Speculation

At a loss for something to write on, but desiring to write, I return to a topic that I have tackled a number of times: the place of Speculative Fiction. I admit, it's something of a pet theme of mine.

For those of you not up on your literary terminology, Speculative Fiction (as opposed to Mundane Fiction) is the part of the book store where you find science fiction, fantasy, and usually horror. It also includes a number of works commonly put in the "Literature" section, such as the writing of Stephen King, Haruki Murakami, Franz Kafka, and other such authors that stray from a realistic portrayal of the world in their writing.

Now, one of my favorite authors, Neal Stephenson, has already given a lecture on the subject, but I wish to say more.

I was taught in the Jesuit Tradition, and one of my good friends (and I'd consider him a mentor, for even though he never taught a class I was in, I still learned a great deal from him) Brother Glenn Kerfoot, S.J., insisted that science fiction has a definite place in Catholic--especially Jesuit--Theological thinking. I took this idea, and expanded it outward somewhat, and found that it has a place in all thinking, but first I'll give you his explanation.

In short, the idea is that God constantly intervenes in the world. Despite the bad things, we can see the hands of God at work; the faculty for seeing this comes to us in the form of imagination. Therefore, by reading Speculative Fiction and exercising our imagination, we are increasing our capacity to see God's will at work in our lives.

I like this, but I understand that many of my friends are secular, so allow me to present to you an alternative explanation that leaves out metaphysical speculation:

We can agree that Speculative Fiction increases your ability to imagine, to visualize things that are not (in some cases, "are not as of yet.") Do you think that the Imagination is unimportant? There is no human endeavor which doesn't require a certain degree of mental flexibility; even digging a ditch requires you to imagine obstacles so that you can prepare for them. Therefore, reading Speculative Fiction is an important part of improving your mind.

The important part isn't the accuracy of the speculation--the most accurate picture of the future I've yet read was Stephenson's Snow Crash, which predicted Google Earth, the economic crisis, the rise of the megachurch and a dozen other things, but included full 3-D virtual reality for the internet and the collapse of the US government. It was a brilliant read, but it did not show the modern world.

It showed another way of conceiving events, and that is the important part.