Lectori salutem.
Welcome to Sci Phi Journal’s autumn edition… or spring, if you happen to read this from our home planet’s southern hemisphere. It is remarkable that since the golden age of science fiction, “living in a globalised world” has gone from a futurist trope to a tired cliché. Indeed, at the time of writing this, one of our co-editors is on deployment in South Africa while our crew are spread across three continents.
Travel is by no means a novel human endeavour, but working collaboratively as a team across such distances would have been considered speculative even a generation ago. Perhaps it is fitting then that our present issue is dedicated to imaginary places – ranging from the physical to the virtual and even spiritual realms.
How would the economics of a fantasy realm cope with questing heroes unearthing a constant supply of treasure? Should sentient non-player characters slain in a game receive burial rites? Can religion act as a problem-solving algorithm programmed into children sent to colonise planets? If trees were the dominant species, would they compete for power as we do?
These and many more armchair expeditions, brought to you by our human authors and illustrated by human hands (never AI), are rounded out by two essays, one celebrating the 200th anniversary of Orplid (conceived in 1825), arguably the first instance of comprehensive secondary world subcreation in high fantasy (our mundane world being the primary wherein SF arises), and a think piece on the place of spirituality in science fiction.
We hope you enjoy reading this latest issue as much as we enjoyed shepherding it together from around the globe.
Speculatively yours,
Sci Phi co-editors and crew
~
