This is a question that I have been musing over for a long time. Beyond mere "escapism" is there any real value to imagination and fiction? Open for discussion.......
Oh yeah! This topic is my jam! "Is it that it's fun, or that it lets you forget yourself?" Beyond escapism, as you say, I think one value of fiction is its communication between writer and reader. Everybody lives in their own world; have you ever wondered what another person's world(s) looked like? That is one reason why I read and write fiction. I've moved on from fanfiction since about two years ago and am now working on my own worlds. I think I would like to share them, and so I write. Put simply, I do not believe that I am escaping reality when I read or write fiction. I think it's more like gaining a new perspective on reality.
Fiction is not just making things up, but it's also providing a shell for the future to possibly fill in as reality. Take Star Trek, for example. Back when Star Trek came out, people didn't have cell phones and technological medical hoodoo. All that stuff was things people could only dream of, something to make the space more futuristic. But now... we've taken these ideas and made them reality. We're not even halfway through all the things in the Star Trek universe but we've come up with a way to make a few. Perhaps long-distance teleporters aren't too far off...? Another thing is with Star Wars, but not quite as much. I think there is a company somewhere trying to replicate a working model of a hovercar/pod racer, but I don't remember the details quite well. Or perhaps my brain is just making things up.
Wow, this stuff really is your jam! excellent response. I get what you're saying: I've always felt that people know me best from what I write, which in a way makes what I write a dangerous game because I leaves me completely exposed and open
This and all of this. This is exactly what all of my poetry and writing boils down to. Everything in the world is an idea, and fiction is a way of showing others what the world looks like to you. It's why any story (or, I should say any good story) can be distilled down to one or more central themes that the writer wants to present, where everything else in the story is a way to bring that theme to life. Anybody could say "people need to take responsibility for their actions", but it's another thing entirely to say "people need to take responsibility for their actions... and here's how and why".
Fiction can serve to make controversial ideas more palatable to the masses. Even to children. Pick up a Dr. Seuss book, and you'll see what I mean.
I must say, I am surprised by how great this discussion turned out to be. Thank you all for contributing such quality responses, all of your thoughts are appreciated!
I can honestly say that reading "The Lorax" was one of the most influential experiences of my life. I was five years old, trying to figure out why so many of the people I saw everyday didn't understand the simple lesson that I had just learned. That was the day I became a conservationist.
In many cases it provides non-factual scenarios that, aside from entertaining, can portray a very powerful message which can be learned from.
That is such a fantastic point. It's like the reverse of "art imitating life." I feel very much that same way. When it came to poetry, that was the best way for me to open up. I eventually learned that I could create characters, events and scenarios in fiction that were equally as emotional and revealing as my poetry. I think that was when I fell in love with writing fiction. "1984" and "Brave New World" seem to be some likely examples of that. Yeah! I think a lot of the emotion of fiction comes from the portrayal of circumstance (a word that I fell in love with after reading William Ernest Henley's "Invictus") where the writing communicates a certain scenario to the reader. Writers have debated the core of fiction for quite some time, but to me fiction boils down to a particular scenario or set of scenarios. Those scenarios can be further reduced to a catalyst event and characterization, and characterization comes from dialogue and action. That's how I have always seen it and done it, though I understand some writers disagree. I also believe this: a writer of fiction (specifically of fantasy or science fiction) is a creator of new truth. It is neither a well-known truth or a falsehood. You're telling them something they didn't know they knew. And they have to know it ("they" being the reader and "know" meaning to understand) in order for you to communicate with them.
(Seriously get the hell out of my brain. You don't belong there. It's creepy.) The rational side of my mind doesn't quite believe that, but in my other brain, hoo boy am I all over this idea. I keep a diary titled "Philosophy Sucks" just so I can rant to myself about this kind of thing. And of course concepts like this make it into my writing all the time too, because of the nature of the setting of my stories. The poem I'm working on right this minute actually explores the idea to some degree (I'd have put a preview of it in my sig by now but the editor won't let me, lol), as do many of my others (some of which I admittedly haven't written yet... I think way faster than I write). Everything an artist creates is either true or a reflection of something they believe is true, and their art is how that idea gets around in the universe. That's ultimately what fiction means to me; it's ideas moving around. This is also why I keep most of my writing, even my fanfiction, rather abstract and open-ended; as a writer, I don't believe I tell the reader a story. The reader tells themselves the story, I just give them an idea. Yep, right now I don't exist. I'm just a concept your mind has created so you have someone to talk about philosophy with.
Welp quite frankly, I suspect there is nothing but fiction. Aka reality = fiction = existence. Let me explain. Within an instant my mind can conjure up Burbaflapsy the pink hippo. Similarily, I could argue that I am a figment of the universe's imagination. Burbaflapsy is made up out of electrical signals in my brain, and I am made up out of a semi-persistent pattern of atoms. What makes me more real than Burbaflapsy? Is it my free will? What if I imagine Burbaflapsy has a free will, going on adventures and making her own descisions? Sure, it's actually me controlling her, but I can imagine that she isn't aware of it. Doesn't it work the same way for me? Of course I feel like I am in control of my descisions, but in reality every decision is make is caused by a specific set of circumstances. Proposal: The universe is a storyteller.
So I take it you are the one responsible for this? -On topic- Fiction doesn't exist. Every possible scenario ever dreamed up by humanity has already happened in at least one of the infinite number of alternate universes.
I respect your theory on an intellectual level, but it's kind of a scary concept when you think about it. That means that somewhere there is an alternate universe where no one can ever be happy and can only feel pain and misery and the eternal piercing of a thousand knives:ahh: I know that sounds like a childish thing to worry about but if all things exist, then so does that. sooooo yeah I'm not sure I want to believe in that alternate universe stuff due to some of the implications. I just might go mad :Boo: Heck, I'm mad enough as it is! :derpe: but enough speak of madness, while we are on the subject of alternate universes I might as well contribute something at least a tad thought provoking: what if there is a universe where NOTHING in this universe exists? as in, there is no such thing as matter, thought, emotion, death, life, or anything we can possibly conceive of, and yet that universe functions just as well as ours does without any of that stuff?
The exploration of ideas. Take RP for example. It's a potential outlet for your imagination to trial run ideologies that pop up in your life, subtly. Depending on how in depth you try and write, the more of your mind we get to see. Why? Because that's where our ideas are coming from. And sometimes, some of the ideas and even personality types of the people you know or have ever met. Even certain characters. Some characters will reflect your ideals, your fears, your fascinations, your desires. Some may even reflect your own personality and dreams. It's all being syphoned from the same place, afteral; your brain. And then it's nit-picking RPer's like me that like to poke around and try and see what came from where, possibly. I have no idea what's in your head so I rarely get very far, don't worry. Even so, it's a wonderful place to work out ideas.
I know for sure there are cosmologists who suspect this, lol. They say that because quantum fluctuations produced the big bang, and quantum mechanics is by its own nature nearly unpredictable and completely random, then there must be a multitude of other universes that are all markedly different in some way, each one with different laws of physics. Physicists generally agree that if there were any variance in any of the multitude of known cosmological constants (to say nothing of the unknown cosmological constants), then matter and energy, at least as we know them, would not exist. So you could imagine a universe in which, instead of the matter-energy dichotomy we know in this one, there is some third fundamental constituent of nature that makes up the universe instead. Rather than the spacetime we know in this universe, the other universe is spaceless and timeless, and consists of a magical ~* something else *~ that can't be described with respect to any of the physical laws, known or unknown, that our universe runs on. It'd be such an alien world that we probably couldn't even recognize that it's a "universe". XD But by the multiverse principle... it doesn't matter if you could imagine such a universe or not, because somewhere out there it's already happened! It's pretty mind-bending, but this is the kind of philosophy I absolutely eat up. Lovecraft, I believe, was the first to make it a thing, with his philosophy of cosmicism, that the universe is fundamentally indifferent to human life. I like to take it to the next level with the idea that the human intellect, or any intellect in nature for that matter, is also fundamentally unable to grasp the laws of nature in any true and complete sense (which is also backed by a number of philosophical principles, but I won't go into those lol). So those mystical third legs to the nature of the universe not only almost certainly exist, but are also fundamentally unknowable. gods I'm going way off topic aren't I lol
To me, fiction is just another kind of art. Art in and of itself has no intrinsic value, but it definitely brings something to the table. I think art in general can make people happy, and can inspire them to do great things. On top of that, it promotes creative thinking. Pretty simple answer for a complicated question, i know =P
I'd just like to say this. Let's for the argument say that your premise is correct. That would mean that there would be worlds in which there exist beings that can transverse universes, right? I mean, I could write some fiction about it, so it must be true, because fiction does not exist. Now, let's take it further and say that there exists a universe with said beings, but if even one exists, then all of existence, the multiverse, literally EVERYTHING does not exist. I could certainly write a story about it, so if fiction doesn't exist for the reasons you say it does, then nothing exists, and everything exists and everything is nothing, and nothing is everything. Basically, what you're saying doesn't make sense =P (I say that with the utmost kindness!) Oh, and let me add this: If what I'm saying doesn't work, and that wouldn't destroy the premise, it would then mean that fiction IS real, because I can write a story about those things.
