The Cheesy SF Categorization System

[Gullible Jones]

SF is generally renowned for the sheer quantity of cheesiness to be found in the genre. Also somewhat like cheese, we group it into "hard" and "soft" SF.

But "hard" and "soft" isn't really good enough, is it? Take the Revelation Space series: most people would categorize it as soft SF, but agree that it's softer than Accelerando and harder than the Uplift series. Just calling it "soft SF" doesn't really give you an accurate idea of how accurate, or how offensive, its science is.

I have thus come up with a more complete system for categorizing SF stories, based on (what else?) cheese. It contains five categories - hard, Swiss, soft, spreadable, and rotten.

Hard: based entirely or almost entirely on known science, perhaps with the occasional nod to theoretical stuff that hasn't been proven but isn't blatantly impossible (e.g. string theory). Most cyberpunk probably falls into this category, although Neuromancer doesn't courtesy of certain grotesque inaccuracies involving the storage space required for AIs and human personalities. Likewise, the majority of what Ben Bova pens is hard, often in more ways than one. Like cheddar, Hard SF can be good, or it can be the cheap version that sucks.

Swiss: extrapolates (mostly) from known stuff, but rather far and on rather sketchy ground. Accelerando is a good example of this - there aren't many things in it that seem completely implausible at first glance, but look at it closely and it starts looking unlikely. Where does utility fog get its power? Aren't those 3D printers just a little too magical? As with genuine Swiss cheese, examination... reveals holes. Sometimes quite a few.

Soft: pays some respects to the some of the known laws of physics, but not if it doesn't have to. See David Brin's aformentioned Uplift series for an outstanding example of this. Often includes telepathy, but the real thing to look for is violations of the laws of thermodynamics, followed by violations of Newton's laws (e.g. reactionless drives). Falls apart if prodded too hard.

- Magic: okay, so I lied, it's six categories. Anyway... somewhere between "soft" and "spreadable" is the ill-defined world of science fantasy. If it's got uber-powerful swords, it's probably science fantasy; but if its universe actually gives a damn about us puny (or maybe not-so-puny) mortals, then it's definitely science fantasy. Thus, Star Wars, Babylon 5, and the Hyperion series are all science fantasy. Think of it as the Brie cheese of SF.

(Yes, I said "Hyperion is science fantasy". Sorry, "love" is not a physical force.)

Spreadable: pays its respect to the known laws of physics every once in a while; the rest of the time, it rotates out of the main stream into a null bubble in the sea of ylem that defines space, time, and... uh... yeah, it uses technobabble. It can be entertaining, even inspiring, but at heart it's still full of junk, much like any dish made with velveeta. Keith Laumer's standalone stories are almost invariably Spreadable SF.

Rotten: unlike real processed cheese, Spreadable SF is highly perishable, and leaving it out too long will reverse the polarity of the tachyon flux, causing the nadionic buffers to overflow and sending a protonic pulse to the omega nucleus, resulting in an endless feedback loop that causes technobabble to accumulate until it forms a critical mass and implodes into a space-time singularity. If you read, see, or hear rotten SF, you'll know it.

This concludes the summary of my cheesy new system. Hopefully it will be of some use to someone.

[Gullible Jones]

P.S. The above is a joke. It's not supposed to be taken seriously.

[Gullible Jones]

P.P.S. And unfortunately, I don't really like cheese. Please don't shoot me.

[Ford Prefect]

Joke though it may be, it's got its merits, only it needs more cheese in the classification system. I have to say that the 'Swiss' classiication is pretty good for prettym uch every 'hard sci-fi' series I've ever read.

[Nyrath]

A joke with a kernel of truth. With a bit of polish this system might actually work.

[Molyneux]

But...but...I hate Swiss! Don't put my favorite books under a fetid, foot-smelling category...

[Sarevok]

Hey Gullible Jones you the same guy who used to post on BABB and FWIS forums ?

[Zixinus]

I like it, although definitions should be more clear and more examples. Otherwise, its actually a good system.

[Master_Baerne]

P.P.S. And unfortunately, I don't really like cheese. Please don't shoot me.

BANG! You're dead.

Seriously though, that's not a bad system. With a bit more polish, it could work.

[CaptainChewbacca]

I think a good name for the 'magic' subset would be either 'artificial' cheese, where things happen just because the writer says so, or you could call it 'Cheese Whiz' because its rather puffed-up and crazy-looking.

Cheese scale. Brilliant.

[Gullible Jones]

Hey, it looks like I might be on to something... cool. At least I appear to have coined a phrase. "Swiss cheese SF"... Not bad.

Hey Gullible Jones you the same guy who used to post on BABB and FWIS forums ?

Yeah, I'm the one. You another (ex)BABBler?

[Ford Prefect]

Given that there does seem to be positive reaction to this sort of system, I think some effort should be made to polish it up. Certainly, you could break it down further (what's the hardest cheese in the world? Edam?), which would be useful - and it would be much more fun than diamond hard. I really like saying Swiss cheese sci-fi.

[Darth Wong]

An extra category should be made for the "hollow block of Swiss cheese" science fiction, where you look through the holes and realize there's nothing at all in the centre. That's what drives me nuts about Star Trek; it tries so hard to sound pseudo-scientific but once you dig beneath the surface there is not only no scientific validity but not even any real internal consistency. Technologies that couldn't do something in episode A can suddenly do it in episode B, as if it's the most natural thing in the world.

[Ford Prefect]

The 'rotten' category carries the spirit of it well, even if it doesn't quite adress what is so bad about that sort of writing (as you say, it's internal self-consistency/utter barmyness). I'm not a huge fan of Star Trek, but it really saddens me to think that its writing was often so hollow.

[Gullible Jones]

The "rotten" category was indeed concieved to contain Star Trek, Doctor Who, and other series, novels, etc. that regularly fail internal consistency checks. This isn't to say that individual episodes of a Rotten SF TV series can't be good, in spite of the underpinnings being crap; although excessive use of handwavium and lack of internal consistency generally does lead to lazy writing.

[Sriad]

Instead of "Rotten" I suggest "Garlic Limburger Fondue". 0 hardness, no structure and smells nasty, and while it is sweet and creamy and has a bit of punch, you'll be ostracized for days after people find out you've consumed it.

[Sriad]

Which is exactly how I think of the Metabaron comics, come to think of it.

Misogynistic scienceless space opera shouldn't be so entertaining!

[Gullible Jones]

Ah... I forgot. I failed to mention that the "rotten" category is also based on a genuine cheese. Similarly to rotten SF, it is unaccountably popular in some circles, in spite of its capability to cause violent digestive distress.

[Uraniun235]

At some point, I think we simply have to acknowledge that "science fiction" is not really a good catch-all term for "basically any story which happens in the future and/or in space", because there's really a lot of very good stories out there which take place in space and in the future which have little to no basis (nor do they need one) in science whatsoever. (At the same time, a more developed version of this could be useful for those who really must insist on lumping every space adventure story in under the term "science fiction".)

So...

Thus, Star Wars, Babylon 5, and the Hyperion series are all science fantasy. Think of it as the Brie cheese of SF.

Why the term "science fantasy"? That doesn't even make a whole lot of sense to me; just because it's somewhat self-consistent and has advanced technology, it qualifies as "science [something]"? Also, I'm fuzzy on what the difference between "fiction" and "fantasy" is; they're both words for a description of an event that didn't happen, and it frankly sounds like a distinction of pure snobbery to me.

There's a much, much better term for stuff like Star Wars and B5 and Star Trek and Captain Harlock that's been around for quite some time: "space opera". Just because it's dreadfully unfashionable these days doesn't make it a bad word.

[Gullible Jones]

I guess you have a point. Given the blatant mysticism in B5 though (in some ways much more blatant than Star Wars), I have a lot of trouble not calling it fantasy, even if it's also space opera.

[Sarevok]

Hey Gullible Jones you the same guy who used to post on BABB and FWIS forums ?

Yeah, I'm the one. You another (ex)BABBler?

More lof a lurker than a regular poster. I had a few posts under the username Styx before BABB transmuted into it's current form. The ugly vBulletin user interface and different board culture (is that even a word ? lol) kept me away since.

[Sea Skimmer]

I think of sci fi as generally being three types; stuff which is completely or close to completely realistic, stuff which tries to be logical, consistent and look like it could be real normal standards for sci fi when everything logical and reasonable is thrown out the window. In any of these categories the actual product its self can be good or bad.

[Nyrath]

An extra category should be made for the "hollow block of Swiss cheese" science fiction, where you look through the holes and realize there's nothing at all in the centre. That's what drives me nuts about Star Trek; it tries so hard to sound pseudo-scientific but once you dig beneath the surface there is not only no scientific validity but not even any real internal consistency

Yes, that too was my thought when I reflected on swiss cheese. It puts up a facade but it is actually full of holes.

[WesFox13]

Hmm, so where would Orion's Arm be placed in this "Cheesy" categorization?

[CaptainChewbacca]

Hmm, so where would Orion's Arm be placed in this "Cheesy" categorization?

Soft, swiss cheese