By Edward Willett

To write science fiction you have to be able to imagine the future...which recently got me thinking about some of the predictions (good and bad) SF writers have made over the years.

Before the term "science fiction" was invented, there were H. G. Wells and Jules Verne.  Wells's The Shape of Thing to Come envisioned major wars fought in the 20th century, a distressingly accurate prediction.  Jules Verne's stories took readers Around the World in 80 Days, From the Earth to the Moon and, of course, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.

But the "father of science fiction" is Hugo Gernsback.  In 1911 he filled a few empty pages in the radio magazine he published with a short story, "Ralph 124C 41+:  A Romance of the Year 2660."  Gernsback's prose was abominable, but then, his story was just an excuse to make predictions.  Microfiche, skywriting, solar power, holograms, fax machines and even aluminum foil were all part of Ralph's daily life--but certainly not part of daily life in 1911.  And then there was the "parabolic wave reflector," which  today we know as radar.

The success of "Ralph 124C 41+" led Gernsback to found Amazing Stories, the world's first science fiction magazine, in 1926.  That's why the awards for the year's best science fiction, handed out at the World Science Fiction Convention each year, are called "Hugos."

SF writers continued to make predictions.  During the Second World War, for example, stories appeared about tapping the energy contained in the nucleus of an atom for power--or powerful weapons.  This garnered a few writers and publishers visits from the FBI.  Of course, the writers knew nothing about the Manhattan Project:  they were just drawing on existing scientific knowledge and predicting where it might lead.

Around the same time, SF writer Arthur C. Clarke came up with the idea of communication satellites.  Today we take them for granted.

A few years later, Robert Heinlein wrote a story called "Waldo" about a man who manipulated things with the help of remote-controlled machines.  Today, remote manipulators of this sort, used for handling hazardous materials, are called "waldoes."  (Heinlein also originated the idea of the water bed, by the way.)

Space exploration, of course, has always been a favorite SF topic.  Many of the engineers and scientists who worked on the Apollo program were inspired by Heinlein's space stories.  But while the SF recognized the possibility of space travel, the details have sometimes been a bit fuzzy.

For example, Jules Verne predicted that the first trip to the moon would be launched from Florida:  unfortunately, he shot his moon-explorers out of a giant cannon.

Lots of SF stories were set in the steamy jungles of Venus; Venus turned out to be a hellishly hot and barren place when we finally got a spacecraft there.  During the same period, many stories depended on the "fact" that Mercury always kept one side to the Sun, so that one side of Mercury was always very hot and the other always very cold.  Unfortunately, that turned out not to be true, either.  And then there are all those stories set among the canals of Mars...

Today, SF is still making predictions.  Hot topics include...

Virtual reality: computer-generated worlds almost indistinguishable from the real thing.

Nanotechnology:  microscopic robots that could bring about heaven on Earth...or hell.

Genetic engineering:  someday we may be able to design humans to live underwater or in badly polluted environments.  Should we?

Mars:  it's time to go there.

Cyberspace:  in the mid '80s Canadian William Gibson wrote Neuromancer, set in a gritty near-future where people battled for power inside the world's interlinked computer systems.  Several similarly themed novels and short stories appeared around the same time, and the new sub-genre was labelled "cyberpunk" by SF critics.   The term and the concepts it implies have now moved into the mainstream.

You see, SF predictions are different than the predictions made by, say, the Psychic-of-the-Month appearing on this week's supermarket tabloid covers.  Though SF looks to the future, it is firmly rooted in present-day knowledge and concerns.  As a result, its predictions can actually shape the future, either actively--convincing a generation that it is possible to put humans on the moon--or reactively, warning us against the dangers of overpopulation, pollution, or even virtual reality.

And best of all, it does all these things while entertaining us with terrific writing and terrific stories.

Can your favorite fiction genre claim as much?