Re: Hard Sci-fi?

On Apr 21, 5:50=A0pm, John Schilling <schil...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:

> Uh, this is rasfs, the "sf" part being "speculative fiction", so it's
> kind of important to know what that means.

I certainly agree.  But at that point, nobody had defined the term in
this thread, or explained its relationship to the term "science
fiction".  Since this whole post is about definitions, I thought it
was worth exploring.

> Yes, but not fictional or speculative social sciences. =A0Single young
> men in posession of a fortune and in want of a wife, and all the rest,
> are known to have existed in Regency England. =A0Specific names, places,
> and plot details are fictional. =A0The social sciences linking all these
> things together, are quite real.

What are you saying here?  That the elements of a science fiction
story must be based in non-existent academic fields?  Or only that the
elements themselves must be fictional, and can be based in known
science?  The "fictional social sciences" reference suggests the
former, but the rest of the paragraph sounds like the latter.