Z is for ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha

Since this is the last post for the A to Z Challenge, I wanted to keep this post short and sweet.

In the universe of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha is the name of the galactic sector in which Earth is located.  This is a designation given by outsiders.  The entry in the Guide regarding Earth is also written by an outsider, and it consists of one word: Harmless.  Ford Prefect tries to make Arthur Dent, who as an Earthling is disgruntled by this lackluster entry, unsuccessfully tries to comfort him by saying the new edition will have an expanded entry.  Earth will soon be described as “mostly harmless.”

In encountering this interaction, I have a few thoughts.  Douglas Adams, brilliant as he was, couldn’t provide a true outsider’s perspective.  After all, he was a human being, at least insofar as he could tell.  He simply poked fun at a world of which he was inextricably a part.  How might an actual alien species describe our world and the people in it?  Would we seem impossibly strange to them?  Quaint?  Disgustingly violent?  What other outsider's perspectives have you seen in science fiction?  What might be the value in attempting to view our culture from an outsider’s perspective?

Y is for Youth

Within the field of medicine, many have been working tirelessly to extend our lives and improve our health.  I discussed this in my post for I where I dealt with the concept of immortality.  When humans envision living forever, they typically envision themselves living out that forever in a youthful, healthy body.  Perhaps why there have been so many stories that focus on the mythical fountain of youth.  It sounds pretty enticing, at least on the face of it.  Take a drink of this water, and you will stop aging.  Frozen in time in the physical sense, you get to live on in the world, experiencing all it has to offer.

“Youth is wasted on the young.” –George Bernard Shaw

“In youth we learn; in age we understand.” –Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach

These quotes make it easy to see one of the ways that eternal youth appeals to us.  We cherish the wisdom that comes with age, but we lament the loss of the strength, endurance, and beauty that goes hand-in-hand with youth.  If we can gain eternal youth, we could have wisdom along with the benefits of youth.

There are problems with eternal youth, though.  When those around you age and die, it’s hard to form lasting relationships with people, either because of jealousy on their part, or fear of losing them on your own.  Your immortality sets you apart, leaving you separate from humanity.  In the film The Man From Earth, a man in modern times reveals that he was born as a caveman, and through some fluke of genetics, has been able to live for more than 14,000 years.  He stopped aging in his mid-thirties, and while he has had injury and illness befall him, he has always healed and continued on with his life.  Unfortunately, the fact that he no longer aged made him an object of fear for many, who assumed it had to be due to some kind of evil influence.  He started moving from place to place, staying for only about 10 years in each location before moving on.  In the film, he decides to tell his colleagues the truth about himself, reactions range from fascination to outrage.  Some parts of this film may be considered controversial for some, and the fact that it is all dialogue mean that it isn’t for everyone, but I thought it was an intriguing movie.  If one of your friends revealed that they were immortal, how would you react?  Would you doubt them, would you envy them, or would you want to try to understand?

However, what if all humans were suddenly blessed with eternal youth?  Birthrates would either need to decline significantly, or we would need to expand and colonize other worlds.  Would humans lose an appreciation for life, or would we embrace the benefits of a seemingly limitless lifespan and explore all the universe has to offer?

X is for Xeno-

The prefix xeno comes from the ancient Greek xénos.  Both refer to something that is foreign, and denotes a lack of familiarity.  When we are unfamiliar with something, it can often be strange, even frightening.  The word xenophobia denotes a fear of that which is alien.  This is a common fear, and makes sense given our history.  Humans form tight-knit communities as a means of self-preservation, but anyone coming in from the outside could conceivably pose a threat.  Luckily, we also have the ability to reason, so many of us do not let xenophobia get the best of us.  (Though, in my opinion, there are still far too many people who live with an unfounded fear of those who are different from them.)  Xenophilia, a term that one hears less often, refers to a love of that which is foreign.  As a science fiction geek, I may have a touch of Xenophilia, but that’s fine with me.

Science fiction, after all, deals in things that are alien.  This can mean the presence of an actual alien species, though it can simply be anything that is different.  In this day and age, one can be said to be xenophobic if they fear different human cultures, and we’re all part of the same species. 

There is plenty that anyone would recognize within science fiction.  Humanity is often at the forefront of science fiction stories, and we ride along as the humans in the story engage with whatever forces are threatening them or their way of life.  The presence of humanity gives the reader or viewer something with which they can relate.  It gives them a foothold so they can enjoy a story that is otherwise replete with the unfamiliar.  If everything were strange to the audience, most of them would likely feel alienated and unengaged.

Even things that we are relatively familiar to us can be something we see as “other” in a story.  Technology may advance to the point of feeling strange and threatening in a way we never expected.  People we know may be changed by an outside influence.  This influence can be alien in nature, or it can be a frightening disease that threatens humanity.

Do you have any experiences with xenophobia or xenophilia?  What kind of encounters with alienness do you find most frightening?  The most intriguing?  Why do you think we have both a natural fear and a natural curiosity about the unknown?  Which of those natural reactions to the unknown do you think should be embraced?  Or are both a good thing, as long as we use reason to guide us?

W is for Warfare

If there’s anything we’ve become better at over the course of human history, it’s waging war.  There was a time when we were limited to the use of bows and arrows, swords, or similar weapons.  The invention of the gun made it a bit easier to kill your enemy, but now we have nuclear weapons.  Such weapons of mass destruction can take out large numbers of people at a time, as well as devastate the ecology of the area.

It isn’t surprising that science fiction often shows us war in the future.  As much as I hope we eventually get past our tendency for destruction, it isn’t unrealistic to assume that warfare will continue to change as we advance technologically.

In Star Wars, The Empire constructs the Death Star, which is capable of destroying an entire planet without much problem.  Babylon 5 also shows that both the Vorlons and the Shadows have their own planet killers.  These aren’t the only examples of such technology being used.  Never mind the issue of how you’d begin to power such a device.  How can we ethically justify destroying an entire planet?  Would it ever be justifiable?  Does it depend upon the level of threat the inhabitants of that world pose to our own people?  How do we determine whether they are a big enough threat to justify resorting to such drastic means?

Babylon 5 also shows a kind of brutal planetary assault at the end of the Narn-Centauri war.  The Centauri used mass drivers to accelerate asteroids to hit the Narn home world.  Mass Drivers had been outlawed by every civilized planet, so this action stirred up a lot of controversy.  This assault killed millions of Narns, destroyed the Narn infrastructure, and wreaked havoc on the environment.  How does this compare to an action such as dropping an atomic bomb?  What use of weaponry is too barbaric?  Too widespread?

Warfare also includes gathering information.  We frequently encounter telepaths in science fiction, who could easily be used as intelligence operatives.  Would employing such a method be unethical, or could it be justified if doing so saves lives?  Is there a fundamental difference between searching someone’s desk for information vs. invading their mind?  They are both forms of intrusion, after all, though one seems a tad more personal than the other. 

Various forms of torture could also be used to extract information from people.  The use of torture is controversial as it is, but time will surely help us develop new and more effective means of extracting information from unwilling people.  In your mind, can torturing someone for information be justified under certain conditions, or is it always wrong?

V is for Virtual Reality

Virtual reality is frequently seen in science fiction, and that can hardly come as a surprise.  Today people spend considerable amounts of time and money on video games, as well as movies and books.  People love to immerse themselves in worlds outside their own reality.  There’s no reason to believe the desire to do this will disappear anytime soon.  And as technology progresses, we can likely expected even greater levels of realism when it comes to such recreational activities.

Image courtesy of
Victor Habbick/
FreeDigitalPhotos.net

The benefit of video games for many is that they’re interactive.  However, something like the holodeck from Star Trek is completely immersive.  Red Dwarf also deals with this concept with total immersion games.  These games could allow you the opportunity to visit any place and to live any life that you want.  (I’ve also read the Red Dwarf novels, which delve into greater detail about these.  Apparently some people become so addicted to the games that they actually starve to death in the real world.  For some, real life might genuinely be the unappealing a prospect, I suppose.)

Holodeck addiction also became an issue in Star Trek TNG.  Reginald Barclay struggled to deal with people.  He was nervous, and generally didn’t know how to interact with living, breathing people.  Within the simulated world of the holodeck, he could act without fear of judgment.  It gave him the freedom to be who he wanted to be.  Of course, he also allowed his holodeck time interfere with his duties from time to time.  In the Star Trek Voyager episode “Human Error”, Seven of Nine also had a problem with this when she used to holodeck to perfect her social skills and try her hand at having an intimate relationship.  Janeway also had a holo-romance in “Fair Haven,” though she questioned the wisdom of such a relationship, primarily because he wasn’t real.  Why are real world experiences considered more valuable or meaningful than the ones you can have on the holodeck?  Is it because of our responsibility to real people?  Or do we, subconsciously or otherwise, consider simulated experiences fundamentally inferior?

Is virtual reality pure escapism?  After all, one of the benefits of the holodeck and other such inventions is that it can make the experience feel intensely real.  If we wanted only to escape reality, why would the realism inherent in virtual reality technology be so important?  Or would we use virtual reality to live the kind of life that real-world circumstances might deny us?  If it adds something meaningful to our lives, should we consider those experiences as inferior, or should we celebrate them with the understanding that we need to balance them with real life experiences?

U is for Utopia

In the realm of science fiction, we often try to imagine societies that have improved past the arguably dire state of our own.  If you look at today’s world as a whole, there’s a lot of room for improvement.  The question is, how do we work on our problems in a way to make things better for everyone?  Is that even possible?  Differences in ideologies and values systems, as well as personal experience, mean that we’ll all have a different idea on how to go about turning our world into an ideal place.  We may have an idea of how we want the world to be, but there will undoubtedly be plenty of people who disagree.

Many kinds of utopian societies have been envisioned.  Perhaps someone’s idea of utopia is to live within a tight-knit community of people who hold the same religious beliefs as they do.  Historically, plenty of communities have been founded for this express purpose.  I live in Iowa, so I am inclined to mention the Amana Colonies as an example.

The proposed religious utopian community New Harmony.
Image found here.

There were also communes in the 1960’s that sought to bring people together to live off the land and come up with new ways to govern themselves as a group.  That is also the same time period that brought us feminist utopias presented within the realm of science fiction.  Joanna Russ’ The Female Man is an example of this.  In this novel, four different women from parallel worlds encounter one another, and the conflicting ideas of gender roles they each have challenges them and the reader to question the assumptions of gender that we might make.  Books like this were born at that time because women were fighting to be seen as equals and yearned to be able to define themselves on their own terms.

Star Trek shows us a kind of utopian society.  They’ve abolished money, poverty and war are nonexistent (at least between human beings-worlds that exist outside The Federation still cause plenty of problems), and people work with the goal of bettering themselves and the rest of humanity.  Science and technology add to the quality of life.  It’s not all perfect, of course.  Individuals can still be corrupt, can still crave power for personal gain.  And since not all sentient beings ascribe to the same ideals and live within this utopian society, threats still exist.

What would your idea of a utopian society be?  Is it even possible to come anywhere near creating a utopian society?  If you don’t believe it’s possible, do you think it’s even worth trying?  If you were to go about creating a utopia, how would you engage with those who disagree with your ideas about what a utopia would be?  Do you find depictions of utopian societies interesting, or do dystopian narratives resonate with you more?  Why? 

T is for Time Travel

I couldn’t do a science fiction theme without addressing time travel, now could I?  The Star Trek franchise has used time travel many times, along with Babylon 5 and various other shows.  Doctor Who has existed for 50 years for a reason.  People enjoy the idea of time travel.  We love the idea of connecting with the past, and the possibility of changing the things that went wrong.  Quantum Leap anyone?

There are lots of ways to come at the theme of time travel.  We could talk about paradoxes, which are always fun.  We could look at the different ways that time travel has been used to good effect in fiction.  I considered various ways of tackling this subject, but in the end I decided to look at the ethics of time travel.  After all, I’ve been looking at ethical issues throughout this challenge, so why not?

If we gained the ability to travel through time, should we use it, and if we choose to do so, in what way should we use it?

If it were possible to use it as observers without actually interacting with events, think of all the things we could learn.  Then again, think of the cultural heroes we admire now, the people who inspire so many.  It’s perfectly possible that they too had their demons, and that learning the full truth about them could dishearten many.  Would it be more of a curse than a blessing to learn these kinds of truths, or is it always better to believe the truth than in a lie?

Image courtesy of
LabLayers/
DeviantArt

Then, if we decide that we can interfere in the past, to what extent should we be allowed to do it?  Even The Doctor, who changes events all the time, knows when to be careful, and he warns of fixed events that cannot be changed.  We would need rules that determine what can be changed and what can’t.  Events such as the Holocaust were horrific, and we could save so many people if we went back in time to try to change it.  However, this is an event in history that impacted so many, how can we even begin to imagine the impact such a change would have?  There’s also the question of whether we could even change it.  The revival of The Twilight Zone brought us the episode “Cradle of Darkness,” where a nanny sought to kill Adolf Hitler as a baby.  In the end, she killed an innocent child and ensured that Adolf would grow up in the other child’s place.  Time is tricky that way.  And even if that nanny had killed the real Adolf Hitler, can we ethically justify killing someone who has not yet done any harm?

If we did have a set of rules governing how we tinker with time, who would make those rules?  Who should have the right to decide which events determine our future?  In the film Galaxy Quest, we see the Omega 13 device, which allows someone to jump 13 seconds into the past.  That is enough time to rectify a single mistake.  At this small a level, we cannot see what the consequences might be of such alterations, and it could conceivably save lives.  Yet, once the mistake is made, is it within our right to go back and change it?

It’s also worth noting that the Star Trek universe has a Temporal Prime Directive, but people tend to flagrantly ignore it.  Maybe it’s worth considering whether people will actually follow the rules at all before we make time travel a reality.