# Obsolete Science Fiction **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 6, 2002, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187 "2002-04-06T17:32:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![dougiequick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@dougiequick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dougiequick)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/81 "2016-10-21T19:25:19Z")
It seems to me that certain old comic book writers had a better way to deal with future tech than many of the 50’s era sci fi writers?? For instance superman and dick tracy with watches capable of communication…the writers simply took it for granted that maybe that was a believable thing that COULD be engineered and they of course have been vindicated! Also the vast stores of information available to superman via crystals in the ice caves that generated 3d holograms( I THINK but not certain that was in comics pretty early on??) THAT was so much a better way to deal with future tech than to to simply speak of “today’s tech” as if it would remain state of the art…like Robert Heinlein referring to things like computer punch cards and switchboard operators as if those things were remain penultimate?? Then again what are missing now in our imaginations of future tech? It is hard to imagine an author could get too crazy in imagining what is possible re transportation and communications…I mean just in a brief moment of time mankind has achieved SUCH previously unimagined solutions! Surely we have only scratched the surface and have missed way more than we have grasped…no? My main wondering is concerned in whether the God of this universe (my own personal choice in belief) has a Spiritual purpose that includes even ALLOWING us to keep “advancing” in technology??? I have no axe to grind here and no agenda to proselytize anything other than people being HONEST with what they decide to INSIST on as “fact” …THAT broken honesty has become my main desire personally! That I NOT be an hypocrite as I reject all the other folks that claim to “KNOW” things BEYOND an individual’s TRUE ability (which is the sin of presumption insisted on AS fact) I hate/reject (I consider “hate” SPIRITUALLY to be rejection!) ALL dishonest presumption in the same way…both the religious zealot and atheists together rejected. One may think this topic has no business in this discussion but think I see how it could be key to EVERY thread taken to furthest development? Maybe?? Jeremiah 17:9 “The heart is deceitful above all, desperately wicked: who CAN know??” ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/82 "2016-10-21T19:55:49Z")
Reported. ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/83 "2016-10-21T20:06:26Z")
> [@slortar](#): > > Whenever I reread **Spacehounds of IPC** (Doc Smith) I’m always amused by the fact that the main character is a _computer_, i.e. a man who _computes_ for a living. what about anti science fiction like dune? where the mentants were supposed to be walking computers because of the technophobia due to mankind’s enslavement by the “thinking machines” which was why people needed the lsd or “spice” in the first place becuase they couldn’t build the computers for the spaceships …(centuries of no education was the reason if you seen the movie with the timeline intro) ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/84 "2016-10-21T20:28:07Z")
**Ender’s Game** has the quaint side plot that a couple of kids grow into some of the most influential people on the planet purely by anonymously arguing with one another on the internet. ---
**Author:** ![G0sp3l](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c68b51/32.png) [@G0sp3l](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/G0sp3l)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/85 "2016-10-21T20:43:32Z")
> [@Jophiel](#): > > **Ender’s Game** has the quaint side plot that a couple of kids grow into some of the most influential people on the planet purely by anonymously arguing with one another on the internet. Heh, one of my favorite [XKCDs](https://xkcd.com/635/). ---
**Author:** ![buddha\_david](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ee7513/32.png) [@buddha\_david](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/buddha_david)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/86 "2016-10-21T21:45:59Z")
Ray Bradbury’s short story “All Summer in a Day” hinges on the fact that Venus is a habitable planet with constant torrential rains, and the sun only comes out for one hour every seven years. ---
**Author:** ![Panthan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Panthan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Panthan)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/87 "2016-10-21T21:46:00Z")
Is there any science fiction from the ancient world of 2002 that has become obsolete? ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/88 "2016-10-21T21:52:56Z")
> [@buddha\_david](#): > > Ray Bradbury’s short story “All Summer in a Day” hinges on the fact that Venus is a habitable planet with constant torrential rains, and the sun only comes out for one hour every seven years. The sun must have been out when Venera 13 landed. ---
**Author:** ![Cartoonacy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/848f3c/32.png) [@Cartoonacy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartoonacy)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/89 "2016-10-21T21:59:49Z")
nm ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/90 "2016-10-21T22:09:23Z")
> [@Panthan](#): > > Is there any science fiction from the ancient world of 2002 that has become obsolete? Midichlorians. ---
**Author:** ![Common\_Tater](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/common_tater/32/13846_2.png) [@Common\_Tater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Common_Tater)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/91 "2016-10-21T23:05:00Z")
The old time radio 1950s SF episodes (X Minus One, Suspense! Space Patrol etc) are pretty comical. The space craft are usually setup with a crew with regimented military type command structures and hard boiled cowboys. Comms are usually signaled by ordinary door buzzers and bells. Females are not present, or reduced to window dressing or damsels in distress. Hey Gang, be sure to eat your Wheat Chex! ---
**Author:** ![Jophiel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jophiel/32/66_2.png) [@Jophiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jophiel)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/92 "2016-10-21T23:18:37Z")
> [@G0sp3l](#): > > Heh, one of my favorite [XKCDs](https://xkcd.com/635/). Ha! Thanks for that. I thought it was ridiculous when I first read it in the days of Usenet but, yeah, now it seems even worse 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/93 "2016-10-21T23:27:33Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I would not count stories to be obsolete due to social changes, though, since social changes tend to go both ways. Perhaps, for instance, by the time interstellar travel becomes possible, we’ll be back to a patriarchal society, so an all-male crew will be plausible. If it had been up to me to write the bible for the pre-ST:TOS era _Enterprise_, I would have had as backstory something like this: That after the Eugenics Wars turned loose several self-propagating biological weapons, Earth was left with only a few million fertile women. That as a result an extreme culture of sheltering women had arisen, and that in the time of _Enterprise_ it was still extremely unconventional for Hoshi to be part of a starship crew. (Postscript: and that also explains why in TOS there was a cultural rebellion leading to women insisting on miniskirts as their official uniform.) ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/94 "2016-10-21T23:32:13Z")
> [@Cartoonacy](#): > > nm Good Lord, why did you retract that? ---
**Author:** ![Idle\_Thoughts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/838e76/32.png) [@Idle\_Thoughts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idle_Thoughts)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2016, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187/95 "2016-10-22T00:06:45Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > Good Lord, why did you retract that? It might have been because he noticed it was a thread that was fourteen years old. I’m closing it. If anyone would like to start a new one, feel free. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obsolete-science-fiction/102187.md?page=4)