Popular Culture and Epistemological Doubt
7
“holo-deck” in Star Trek, that is of a trompe I ’oeil designed to replace reality;
however, its existence never challenges the certainties of the Enterprise crew
regarding their perception of “true” reality: there cannot be any possible
confusion between the real and the virtual, for the “holo-deck” functions mainly
as a training or recreational device.8 It is indeed significant to encounter an
almost identical contraption in the narrative universe of James Bond, which by
definition is based upon a very solid, fossilized conception not only of reality
itself, but of an entire system of values: the last installment to feature Pierce
Brosnan as 007, Die Another Day, presents a virtual reality training program,
which is used by James Bond to perfect his skills and abused by Ms.
Moneypenny in order to fulfill her ever-frustrated sexual desire for 007. As to be
expected, both sequences are kept very short in the economy of the narration and
the artificial nature of that virtual reality is immediately revealed:9 there can be
absolutely no doubt about reality in the righteous universe of 007 for it would
surely endanger the welfare of the free world. Hence, to equate the adventures
of James Bond with Science Fiction, as it has been done in some instances,10 is
to deny the intrinsic characteristics to the genre, which is then reduced to its
most obvious paradigms, such as spaceships and talking computers. Moonraker
may happen in space and include all the gimmicks of the Space Opera; however,
it remains a James Bond adventure, which does not question at any moment
neither the true nature of reality, nor the accuracy of our epistemological tools.
If the genres of Fantasy and Space Opera—and that of spy films for that
matter—tend to cater to our escapist tendencies and do not generally attempt to
raise ontological questions, Science Fiction, on the contrary, has exhibited from
the very start a definite affinity for the great philosophical issues, such as the
nature of reality and the limits of our perception. From Jules Verne’s strangely
prophetic scientific narrations to Phillip K. Dick’s dystopian novels, Science
Fiction, as the Fantastic, is a genre centered around a serious reflexion regarding
our reality rather than upon sheer entertaining qualities; in other words, the
entertainment that is provided by Science Fiction resides in its capacity to
stimulate some intellectual reflexion regarding our world rather than in its
purely distracting features. Science Fiction, rather than separating us from
reality as do Fantasy or Space Opera, forces us to consider it under a different
light, as any scholarly worthy, “high culture” artifact would. The ambiguous
academic status of Science Fiction is in itself indicative of a certain
inconsistency within the selective process and amply justifies our intent, for if
Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World or George Orwell’s 1984 are generally
considered part of “high culture,” equally significant dystopian narrations such
as Phillip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream o f Electric Sheep? or Stanislas Lem’s
Manuscript Found in a Bathtub are confined to the status of minor works
belonging to a popular genre.
Contemporary Science Fiction, which we may call postmodern more for its
affinities with the radical skepticism that characterizes most post-structuralist
theory rather than for chronological reasons, tends to shy away from its usual