Sci Fi, Morphing

ONCE UP A TIME there was a literary genre called "science fiction". the best science fiction, written by very talented writers, ranks among the great literature of the world. Clarke Asimov, Silverberg, Heinlein, among many others, contributed much to culture. The same is true of more contemporary authors. Common science fiction motifs included: space travel, exploration of nature, including the oceans, alien planets and life, and technology, among many others, science based. Then too there was another genre called "fantasy", which dealt with motifs such as demons and dragons, witchcraft, sorcery, magic and so forth. Like science fiction writers, fantasy writers contributed many excellent works of fiction. These two genres tended to attract different, separate types of readers. Then, gradually, something changed. the two genres gradually merged into one, and a new category emerged: "fantasy and science fiction". Writers began combining scientific motifs with those of fantasy. Demons and dragons got mixed up with time travelers. Whereas most sci fi writers had usually stuck with topics which were at least possible within the known laws of nature, with what could conceivably exist, perhaps in the future such as interstellar space and time travel, they abandoned scientific possibility for the altogether impossible, or implausible, if you will, such as magic and sorcery. Instead of going to the trouble of building a starship to travel the galaxy, why not merely cast a magic spell? Its much easier that way. It is almost as if American culture had forgotten the difference between science and pure imagination, almost as if it still hasn't regained its memory. This literary phenomenon has been relegated to exclusivity, a mysterious realm penetrated by only an elite class of nerdy intellectuals, beyond the scope or interest of intellectual laity. Science education among America's masses has decline so precipitously that a high percentage of Americans can no longer even distinguish between science and fantasy, nor seem to care. This we have a sizeable segment of society which denies climate change, obvious though it is, refuses to understand that vaccines actually work, and is perfectly convinced that advanced creatures from far away star systems or "other dimensions" interact with or even control human affairs, despite the complete lack of even a shred of actual evidence to support such fantasy. When science education declines, do do critical thinking and intellectual credulity. When a huge percentage of the general population can no longer distinguish between reality and fantasy, between fact an fiction, we all retreat into our own private universes, universes of our own invention, which no one else can ever hope to share or understand.