When dealing with things and situations that don’t exist yet, isn’t fiction expected to be one of the primary (if not only) source of insights?
Not in a sane world. It should be serious analysis of the possible future, not storytelling. One expects more useful results from trying to directly answer the question “what could happen”, not the question “what weakly plausible setting would work for an entertaining story, given these and these limitations of the genre”. This is the difference between “Terminator” and paperclip maximizer.
“Up to now, if we had had to wait for serious studies, most of us would never have been exposed to certain futuristic ideas and insights about those ideas (which can then lead to more serious thought).”
But you are absolutely right that the ideal state would be deliberate analysis.
I agree, except that it is on a sad day that the best (or only) source of relevant insight is fiction.
When dealing with things and situations that don’t exist yet, isn’t fiction expected to be one of the primary (if not only) source of insights?
Not in a sane world. It should be serious analysis of the possible future, not storytelling. One expects more useful results from trying to directly answer the question “what could happen”, not the question “what weakly plausible setting would work for an entertaining story, given these and these limitations of the genre”. This is the difference between “Terminator” and paperclip maximizer.
I agree, and I’m updating my position.
My thoughts were more along the lines of:
“Up to now, if we had had to wait for serious studies, most of us would never have been exposed to certain futuristic ideas and insights about those ideas (which can then lead to more serious thought).”
But you are absolutely right that the ideal state would be deliberate analysis.