Is hard sci-fi really appropriate as a rpg genre?

[DMH]

And please, I'm not insulting your understanding of anything, so don't insult mine. I completely understand what you're saying, and it makes sense. But again, with the vastness of the universe and the insane amount of possibilities out there, we can't say what IS and ISN'T in any kind of definitive way.

I apologise for insulting you and those reading this thread who agree with you. I didn't mean to do so.

ANYTHING is possible. Just because it hasn't happened here, doesn't mean it can't. We simply don't know enough to say otherwise. That doesn't mean its TRUE, but that doesn't mean its not true.

No, anything isn't possible. Physics is physics the whole universe round. There are no jellyfish with the exact characteristics of those on Earth in space and never will be.

 

[cmanos]

it depends on what you want to do with the hard Sci Fi Setting. Blue Planet is close to Hard Sci Fi and I can see a TON of excellent campaign options in the world. It all depends on what you are planning on doing. With Blue Planet I have a plan to do a campaign involving the battles of the corporate conglomerates and the environmental terrorists, and all depending on how the characters reacted in the first story, they would either be working for the corporations and have tons of neat toys or would be the terrorists.

I bet money they'll be the terrorists.

 

[Umbran]

But the truth is, that in the 23rd century or so, they would have scanners, probes, computers and other equipment so they could locate, analyze, and know what's there from orbit. Also, who would be fool enough to go there seeking something alien without taking precautions? As such, the alien creature would remain on its planet and that's all.
[...snip...]
Any ideas???

Yes. One of the tricks to working with "hard" sci-fi si to pick where you get technological advancement. These "scanners" make a good example.

Really, for gethering information over distance, we have very few available options. Unless we are going to open ourselves up to Star Trek exotics, we are pretty much left with teh electromagnetic spectrum. We can only "scan" by shining a light on the thing and catching what bounces back. We have to place a reciever on the far side if we want to catch what passes through. That is a horribly stringent limitation. Basically, if you don't have line of sight, you cannot "scan".

And there goes many of your problems right there. Limit the ability to gather information at a distance by not allowing much in the way of exotic information gathering, and you have to get people on the ground to learn much.

Intelligent aliens might be bipeds, but they are not humans and they do not think like humans. To even consider the notion shows a lack of understanding of evolution, ecology and physiology. And arrogence of a different type.

Now, now. Anyone with proper understanding of evolution, ecology, and physiology should know not to speak in abosolutes. Biology doesn't work that way. As the old saying goes - despite carefully controlled conditions of temperature, humidity, light, and medium, the organism will do whatever id damn well pleases.

It is very possible that a critter will have totally alien thought processes. It is possible that those processes will be very much like our own. The biology will do what it darned well wants, completely ignoring all our theorizing about what it absolutely will or will not do. And, our ability to work out how other critters think may currently be limited, but that doesn't mean it will stay that way forever, or that the aliens won't have superior abilities in that regard, enabling them to initiate the communication.

Orson Scott Card, in his books about Ender Wiggin, put it very well - there are grades of alienness. There are people who are pretty much exactly like you. You can easily understand and communicate with them. There are people who are unlike you, but who you can figure out if you put your mind to it (these are "ramen"). Then there are people wo are so alien that you cannot figure them out, no matter how hard you try. These are called "varelse". They might as well be forces of nature rather than sentient beings.

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

No, anything isn't possible. Physics is physics the whole universe round. There are no jellyfish with the exact characteristics of those on Earth in space and never will be.

But how do you KNOW that?! That's my point! You don't! Have you been to EVERY SINGLE PLACE in the universe and made sure there aren't jellyfish just like here on Earth? And we DON'T KNOW that Physics is physics the whole universe round. We've never BEEN the whole universe round.

That's why I love sci-fi. NOTHING is wrong. ANYTHING is possible because we don't KNOW what's out there. Its why space is fun.

 

[Dakkareth]

One would have to make a distinction between possible and probable. Intelligent, English speaking bunnies are definitely a possibility (after all there's no law of nature stating that they aren't), but it's very improbable. Poof, no problem left.

Regarding Jellyfishes: Again it is a matter of probability. There is no reason, why there couldn't be a similar organism on a different planet, though you'd be right to be amazed if you found it as the probability would be astronomically small.

As for the laws of physics we have observed - the scientific method is to put forth theories describing and explaining what we see. The most accepted theory, the best explanation is just that: The best explanation we have, no less, no more. There's nothing saying our understanding is complete, or that the laws we have formulated hold sway everywhere. In the context of relationships we have not yet understood or even observed, there can be explanations for many things that would look like 'different laws of physics'.

The point is, that as long as there's a concise, logical explanation, anything is possible even in 'hard' sci-fi

 

[DMScott]

But how do you KNOW that?! That's my point! You don't! Have you been to EVERY SINGLE PLACE in the universe and made sure there aren't jellyfish just like here on Earth?

"Know" is perhaps the wrong word. What is true is that if what we know about the development of life on Earth is accurate, then the odds against finding a critter just like a jellyfish on a world close enough to matter (in a sci-fi RPG sense) are pretty astronomical. Such a find would therefore imply that biology as we know it is almost completely wrong, and in a hard sci-fi setting (which thrives on consistency), that means the author/GM/whatever would have to figure out in what way it's wrong and how to apply that consistently to the setting. That represents either a lot of work, a lot of handwaving, or a combination of both.

For example, Traveller has been brought up a few times in this thread. Traveller's default setting has a bunch of human varieties scattered on different planets, and two major alien species that look like humans in funny suits (the Aslan and the Vargr). So Traveller uses a pretty massive handwave to explain all but the Aslan, which has a variety of implications for the official setting that tend to be more science-fantasy in tone - the Ancients, pocket universes, and so on. The Aslan they just tried to make act relatively strangely as compared to humans. Other alien races like the Droyne, Hivers, and K'kree are all sufficiently weird that they don't need such a handwave.

To avoid the handwaves, many hard sci-fi settings make alien life as weird as possible. That's easier than explaining why it should be similar to Earth's. Of course, there are relatively hard settings that simply ignore the question - Babylon 5 comes to mind, I don't think they ever really explained why all the younger intelligent species are human-like bipeds, though some story elements hint at possible reasons. But in hard sci-fi, it's usually good practice to have some answers for things like that, even if they're not revealed, so consistency can be preserved.

 

[buzz]

To avoid the handwaves, many hard sci-fi settings make alien life as weird as possible. That's easier than explaining why it should be similar to Earth's. Of course, there are relatively hard settings that simply ignore the question - Babylon 5 comes to mind, I don't think they ever really explained why all the younger intelligent species are human-like bipeds, though some story elements hint at possible reasons. But in hard sci-fi, it's usually good practice to have some answers for things like that, even if they're not revealed, so consistency can be preserved.

Given what we know about biology, tough, and what we believe is necessary to sustain life, wouldn't it actually make sense that, were life to evolve on another planet, that it would probably be pretty similar to earth? At least, isn't that not so much of a handwave, in a way? Isn't that actually a bit more "realistic" than silicon life forms or sentient balls of energy?

I've always wanted to write a story about first contact where the first alien race we encounter turns out to be so much like our own (owning to the necessities for the develeopment of life in the universe) that we're actually kind of bummed. "That's it? You mean you guys are just like us, but you have red skin? Lame!"

 

[Agback]

Interesting...though the one thing that's always bothered me about 'hard sci-fi' is that its no more 'real' than Star Trek/Star Wars/Alien/etc. Since we just plain don't KNOW what is out there, its hard to say what's more realisitic.

I think that perhaps you are overlooking the difference between 'real' and 'realistic'. To be realistic, a fiction only has to resemble what we believe is real, not be what actually is real.

The point of 'hard' science fiction is not that it accurately predicts what we will find when and if we go 'out there', but that it avoids irritating the players or audience with the recurring thought "I know that is impossible". 'Hardness' in SF is realative to the consumer's beliefs about science. This being the case, the 'hard SF' of a person with a high-school science education may be soft to a grad student in planetary science, and vice-versa (ie. a grad student can know that something is plausible that seems impossible to a person with less knowledge). A lot of golden-age SF (eg. Heinlein and Asimov) features an ancient, dessicating Mars and a nascent, swampy Venus, and was hard SF in its own day: it matched, not reality, but contemporary beliefs.

A case in point involves the Blue Planet game setting. The designers are competent marine biologists, and I will take their word that the biology of the setting is well done. But I am a trained and professional economist, and I just can't suspend disbelief in the economic-political set-up they posit (for the humans). For one group of people it works as hard SF. For another it excites disbelief.

 

[Agback]

That's why I love sci-fi. NOTHING is wrong. ANYTHING is possible because we don't KNOW what's out there.

I understand your appreciation for the great variety that SF offers, but I think you might have got a little bit carried away with your rhetoric, because there are certainly things that are known to be impossible.

For example, we will never come across a race of primitive giants using 100-kg disks of pure U-235 as coins. Organisms that reproduce with no trace of inheritance are equally impossible. Ditto for flat planets, systems in which the sun goes around the world, and self-reproducing solar-powered nano-robots that could terraform Venus in a fortnight.

 

[Sebastian Francis]

No, anything isn't possible. Physics is physics the whole universe round.
.

Oh, please. That's what we may think thus far, but it's only true until we discover otherwise.

There are no jellyfish with the exact characteristics of those on Earth in space and never will be.

How do you know?