Oh, Card said it! That changes everything. If it’s just some random guy from the internet saying something like that, I tend to assume he’s just full of shit. But when it’s Orson Scott Card saying it, then I know he’s full of shit. No, I’m not particularly a fan.
But, my biases aside, he is indeed one of the pre-eminent living science fiction writers. Mostly thanks to the reputation of one book: Ender’s Game, since most of the rest of his stuff is pretty middle of the road (actually, I liked the first couple Alvin Journeyman books better than EG, but those were definitely fantasy). And what is that book about? Space aliens. In fact, it involves four distinct “impossibilities” that I can recall off the top of my head: space aliens (not an actual impossibility, as will be dealt with later), interstellar war (not impossible per se, but highly unlikely: the resources of a single solar system should be able to sustain an interstellar civilization almost indefinitely), faster than light travel, and telelpathy (both of which are impossible according to the laws of physics as we understand them). Which means, by yours (and, apparently, Card’s) definition, Ender’s Game is a work of fantasy. Which means that Card is not a pre-eminent science fiction author, unless you want to argue he deserves that status on the strength of The Worthing Saga or that god-awful Book of Mormon in Space series he did. Homecoming? Whatever, I’m not going to waste the time to google it. The point is, your quute only comes from a pre-eminent sf author if the quote is untrue. If it is true, then Card isn’t an sf author, and is no more an authority on the subject than you or I.
Regardless, the idea that science fiction cannot deal with space aliens and still be science fiction is contrary to the popularly accepted definition of science fiction, and even the more specialized definition of science fiction favored by most people who are versed in the genre. I suspect that even Card would disagree with you, since I simply can’t imagine him making the argument you claim he is making. I’d need a better cite than a link to Amazon.com before I accept your interpretation of that quote, and even if you find one, I can tell you right now that it’ll do more to change my opinion about Card then it will to change my opinion about the definition of “science fiction.”
Nonsense. Haven’t you ever heard of an “educated guess”?
Again, nonsense. No, more than nonsense: bullshit. Certainly, sf aliens don’t resemble any actual alien species that might exsist somewhere in the universe, but that doesn’t mean that a solid grounding in science can’t allow an author to make reasonable guesses about how life might evolve under different circumstances than that on Earth. Hie ye to the bookstore and find something written by C.J. Cherryh, Vernor Vinge, or one of Wayne Barlow’s books of sf illustrations.
True, although I doubt you can explain why. Hint: it’s not because of Chewbacca.
Wrong. Star Trek is sf. It’s generally really bad sf, but it is still sf.
Correct, but note that the science underlying Jurassic Park is not much better than the science underlying Star Trek. Can you explain why one counts as sf and one doesn’t?
I never saw AI, so all I can do here is reinforce the fact that, wether they were robots or aliens has no effect on wether the movie was science fiction or not.