23-12-2002 02:56									#1
	Star Wars is not Sci Fi! Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

Most people would agree with the statment that Star Wars is the biggest Sci Fi blockbuster series EVER! I wouldn't. Star Wars is hardly Sci-fi/

Wait, you say: Star wars is filled with spaceships, robots, aliens, and so ofrth. How coulkd it not be sci-fi? Well, beause sci-fi doesn't need robots, spaceships or aliens, and their existance does not make something science fiction. Notice the name of the genre, the prominance, the centrality, of science. Star wars, as we are told, was set long, long ago, in a galaxy far far away. The characters are not even human (we never find out what they are, the humanoid looking ones), and the movies are certanly doen't give a damn about science.

So what makes science fiction? Personally, the most important aspect of sci-fi is the theme of how science and its applications influence other basic human themes. Take Frankenstein: a great piece of science fiction: in it, we see an exploration of how science could give man the power of creation, and it explores how man could handle this power, and its reprecussions. 1984 is in some ways science fiction, as the oppresive regime is only possible due to the exstance of mass media and the total control of information that modernity (and its handmaiden, science) make possible.
The themes of sace travel and robots are very important for modern sci-fi because they open all sorts of possiblities. What would be man's relation, both practical and moral, to sentent creations of his own? HOw does incorporating mechanical bits change what man is? How would man change after leaving home (earth)?, so forht and so on. Star Wars then, is a fantas tale in space, with all the characteristics of sagas and myths, not those of science fiction!

	23-12-2002 03:06									#2
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I agree.

It's time to close this thread.

	23-12-2002 03:07									#3
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yes

	23-12-2002 03:09									#4
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Seriously though, I didn't know that "Star Wars" is considered to be Sci-fi. I always thought of it as of a fairy-tale, similar to the fantasy books of these days.

	23-12-2002 03:17									#5
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Most people I know see Star Wars as Science Fantasy more than Science Fiction.

	23-12-2002 03:23									#6
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel It's time to close this thread.

Tha's so unkind, you scrooge! and so near to Christmas!

	23-12-2002 03:24									#7
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Isn't Star Wars just cowboys and Injuns in space?

	23-12-2002 03:29									#8
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HEY! Case Closed means CASE CLOSED!




Hueij: that was supposed to bed star-trek.

	23-12-2002 03:33									#9
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quote: Originally posted by Asher Most people I know see Star Wars as Science Fantasy more than Science Fiction.

Ditto - but then, Sci-Fi and Sci-Fantasy are usually grouped together by the general public.

That said, I completely disagree with Gepap's reasoning - Sci-Fi does not have to concentrate on human beings and, while Sci-Fi usually tries to be technologically plausable, there are many themes that as far as we know, are not (ie, time-travel, warp drive, other technolobable gobilty-gook put in to make stories more interesting/dramatic/whatever). Sci-Fi that does concentrate on making stories using plausable futuristic science is known as Hard Sci-Fi.

	23-12-2002 03:35									#10
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quote: Originally posted by Hueij Isn't Star Wars just cowboys and Injuns in space?

Nonsense. Cowboys and Injuns are merely Star Wars in the old west, but without the cool lasers.

	23-12-2002 03:39									#11
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quote: Hueij: that was supposed to bed star-trek.

Huh?

quote: Nonsense. Cowboys and Injuns are merely Star Wars in the old west, but without the cool lasers.

So Star Wars is merely C&I without the cool John Wayne?

	23-12-2002 03:42									#12
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quote: Originally posted by Edan Ditto - but then, Sci-Fi and Sci-Fantasy are usually grouped together by the general public. That said, I completely disagree with Gepap's reasoning - Sci-Fi does not have to concentrate on human beings and, while Sci-Fi usually tries to be technologically plausable, there are many themes that as far as we know, are not (ie, time-travel, warp drive, other technolobable gobilty-gook put in to make stories more interesting/dramatic/whatever). Sci-Fi that does concentrate on making stories using plausable futuristic science is known as Hard Sci-Fi.

I never said that somehitng has to be scientifically plausible: many great sci-fi stories deal with time travel, which most physicist say is impossible. BUt making good time travel stories is hard,since you have to keep in mind paradoxes and logical issues, which most writers can't. As for sticking to humans: no writer can write anyting not related to human beings: we are human and so is our conciousness. At best, we can try to come up with some reasoning as to how a non-human being would think, but even then, we are limited by our own sentience and our own experiences. Perhaps my statement about Luke skywaker being some Star trek like 'humanoid' that for some reason walks, talks, and acts like a human being was taken out of context.

As for Star wars being 'Science-Fantasy', what' 'Science about it?' lasers? It taes artifice to make swords too, just as it takes artifice to make lasers, but I would never call LoTR science -fantasy.

	23-12-2002 03:42									#13
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Demand the return of the Yub-Nub song!

Boycott the SW DVDs!

	23-12-2002 03:46									#14
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The term "Sci-Fi" has lost it's meaning in the past year, manly due to the fac that the Sci-Fi channel aired Braveheart.

This I can tell you first hand, has caused a ripple effect in the Sci-Fi community. Some are asking for the Sci-Fi's programmers heads, others are willing to accept such nonsense.

It's a Mad Mad Mad World.

	23-12-2002 03:48									#15
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Hueij, a spelling error by me.

I meant to say that the first star trek was cowboys and indians in space, With the ship docking in all kinds of saloons of sort, etc.

	23-12-2002 03:51									#16
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So if the sci is not the governing part of the story, or atleast not very important to the theme, then it's not sci-fi anymore? Lotr is very similar to to sw, yes, only the environment is different. But environment is a lot still.

	23-12-2002 03:54									#17
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IIRC, Science Fantasy ("SF") is the superset of Science Fiction and Fantasy (and horror too, I think, as well as pieces that include parts from more than one of the genere).

	23-12-2002 04:05									#18
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You smoking something .

Star Wars is of course Sci-fi! Science Fiction involves science and fiction. Star Wars fits .

	23-12-2002 04:09									#19
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how does Star Wars involve science?

	23-12-2002 04:10									#20
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Technically it's a space opera. (or summat to that effect, there is a name for the genre but i am unable to produce it from my meager mind)

	23-12-2002 04:16									#21
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quote: how does Star Wars involve science?

It's kinda hard to have spaceships (and repair spaceships) without science .

And seeing as the story is based on those ships, it is sci-fi .

	23-12-2002 04:21									#22
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It's rather hard to have rifles and planes without science. so how did you like that Sci-fi flick, "Saving private Ryan"?

	23-12-2002 04:25									#23
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But they don't focus on the rifles and planes as being central to the story do they?

And its history. Sci-fi is about the future .

	23-12-2002 04:57									#24
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Not so. GePap already mentioned Frankenstein. War of the Worlds, any Jules Verne novel you care to name...

And technically, the central theme of Star Wars is the force, which is not science, but fantasy.

	23-12-2002 05:27									#25
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Star Wars is not a fantasy. It doesn't happen to have all that magic and orcs and whatnot.

Frankenstein, War of the Worlds, and Jules Verne ALL dealt with the future. I don't understand how you can say that the people writing them were thinking their stories happened in the past!

	23-12-2002 05:33									#26
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Star Wars is Sci-Fi because it takes basic elements of science and expands them into areas that current science says is impossible.

such as light speed. That alone makes it science fiction stupid.

	23-12-2002 05:34									#27
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel It's rather hard to have rifles and planes without science. so how did you like that Sci-fi flick, "Saving private Ryan"?

Saving private ryan doesn't take rifles and planes to levels that current science says is impossible, therefore saving ryan is not science FICTION




stupid...

	23-12-2002 05:41									#28
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quote: I don't understand how you can say that the people writing them were thinking their stories happened in the past!

They all happened in the author's present, but they all had science as a central theme. They weren't far-future weirdo tech SciFi. Journey to the Centre of the Earth could have happended! (Certain large lumps of molten iron and rock notwithstanding) - but they were SciFi.

Restricting your view of fantasy to solely stuff with magic and orcs in is somewhat narrow-minded Imran
"The Force" is a nat's bollock away from magic anyway.

	23-12-2002 05:43									#29
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from the dictionary:

science fiction
n.
A literary or cinematic genre in which fantasy, typically based on speculative scientific discoveries or developments, environmental changes, space travel, or life on other planets, forms part of the plot or background.




Frankenstein IS sci-fi because it has elements of cloning a living thing....currently possible, buit at the time impossible

star wars is sci-fi because it takes real life science like space travel and lasers and elevates them to a level that current science says is impossible.

for pete's sake, this is a ridiculous thread...how stupid...star wars isn't sci-fi...only someone whodoesn't know what sci-fi is would even start such a theread


good Lord



my oh my


holy cow

	23-12-2002 05:43									#30
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quote: Originally posted by vee4473 Saving private ryan doesn't take rifles and planes to levels that current science says is impossible, therefore saving ryan is not science FICTION

I happen to agree with you. But Saving Private Ryan is still FICTION because it did not in fact happen.