Smile for Big Brother
Our lives are science fiction -- cool, isn't it?
      by Rachel Hyland

Oh, why aren't I invented yet?

A wise man once said: "Science Fiction creates the future." Except maybe it was a wise woman. Or an android. Possibly, it was me. I'm not sure of the specifics.

I only know that it's true.

Just look at how far we've come, since those first sci fi pioneers dared to dream, way back in a dark pre-history I'd rather not have to contemplate. There have been people on the moon, and machines on Mars. We have that cheese-in-a-can stuff, clearly a sign of an advanced civilization. There's cyber-netics, cyber-lives, cyber-sex. Nanotechnology. Reconstructive surgery. World-dominating corporations, impending ecological chaos, a rapidly decreasing right to privacy. Big Brother is watching. And people actually watched Big Brother. It's a weird, weird, weird, weird, weird, weird world.

Mary Shelley would be so proud.

It was in 1818 that Shelley's Frankenstein, the story of two guys, a girl and an offence against God and man (hey, sounds like a wacky sitcom premise) introduced to the population the concept of a time in which science could triumph over nature. The ideas that fantasy popularized aeons ago, through myth and fairy tale and religion, were expanded to propose the notion of wholesale human intervention in life and death; not godly or magical. And the power that vicariously gave to us, the power to change and shape our lives, led ultimately to the modern culture of Sci-Fi fandom we have developed today.

De Niro as Shelley's Frankenstein -- what, no neckbolts?

Thus endeth the literature essay-type portion of our article. I think.

Naturally, much in a similar (though not nearly so erudite) vein has been written on the meaning, the very essence of what Science Fiction is all about. Its genesis has been debated to within an inch of its interestingness, and its profound socio-political ramifications for life, Jim, but not as we know it has been done to death. And then, quite appropriately, resurrected again.

But, in all of this philosophical posturing, this academic mass debating, one oft-spoken question remains: where's my flying car?

The future looked so fantastic when we were kids, didn't it? The living on the moon, those palatial underwater cities. And most importantly... robots! Robots to cook our meals and make our beds and brush our teeth. (Though why this should have been so attractive, I don't know... isn't that what mothers were for?) We thought that, for sure, by the time the fabled Year 2000 arrived and we made it into our far-off twenties and thirties, we'd have it all, and never have to lift a finger again except to beckon for another Coke (or the future equivalent), and work the buttons on our Atari joysticks.

The Skycar prototype: built in '99, still not off the ground.

What the hell is going on here? What kind of a Utopian future is this supposed to be? I mean, here it is, the year two-thousand-and-one, no less, and not a flying car in sight. Do I have a Rosie the Robot to say to me: "Of course, Madam, would you like some more tea?" I don't think so. This plain ol' existence sure wasn't in the Amazing Stories catalogue, I can tell you.

But, then... perhaps we're not so far off from it. When you really think about it. Or even if you just ponder it idly.

For example, I tell my microwave to cook something, it does so, with the mere press of a button. My aircon goes on immediately if the temperature gets unseasonable, my lights are time-controlled, my garden sprinkler runs on auto-pilot. I set my Mr. Coffee to make my morning latte at 6:00 am, and damned if he doesn't oblige. (Not that I would ever do this, since 6:00 am does not exist for me except as an extension of the night before, and I would rather drink -- ew -- Mountain Dew over coffee.) All of my life's inconveniences are taken care of by my little electronic minions -- as are, I would venture to guess, yours. (Though, possibly, without the aid of the sophisticated-sounding technology I just bestowed upon myself for the sake of this discussion. 'Cause I suddenly have a garden.)

Would you check out our brave new world, already? I mean... wow. Just, wow. How the hell did we get from there -- the there of metal washboards and horse-drawn carts and actually lighting fires for heat and light; not to mention the corsets -- to here?

How, indeed.

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