Science Fiction as an Examination of Human Culture

     One of the things that intrigues and excites me the most about science fiction is that, as much as it is set in the foreign and unknown future or lands, it usually contains an examination of human culture or social criticism. It is a medium that allows the author to take aspects of society today, and blow them up to an absurd scale. 

     A wonderful TV series that I watched over winter break is a fantastic example of this. It was one of those days where you scroll through Netflix, not really caring what you end up watching. I saw Black Mirror, thinking that it was innocent enough. I was not prepared for what was to come. Black Mirror is a BBC show where every episode is not related and are stand alone. Each episode, takes an aspect of society or technology and explores what the future would be like and the ramifications of these things. For example, in one episode, most humans have a chip in their skull that records everything you ever see or hear. You can watch these at any time or, for your convenience, pull it up on a TV screen for everyone to see and enjoy. At first, this sounds like a wonderful idea, until you see a future based on this technology. This future world is one without trust. There is no need to trust someone when you can just hold the accountable right away, by searching through the memories.

     Every episode is very poignant and a concise criticism on society as well. The one episode that got to me the most (and is my favorite episode) was the first episode of the second season. In the episode, a woman's husband dies and she is having difficulties coping with a life without him. He had a very big online and social media presence, and there is a program that allows a computer to calculate how he would react, and email the widow. It escalates to phone calls, and finally, a full grown robotic replica. This episode shows the ramifications of living in the past, with the dead, and not properly grieving. However, what scared me the most was the knowledge that the writers got the idea, after they learned that creation of this software is in the works. This article (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/01/08/black-mirror-technology_n_6431214.html), while it contains spoilers, marks all of the technology seen in the series, that is currently being worked on today.