Musing 25

I’ve mentioned before how I love sci-fi, and it’s something I’ve had to guard my heart against. But why is it a genre I have long loved (and at some point, want to write a sci-fi story of my own)?

There are quite a few reasons, but the three that come to mind immediately are

• a desire to see creation better understood and well-stewarded
• a love of stories that make me think
• my dad loved it.

Beginning at the end, I have many a fond memory of watching Star* with my dad, and whether it was laughing at O’Neill’s jokes in SG1 or laughing at Q in Star Trek, many a Friday night was spent enjoying some sort of sci-fi (though usually Star Trek, Stargate, or Star Wars). And as is often the case, what you start in childhood stays with you throughout life. And I look forward to sharing this love with the next generation. (pun fully intended)

The second reason is that sci-fi stories are often explorations of some aspect of life and either push that concept to extremes, or just to weird conclusions. On the one hand, we have characters like Khan, who represent the risk of genetic engineering, but of the other, we have Wall E, where mankind have become so isolated and fat. These explorations make us ask probing questions – “Are we doing the right thing with this technology?”, “what are the consequences for us if this becomes real and not just fantasy?”

Related to that latter question, sci-fi has often inspired real technological innovation. Much ink has been spilled on how Star Trek inspired much of modern technological marvels and so I need not speak more there. But often times when sci-fi challenges us, it did so in our relationship with creation in some way. As a Christian, I want to see us better improve our stewardship of the resources God’s given us to rule over, and sci-fi has been used well to predict the technology we use to help us do so. And I hope to see us advance further through creative use of sci-fi in the future.