Sci-Fi Technology Thoughts Inspired by Gravity

I agree with the rest of the world: Gravity is a fantastic film that I recommend to everyone. For an excellent analysis, see Lettered’s post on Dreamwidth.

For now, I’d like to talk specifically about technologies used in Gravity as an example of a type of technological reasoning I use in my science fiction in the Continuation universe.

Gravity is set in space – space! – presumably around 2013: it “should” be reflecting the pinnacle of modern technological development, right? Yet many of the technologies we see the characters use are retro, as if they came out of 1960s conceptions of space travel. We see airlocks that open with the turn of a handle (a rather 19th-century technology). We see landing modules that operate using rows of old-fashioned pushbuttons rather than touch screens. We see print instruction manuals color-coded by cover. As many have remarked on the considerable realism of Gravity, I’m going to posit that these technologies are fairly plausible for current space exploration. And well they should be: they make perfect sense.

But our society has a tendency to assume that more recent, more “advanced” technology equals better technology and to extrapolate this into science fiction. For example, the theory goes, in the future, you certainly won’t see space ships run by pushing buttons. Buttons have already been made obsolete by touch screen icons. Before long, people will just use neural implants, and so on.

The pushing buttons thing keeps coming back to me because my far-future, technologically advanced civilizations do, in fact, push buttons. And it’s not because I’m not aware that touch screens exist, or holograms, or neural implants (as future possibilities). It’s because there’s a stability to an on/off button. Or to go back to Gravity, when you’re about to smashed by space debris and have just a few minutes to launch your escape module for Earth, what you really, really don’t want is for your touch screen to have an electrical fault and black out or get greasy and not respond to your touch. What you want is a nice button that will directly activate a mechanism when you push on it.

Well, that’s 2013, one might say. In the future touch screen technology will be better. Yes, this is a good point. And in science fiction, of course, you can posit whatever you like. You can imagine that humans develop such advanced technology that it’s almost godlike and, like Iain M. Banks’ Culture, you can pretty much do whatever you want. But if you’re in a middle zone, where futuristic tech meets some sort of some imperfection, some possibility of malfunction, you want to minimize the chance for malfunction, and you do that by minimizing the complexity of the mechanism. A touch screen is more complicated than a button; all things being equal, it is, therefore, more prone to error. The basic dictum is:

A technology should be the simplest mechanism available for optimally performing the task.

Now, for some tasks, that will be a very complex mechanism: the results of micro-laser surgery cannot be replicated with needle and thread. But there’s no reason an airlock can’t be cranked open or that landing module directions can’t be in print.

My readers sometimes express confusion that I have some very high tech peoples using very simple technologies. A recent recurrent comment from a critiquer (a very helpful critiquer, let me add) goes something like, “Why are these high tech people using a knife?” Well, why do the Japanese, who are the world’s premier producers of robots, use two sticks to pick up their food? Because it works. Because – for all intents and purposes – there’s nothing to improve on.

I don’t claim that my schemes for tech use in the Continuation always make sense. I’m not a great technician, even in fiction. But the general philosophy is sound. Cutting edge is not always better. And there’s no reason why the distant, high-tech future shouldn’t keep on using knives, forks, chopsticks, cups, plates, robes with belts, shoelaces, metal hair clips, ink on a piece of paper, or push buttons. If it ain’t broke, don’t give it more pieces to break.