John VanSickle <evi### [at] hotmailcom> wrote:
> On the other hand, fantasy is based on magic, which is all about the 
> real world responding to human will.  Magic wands spout magic because 
> the person holding the wand wants it to.  Philosophers call this the 
> primacy of consciousness.

  I wouldn't say that fantasy as a genre is defined in terms of or
requires the existence of any kind of 'magic'. Magic is a common
feature of fantasy, but it's perfectly possible to write fantasy
that does not contain any magical elements at all.

  Likewise sci-fi doesn't necessarily require the use of currently
non-existent (or even impossible) technology. It might include things
that are simply not done currently, not because the technology is not
advanced enough, but because it's not feasible (eg. it's too expensive,
has no useful purpose, etc. People traveling between planets would be
a good example.) Much scifi has been written which use purely settings
which could be achievable today, if someone really wanted (eg. astronauts
traveling to Mars).

  This distinction between "fantasy" and "scifi" always comes down to
your *definition* of those terms. No two people have the same definition,
and what one considers to be an example of one of the genres might not be
in the opinion of another person.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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