Science Fiction: A Philosopher's Dream

         
       Every science fiction movie/TV show I've seen so far has contained some sort of philosophical or socialist message. The message is also pretty obvious much of the time, but I think that's what science fiction is for: to convey a message to the people because it's only a matter of time before science fiction becomes science fact.

You can't enter heaven without going through hell

        A lot of sic-fi movies I've seen in the past year focus on social inequality; class warfare. The film Elysium is literal class warfare where the rich and privileged reside in a space craft that is a paradise. They have access to healthcare, clean water, and food while the millions of people on Earth are in abject poverty, suffer from hunger, disease, high percentage of crime, and even the terrain is barren like a desert. If you've seen Africa then it's kind of like that. Earth has become a third world. Max Da Costa is the hero of the story and he wants to ascend into Elysium; so much so that he fuses his body to a robotic suit to combat the authorities who try to keep him out of the paradise they have created. This also reflects our own society to exclude others from ascending to their level. The new Total Recall film starring Colin Farrell also depicts class inequality with the rich and privileged on the other side of the Earth. 

What is real, indeed?

          Another film, District 9 goes deeper into racism, segregation, xenophobia, an illegal alien problem with actual aliens as the ones who are being prejudiced against and everyone fears and hates them. The people just want them to go home, which expresses some public perspective of illegal aliens entering the United States and taking jobs for less pay. It's only when Wikus van de Merwe is forced to interact with them for his own survival does he change his opinions and views and becomes more sympathetic towards the aliens.

The Ancient Egyptians would be jealous

         Some science fiction stories describe our desire to explore our origins and the unknown. It's a sort of search for "God", our creators. Prometheus is about a team of scientists who are in search of their creators they dubbed "The Engineers". Their search takes them far beyond our own solar system and to a desolate planet. The ruins they found with a virus resemble a Mayan Temple: majestic, abandoned, the bones of a great race now a shadow of its former glory. It was very disappointing for the crew to discover the containers of the virus was meant for them. The Engineers saw the humans, their creation as a failed experiment. It's kind of like discovering that there's no God. You climb to the top of the mountain to meet with God but find that it's only thin air and clouds. Yet despite almost all of the crew being killed, the remaining survivors continue on their journey to find out more about the Engineers, their creators. That shows how passionate we are about our origins. We have this desire to know and understand where we come from in order to understand ourselves and our futures.

Set phasers to stun. 

         Where Prometheus was claustrophobic and cynical, Star Trek was optimistic and hopeful. The popular TV series turned film franchise has reignited a passion to explore and discover new worlds and civilizations in order to understand what's out there. It's an odyssey with no specific destination and for us that's the excitement of it all. Interacting with aliens and working together achieves a sort of world peace for not just Earth but the galaxies. Part of our goal in life is to get rid of war and achieve what Star Trek has already accomplished. 

The force was strong with us…& then came the Phantom Menace

         Star Wars has touched all of our lives in some way whether you were there when it came out or your parents introduced you. I know the new films weren't that good but on the whole Star Wars is about how far a civilization can fall once democracy fails. The crumble of democracy is an actual fear we all have and that has happened in the Middle East. Demolishing a democracy and then setting up an autocracy has happened and will continue to happen. And it's all lead by a charismatic dictator come disguised as a savior. Senator Palpatine preyed on Anakin's weaknesses in order to fit his will. That's what dictators do, prey on the weakness and disgruntled people in order to obtain their affection and by extension bind the people to them. The older films are about rebellion, resurgence of faith and religion, and a messiah come to deliver us from evil. 

Nothing if not an ugly truth about humanity in crisis

            Science fiction can also cover survival. In the TV series Revolution, after the power went out people were in a panic. Some have killed people for a bag of chips. It paints an ugly picture on when civilization falls so do humans. There's no more compassion or unity but a will to survive by any means necessary. Then people find their footing after a few years, new border lines are drawn, new leadership, and hope. Order is restored once more. Old regimes fall and new ones come up as the New United States of America drop two nukes on cities, killing 1,000s of people. They use this as an opportunity to reclaim and rebuild America in their own image. Think if Hitler/Stalin/Mussolini were the same entity and give them meth. The show paints us another hideous picture of how far America has fallen from the ideal that it once was when the Founding Fathers signed the Declaration of Independence. A Land of the free and Home of the brave sounds like the fevered dream of a mad man. The water boarding scene was kind of a criticism of the United States, but that's what science fiction allows you to do; take a horrible aspect of real life and turn it into a plot device that gives the heroes a reason to stand up to corruption.

Shoot the mutants & get a prize!

             Curiosity killed the cat because Kitty Cat just couldn't leave it alone. Our aspirations to discovery have gotten us into trouble. Firefly battled with our idea in trying to make people more peaceful; kind of like a short cut which is cheating. It's a lack of faith in humanity that led to the PAX turning humans into monsters that devolve into cannibals, rapists, and murderers. The 2005 film Doom also deals with this issue. It highlights the good and evil of man and how it may also be programmed into our DNA to be good or evil and how humans repeat the same mistakes. The crew discovers that they have found a extinct species similar to their own but they have an extra chromosome that makes them perfect. The civilization before had created their own monsters that led to their own destruction and nearly destroyed the entire crew. 

Update your files, let's go!

          Other stories represent philosophical questions like in the new FOX TV series Almost Human, what makes a human human? The debate on whether or not giving a robot human emotions, that can bond with people and form personal opinions makes them human is a heated one. I suppose it debates on the theory of the soul. If it has a soul then it's pretty close to human. John Kennex has a robotic leg and I believe this represents how John feels he's lost a piece of his soul and so he can connect with his synthetic partner, Dorian, who is physically robotic but also he's someone John can talk to like a real person. Having flesh and bones gives us the idea that since we call ourselves human then we must be human; a species classification. The film Looper is all about: "Would you really kill yourself?" It's a time loop that continues to repeat the same mistakes. So in order to stop the cycle from repeating itself, one must simply close the loop and allow a new cycle to come forth. Returning to Total Recall and also looking at The Matrix it's about the philosophical question of what is real? Are we all really asleep? Inception begs the question which is the dream and which is the reality? When we die do we simply just wake up?

        Science Fiction allows us to address social issues and throw them into our faces to make us think. It's a way we can warn ourselves that this could all be a reality some day. It's something that could actually happen and we have a choice to take charge of our own destiny.