See a kid curled up with a novel about space aliens instead of swinging on the jungle gym at the park and one word will probably pop into your mind: geek.
Maybe that young bookworm will grow up to be a billionaire (many of the biggest names in business were dedicated sci-fi fans in their youths), but many of us associate a love of sci-fi with social awkwardness and getting pushed into your locker a lot.
Instead of a sure, straight road to social isolation and nerdiness, parents should think of science fiction as a great way for kids (and adults) to build mental strength, weather uncertainty, and imagine better futures, experts argue.
Predicting the unpredictable ...
"Science-fiction writers don't know anything more about the future than anyone else," admitted celebrated sci-fi writer Kim Stanley Robinsonin The New Yorker recently. "Still, if you read science fiction, you may be a little less surprised by whatever does happen."
Why? "By presenting plausible alternative realities, science-fiction stories empower us to confront not just what we think but also how we think and why we think it. They reveal how fragile the status quo is, and how malleable the future can be," Eliot Peper pointed out on the Harvard Business Review site.
Science fiction nudges us not just to imagine other worlds, but also to face up to the fact that the world as it exists today isn't fixed. Alternatives are possible. Maybe even inevitable. The status quo can feel like an all-enveloping fog around us. Sci-fi (and global shocks like the one we're living through) part that fog, reminding us empires fall, tech advances, certainties crumble, and nature regularly dishes out corrections to our hubris. Unpredictability is the only thing that's predictable.
Read the full article: https://www.inc.com/jessica-stillman/reading-science-fiction-will-make-your-child-more-resilient.html
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