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Science fiction, shortened to sci-fi or scifi, broadly describes media that involves visual elements, themes, and settings featuring speculative and/or fantastical scientific and technological advancements.

Space exploration and travel, interactions with alien life, science experiments, advanced robotics, sentient artificial intelligence, immersive virtual reality, cybernetics, alternate universes/dimensions, time travel and cloning are some common technologies and premises featured in science fiction. Science fiction also frequently includes genre elements of fantasy, horror, and even westerns to craft narratives or for world building.

In terms of tagging, science_fiction should be applied to posts featuring an overall sci-fi aesthetic or setting. robot or alien characters alone shouldn't be tagged as science_fiction, unless they are depicted in a science fiction themed setting or the post depicts other science fiction elements.

While science fiction is often set in a "predicted" future (some more believable than others), it can take place any time, any where, from imagined galaxies, to fantasy dimensions, to even being set in an "alternate past" or "alternate future of the past" (see dieselpunk and steampunk below), "science fiction" applies as long as sci-fi elements are present in a piece of fiction. Science fiction can also cross over with the fantasy genre, combining science fiction elements with traditional "fantasy" aesthetics, or incorporating magic, the supernatural, and/or mythology into a science fiction setting.

Subgenres/Aesthetics

• cyberpunk
• dieselpunk
• steampunk
• magitech
• post-apocalyptic - Often taking place within the realms of science fiction but not always (ex; Dark Souls).
• retrofuturism

Related Tags

• futuristic
• cybernetics

See Also

• fantasy