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The following is a list of science fiction themes.
Common themes and tropes
See also: Science fiction genreCosmology
- Creation of the Universe
- Ecology
- The future
- Omega Point
- Quantum suicide and immortality
- Parallel worlds or universes.
- Ultimate fate of the Universe
Economics
- "Age of Greater Scarcity", often in connection with ecological or post-apocalyptic themes. In such dystopias, people are poorer and have fewer resources to draw on.
- Post-"Age of Scarcity" (arguments over how to distribute resources are irrelevant since anyone can have anything they reasonably want). Examples include:
History
- Alternate history
- Historical cycles: history repeating itself (either on long or short scales)
- Scientific prediction of the future (e.g. psychohistory)
- Secret history
Language
- Alien languages (e.g. Klingon)
- All humans speaking one language
- Current human languages evolving/splitting
- The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis being strongly true (e.g. Babel 17 by Samuel R. Delany or The Languages of Pao by Jack Vance)
- Universal Translators (e.g. Babel fish)
Military
- Military - strategy, weapons, ranks, technologies.
Sociology
- Sociology and sociobiology
- Religious ideas in science fiction
- Sex (including gender roles, polygamy, sexuality and procreation)
- Astrosociology
- return to feudalism
- hive-like eusocial societies
- caste systems
- Zero population growth
- Symbionts & Co-evolution
- Solipsism - a belief that the universe is entirely the creation of one's own mind
- Astrobiology
- First contact
Types of beings
See also: List of stock characters in science fictionBody and mind alterations
- Bio-implants
- Body modification, including genetic modification
- Bionics
- Cybernetics
- Intelligence amplification
- Invisibility
- Life extension, Biological immortality, Universal immortalism and immortality
- Artificial organs
- Cloning
- Cryonics
- The Organ Bank Problem
- Mind control
- Mind uploading
- Neural implants to directly interface with machinery
- Molecular manufacturing & Nanotechnology
- Psi powers and psychic phenomenon
- Paradise engineering
- Resizing
- Shapeshifting
- Telepathy
- Teleportation
Possible futures
- Alien invasions
- Apocalypses or world wide disasters
- Post-apocalyptic life - new societies that develop after the event
- Posthumanism
- Ultimate fate of the Universe & Kardashev scale
Political structures
Main article: Political ideas in science fiction- Alien Contact
- Anarcho-capitalism (see: Anarcho-capitalist literature and Libertarian science fiction)
- Dystopias and utopias
- Galactic empires
- Libertarianism
Habitats
- Alien Reality Television, usually the protagonist discovers his life has been one big reality television show for aliens.
- Alien Zoo, a zoo where humans are kept as exhibits.
- Arcologies - enormous habitats (hyperstructures) of extremely high human population density
- Domed city
- Endemic
- Exploring alien habitats.
- Floating City
- Seasteading & Ocean colonization
- Space colonization
- Underground city
- Walking City
Travel
- Colonization of other planets, moons, asteroids, etc.
- Moving planets
- Space exploration
- Interstellar travel
- Faster-than-light travel and communications
- Much slower than Light
- Very nearly light speed
- Bussard ramjets
- Ursula LeGuin's NAFAL ships, and the Twin paradox
- Space stations
- Interstellar travel
- Time travel
- Alternate histories: time travel can be used as a plot device to explore parallel universes. While alternate history has its own category (see above), it often occurs in time travel stories as well.
- Anachronism
- The Grandfather paradox -- e.g. Can someone go back in time and kill his parents before they beget the killer?
- Travel to the Earth's center
Technologies
- Artificial gravity
- Artificial intelligence
- Singularity
- Star lifting & Stellar engineering
- Megascale engineering & Planetary engineering
- Technology
- Far advanced technology for the time.
- Alien technology being found and used by humans. Most of the time for selfish purposes, or is being used incorrectly (not how it's supposed to work)