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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Wild Gazebo" data-source="post: 2279758" data-attributes="member: 24413">"The "the past was better and the future can only get worse" trope is not exclusive to fantasy. Nor is the "the future can only be better than today" trope exclusive to science fiction. You could write a fantasy in which the future means better things, and you could write a science fiction tale in which things are worse than they wore before, and will continue to get worse."I don't think you can based on your own definition.  Magical thinking is an absolute or truth meaning that once it is attained there can be no more.  The idea of the past and future doesn't deal with the actuallity of past or future but the mentality of the current culture...which closley mimics your idea.  So, that your magical thinking will always have a limit and be discovered quickly, become abused, and then lost (possibly).  The idea that the past contains the truth is more acurately described in your post...since past simply refers to the limits of knowledge and understanding of advancement as opposed to the actual chronology of the setting.  I guess I didn't describe it very well.  It is not a matter of better, but an ingrained assumption that there are limits...in fact, you have it, pretty much dead on...you explained it better than me.  But, you must now add the modifiers of phantasy and science fiction trappings to define your parimeters...including the much touted tech vs fantastic.As for science fiction thinking being non-absolute, I would suggest that it doesn't contain any perceivable limits...meaning that there is always an expansion of ideas and understanding...which is probably what you said...but I'm getting really tired.  I should go to bed, I'm not thinking straight.  But, yes.  I think you have a grasp of what Genre Theory suscribes as the difference between phantasy and science fiction.  But, the other trappings are important...just like defining other genres.  Yeah, I gotta go...I can barely type.  I'll look on this thrwead tomorrow.</blockquote>

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