On Tue, 29 Apr 1997 15:46:17 -0500 Michael Marc Levy wrote:
> From: Michael Marc Levy <levymm@UWEC.EDU>
> Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 15:46:17 -0500
> Subject: Re: science & science fiction
> To: FEMINISTSF@LISTSERV.UIC.EDU
>
> On Tue, 29 Apr 1997, L. Timmel Duchamp wrote:
>
>
> (2) "hard
> > sf" grossly misrepresents how science works and how practicing
> > scientists conduct research. Practicing scientists work
collectively
> > and collaboratively.
>
> This is a very important point. Most of the conservative, so-called
"hard
> sf" writers seem obsessed with what has been called The Great
Man School of
> History. By this I mean that they almost always show one great
scientist or
> captain of industry leading the way, backed by a bunch of second
bananas.
>
> This unscientific idiocy is perpetrated in recent supposedly hard sf
by
> Poul Anderson, Larry Niven, Michael Flynn, Robert Forward, and
others.
> Basically it's the same wishfulfillment fantasy idea that was used
by the
> early space opera writers like E.E. Smith, Ray Cummings, John W.
Campbell,
> and George O. Smith. As it was by Heinlein.
>
> It's simply an extention of the conservative-libertarian view of the
> heroic scientist as high IQ, high sperm-count ubermensch.
>
> Mike Levy
See Alfred Berger, The Magic That Works, for an account of this
conflict in the life and work of John W. Campbell. A superb book.
Farah
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