A Question
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| Meta | |
|---|---|
| Title: | A Question |
| Creator: | Anonymous |
| Date(s): | May 1940 |
| Medium: | |
| Fandom: | Science Fiction |
| Topic: | Science fiction |
| External Links: | Hosted online by the Iowa Digital Library; The Science Fiction Fan #41, pp. 5, 14. May 1940. |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
A Question was a 1940 list printed in The Science Fiction Fan. The anonymous author asked whether science fiction was having a positive effect or a negative one.
Text
Will Science fiction ever become but a memory? That is a question that should be seriously discussed. Other than pleasure what actual good effect can SF claim to be responsible for? These two problems are closely interlocked; the first depending however on the second.
| Advantages | Disadvantages | |
|---|---|---|
| Develops imagination | Prevents reader from distinguishing between realities and unrealities. | |
| Gives reader a general understanding of science | Gives reader false scientific facts, occasionally. | |
| Gives reader practice at criticism. | Gives reader bad literary style. | |
| Gives reader something utterly alien to ordinary life that will take his mind from worries and troubles | Gives reader natural inclination towards "blood and thunder" stories. | |
| Presents new ideas, new visions of future, new plans, etc. that give scientist many of their inspirations | Sometimes gets too far ahead of scientist to be a sparkling goal. | |
| Gives people interest in science. Some become famous scientists. | Gives some people lack of interest in science because long scientific theories in stories bore them. | |
| Gives a hobby that causes correspondence and meetings of new friends on their common interest | Creates organizations some being commercial and means of advertising. |
The article concluded that Advantages had 7 strong arguments and 0 weak ones, while Disadvantages had 5 strong arguments and 2 weak ones.