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Smerity
@Smerity
I've been curious how much of the pop culture representation is simply due to dystopian fiction being easier to write. Many of the tenets of fiction fall out naturally from trying to mend what is breaking or broken.
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Tiago
@Tiago_R_Ribeiro
Is it? Maybe it’s because media in general exhaustively shows you this version of humane nature. Rousseau versus Hobbes again. It’s a self fulfilling prophecy where our lives are “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short”. And I don’t think this is by accident. It’s political.
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Anand Madhvani
@dosima_org
Replying to
@shivon
I'd say we learn different things I think utopian tends to be older, so more about historic preoccupations and fantasies then, rather than our dystopian fears now (and we learn very little about the future from either)
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Shivon Zilis
@shivon
It’s fascinating to think about the “why” behind the ratio of utopian / dystopian over time. I wonder if another reason is bc it’s easier to project utopia into a far future - but since the future is coming ever more quickly it’s hard to project out far enough to see that place.
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Shivon Zilis
@shivon
Good point! Conversely, Diamond Age came off to me as dystopian out of the gate but contained one of the most utopian ideas I’ve come across. All fascinating books...
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Smerity
@Smerity
Replying to
@shivon
- If we assume society is overall getting better (Hans Rosling inspiration) then utopian - If we assume society can black swan bifurcate from stability then dystopian
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