# Science fiction is a powerful tool for transmitting science or economic ideas Ideas are carried on stories and feelings the way a coronavirus is carried on droplets of water, and most ideas from science and economics are exceedingly dry. [[Stories are a powerful mechanism for idea transmission]]. I’m basically screwing up my own advice by writing this as notes instead of a story (although the linked-context of a Zettlekasten [[§Slipbox Systems]] serves much of the role of a story.) The tradition of academic and policy writing forces authors to present ideas as atomic ‘contributions.’ There is value to atomic thoughts, but that value only happens in context. [[Context is important and underrated for knowledge transfer]]. Academic and policy writing assumes that the reader already has plenty of external context for the atomic contribution to fit into. Most of the time this assumption is just wrong. There is no longer a single conversation in most countries, industries, or even disciplines thanks to well-documented factors like proliferating information sources, fracturing platforms, information bubbles, etc. If they’re not part of a conversation, atomic contributions from a sub-group just pile on top of each other in a series of arguments with no checks against reality and no way to adjust for changes in the underlying world. Science fiction enables you to explore ideas and their consequences holistically and package context with ideas. Optimistically, writing science fiction is not only a better way to transmit ideas, but way to improve those ways as well. Writing science fiction could enable people to narratively explore the consequences of changes. In a way the self-consistency of the story is supporting evidence as powerful as precise arguments. But people would not take ideas seriously if they are presented as science fiction! Policy proposals and future predictions are Very Serious™ and science fiction is entertainment for kids and nerds. But seriously, it is a legitimate concern. You probably can’t get people to take ideas from science fiction as seriously as a policy proposal or a paper on a short timeline. The mechanism of action for ideas embedded in science fiction is different. They’re meant to percolate through people’s heads over time. I also don’t know whether anybody has *tried* to transmit a shorter term idea through sci-fi. Several pieces on SlateStarCodex are examples of how science fiction can powerfully transmit ideas. <list of links once SSC comes back up> [[Fiction is a powerful tool for satire or suggesting heretical ideas]]. It provides both an ‘out’ to avoid excommunication and a way for people to engage with the ideas without openly endorsing them. Fiction as heretical political critique is common - Animal Farm, The Catcher in the Rye, Ulysses, Brave New World, [etc](http://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/classics). It seems underused as a way to explore ‘crackpot’ or ‘radical’ science and economics ideas. The Responsible and Serious side of me can come up with a thousand reasons why this is a bad idea, which might mean that it’s a good idea. ### Related * [[Scientists, Engineers, and Economists have the tools to write Good science fiction]] * [[Scientists, Engineers, and Economists should write more science fiction]] * [[Constraints and assumptions are not directly observable in literature]] <!-- #evergreen --> [Web URL for this note](http://notes.benjaminreinhardt.com/Science+fiction+is+a+powerful+tool+for+transmitting+science+or+economic+ideas) [Comment on this note](http://via.hypothes.is/http://notes.benjaminreinhardt.com/Science+fiction+is+a+powerful+tool+for+transmitting+science+or+economic+ideas)