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Comment by aashu_dwivedi | Hacker News Reader

What's hard Scifi?

Based on the answers here, it's apparent that different people have different definitions.

For myself I take it to mean no new fundamental physics. Any new technology is a reasonable extrapolation from existing, known science. Probably the single biggest narrative restriction that implies is no FTL.

As you mentioned, there is disagreement. Many folks would characterize as Hard SciFi some stories that make use of FTL travel but which give a "rigorous" explanation of why it initially appeared to be impossible (in present day) but is actually possible according to physics discoveries made after the present day. In some sense, the important criteria is that the laws of physics are "taken seriously", and that the author constructs a hypothetical scientific framework that (1) is internally self-consistent and (2) is compatible with current observations.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_science_fiction#Scientifi...

The definition of hard and soft scifi, altough not widely used is:

Hard scifi implies that technology has changed the entire world. A good example is "I, robot". Themes are explored by characters interacting with the world.

Soft scifi implies that technology has changed only the lives of the characters. A good example is "Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind" Themes are explored in characters interactions.

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