Innovation, between Science and Science Fiction

<p>Contents</p>
<p>Foreword ix</p>
<p>Introduction xvii</p>
<p>Chapter 1. The Growth of the Imagination in Industrial Societies 1</p>
<p>1.1. A short history of science fiction&nbsp; 1</p>
<p>1.1.1. From Frankenstein to The Island of Doctor Moreau 1</p>
<p>1.1.2. Jules Verne, the founding father of science fiction 3</p>
<p>1.1.3. Albert Robida, a visionary in the shadow of Jules Verne&nbsp; 6</p>
<p>1.1.4. Hugo Gernsback, from fictional invention to innovation&nbsp; 8</p>
<p>1.1.5. Hard science fiction 10</p>
<p>1.1.6. The cyberpunk movement&nbsp; 12</p>
<p>1.1.7. The biopunk movement&nbsp; 16</p>
<p>1.1.8. A map of utopic technologies&nbsp; 18</p>
<p>1.2. The imagination, a cognitive barrier useful for innovation 20</p>
<p>1.3. The organizations use of science fiction&nbsp; 21</p>
<p>1.3.1. Design fiction and the popularization of technological imagination&nbsp; 21</p>
<p>1.3.2. Science fiction prototyping, a method to innovate 24</p>
<p>1.3.3. Science fiction and the identity of engineering students&nbsp; 27</p>
<p>1.3.4. The filter–philter theory&nbsp; 28</p>
<p>1.3.5. Institutional science fiction&nbsp; 29</p>
<p>1.3.6. Future Visions: Microsoft s science fiction&nbsp; 33</p>
<p>1.3.7. China s interest in science fiction and innovation&nbsp; 44</p>
<p>1.3.8. Forecasting and institutional science fiction&nbsp; 47</p>
<p>1.4. The psychology of organizations and science fiction 51</p>
<p>1.4.1. Normal, subversive or pathological imagination&nbsp; 51</p>
<p>1.4.2. Stimulating creativity with the imagination 54</p>
<p>1.4.3. Psychiatry and science fiction 56</p>
<p>1.4.4. Freudo–Lacanianism and science fiction 57</p>
<p>1.5. Should we organize a patenting system for utopic technologies?&nbsp; 59</p>
<p>Chapter 2. Technological Ideologies and Utopias 67</p>
<p>2.1. The space industry and technological utopias 68</p>
<p>2.1.1. Imagining the human colonization of Mars 68</p>
<p>2.1.2. Terraforming Mars, a great project that remains fiction 77</p>
<p>2.1.3. The colonization of the universe, the future of humankind? 79</p>
<p>2.1.4. Space imagination in Lucien Boia and the ESA s ITSF report&nbsp; 81</p>
<p>2.2. Transhumanism and science fiction 84</p>
<p>2.3. Science fiction and nanotechnologies&nbsp; 90</p>
<p>2.4. Accelerationism for a critical use of science fiction 95</p>
<p>2.5. From technological fiction to innovation&nbsp; 96</p>
<p>2.6. Imagining futures, at risk of the Cassandra syndrome 104</p>
<p>Chapter 3. Science, the Imagination and Innovation 109</p>
<p>3.1. The serious global dangers tackled by science fiction&nbsp; 109</p>
<p>3.2. The great steps in the history of technologies since the end of the 19th Century&nbsp; 116</p>
<p>3.3. Economic cycles and science fiction 121</p>
<p>3.4. Theories on innovation and theories on the imagination 124</p>
<p>3.4.1. Performative imagination and the creation of cyberspace 133</p>
<p>3.4.2. From science fiction to techno–scientific innovations: virtual reality headsets 134</p>
<p>3.4.3. The imagination before, together with and after science&nbsp; 135</p>
<p>3.4.4. The hypothesis of a basic imagination at the root of science 136</p>
<p>3.4.5. From the prophetic unconscious to the technological imagination&nbsp; 137</p>
<p>3.4.6. Historical dynamics and technological utopianism&nbsp; 138</p>
<p>Conclusion 141</p>
<p>Bibliography 149</p>
<p>Index&nbsp; 169</p>