Mohs Scale of Science Fiction Hardness: Difference between revisions
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{{quote|''"The fun, and the material for this article, lies in treating the whole thing as a game. I've been playing the game since I was a child, so the rules must be quite simple. They are: for the reader of a science-fiction story, they consist of finding as many as possible of the author's statements or implications which conflict with the fact as science currently understands them. For the author, the rule is to make as few such slips as he possibly can."''
|'''Hal Clement''', ''Whirligig World''}}
[[Speculative Fiction]] fanatics are always raving about how "hard" the science is in various
Beginning with the first question: "Hard" [[Science Fiction]] is firmly grounded in reality, with few fantastic flights of fancy not justified by Science. "Soft" [[Sci Fi]] is more flexible on the rules. Even the fantastical aspects of the story will show a
Example: a character is shown a machine for traveling into the past and asks, "How does it work?"
* '''In really soft SF:''' "[[Magic-Powered Pseudoscience|With science.]]"
* '''In soft SF:''' "You sit in this seat, set the date you want, and pull that lever."
* '''In hard SF:''' "A good question with an interesting answer. [[Info Dump|Please have a seat while I bring you up to speed]] on the latest ideas in quantum theory, after which I will spend a chapter detailing an elaborate, yet plausible-sounding connection between quantum states, the unified field theory, and the means by which the brain stores memory, all tied into theories from both [[Albert Einstein]] [[Small Reference Pools|and]] [[Stephen Hawking]]."
* '''In really hard SF:''' "It's a ride. [[As You Know|Obviously]], time travel to the past is impossible, but this multi-axis motion ride will make you think you're really there."
Unfortunately for analytical purposes, this pattern is not universal - hard SF stories can skip over the details as long as the basic explanation is correct [[Magic
Paradoxically, hard SF often ''does'' include technology that looks impossible. Many works of hard SF embrace the maxim, "A sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." This was coined by [[Arthur C. Clarke]] (one of the definitive hard SF writers) and is embraced at the end of his novel (and movie) ''[[
Which leads us to the Scale.
== Notes (please read!) ==
''Note:'' The works mentioned below are purely for illustrative
''Note 2:'' Contrary to what one might expect, there is no apostrophe in "Mohs"
''Note 3:'' While the term "soft science fiction" is used above as the antonym of "hard science fiction", another common use of the term is to describe ''soft science'' fiction: [[
''Note 4:'' There are sometimes in the news reports of studies which would reassign many works on the
''Note 5:'' As far as this wiki is concerned, [[Tropes Are Not Good]] and [[Tropes Are Not Bad]]. "Hard" and "soft" may be considered as denotations of the quality of the story by those who prefer one over the other. We don't hold to that here, as each category has readers who find it "[[Goldilocks|just right]]".
''Note 6:'' [[All The Tropes:Examples Need Context|Examples Need Context]]. When adding this trope to a work page, don't simply put down the number and leave it at that. This would require a troper to visit this page to learn more about it. That's fine if the troper is interested, but if they are already working their way down the work's page (And only at the M's) they probably don't want to wander off on a [[Wiki Walk]]. You can say the number, but please go on a bit explaining what the number is. for instance:
*
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# '''[[Mohs Scale of Science Fiction Hardness/Science in Genre Only|Science in Genre Only]]:''' The work is unambiguously set in the ''literary genre'' of [[Science Fiction]], but ''scientific'' it is not. [[Applied Phlebotinum]] is the rule of the day, often of the [[It Runs
# '''[[Mohs Scale of Science Fiction Hardness/World of Phlebotinum|World of Phlebotinum]]:''' The universe is full of [[Applied Phlebotinum]] with more to be found behind every star, but the Phlebotinum is dealt with in a [[Magic A Is Magic A|fairly consistent fashion despite its lack of correspondence with reality]] and, in-world, is considered to lie within the realm of scientific inquiry. Works like E. E. "Doc" Smith's ''[[Skylark Series|Skylark of Space]]'' and ''[[Lensman]]'' series, ''[[Star Trek: The Original Series]]'', and ''[[StarCraft]]'' fall in this category.
# '''[[Mohs Scale of Science Fiction Hardness/
# '''[[Mohs Scale of Science Fiction Hardness/One Big Lie|One Big Lie]]:''' Authors of works in this class invent [[The "Unicorn In The Garden" Rule|one (or, at most, a very few)]] counterfactual physical laws and writes a story that explores the implications of these principles. [[David Weber]]'s ''[[
# '''[[Mohs Scale of Science Fiction Hardness/Speculative Science|Speculative Science]]:''' Stories in which there is no "big lie"
▲# '''[[Mohs Scale of Science Fiction Hardness/One Big Lie|One Big Lie]]:''' Authors of works in this class invent one (or, at most, a very few) counterfactual physical laws and writes a story that explores the implications of these principles. [[David Weber]]'s ''[[Honor Harrington (Literature)|Honor Harrington]]'' series, most works in [[Alan Dean Foster]]'s ''[[Humanx Commonwealth]]'' series, and [[Robert A. Heinlein]]'s ''Farnham's Freehold'' fall in this category.<br /><br />This class also includes a subclass (4.5 on the scale) we call ''One Small Fib'', containing stories that include only a single counterfactual device (often [[FTL Travel]]), but for which the device is not a major element of the plot. Many Hal Clement novels (e.g. ''[[Mission Of Gravity]]'', ''Close to Critical''), ''[[Freefall (Webcomic)|Freefall]]'', and the ''[[Alien (Film)|Alien]]'' series fall within the subclass.
▲# '''[[Mohs Scale of Science Fiction Hardness/Speculative Science|Speculative Science]]:''' Stories in which there is no "big lie" -- the science of the tale is (or [[Science Marches On|was]]) genuine speculative science or engineering, and the goal of the author to make as few errors with respect to known fact as possible. Early works in [[Larry Niven]]'s ''[[Known Space]]'' series, the first two books in Robert L. Forward's ''Rocheworld'' series, ''[[Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind]]'', and [[Robert A. Heinlein]]'s ''[[The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress]]'' fall in this class.<br /><br />A subclass of this (5.5 on the scale) is ''Futurology:'' stories which function almost like a prediction of the future, extrapolating from current technology rather than inventing major new technologies or discoveries. (Naturally, [[Zeerust]] is common in older entries.) ''[[Gattaca]]'', ''[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Machine_Stops The Machine Stops]'' by E. M. Forster, and the more [[Speculative Fiction]] works of [[Jules Verne]] fall in this subclass.
# '''[[Real Life]]''': A [[Shared Universe]] which spawned its own genre, known as "[[Nonfiction]]". Despite the various problems noted at [[Reality Is Unrealistic]], it is almost universally agreed that there is no other universe known so thoroughly worked out from established scientific principles. [[NASA|The Apollo Program]], [[World War II]], and [[Woodstock]] fall in this class.
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