The Post-Apocalyptic Imaginary: Science, Fiction, and the Death Drive

Abstract

This article considers why the relatively new genre of post-apocalyptic fiction is proliferating in the twenty-first century and argues that its compulsive return to scenes of the destruction of the world is symptomatic of a traumatized culture. The violence of World War I– where the co-option of science by the military and state in the name of civilization made possible industrial-scale killing – persists in haunting the collective psyche even as, on a ‘rational’ level, we continue to invest in the contrary hope that this technology is future-orientated and will solve the problems of the world. The latest concerns around artificial intelligence and autonomous killer robots highlight the ways in which what Freud referred to as ‘the death drive’ and ‘the destructive impulse’ govern the logic of both our anxiety about and celebration of this technology. The second part of the article reviews the complicated relationship between science and fiction, where on the one hand science uses fiction to promote its inventions and on the other warns that the fears fuelled by the ‘hype’ of fiction hinder its progress and thus must be exiled from ‘serious’ discussions of science. I conclude that, on the contrary, science needs fiction to assist in restoring an ethical impulse to this technology.

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