ROTF nominated for a Saturn Award

[138 Scourge]

I am just arguing that there is little meaningful difference between the genres.

And as I already pointed out, there is a very meaningful difference. How a piece of technology isn't necessarily going to be explained within a story. This doesn't make it more "magical" though, as within context of the story it is still understood to be something governed by the scientific laws of nature.

More or less, I suppose. Every so often something completely ridiculous comes up in a story and it's just explained away by going "Look, it was magic, shut up". That's kind of funny. It also amuses me when magic and super-science are treated as just different "technologies" for lack of a better word. Alan Moore's "Top Ten" series did a lot of fun things with this.

Buuuut...if the Doctor was, say, an immortal magician that traveled around in an enchanted cabinet fighting monsters, the show wouldn't be that different, would it? Or if John Constantine was a guy that, say, had discovered the existence of aliens and psychic powers on Earth and used the one to fight the other.

I mean, when you got a guy like Asimov, who understands his science, and he's writing a science fiction story, that's one thing. But, say, Star Trek. That ship may as well be powered by magic. It's not important to the stories so much, I don't think, it's just sort of dressing on the main thing.

This is fun. Someone else try it! Flip a science-fiction and fantasy thing around!

[Sparky Prime]

Buuuut...if the Doctor was, say, an immortal magician that traveled around in an enchanted cabinet fighting monsters, the show wouldn't be that different, would it? Or if John Constantine was a guy that, say, had discovered the existence of aliens and psychic powers on Earth and used the one to fight the other.

I've never seen Dr. Who myself, so I can't speak for that, but Constantine would be a very different story if it replaced the demons/angels with aliens instead.

But, say, Star Trek. That ship may as well be powered by magic. It's not important to the stories so much, I don't think, it's just sort of dressing on the main thing.

Star Trek actually does a decent job in explaining how the ship's technology is supposed to work. There isn't anything magic about it. And I really would have to say it is important to the stories.

[JediTricks]

The more loosely defined technology is in a given story, the more "magical" it becomes.

I disagree, it only needs to be defined in the minds of the author so that he can convey the ideas behind it in the story. And if it's a technology that the audience can easily grasp within their scientific understanding, then it needs even less pinning down.

I am not against the use of magic, (or sort-of science), in fiction. I am just arguing that there is little meaningful difference between the genres.

And I am saying that's not accurate, there's a significant difference between the genres. Sci-fi asks its audience to make assumptions based on existing knowledge to get them across the threshold, fantasy merely asks its audience to blindly believe what they're reading. It's the difference between an educated guess and blind faith. Fantasy's only limitations are based on the author's needs to accommodate the story, sci-fi requires foundation to get near those levels.

TF is a good, if extreme, example of how some science fiction is so ungrounded in physics that it is effectively about magic.

If you're talking about the movie series, I agree. If you're talking about G1 or Beast Wars though, I wouldn't agree at all, there is a clear attempt in those stories to carry concepts that make TFs possible there into a sci-fi realm while still keeping it grounded enough to explain it to a kid audience.

The harder the scifi, the less it deviates from established science or reasonable extensions of it. "Star Wars" and "Transformers" are in no way hard scifi.

Did anybody claim they were hard sci-fi, or are you just stating the obvious for effect? I don't buy your reasoning about what makes sci-fi hard, it's not just about the science behind the story, but about how much believable-yet-still-fictional science drives the story itself. Star Wars is soft sci-fi because the story isn't heavily driven by the science. Yet Star Trek's roots are all about the established sciences of the 1960s being extended upon but that doesn't make it hard sci-fi.

I am just arguing that there is little meaningful difference between the genres.

And as I already pointed out, there is a very meaningful difference. How a piece of technology isn't necessarily going to be explained within a story. This doesn't make it more "magical" though, as within context of the story it is still understood to be something governed by the scientific laws of nature.

Or I could have saved some of my time and just quoted this. Good point.

Buuuut...if the Doctor was, say, an immortal magician that traveled around in an enchanted cabinet fighting monsters, the show wouldn't be that different, would it?

Well, it would remove the time-travel aspect which is a big portion of what makes Dr Who sci-fi, and it would remove the threat of running out of lives for the Doctor which is part of the dramatic tension for the character, and it would remove the nobility of when the Doctor *doesn't* kill the monster of the week because it's merely another alien with the same rights to co-exist as the rest of us. A monster is merely a thing to defeat, an alien is something that might seem monstrous but has more going on.

But, say, Star Trek. That ship may as well be powered by magic. It's not important to the stories so much, I don't think, it's just sort of dressing on the main thing.

I could spend all day explaining how the ships are powered, how they're based on ideas straight from NASA's understanding and extrapolations of known science (some more extrapolated to the Nth state such as the transporter, and the fact that as of yet there is no access to a subspacial state). But it's not "magic", it's grounded behind-the-scenes, it holds up ok despite being pretty soft science.

[138 Scourge]

....I clearly did not pick good examples.

But everything that you mentioned being different in "Magic Doctor" vs. "Doctor Who" could be done with the magic, as well. And now that I think of it, it was pretty strongly hinted that the Doctor was Merlin, so that sorta blends the science-magic kinda thing right there.

Now, as for Star Trek, I'll just go ahead and assume you're right about the ships and such being based on real science, but humanity being able to cooperate long enough to build those suckers? Yeah, tell me that wasn't magic! ...okay, I got nothin'.