“White Mirror”? Why we need upbeat sci-fi.
Black Mirror has a new season on Netflix, which has reignited a discussion on the endless stream of negative sci-fi shows that we can watch.
This has led to some discussion by contrarians on having a “White Mirror” which seems almost intentionally avoidant of the downsides of technology. Some people even commented this hypothetical ad could fit in a Black Mirror episode.
But I do think the contrarians are onto something. The vast majority of pop sci-fi today is deeply cynical and dystopian. Culture is important, and the broad vibes of our culture end up shaping our national mood. For sci-fi in particular, the things we dream up end up shaping our future. We can see how books like Snow Crash invented the metaverse.
When all the sci-fi we have is dark and grim, that affects our futures both tangibly and culturally. Even if new inventions are not actually coming from those dystopic shows, we will use our cultural understanding to transform new things into horrible ones because that’s all we know.
This isn’t true across culture. I’ve been an avid fan of Apple TV shows like For All Mankind, Sunny, and Hello Tomorrow. One of their shows Foundation, tries to capture the epic scale of Isaac Asimov’s books.
Asimov was a prolific writer whose books were not always light and easygoing, but had reasonable relationships between humans and technology. He wrote about the laws of robotics, not to be ignorant on the real risks of artificial life, but to view technology in a multi-dimensional way.
I wouldn’t want to get rid of dystopian sci-fi. There is always value in steelmanning new ideas and pre-emptively finding problems. But I do want to balance the scales, to try developing a healthier perspective and to show how we can actually make the future better. If the only culture we have says it can’t be done, then it won’t be done.
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