Social progress is a big thing for me. Although science fiction is traditionally concerned with the hard sciences, which is chemistry, physics, and, some might argue, biology, my father was and still is a social scientist at the University of Toronto.

Print science fiction writers often do consulting for government bodies.

No one disputes that seeming order can come out of the application of simple rules. But who wrote the rules?

Science fiction is the WikiLeaks of science, getting word to the public about what cutting-edge research really means.

There were four major 20th-century science fiction writers: Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Robert A. Heinlein and Ray Bradbury. Of those four, the first three were all published principally in science-fiction magazines. They were preaching to the converted.

The gods do not protect fools. Fools are protected by more capable fools.