Please enable JavaScript.
Coggle requires JavaScript to display documents.
Science Fictions by Becca Moore (Aliens & Others (Sci-Fi Poems (Tracy…
Science Fictions by Becca Moore
Aliens & Others
Sci-Fi Poems
Tracy K. Smith's "Sci-Fi"
-This poem is about Science Fiction transcending what is normal.
-Science fiction looks to the future.
-Sci-fi does not care about history; it imagines another world and possible futures: "History, with its hard spine and dog-eared/ Corners, will be replaces with nuance" (3-4).
-Sci-fi can be about anything. Its subject matter can be about human progress, a utopian or dystopian future. The possibilities are endless.
-While sci-fi can provide hope it can also serve to teach humans lessons.
-Finally, sci-fi must be "scrutable and safe" (21). In order for people to learn sci-fi works have to be understandable and relatable.
-Tension exists in the poem because it claims that science fiction will become reality. Smith hopes that science fiction will allow the future to be less daunting as humans will be able to drift in space "eons form even our own moon" (19).
However, once sci-fi becomes reality then the ability to use our imaginations disappears.
Lisa Mueller's "The End of Science Fiction"
-Mueller discusses the same fear that Smith does, that science fiction will cease to exist. According to Mueller the genre of sci-fi is "not fantasy, this is our life."
-Humans are already going to the moon, exploring space, creating artificial intelligence.
-As humans become invincible Mueller suggests humans tell stories about humanity "before our bodies glittered / and we stopped bleeding" (25-26).
-As science fiction becomes reality Mueller believes humans will lose humanity because "we are gods who can unmake / the world in seven days" (5-6).
As humans make rapid advancements in technology and science humans may forget to think about the ethics of creating new life with this technology.
Les Murray's "Science Fiction"
-Murray's agrees that sci-fi can take people to incredible worlds but this will only isolate society.
-Once imagination becomes reality people "can't get out / to be real or present" (10-11). When technology becomes so advanced people do not need to interact with the environment they are in. Apps like facetime and social media apps exemplify how humans will increasingly "stay in our space / just talking and joking / with those we reach / but can never touch" (15-18). This isolates humans from enjoying the people that physically surround them.
With rapid technological advancements humans will interact less with their environment. This is what happens to humans and the Penfield Mood Organ; humans rely on a machine to create artificial emotions
-The episode points out the flaws in humanity and the problem with reading too much sci-fi. Tommy's extensive reading of sci-fi literature increases his paranoia as well as the rest of the neighborhood's. The Maple Street community could have gone to town to solve the problem but fear and paranoia dominated their thinking.
-The episode reveals humanity's flaws by using a supernatural phenomenon. The aliens were not hurting the humans, all they did was turn the power off. However, the lack of electricity and power, symbolizing order and civilization, resulted in chaos.
The time of day reflects this. When it is daytime the Maple Street community is civil but at night anarchy rises.
-Science fiction and technological advancements can result in humans losing their humanity. This theme exists in the three sci-fi poems.
-The episode also demonstrates that humans are afraid of the unknown. This is a theme that occurs in
Battlestar Galactica
and
Never Let Me Go
.
Fear of the unknown
Major Themes:
-This book explores the relationship between what defines something as alien and human.This conflict is evident with the Athsheans and the humans. While both species share the same genetic roots the Athsheans developed differently and are treated by humans as slaves. The reluctance of certain humans, like Davidson, to see the Athsheans as his equal, even though Athsheans are relatives to humans, parallels the experiences of the cylons, androids, and clones.
-"Two pieces of yesterday were in Captain Davidson's mind when he woke, and he lay looking at them in the darkness for a while" (9). The book begins in medias res: the reader is not given background information on the story. This is also how
Never Let Me Go
begins; Kathy assumes that the person she is talking to is aware of her current situation and her occupation as a Carer.
-Language and its significance is shown in
Word for World
and
Story of Your Life.
In
Word for World
language symbolizes intelligence and what defines someone human. This is evident when Davidson describes Selver's speaking voice as a "soft queer voice that reminded Davidson of some human" (28). Selver, the "nonhuman," responds to Davidson's questions in full sentences and responds intelligently while Davidson speaks in broken up phrases (28).
-The book also goes into the theme of deterritorialization. The Athsheans decision to fight the humans results in them losing their connection to the forest and becoming like humans.
-What also defines humans is knowing how to kill and using fear to control. Before the humans came the Athsheans resided in a symbiotic relationship with the planet, emphasized through their dreams. With this connection the Athsheans built decentralized systems of power in their societies; men and women were equal and had power. With everyone equal and not competing for control there was no need to kill or use fear to conquer. This changes when the humans come. Enslaving the Athsheans and destroying the forest forces the Athsheans to rebel. The Athsheans learned to fight like the humans but at the cost of discovering the knowledge of killing and creating a new hierarchical system that encourages conflict. Once this knowledge is known it it not possible to unlearn it. Like the Garden of Eden it is impossible for the Athsheans to go back to the state of innocence (189). The idea that ignorance is bliss is echoed in
Never Let Me Go
.
Ignorance is bliss
Story of Your Life
by Ted Chiang
Major Themes:
-Like in
The Word for World is Forest,
Story of Your Life
examines language.
-Louise learning the heptapods language allows her to know the future but it grants her knowledge that she can not unlearn. Like the Athsheans learning how to kill, Louise can not return to the state of innocence.
-The story also examines whether human nature or free will is possible. Louise does not try to stop her daughter's death even though she knows that her daughter will die young. This theme is also prevalent in
Kindred
by Octavia E. Butler.
the power of language
agency versus knowing the future
-The film adaptation of the short story also goes into the idea of free will.
-There are similarities between the film's Colonel Webber and
The World for World is Forest's
Captain Davidson. Both men are military and prepared to attack the unknown alien threat. In contrast, Louise is like Lyubov. Both work with their respective aliens; Louise with the heptapods and Lyubov with the Athsheans.
-One major difference the film made from the short story is Louise tells her husband about their daughter's death. It is led to assume that Louise confiding in her husband is what made him leave Louise and their daughter.
-Another change is how the daughter dies. The film has the daughter die from a rare disease when the short story has the daughter die from rock climbing. This changes the stakes; it is possible to stop someone from rock climbing but not possible to stop a rare disease. Another purpose for the change was for simplicity.
Time Travel
Major Themes:
-The book is an allegory for the Industrial Revolution and the upper and lower class conflict in England.
-The book also deals with Darwin and his Degeneration Theory; evolution is "reversable" and it is possible for humanity to regress. This concept is prevalent in the way the Eloi and the Morlocks are presented. In the future, humanity has evolved into two separate species. The Eloi represent the upper class of Industrial England. They are lazy, small, not very intelligent, and dependent on the Morlocks to make their sandals and clothes. While the Eloi can be compared to the elite their lifestyle and mannerisms is the same as livestock. They can not survive without the Morlocks. In contrast, the Morlocks are strongly built, have industry, and far more intelligent than the Eloi. Even though the Morlocks live underground they control the Eloi and treat them like livestock.
-The book is sci-fi and speculative fiction, which is the genre Octavia E. Butler's
Kindred
falls in.
Major Themes:
-The relationship between the past and present. Dana's ancestors are slaveowners and slaves and she is sent back in time to ensure her family's existence. As Dana spends more time in the past it is impossible for her to forget the past and how it is shapes her life in 1976. The idea that the past will return is evident in
Battlestar Galactica
. The humans created cylons to be their slaves but it resulted in war and the near extinction of the human race.
-Agency. This is a theme from
Story of Your Life
; Dana and Louise know the future but are they have no ability to change it. Dana knows that Rufus raping Alice is the reason for her family's existence, but she constantly refuses to acknowledge this fact.
-The racial differences between Kevin and Dana is magnified in the antebellum South. Kevin, a white man, does not understand the danger Dana is in because his physical experience in the South contrasts Dana's. Butler increasing aligns Kevin with the Weylins to argue that whites are complicit in slavery.
-Trauma. Rufus's traumatic and near death experiences bring Dana into the past, and Dana's traumatic and near death experiences bring her back to 1976. This emphasizes that the only way to combat violence is through violence.
-Responsibility, especially for the institution of slavery. Dana chastising Kevin for failing to understand the little power slaves hold, but then letting Rufus rape Alice, is ironic. Even though she questions Kevin and Rufus on their role in the system of slavery Dana is also guilty because she lets Rufus to rape Alice.
-The slaves in
Kindred
and the clones in
Never Let Me Go
are similar because neither group rebels against their oppressors. While both groups know that they are enslaved they are constantly reminded of the hierarchy. In
Kindred
the slave children playing slave auction indicates how they do not know anything other than slavery (99). Slavery defines their universe; they do not know what it is like to be free. This is how the characters in
Never Let Me Go
view their lives. They fantasize living normal lives but living in Hailsham and the Cottages is all they have known.
Artificial Intelligence & the Post-Human
Major Themes:
-Reality and what defines something as real. In the book things that are considered "real," like humans, are little compared to what is "fake." Electric animals, androids, and creating people's emotional states through the Penfield Mood Organ demonstrate how little things in human's lives are real. These material things, despite being artificial, are of value to humans because they can not have the real thing. The reason why Rick retires the androids in the book is so he can buy a real animal.
-Religion. Rick's point that "Mercer isn't a fake... unless reality is a fake" indicates how religion creates order by setting guidelines for people to follow (215).
-What does it mean to be human? In the book being human is to have empathy and the ability to care for other people. The Voigt-Kampf Altered Scale Test is used to determine whether someone is human or an android. Unfortunately, humans in
Do Androids Dream
encounter the same problem that humans in
Battlestar Galactica
do; androids and cylons are beginning to look and act more human. As a result,tests like the Voigt-Kampf will be rendered useless. The advancement in android technology reveals the problem with technological advancement. As Miss Emily tells Kathy and Tommy in
Never Let Me Go
once rapid discoveries were made "there wasn't time to take stock, to the sensible questions" (262). No one in
Do Androids Dream
asked whether it was okay to create androids just to enslave them.
-An interesting connection between the androids and cylons is how both are created by humans with the intent of being slaves, but both groups decide to rebel against their enslavers, the humans. Androids flee Mars to go to Earth while the cylons destroy human civilizations and prompting humans to search for Earth.
-Androids and gender. This theme is present in
Battlestar Galactica
. In both, the female androids and cylons are sexy, dangerous, and seductive while the men are human and constantly seduced by these women. Rick is sexually attracted to Luba Loft and Rachael Rosen and Gaias to 6. While this is a commentary on men sexualising women it also shows how male humans are flawed. Both Rachael and 6 have underlying motives for sleeping with human men; Rachael wants Rick to empathize with her so he would stop hunting the other androids while 6 needs Gaias to grant her access to the defense codes so she can destroy the Human Colonies. While these men see the women as less powerful these women prove they are more powerful than the men.
Gender
Similarities and Differences to
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
:
-The film perfectly captures Philip K. Dick's description of Los Angeles. The book and movie depict a dark, cold, lifeless world devoid of sunlight or natural life.
-The film's music score captures the surreal tone, making it feel like the viewer is in a dreamlike state. This further questions what is real and what is not. Using the score to portray the film's tone is also evident in
Arrival
.
-Rick Deckard. Unlike the book, Rick does not have wife and is a former police officer who is forced to help the police catch replicants. The film also questions whether Deckard is a replicant or human while the book makes it clear that Deckard is human.
-Racheal. As with Deckard, Rachael's book and film versions differ. Both versions work at Tyrell Corp. and both are replicants but those are the only similarities. Book Rachael sleeps with Deckard to make him sympathize with replicants so he will not kill them but film Rachael sleeps with Deckard because she loves him. The end of the film shows Deckard and Rachael leaving together.
-Animals. While real animals are noted as difficult to find in the book and film the film does not go into the material implications of owning an animal. In the film, Deckard is not forced to hunt down the replicants so he can buy an animal.
Major Themes:
-The external power. Tyrell Corp. looms over the film's story, making its presence known even through little nuances. The architectural style of the Tyrell Corp. building resembles a Mayan pyramid, a place of religion and worship. This emphasizes how corporations have taken over as the center of power in the future, not government. The lack of government presence in the film makes this point as well. The presence of a higher power, though not always seen, is witnessed in
Never Let Me Go
.
-Memory. A theme that is prevalent in
The Matrix
,
Station Eleven
,
Never Let Me Go
, and
Kindred
, replicants, especially the Nexus-6 models, hold onto memories that are not their own. As Rachael is playing the piano she tells Deckard she knows how to play but it is not because she actually remembers training. Rather, she is reliving another person's memories.
The music scores for
Blade Runner
and
Arrival
play off both film's tones. The first time the audience sees the heptapods in
Arrival
the music fits the tone of fear, hesitation, and uncertainty. In
Blade Runner
the music plays to the film's surreal atmosphere.
Major Themes:
-Higher acting power. This is evident with the relationships between Commander and Captain, the Commander and the President, and father-son. This power dynamic is connected to
Kindred
.
-Responsibility. This theme is also prevalent in
Kindred.
In
Battlestar Galactica
the question of who is responsible for creating the Cylons and eradicating the human race represents issue of the past coming back to haunt the present.
-The unknown threat. This was brought up in "The Monsters are Due on Maple Street." In both shows the humans can not tell whether their fellow humans are aliens or Cylons. While this paranoia caused chaos in
The Twilight Zone
episode the inability to tell the difference between humans and Cylons becomes a very real threat in
Battlestar Galactica
.
-Technology and the threat it poses. The Cylons are able to destroy the humans due to the advanced technology.
-Gender. Like in
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
The female Androids and Cylons are seducing human men. There are also multiple different types of female characters in the show. The President, Starbuck and 6 portray different types of women on the show.
-Power Switch. In both
Battlestar Galactica
and
The Word for World is Forest
the oppressed people, the Cylons and the Athsheans, rise up against their oppressors, the Humans.
-The different lifespans of androids and cylons does not change the fact that both do not view life the same way as humans. Androids only live for four years and their fatalistic view of life is seen as weak. Deckard notes how androids give up and do not fight when he finds them. To him, this "classic resignation" is something a "genuine organism-with two billion years of the pressure to live and evolve hagriding it- could never have reconciled itself to" (Dick, 184). If something is truly alive it will fight to survive. What Deckard may not comprehend is the fact that humans do not have a set expiration date whereas androids know when they will die. Lacking this knowledge frees humans and makes them focus on living and surviving while androids accept death. Portraying androids in this manner makes them emotionally and physically inferior to humans. In contrast, cylons live forever because they can upload their consciousness to another body. Cylons have achieved immortality and this makes them view life differently from androids and humans. Since they can live forever cylons do not see life or death as a gift and therefore do not care about killing or self-preservation. This lack of care for life makes cylons far more dangerous than androids. The scene with Six and Gaius in the house as it explodes, and Six protecting Gaius while she is incinerated demonstrates that cylons are willing to sacrifice their bodies in order to destroy humans. This godlike power makes the cylons physically superior to humans.
Major Themes:
-Power structure. Kathy's use of "they" is unclear (3). This shows that there is an unknown external force that exists in the book. While Ishiguro never tells us who the "they" are it is clear that "they" are higher up and run the donor program.
-Along with the power structure is the question why the clones never rebel. The Athsheans, androids, and cylons, also enslaved by humans, fought back. In
Never Let Me Go
rebelling is useless; the system that keeps the clones in, while never seen, is present in the background.
-Art. This is a major theme. According to Miss Emily, art was how she and her colleagues proved the clones "had souls at all" (260). It proves that the clones are like humans. Like in
Station Eleven
art is how people live and try to find purpose in life.
-Ethics. It is obvious that the humans in the book do not care about the process in which they receive organs and body parts. Their concern is the outcome. Once humans made breakthroughs in science and technology "there wasn't time to take stock, to the sensible questions" of whether it was ethical to create clones in order to take their body parts (262). By the time humans started to ask these questions it was impossible to "reverse the process;" humans had become used to curing cancer and other life threatening illnesses that they did not want to go back to suffering like that again (263). This is relevant to our world today. Rapid advancements in science and technology should not deter from us asking the hard questions of morality and ethics.
-Like the humans in
Battlestar Galactica
, creating something that not only looks human but is also physically superior is a threat to human existence. The Morningdale scandal confirmed fears that it was possible to create humans that were better than actual humans (264). Similar to the humans in
Battlestar Galactica
humans in
Never Let Me Go
were fine with creating children only to enslave and prevent human suffering. However, a "generation of created children who'd take their place in society?... Oh no. That frightened people" (264).
-Like the slaves in Octavia E. Butler's
Kindred
, Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy are enslaved and not viewed as human. In both books it is very clear that the slaves and clones are human while the "humans," the slave owners and the guardians, are actually inhuman. It is also necessary to point out the power of education. In both books education is a weapon; the oppressed people, the slaves and the clones, are taught that there is another way to live. While Kathy and Tommy wish to change the system both know that doing so is impossible.
Art
Post-Apocalypse
Major Themes:
-"Survival is insufficient" (58). It is not enough to just survive in a world that has just ended. Jeevan repeating "keep walking. Keep walking. Keep walking," helps him cope with Frank's death and the end of the world but this makes him lose his humanity (194). Just surviving for the sake of living is not a good use of life. This desire for order and to make sense of this new reality is evident in the use of art and religion.
-Art. For life to have meaning humans use art to fill this void. The Traveling Symphony has a purpose and gives people a reason to live. By doing so art helps humans preserve their humanity. The idea that art is a mechanism for keeping humanity is evident in
Never Let Me Go
. Like the humans trying to live in a post-apocalyptic world, the clones' artwork is how they show their humanity.
-Religion. Like art, religion gives people a reason to believe that the end of the world happened for a reason. It also provides structure in a world that is in chaos. However, the Prophet's rhetoric indicates how religion can be manipulative and a threat to order.
-The book's structure.
Station Eleven
resists showing the plot in a linear progression and instead wants the reader to see a web that connects the characters from before and after the flu outbreak. Like
Story of Your Life
this web crosses time; everything is connected and happening simultaneously. This is evident when Clark is holding the snow globe and thinking about all the people who were involved in the process of making one snow globe (255). While the snow globe represents how many people were lost in the epidemic and the reduction of human connections it is also a symbol of human networks. The book wants to tell the story about the whole world and it does so through human networks. The focus in the snow globe passage is not the snow globe, it is about all the people who's lives were touched by the snow globe. As a result,
Station Eleven
can be seen as a collection of short stories.
Major Themes:
-Unlike
Station Eleven
Ray Bradbury's short story is a bleak view of the future.
-Time. The short story's poem indicates how humans are a blip in time. Even if humans are gone the earth and animals will remain.
-Fear of technology. The house is sentient and intelligent. Having the house last longer than humans indicates that technology will outlast humanity and does not depend on humans to survive. Technology's increasing independence from humans echoes the fact that the cylons can live on without humans.
Fear of technology and the fact that our technology can outlive us
Major Themes:
-Fear of technology. The machines have literally taken over and humans are now the slaves.
-Hierarchy. Before the machines took over humans controlled the machines. Now, the humans are the machine's slaves and their batteries. The machines serve as the external force of power in the movie, using the Matrix to keep the humans in.
-Reality and what makes something real. This is seen in
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep
? In
The Matrix
what is considered the "real world" is actually a creation of the machines to keep humans in. The real world is dark, destroyed, and is in the post-apocalypse. While the Matrix world is set in the 1990s the real date is around 2199. As Morpheus says, "your mind makes it real"; reality is therefore deemed to be whatever a person believes it to be. However, even though one's mind may make something seem real does not mean that it is. The Matrix, while it looks, feels and smells like the real world, is only a facade.
-Similarities between humans and machines. The humans that were connected to the Matrix exhibit machine-like qualities. Unlike humans who were born naturally, these humans were grown and are able to connect to the Matrix through a plug in their heads. Also, it is possible for these humans to download information, seen when Neo needs to learn jujitsu and Trinity when she needs to know how to fly a helicopter. The fact that humans can be programmed to know information leads to the question of what it means to be human.
In contrast, the machines exhibit human-like traits. Smith's belief that humans are like viruses that spread and destroy everything is ironic because this is exactly what the machines did to Earth. The real world has been destroyed, the machines have enslaved humans and depend on humans to live. This act of total war and destruction, along with enslaving a group of people or species, is a human characteristic. The film's depiction of humans acting like machines and machines displaying human characteristics shows how much each group depends on the other for survival. The greatest fear is not that humans are annihilated or enslaved, it is the fear that technology can turn humans into inhuman, that humans will lose what makes us human.
-Religion. Neo being "awakened" from the Matrix and entering the real world symbolizes his rebirth. Much like with baptism, which allows someone to be reborn. Also, the name of the human city, Zion, is a biblical reference to the place where Jews would finally have their home.
-Ethics and deterritorialization. Like in
The Word For World Is Forest
humans prior to the events of
The Matrix
tried to bend nature to their will. According to Smith, if humans were mammals then humans would be at harmony with nature but instead humans wanted to play God and created something like AI. The desire to control and make advancements in technology overshadowed the ethics that came with it. This is what happened to humans in
Never Let Me Go
; the creation of clones and the eradication of disease made it impossible for people to stop and ask whether what they were doing was wrong.
-Degeneration Theory. The Time Traveler in
The Time Machine
discovers in the far future that humans have separated into the Eloi and the Morlocks. Traveling farther into the future the Time Traveler discovers that humans no longer exist and all life has been reduced to crab like creatures. In comparison, humans in
The Matrix
have gone from a dominate position of power to serving as the machines' batteries. Humans have been reduced to inactive objects.
Fear of technology and the threat is poses on humanity
Evidence of an external force/power
Degeneration Theory
