From: Nick_Janow@mindlink.bc.ca (Nick Janow)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.advocacy
Subject: Re: Psionics
Date: 30 Jul 92 06:01:28 GMT
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada
Distribution: world

al@calsci.UUCP (Al Petterson) writes:

> My challenge to you was to defend the assertion that psi isn't part of the SF
> genre to three of the authors who have contributed significantly to the
> definition of the genre and who use psi liberally in their stories.

Ah, but my claim was that psionics isn't an _inherent_ part of the SF genre,
not that it couldn't be valid in SF.  Psionics isn't an element that
necessarily turns a story into science fiction; psionics can be treated as SF,
but it can also be treated as magic or a scientifically unsupported plot
device.  You can write a SF story based on psionics, but you can also write a
horror or adventure or even romance story based on psionics.

> The analogy to FTL is there for a specific and valid reason: psi and
> FTL-plus-causality fall into the same category of implausibility.

They are both implausible with regards to what we know of our universe; they
are not necessarily implausible in a fiction universe.

> Second, note *imagined*.  What's wrong with psi as an "imagined science"? And
> the extrapolation can be improvised as required in an RPG.

There's nothing wrong with psi being an imagined science.  I do object to it
being called SF if it is there as a gratuitous stage prop, with only the barest
attempt to explain it.

> How do you extrapolate the existence of FTL without the existence of time
> travel?  By rejecting general relativity?

You have to include a consistent set of laws for it, at least as far as the
scope of the story or game requires.  Whether those laws use an "exception"
using other dimensions, or uses some other "can't disprove it" explanation
doesn't really matter.  What matters is that you apply those laws consistently
to your universe.

> A good GM will answer questions by making it up on the fly if he hasn't
> thought of it ahead of time.  This is true in all rpgs of all genres when the
> PCs get to any area of any science or force the GM doesn't have the
> background to know about offhand.  That doesn't make the game non-SF. Again,
> it's genre-irrelevant.

If the GM uses the existing laws he's created for his universe, then it can be
SF.  If he simply makes decisions to suit the plot, without regard to those
laws, then as far as that goes, it isn't SF.  Battletech for instance (from
what I've heard), uses excuses to get around inconsistencies, instead of
explanations based on the basic laws of that universe.

> But since the story is made up in part as it goes along (if this isn't true
> at least in the aspect of the characters' reactions to each other it's
> something very different from a role-playing game) the set of scientific
> facts can be implicit rather than explicit.

Yes, our group frequently pauses while we discuss the economic and technical
points of high-acceleration missiles vs lower-acceleration ones, or other
aspects of the game universe.  We do try to base the decisions on basic laws of
the universe.

> (1) Because there is a widespread and essentially unjustified sentiment among
> otherwise nominally rational people that psi exists in the consensus reality,
> there is a tendency among nominally more rational people to jerk their knees
> when the topic of psi is mentioned.  I have a suspicion your statements
> regarding psi not belonging in the hallowed "SF genre" have this as their
> source.

That's probably part of it.  :)    However, it doesn't invalidate my arguments.

> (2) To put more directly what I've been dancing around regarding FTL and time
> travel: if the goal is to extrapolate from current scientific theory,...
> 
> Yet the existence of FTL and the nonexistence of time travel is a staple of
> hard SF.  Similarly the existence of psi is a staple of hard SF despite
> strong current evidence from current scientific understanding that it doesn't
> exist.

I agree.  Both can be valid elements of SF, but both can be and are included in
SF stories even though they are not written as extrapolations of consistent
laws of their universes.

> If I make the following statement: "General relativity is nominally correct;
> FTL exists;  yet time travel does not," I can still build a hard SF story or
> RPG from this premise.  The hard SF comes in the extrapolation of the
> existence and use of FTL on humanity and the universe and does not depend on
> the plausibility of the axioms.

No argument from me there.  :)

> Similarly, "The universe has an additional fundamental force, 'psi', which
> behaves more or less thus: <x> (this list is incomplete and will be added to
> as we see fit," is still a perfectly good basis for a hard SF storyline.
> Again, the hard SF comes in the extrapolation of the existence and use of psi
> on humanity and the universe.

Certainly.  Unfortunately, all too many stories with psionics stretch the
credibility of the "basic laws" by adding in too many different psi powers
which are either inconsistent or which require a "law" that would really be as
complex as the pre-Kepler theories explaining the planetary motions.

> It's hard to see any earth-shattering consequences from this discussion.  But
> it's sure fun, ain't it?

It beats endless messages about SRun, GURPS and Champions.  :)

IMO, of course ;-)

--

Nick_Janow@mindlink.bc.ca