Comments on: The future is not a story http://futurismic.com/2008/08/06/the-future-is-not-a-story/ Presenting the fact and fiction of tomorrow since 2001 Sat, 19 May 2012 23:03:43 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 By: Rick Grant http://futurismic.com/2008/08/06/the-future-is-not-a-story/comment-page-1/#comment-15771 Rick Grant Wed, 06 Aug 2008 14:42:00 +0000 http://futurismic.com/?p=3740#comment-15771 And don't forget the fact that many times the things we read about in science fiction actually become real after they are written. This happens not because science fiction writers can predict the future, but because some of the ideas they write about are adopted by creative readers. Some of the young men and women who read Jules Verne were probably excited by the idea of a ship that could travel thousand of leagues under the sea and when they grew up they decided to build it. When H.G. Wells wrote about men visiting the moon in 1901, it is reasonable to assume that some people fell in love with that idea and began to work on it. Science fiction doesn't just shed light on future possibilities, it plants seeds in the imagination of people who may do real work on the concepts it presents. Ideas put into action create trends that will absolutely impact the future. We should not discount the story's power to impact the future simply because our futurists can't figure out how to fit it into their computations. Rick Grant Jim Thorpe, PA And don’t forget the fact that many times the things we read about in science fiction actually become real after they are written. This happens not because science fiction writers can predict the future, but because some of the ideas they write about are adopted by creative readers.

Some of the young men and women who read Jules Verne were probably excited by the idea of a ship that could travel thousand of leagues under the sea and when they grew up they decided to build it. When H.G. Wells wrote about men visiting the moon in 1901, it is reasonable to assume that some people fell in love with that idea and began to work on it.

Science fiction doesn’t just shed light on future possibilities, it plants seeds in the imagination of people who may do real work on the concepts it presents. Ideas put into action create trends that will absolutely impact the future. We should not discount the story’s power to impact the future simply because our futurists can’t figure out how to fit it into their computations.

Rick Grant
Jim Thorpe, PA

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