be real. Only if we find the purpose and strength of will, to chase it in the closed room of logic until it reveals the side, that first makes it look real and then facilitates the process of making it a part of undeniable reality. All by means of logical diversification of the concept or idea that is derived from fiction.
It is very often that science fiction novels inspire us to take up the ideas proposed in science fiction. But our lack of inspiration acts as an inhibitor and we tend to believe that we did not feel sufficiently inspired. And we forget that inspiration descends only in flashes. Many of us after reading this blog post, would credit their scientific reticence to the fact that they had not come across Mr. Patrick White’s quote, until now!
And that is one hell of an excuse. Simply brilliant!
But I believe there are times when we act like ostriches. When they are being chased by lions, they hide their heads inside the sand, thinking that now the predator cannot spot them. But we all know it is suicidal. And many science fiction readers tend to follow this approach when they come across brilliant ideas proposed in science fiction novels. Thinking they have freed themselves from the responsibility to view this idea in the light of reality. But in actuality every act in this direction slowly suffocates the idea until it is no longer able to breathe in the space of reality and is forced to become a phantom of reality. Hoping, someday the flashlight of reality will be cast on it by someone who believes in the vast array of realities hidden inside an idea that germinates from fiction.
Here let me quote something written by one of my favourite poets, Mr. John Milton.
“The mind is its own place, and in itself. Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven.”
And this truly is the case with science fiction novels as well. Because in most science fiction novels, the author offers us the choice to choose whether the fiction that he/she is referring to, can be a reality that sustains every assault of logic and reasoning. Or it shall remain concealed in the mystified world of fiction. Where only dreams can be seen in the moment of reality to be forgotten in the progressing and wakeful moment of reality. This the irony and beauty of fiction, in science fiction.
It will be right to say that every human thought is original as long as it arises from the inward mind of man or woman. And when this thought grows and assumes its place in a scientifically developed mind, it is then that the thought seeks to occupy its rightful seat in the scientifically proven reality, and declares its affiliation to a religion: Religion of Reality or the religion of fiction, with no scientific commandments to baptise the fiction, and see if it too could occupy its rightful seat in the domain of reality.
Because based on the nature of the idea, the nature of the reality that inspects the fiction based idea, should change too. An idea where knowledge of Chemistry is required cannot be declared as trivial by a mind with rich knowledge of Physics. And this is where the major confusion lies, and this is why many fiction-like ideas lie buried in the graveyard of reality, where they are waiting for their moment of resurrection. All they need is their Messiah, that science daredevil, who possesses both the wit and grit to tackle it in the light of reality, and then decide its fate. And in most of the cases, the fiction in science fiction novels, does grow very well in the fields of reality.
Here let every science fiction reader remember one thing, “Even in dreams good works are not wasted.”
So let us give good science fiction based ideas the right to witness the light of reality and then let us decide whether they deserve to be cast into the moulds of scientific bravery, where they become smart phones, solar sails, airplanes, flying cars. And set us on the never ending quest to know what lies beyond the masquerading curtain of reality. And it is then we shall live in the reality where there is no room for fiction anymore, because at this culmination of human mind and scientific advancements, every human thought will be a reality that can be both experienced and executed in every possible dimension of reality.
As of now we only have mastered 2D and 3D, but there are many other dimensions of reality that remain unexplored. And I should not commit blasphemy by saying that the world that surrounds us, and we perceive as the reality, who knows it is but a grand fiction. A mirage. And the actual reality lies hidden, still untouched and virgin in a dimension of reality unknown to us.
With that said, I have no doubt that the fiction in science fiction novels has the potential to be real, feel real and look real as well. Only if we, the readers, let the flashlight of reality shine on these ideas of fiction with the right intensity and exposure time, they deserve.
Because unless light flashes on a photographic film for the right time in the dark room where it is being developed, the image captured in the photographic film will be so dull that it will be invisible, and in extreme cases of distortion, the image would tend to look like a ghost. But this is just a visual abrasion caused by the wrong exposure to light in the dark room.
And due to this technical anomaly the object captured in the photograph would always be nothing more than fiction to everyone. Because they just see a blank photograph.
And fiction in science fiction novels is very much like this photograph, that will show its real and exact colours only when it is exposed to light, long enough and correctly.
Taking the tradition of blending fiction in the cocktail of realities further, I have tried to excite the thinking readers of science fiction novels, by offering them a lot to think about in the form of a science fiction novel titled : They Loved in 2075. It is a science fiction that refers to a far away future i.e. 2075, but it talks about ideas that could redefine human societies in 2075.
It is a fiction, where reality walks hand in hand with scientific originality, and never discards the possibility of reality in 2075, based on the current situations and circumstances that will have a direct influence on our future.
This science fiction novel deals with the evolution of human feelings in the midst of a growing web of synthetic feelings, cast on human society by self aware machines, who look, feel and emote like humans. What will be the social and psychological implications of this exposure, is what the science fiction novel, They Loved in 2075, deals with via an exciting love story. And that too set in 2075.
When one of the purest human feelings, love, seems to be transforming into something unrecognisable to humans in 2075.
To know and discover your version of reality in this science fiction, please read: They Loved in 2075.
As you seek reality in fiction, please be warned: “Some circumstantial evidence is very strong, as when you find a trout in the milk!”
I hope you got my point. On that note, let the trout of human imagination swim freely in the waters of science fiction. And when it is found in the milk, let us pause and think bravely with pure scientific acumen. Then undoubtedly fiction will reveal its parts of reality to the mind that is curious and serious as well!
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