What is Sci-Fi?

Robert Crowther Jul 2023
Last Modified: Jun 2024

I use some words in my writing that may need explaining. I’m grappling with an old problem. In a review column, reprinted in the book ‘In Search Of Wonder’, Damon Knight wrote of his “basic assumptions” (of being a SciFi critic),

…that the term science fiction is a misnomer, that trying to get two enthusiasts to agree on a definition of it leads only to bloody knuckles…

Nonetheless, for various reasons, people kept and keep trying.

The cultural definition

I’ve not read this anywhere. but the easiest way to define SciFi is to say that it was fiction published in one of the magazines that called themselves SciFi or Fantasy, magazines that existed in America (mostly) between about 1929 and 1969.

This is a cultural definition—it’s terms are of a time and a place. The definition has advantages. When people talk of SciFi, or the related ‘Fantasy’, they are often talking about a culture. They are associating with that culture, likely trying to explain their own interests—they like little green men, Googie architecture, red‐sea planets, or the Conan the Barbarian tales. The definition also works for the many, many people who have, summoning cultural prestige, dismissed SciFi. Finally, the definition has the benefit of precision, useful in any definition—with this definition, it is possible to say if any given text was ‘SciFi’.

But here is also difficulty. There are gray areas—magazines published after the dates fit the terms, and how do we handle the novels? Beyond that, a cultural definition tells us nothing of what was in the stories. So we do not know who wrote the stories. We do not know what the appeal was. We do not know what the forms of writing were. At it’s most advanced, having a definition of SciFi may be a start point for authors to explore new avenues in the writing—many authors work like this. But a cultural definition will not help, because here is the deduction, “To write SciFi you needed to be a scientist and/or immigrant living in the 1950’s who wrote short stories for a class of popular magazines”. These difficulties are why people try other definitions. Which definitions are more difficult.

Note that I use this definition sometimes, referring to it as the ‘publishing uplift’ or as the ‘Ages’ of SciFi.

Robert Heinlein—Speculative Fiction

I’m not sure it’s well known nowadays, but the definition “Speculative Fiction” came from the writer Robert Heinlien. Damon Knight in the ‘In Search of Wonder’ chapter ‘What is Science Fiction Anyway?’ quotes Heinlein at length,

A handy short definition of almost all science fiction might read: realistic speculation about possible future events, based solidly on adequate knowledge of the real world… To make this definition cover all of science fiction, it is necessary only to strike out the word ‘future’

This is useful. It covers much of the material in the cultural definition, but unhooked from time and place, so allows for work from any age. And from sources such as Eastern Europe. ‘Speculative fiction’ as words has an appeal too, in that people who are not even interested in the subject can grasp what is being talked about. And the definition neatly splits ‘hardcore’ science fiction from ‘fantasy’—if it’s ‘future’ speculation about science, it’s ‘hardcore’. The definition is a little wondrous itself—you can brood, “What is speculation?” Indeed, the definition has found common usage.

However, there are difficulties. ’Fantasy’ is difficult to integrate into a ‘speculative’ base, because it’s more a creative projection. Damon Knight immediately reacts,

(This…excludes the collected works of Robert Sheckley)

Damon Knight felt Robert Sheckly’s work was inconsistent even in it’s fantasy base. Well, as Knight notes elsewhere, that may be only to say that Sheckley’s work can be, in this way, ‘bad’ speculative fiction. Another objection is that this definition is wider than the cultural definition. In the case of including H.G Welles, that width may suit many people. But in the case of including Sherlock Holmes, maybe not. Given what little we can deduce, is trying to write a novel about Celtic tribes speculative? Given they don’t match facts or current understanding of reality, are Historical Romances speculative? Is Dante’s Divine Comedy a work of SciFi, or has it, to Western Culture, become SciFi? Still, we seem to be on a good track.

Within the chapter where he quotes Heinlein, Damon Knight quotes other authors. Ominously, he goes on to say,

Taken together (if anyone were idiot enough to try) these definitions would reduce the field of science fiction to invisibility.

But, like him, let’s try. For my own reasons, I wander from Knight’s sources…

Theodore Sturgeon–hardcore

Now, I believe I saw a definition of SciFi from the writer Theodore Sturgeon elsewhere. But am unable to track it down. So return to the revised version of ‘In Search of Wonder’ and the chapter ‘What is Science Fiction Anyway?’. Damon Knight quotes Sturgeon,

A science fiction story is a story built round human beings, with a human problem, and a human solution which would not have happened at all without it’s scientific content.

It was a mark of Theodore Sturgeon’s fiction that he worked with finer and more tangled psychology than others. So I find the inclusion of ‘Human’ as a factor more of personal creed than definition. I can work with,

A science fiction story is a story built [X] with a [X] problem and a [X] solution which would not have happened at all without it’s scientific content.

This makes the point I was making above about the Heinlein definition, that ‘hardcore’ SciFi stories need science. Also, the definition offers a good start point for kinds of writing that have not been explored much. The book ‘Flatland’ is based not in technological advance or hopes of planet colonisation, but in a projection of scientific method.

As with the Heinlein definition, this definition rules out much that would be defined in the cultural definition, such as Fantasy stories. Or adventure stories with other‐world scenery. Indeed, maybe two‐thirds of the writing from the old magazines doesn’t pass this definition. Sturgeon himself wrote stories based in then‐current plots and stylisation of ‘other‐world’ travel, sociological speculation or even literary jokes. Still, I do not make it an error of a definition not to embrace a cultural definition—such a definition can offer insight and creativity. Someone else went further with this…

The Adgis Budrys qualification–technology

However, an aside. Another writer of the period, Algis Budrys, noted that what was called SciFi was mostly not of ‘Science’ but of technology. ‘Technology’ meaning machinery, be that rocket ships, rayguns, televisions, computers or the vacuum cleaner (well, from my reading we’re still waiting for those last stories). Though not a definition, it’s a true remark. Without offering evidence, I’d say inarguable.

For example, though I recall a story by Isaac Asimov about the human race being a Petri dish for aliens, there are few stories that speculate on medical advance. Most fiction of medicine is dystopian and based on unscientific, shakily realistic plague. Same for biological advances. Or chemistry, mathematics, and what may be called ‘organic’ science—for example, the effect of fertilizers on farming, or container‐growth and distribution in food production. In fairness Margaret Atwood did write a book ‘Oryx and Crake’ about, amongst other things, the development of wingless square chickens. Beyond that, it could be argued that the currently more empirical science of Sociology has coverage, especially as hysterical dystopias/utopias, And that Psychology has some coverage, mostly in the fantasy proposal of telepathy. Though it could be argued Stanislav Lem’s ‘Solaris’ fits here. At end, I feel the exceptions prove the qualification—SciFi was/is mostly about technology, not science.

Philop K Dick–the plot

Later, the writer Phillip K. Dick refined the Sturgeon definition (somewhere. If I find where, I’ll quote, this is a guess),

Science fiction is writing where the plot is impossible without a scientific advance.

Bearing in mind perhaps the Adgis Budrys qualification that ‘science’ usually means ‘technology’.

This definition has an advantage—it locates the material into the writing process. Applied in a hardened way it rules out many ‘other world’ stories—an ‘other world’ story that is about shooting people to defend land, or defeat the Evil Empire, is a Western (or war story) with fantasy landscape, not SciFi. This is only implicit in the Sturgeon definition. And neither can writing pass the definition by proposal of a new hairstyle, unless that hairstyle is engaged in plot.

In some of Dick’s work this definition can be read in deed. Example; in the book ‘A Scanner Darkly’, Dick proposes that the police have adopted the methods of the WWII resistance organisations—they operate in cells. Since these cells are isolated from each other, damage to one is less damaging to the whole. So Dick proposes a technological advance, the ‘scramble suit’. He adds no details, simply writes that a scramble suit is something a person can wear, and that it disguises them visually. The visual effect is of flickering images of many people. On the one hand, this is implausible—the suit would need to be full‐body, which is impractical, and the projections would be expensive and unnecessary. On the other hand, this is a means of disguise common in many forms, for example, ‘Dazzle Camouflage’ and various message‐encoding techniques. The idea is also a projection of Dick’s psychological scheme. And, true to the definition, the plot would be different without scramble suits—no more face‐to‐face drama, and some of the misunderstandings and false leads would not be possible.

This definition has the disadvantage pursued above, that it is far from the cultural definition of SciFi. It only covers a small set of what was published under that title. But it has the advantage, which is why I’ve provided an extended example, of being able to answer for any given text, “Is it hardcore SciFi?” A straightforward “yes/no”.

Damon Knight and the features

In the revised version of ‘In Search of Wonder’ Damon Knight published a chapter ‘What is SciFi Anyway?’ I’ve quoted above. The chapter goes further than collecting definitions. Knight investigates the idea by seeking/proposing features of texts that define SciFi. You need to get the book and read, but he asks if a story has,

Then he uses these features as criteria to score a set of stories from the time. As test, he ran the criteria against well‐known older books. Some oddities popped out. Some Harlan Ellison stories scored too low to be SciFi. And by this definition ‘Gulliver’s Travels’ and ‘1984’ are SciFi (may have been useful to try ‘Lord of The Flies’ by William Golding?). Knight follows this with various speculations on magazine vs. ‘literary’ fiction, thoughts on the audience for SciFi, some generosity towards the fantasy elements of SciFi, the connection of hardcore SciFi to right‐wing politics, and so forth. Anyway, this effort is good at marking work that is culturally identified as SciFi. Though it should be good, as it’s criteria are derived from wide reading and cultural data.

My usage—speculation unhinged

Before I knew of Damon Knight’s work, I formed the definitions used on this website. There are some similarities—I use a feature scheme. But I don’t score—if writing fits Heinlein’s speculative ‘if’ then it’s in. Then I categorise the ‘if’s as ‘SocFi’ (societal speculation) ‘PsiFi’ (‘psychological speculation) and so forth. I throw in a story feature I feel is significant in pulp writing, ‘opera’. I handled the ‘hardcore’/consistency/bad‐writing question by noting ‘fantasy’. Damon Knight’s approach is more likely to cover the cultural scene— though unlisted Leigh Bracket would score average. My approach is more open to interpretation—is it ‘inconsistent science’ or ‘deliberate allegory’, so ‘fantasy’? Treated as definition, my approach is likely to be more generous (Robert Sheckley, no problem) but less forgiving (Leigh Bracket is marginal or out).

Within other writing, I sometimes mention ‘hardcore’ SciFi. These mentions are almost always in the Sturgeon/Dick vein i.e. ‘Must have science/technological proposals within a plot that would not happen without them’.

Last words

There has been, through the years, a struggle to define SciFi, but distance has made a difficulty clear to me. One group of readers values the old cultural uplift, with it’s gung‐ho exploration and many‐tentacled magazine covers. Another group follows SciFi as some kind of speculative writing. Damon Knight, likely picking up on the discussion of others, tried at one point to mark the difference, calling the cultural uplift ‘’SciFi’ and speculative science fiction writing ‘science fiction’. He didn’t seem to carry this far.

The second group of ongoing readers is now spread and broken—some like the more literary work of Delaney, Ursula Le Guin, James Ballard and so forth; some have a current interest in what Damon Knight called ‘Gonzo SciFi’ such as Neil Stephenson or William Gibson; some follow SciFi because they like a writer who happens to engage sometimes, such as Margaret Atwood. I don’t think it matters now. Writers accepted as ‘good writers’ such as Margaret Atwood or Iain Banks sometimes turn their attention to speculative plots. And, unlike some writers Damon Knight complained about, they do this in an informed, even compelled, way. So long as you know there is a difference between the approaches, you be ok. I only wrote this so you know what I talk about.