Honors 313 Seminar, Section 3 - Science and Science Fiction - Fall 2018

Transcription

1 Honors 313 Seminar, Section 3 - Science and Science Fiction - Fall 2018 Instructor: Prof. Calvin Johnson, Department of Physics Office: P-135 Phone: cjohnson@ sdsu.edu Official office hours: MTuW 11am-noon. If my door is open, you are welcome. Class time and place: EBA 249 Tuesday 3:30pm - 6:10 pm Class Website: also posted on Blackboard Class description This class will expose you to broad scientific frameworks and their portrayal in fiction, and will place science fiction properly against known scientific context and methodologies. The class will compare science with mythology and how science is viewed as mythology both in fiction and by non-scientists. We will discuss tools and paradigms for analysis and criticism of fictive portrayals of science; we will also emphasize basic science literacy as background for these stories. Although a course about science, this class will be heavy on reading and writing: every two weeks you will read a book and more and write a paper. Required Texts: Timescape, Gregory Benford (1980). Physicists try to send a message back in time to 1962 UC La Jolla to stop an environmental disaster. The Dispossessed, Ursula LeGuin, (1974). Physicist develops faster-than-light communication, against the backdrop of personal and political drama. Aurora, Kim Stanley Robinson, (2015). Interstellar colonization runs into trouble, both scientific and social. Robinson may join us via Skype later in the semester. The Three-Body Problem, Cixin Liu (2014). A dangerous alien invasion set in motion by China's Cultural Revolution. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley, (1932). Cloning, capitalism, and communism collide in this classic novel. Nekropolis, Maureen F. McHugh (2001). Genetic-engineered humans from future North Africa flee to Europe. Note: some sexual themes. Additional reading will be assigned during the course. Films to be viewed in class, in whole or in part: Metropolis (1927): Labor issues beneath a utopia for the privileged. Silent classic. Things to Come (1936): After a devastating world war, a utopia arises--but resistance to "progress" remains. Planet of the Apes (1968): Cultures and truths collide when astronauts land on a planet ruled by apes. Gattaca (1997). In the near future, your genes are your destiny. Sleep Dealers (2008). Technology may change, but border issues do not. Set in nearfuture Tijuana. The Martian (2015). Ingenuity and grit save an astronaut stranded on Mars.

2 How this course is structured In this course you will engage with narratives about science, and will compare and contrast those narratives with how science is actually done. This is not a course about scientific correctness so much as understanding how science is really done as well as developing an awareness of how people talk about science. We will also talk about some basic scientific principles. Primarily you will read science fiction texts, novels and online short stories, and will be responsible for writing five papers, discussed in detail below, analyzing the narratives about science in those texts. You won't be doing this in isolation; you will break up into small groups of 4-5 members each, and regularly workshop drafts of your papers. These peer workshops are intended to, first, help you craft better papers and, second, expose you to the thoughts and insights of your classmates. We will also watch, in whole or in part, movies that illustrate major themes and ideas in this course, and you will have an opportunity to write about dramatic presentations of science fiction. Nonetheless our primary focus will be on written texts, as we want to grapple with science fiction as a "literature of ideas" and dramatic presentations tend to emphasize dazzling visuals over ideas. While I will lecture on science, science fiction, how we "read" science fiction, and various elements of science and science fiction, and present my own analyses of our texts, we will also have lengthy class discussions. I expect everyone to participate in discussions, and to enforce this, for each of our assigned novels there will be four student discussion leaders; that is, everyone will be required to speak to the class about at least one novel. These discussions will be informal, that is, I don't expected a prepared lecture, but I do expect you to make thoughtful and well-reasoned arguments based upon evidence from the novel. There is no exact format: the four discussion leaders could each speak separately or participate in a back-and-forth. Everyone is welcome to discuss each novel, by the way, but I expect the discussion leaders to, well, lead. I will also prompt people who do not speak frequently to add their voices as well as keeping notes on who participates in discussions. We will also discuss, and you will have the opportunity to incorporate into your papers, narratives about science found in wider society, such as in news items and in socalled "controversies" such as climate change, evolution, vaccines, and genetically modified organisms. Often we will be asking: are these narratives really about the correctness of the science, or about something else? You come from a wide variety of disciplines and I hope you all bring your diverse perspectives to our discussions and to your papers. I do not want you to simply parrot my analyses, but to bring your own creativity and insight to your analyses. This also means I am not interested in mere "opinions." I want you to bring logic and above all evidence to support your arguments. I also want you to be ware of the difference between how science is done and how it is often talked about. Assignments and grade basis: Class participation (15%): missing no more than 2 classes; leading discussion on one of our assigned novels; regular contributions to and participation in class discussion; active participation in small group workshopping of papers. Four short papers (15% each) plus final paper (25%).

3 I expect in your papers (a) relevance to focus of class, i.e., science fiction as commentary on our relation to technology and science; (b) well-stated theses, that is, a particular conclusion about the text(s); (c) use of evidence from the texts, especially close reading of texts, to support the thesis; (d) demonstration that you understand how science works, i.e., is based primarily upon reproducible empirical evidence, and to be able to contrast with narratives based upon rhetorical arguments; (e) clarity and organization of the argument, as well as correct grammar and spelling and clear, crisp writing; (f) originality; although naturally I expect you to use some of the tools I provide in class, simply parroting arguments I make will not get you a high grade; and (g) participation in small group discussion and peer critique (workshop) process. This means you must turn in a first draft and a final draft of each paper. The final draft should show evidence of improvement over the first draft; furthermore, while overall I will not comment on your first drafts, really poor first drafts (i.e., ones where you clearly did not put in effort) will lower your grade. In other words: try hard on your first draft, and then make it even better for your final draft. You must turn in a first draft; if you do not turn in a first draft at the assigned time you lose half the points for that paper. Grading scale: 90%= A, 87%=A-, 83%=B+, 80%= B, 77%=B-, 73%=C+, 70%=C, 67% C-, 63%=D+, 60%=D, 57%=D-, 50%=F. As a rough guide: C = submitted all material but showed poor critical thinking and weak or trivial evidence; B = presented non-trivial ideas but still vague in portions of argument and/or evidence, or simply recycled lecturer's analyses of texts; A = outstanding, clear and original arguments well supported by the texts, as well as demonstrating understand of how science is based upon empirical evidence. To get above 90% your work must be truly outstanding, not merely nothing wrong with it. For each paper I will give you three scores out of 100, on: first, relevance to class material (i.e., it must be on narratives regarding science and technology); second, how persuasively you structure your arguments, in particular evidence from your source material; and third, quality of writing, i.e., good grammar, appropriate word choice (pro tip: don't call a novel a short story and vice versa), clear, concise writing. Late submissions: Late first drafts lose 50% for each day late, and final drafts 25% for each day late. On papers You will submit four short papers (about three to five pages or 600 to 900 words) and one long final paper (about five to eight pages, or 900 to 1500 words). Word/page counts are just approximate and for your guidance; I'm not going to carefully count. Each short paper will compare and contrast the themes and narratives about science and technology of one of our novels and one of the following: 1. narratives in the media about science and technology; these can be newspaper, television or online news articles or op-ed pieces; while I will allow blog posts, be wary of choosing obscure sources. This can also include text books and materials for other

4 courses/fields, i.e., narratives about science and technology you find in a class on literature, political science, etc.. You should, where possible, provide a citation/link to the source (either URL or reference to origin of the news item). 2. narratives in any of the short online fiction I will provide links to; 3. narratives in any of the movies shown in class or in any of an approved list of movies and television series I will provide. Furthermore of your four short papers, you must submit at least one paper in each of those three categories; the remaining paper can duplicate a category as you are drawn to. (Note you are required to write short papers on only four out of our six novels. Which novels you skip is up to you. You may submit more than four short papers and I will take the highest scores. You may not decide late in the semester to submit a paper on a novel whose deadlines have passed.) The final paper will compare and contrast one novel read and discussed in class with an additional novel chosen by you from an approved list. Small groups and workshopping papers: You will organize into small groups of 4-5 to workshop papers. By this I mean you will send drafts of your papers to your group members, plus to me to ensure timely compliance, and we will devote roughly an hour of class time giving each other feedback on your papers. The ideal way will be to send drafts to each other via , though if you have privacy concerns or prefer some other method for distributing work, i.e., through Blackboard, please contact me. During the course we will discuss writing papers and how to workshop them, specifically how to give and how to respond to critiques. I will strongly encourage you to organize You will distribute first drafts of your short papers papers to your small groups and to me by Sunday evening, 11:59 pm, two days before the class where we workshop them. After your workshop you will have until Friday 11:59 pm to revise them and submit to me. The final, long paper will have a longer schedule. Drafts and finals should be in Word.doc/docx,.rtf, or pdf format and double-spaced. Do not use weird fonts (i.e. use Times New Roman or something similar). If you have a week in which you cannot do this, I suggest this be the novel you skip. If there is more than one week in which you cannot do this, we need to have a discussion how you can participate in the class. Tentative schedule for papers: Short papers on Timescape Sept 16: Distribute drafts to small group and to me Sept 18: Small group workshop Sept 21: Final draft to me Short papers on The Dispossessed Sept 30: Distribute drafts Oct 2: Workshop in class Oct 5: Final draft Short papers on Aurora Oct 14: Distribute drafts Oct 16: Workshop in class Oct 19: Final draft

5 Short papers on The Three-body Problem Oct 28: Distribute drafts Oct 30: Workshop in class Nov 2: Final draft Short papers on Brave New World Nov 11: Distribute drafts Nov 13: Workshop in class Nov 16: Final draft Short papers on Nekropolis Nov 25: Distribute drafts Nov 27: Workshop in class Dec 4: Final draft due Final papers Dec 8 (note earlier date): Distribute first drafts Dec 11: Workshop final paper. Dec 18: Final draft due at 6 pm. There is no final exam in this course. Instead, the final draft of the final paper is due on the date of the final exam. On plagiarism This course is designed so that it will be very hard to cheat. Nonetheless, I have software to detect plagiarism, and plagiarists will be cast into the black hole at the center of the galaxy, or, at the very least reported to the university. Plagiarism is: -- first and foremost, taking text from other sources, even with modifications, without attribution; -- having someone else provide you with significant portions of your text or the bulk of your argument. (This does not mean you cannot bounce ideas off other people, or use ideas you pick up in conversation, or use a friend or classmate's suggestion to improve a sentence or the structure of a paper. Indeed, I welcome those. What I really mean is where someone else does a significant amount of the work instead of you.) On electronic distractions For the courtesy of your fellow students as well as me, please put away your electronic devices except during clearly demarked breaks. If you have some reasonable need to consult your device, i.e., you're an internationally renowned heart surgeon and are on call to operate on an orphan, please advise me in advance. Otherwise I am likely to make some snarky comment. Student Learning Objectives and Outcomes (a.k.a. class goals): Objective 1: Understand reproducible evidence, as distinct from rhetoric, as the foundation of science. Outcome 1a: At the conclusion of the course, students will be able to distinguish discussions of scientific evidence from rhetorical arguments about science (e.g., "it's just a theory").

6 Outcome 1b: Students will be able to analyze the rhetoric about science, looking for the social and emotional origins of that rhetoric. Outcome 1c: Students will be able to cite examples of evidence in several major physics of science, including physics, astronomy, and biology, as well as examples and origins of controversies in those areas. Objective 2: Mastery of science fiction as a literature about our relationship to science and technology. Outcome 2a: Students will be able to use science fiction as a paradigm for past and present representations of anxieties over science, technology, and social issues. Outcome 2b: Students will recognize and analyze arguments in a text about science and technology and separate arguments over evidence from those over meta-issues. Tentative Course Schedule (actual dates of discussion may shift) Aug 28: Introduction to science and science fiction. Narratives about science. Course format and expectations. Intro lecture: What is science? Sept 4: Choose your book to be discussion leader. More on What is Science. Watch: excerpts from Things to Come. Start of What is Science Fiction? Assignment for next time: read introduction to Shelley's Frankenstein online. Sept 11: History and subgenres in science fiction. Introduction to close reading and application to opening of Frankenstein. Form small groups. Watch and discuss: Excerpts from Metropolis Sept 18: Physics and science fiction. Small groups workshop short papers on Timescape. Sept 25: Watch: Sleep Dealers. Oct 2: Discuss Sleep Dealers. Discuss Timescape and the politics of science. Workshop short papers on The Dispossessed. Oct 9: Politics and societies in science fiction and in The Dispossessed. Oct 16: Workshop short papers on Aurora. Oct 23: Watch The Martian. Oct 30: Astronomy and space travel in science fiction. Workshop short papers on The Three-body problem. Skype visit with Kim Stanley Robinson (exact date TBD). Nov 6: Aliens in science fiction and discussion on The Three-body Problem. Nov 13: Biology in fact and fiction. Workshop short papers on Brave New World. Nov 20: Watch: Gattaca. Discussion on genetic engineering. Nov 27: Class discussion and lecture on Brave New World. Workshop short papers on Nekropolis. Dec 4: Class discussion and lecture on Nekropolis. Scientific "controversies" Dec 11: Class summarization. Workshop final papers. Final versions of final papers due 6 pm, Dec 18, 2018 About your instructor: I have been engaged in research into theoretical physics for twenty-plus years, with over forty scientific publications and more than one hundred presentations at scientific conferences around the world. I have also had published more than a dozen science fiction short stories, in major venues including Analog, Asimov's Science Fiction, Interzone, Strange Horizons, Realms of Fantasy, and others. I studied science fiction and creative writing under such SF luminaries as Kim Stanley Robinson, Peter S. Beagle, Joanna Russ, Algis Budrys, Tim Powers, and Karen Joy Fowler.