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by grandalf
5129 days ago
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What more is there to really aspire to? Virtual sex with an indiscernibly lifelike avatar of anyone we've ever met? Wall-E covered the utopian concept of robot-aided leisure pretty well. His comment resonated with me as well. However I think there's a libertarian explanation for the decline of Utopian Sci-Fi. It existed out of a general optimism about problems too large for a ragtag group of individualists to solve. Space travel, etc., is the realm of big governments, and exploration of the universe is the stuff of political hegemony. The real world has gone way beyond that to a place where Peter Thiel is wealthy enough to fund his own space explorations. The problem for Sci-fi is that market based approaches to solving problems are a lot less glamourous than those undertaken by the state. There is also (quite often) far less drama, a simple profit motive, and rather boring incremental progress. State actions are always impossible to disconnect from the propaganda story accompanying them. Scientific advancement, often undertaken by governments solely for the purpose of warmaking, has been the locus of much propaganda, and it wasn't until the 50s were over that the nation started to get a clue. That said I hope someone writes a story that proves me wrong. |
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What a sad view of the world!
Artistic creativity is boundless.