Why do sci-fi writers do this?

[Owen Robertson]

I've noticed recently that nearly every popular science fiction universe has one or more "lost" civilizations. Shit, Halo's got two. But I'm simply wondering why? I can't see a reason other than plot convenience. By having Humans (or any other species) discover ruins on a planet, of technology far beyond theirs, you can allow a jump several thousand years forward in technological advancement, without any time actually passing, thus keeping civilization as we know it close enough to still be relatable (as in we haven't mixed into a Eurasian blend of skin tone and language.) But to me, that seems a bit like lazy writing. It takes maybe 30 minutes to shit out a "timeline" of technological and/or societal advancement that leads you to 10,987 (assuming we keep B.C.E. that long) where we're still racially diverse and speak English. So if anyone can explain to me why else you might want to introduce a long-lost species that conquered the galaxy before the dinosaurs died out on Earth, please do.

 

[Jedoro]

It's more likely that we'll still be racially diverse and speaking English in a few hundred years, than it is in a few thousand. In all that time, we'd be able to have completely blended to where race was pretty much undefinable, and we could have some crazy superior language that makes so much more sense than English. So, the closer their timeline is to ours, the more likely things will generally be the same.

 

[Klumpfot]

I imagine it's because stories involving lost civilizations and such tend to involve exploration, and exploration is exciting. In terms of plot convenience, there are other common elements in sci-fi that annoy me much more. Like how most sentient races tend to be bipedal humanoids who adopt human language as the norm after the races meet.

 

[Guffe]

You know... sci-fi...
Technological monsters with super cool effecting lazer-beams that shoot shurikens and lightning, with boobs are so freaking cool.!

Yeah, because making humans weild laser weapons isn't cool but big monsters that do are, I guess.

 

[Hal10k]

I've noticed recently that nearly every popular science fiction universe has one or more "lost" civilizations. Shit, Halo's got two. But I'm simply wondering why? I can't see a reason other than plot convenience. By having Humans (or any other species) discover ruins on a planet, of technology far beyond theirs, you can allow a jump several thousand years forward in technological advancement, without any time actually passing, thus keeping civilization as we know it close enough to still be relatable (as in we haven't mixed into a Eurasian blend of skin tone and language.) But to me, that seems a bit like lazy writing. It takes maybe 30 minutes to shit out a "timeline" of technological and/or societal advancement that leads you to 10,987 (assuming we keep B.C.E. that long) where we're still racially diverse and speak English. So if anyone can explain to me why else you might want to introduce a long-lost species that conquered the galaxy before the dinosaurs died out on Earth, please do.

There are two primary reasons. You already hit on the first: it allows for swift technological development that still leaves cultural development fairly stagnant. We could puzzle out a timeline up until the year 10,000, but that would logically entail a massive shift in culture. You either pretend that human society doesn't change at all for a very long stretch of time, which is sort of like pretending that a sandwich left on your front lawn will be just fine for eating after a few weeks, or you make wild predictions about cultural progress, which will usually alienate a society from the puny year of 2011. Using precursor technology helps keep things in a shorter ime frame.

The second reason is that it can serve as a wild card in the plot. The important thing about many examples of this sort of thing is that the users of the technology aren't sure how it works. Want to start a new conflict in your setting? Precursor technology starts spawning new enemies. Want to get the heroes out of an unwinnable situation? Have the precursor technology do something that defies the established boundaries of the setting and is never mentioned again.

 

[Vitagen]

Yeah, maybe it's a little lazy, but it's not unrealistic. Look at history. Civilizations collapse now and again.

 

[iaculum]

A multitude of reasons, I would think. Most of which are lazy writing as you said, but some of them because it's a common and "believable" trope that can tie together various story ideas in a way that doesn't require much thought.

For one, it gives -- as you said-- a plot-convenient "thousand-year jump in technological advancement", or "Access to technologies far beyond human ken" which would allow for some paths to take the story which might have been harder to explain otherwise.

Saying that "Oh, once there was this technologically advanced race that solved everything" would also give room for some of the more outlandish-but-common devices as well, like teleportation or laser guns.

To use your example, in Halo they use their Technologically Advanced Race #01 to produce the Halos, which are very convenient universe-destroying tools. The Forerunners are also an excallent source of the enemy's motivation, the particularities of which being hidden away in one of the various novels.
I am curious, however, about the second one you speak of? The Covenant, or the recently-pulled-out-of-their-*censored*-for-the-new-book ones the "Precursors"?

But I digress.

It's quick, it's common enough to be believable but also versatile enough to make unique enough to fit into your story (or base your story upon), and most people don't question it.
I've seen this particular plot device used very badly, and very well, and I don't have much of a problem with it as long as the writers don't abuse it or do ridiculous things with it.

EDIT: Hmm, reading through the other replies here. People do have some good points as well, better than me no doubt.

 

[Owen Robertson]

We could puzzle out a timeline up until the year 10,000, but that would logically entail a massive shift in culture. You either pretend that human society doesn't change at all for a very long stretch of time, which is sort of like pretending that a sandwich left on your front lawn will be just fine for eating after a few weeks, or you make wild predictions about cultural progress, which will usually alienate a society from the puny year of 2011.

That's why I said you could make a timeline where nothing changes. Empires don't last long, but what if they did? Let's say NATO breaks off from the U.N., forms their own union, war with the Chinese, domination of space travel (they co-opt India), new Empire of English-speaking white-ish people for around 4000 years, in which time they develop FTL and colonize a few systems, revolution for another hundred, new Earthican Republic, they dominate for 3000 years, first contact in Procyon system, war with new aliens for another thousand, and we arrive around 10,000 with a similar Earth. That didn't even take thirty minutes.
Your second reason is quite sound, but how about the traditional action movie, red shirt hero, who reappears after everyone thinks he's dead to save the day and/or sacrifice himself? Still works.

 

[tehlordofmyownworld]

I had an idea for a book where humanity was the lost race.It would be set, say, 1500 years in the future, after humanity basically killed itself.Several medieval kingdoms sprung up from the ashes, and they have no knowledge of the previous human civilisation.However, the remains of the old world rise from hidden underground bunkers and wage war on the vastly outclassed knights and lords.The war rages until the old world-ers threaten to blast humanity back to the stone age with a network of hidden nuclear missles.The book ends with these being fired and the old world-ers retreating back to the bunkers to rise again in the future.

 

[agentorange98]

Well there are examples of this within our own history, I mean greek mathematics and philosiphy and Egyptian engineering, craft working, and farming techniques were all lost to Europe for hundreds of years only for them to rediscover them later after the crusades (the knowledge was preserved by Arab peoples during Europe's "Dark Ages") So it's not unheard of for people to find
"lost civilizations" with untold knowledge

 

[Jacco]

From a technical standpoint, it allows the writer to use some specific plot devices. Halo had the Forerunners, without which, there would be no Halo rings. Mass Effect had the Protheans, without which there would be no hope against the Reapers, etc etc ad nauseum.

It allows the characters to complete actions that otherwise would be impossible because someone else laid the groundwork and paid the price. It's cliche, but it makes sense.

 

[Owen Robertson]

I am curious, however, about the second one you speak of? The Covenant, or the recently-pulled-out-of-their-*censored*-for-the-new-book ones the "Precursors"?

Yes. I was referring to the inter-galactic crab people.

 

[Hot Madness]

Well, Frank Herbert did do exactly that in Dune to cite the most famous example of a science fiction writer updating humanity at least 10,000 years into the future. I believe Larry Niven, Steven Baxter, Arthur C. Clarke, and Harlen Ellison have done similar things in their respective works...

The reasons for human finding a "lost" or "dead" civilization are pretty well summed up by previous posters, but I'll indulge:

Go too far into the future and now you've alienated much of your readership by making things too far off how things are today so there is a dissociation. By setting humanity into the future, but not too far, and juxtaposing the older alien civilization, the writer has at once made the audience connect and identify with the humans who are familiar, and now the dead alien civilization takes on a meaning of wonder, curiosity, and possible menace.

The same thing happens all the time in fantasy, the ancient elven, or dwarven, or undead, or demonic city who's ruins the heroes stumble upon or the villains attempt to exploit.

Also, it's harder to extrapolate humans out that far, because society would be unrecognizable to us at that point, but the author still has to make a sympathetic connection to their audience. It has been done before (again, read Dune) but it's harder, and Frank Herbert borrowed liberally from Earth's past and present into cultures unfamiliar to Western experience and history to do it.

 

[Ironman126]

As a sci-fi writer myself, i have written ancient and arcane alien tech into my book. Why? No idea, it really has almost nothing to do with the plot of the book. So, while it can be used as a convenient plot device, a la Mass Effect, they may not actually be such a plot device. Because in my mind, humans are smart enough to figure it out on their own, but so are the other, possibly dead, species.

But yeah, plot device. How do you move something 20,000 light years? A mass effect relay. How do you purge the galaxy of a malicious parasite? A halo. How do you get more original sci-fi? Read Asimov...

 

[Soviet Heavy]

You should check out the thread that's going on in the Role Playing Forum. We're all contributing to a Sci Fi Universe where there is a few thousand years of a gap between now and then. And none of it was achieved through super relics, just technological advancement.

Here we go. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/540.308574-Life-in-the-53rd-Century-New-Sci-Fi-universe-2-Always-looking-for-contributors-and-Artists]

 

[Hal10k]

We could puzzle out a timeline up until the year 10,000, but that would logically entail a massive shift in culture. You either pretend that human society doesn't change at all for a very long stretch of time, which is sort of like pretending that a sandwich left on your front lawn will be just fine for eating after a few weeks, or you make wild predictions about cultural progress, which will usually alienate a society from the puny year of 2011.

That's why I said you could make a timeline where nothing changes. Empires don't last long, but what if they did? Let's say NATO breaks off from the U.N., forms their own union, war with the Chinese, domination of space travel (they co-opt India), new Empire of English-speaking white-ish people for around 4000 years, in which time they develop FTL and colonize a few systems, revolution for another hundred, new Earthican Republic, they dominate for 3000 years, first contact in Procyon system, war with new aliens for another thousand, and we arrive around 10,000 with a similar Earth. That didn't even take thirty minutes.
Your second reason is quite sound, but how about the traditional action movie, red shirt hero, who reappears after everyone thinks he's dead to save the day and/or sacrifice himself? Still works.

It's not just political structures like governments that would have to be stagnant. Look at the various stigma and social structures assigned to things like race, gender, sexuality, economic status, and the like. A society can't be broken down into simple terms like "It's the U.N, but in space". Every culture is the sum of countless societal structures, which are constantly fluctuating according to the events that they withstand. Change even one of the social mores- suggest, for example, that Christians might not be evil to an audience of typical Roman upper-class citizens- and the audience will feel uncomfortable. You either pretend that nothing at all changes in any aspect of a society over 10,000 years of history, which is just flat-out unrealistic, or you do acknowledge that society isn't exactly the same after 10,000 years of development, and risk making the audience uncomfortable. Read "The Forever War" by Joe Haldeman for a good example of the second instance in practice.

As for the second note, the unexpected nature of precursor technology can go beyond Deus Ex Machina. Entire plots are frequently built around it; I submit for evidence the entirety of the Mass Effect franchise.

 

[duchaked]

I speak English, Mandarin Chinese, and Spanish (okay well I can't claim complete fluency aside from English hurr). Soooo I think it's pretty cool with what Joss Whedon did in Firefly, the whole English/Mandarin mixture thing pretty cool and kinda makes sense actually, I dunno.