By Madeleine Stone   @themadstone

Science fiction is often said to reflect human culture: who we are today and what we dream to be in the future. But those who write on the future also have a hand in shaping it. Indeed, many future thinkers of the past have predicted technologies of the present with uncanny accuracy.

“By looking to people in the past who predict the future — why they got it right, why they got it wrong — we can start to understand what being able to predict the future entails,” says University of Pennsylvania senior Paul Marett.

A double major in science, technology and society and philosophy, Marett’s interest in the historical figures, who both predicted and influenced their futures, has led him down a unique path. For his senior thesis, he’s researching a collection of largely forgotten books published in Britain between World War I and II. The series of 109 short books, authored by nearly as many distinct men and women, includes both nonfiction and science fiction, works that correctly predicted the future and those that didn’t, and ideas that became enduring tropes in science fiction.

Marett’s thesis work is the culmination of an undergraduate career spent exploring the intersections of science, society and the future.

Growing up in Atlantic Beach, N.Y., his penchant for science fiction began during high school, when, for a class assignment, he reviewed William Gibson’s Neuromancer, the 1985 novel that coined the term “cyberspace” and spawned the cyberpunk subgenre.

In his first two years at Penn, Marett took courses on the history and philosophy of science fiction. Already an STSC major, these courses convinced him to take on a second major in philosophy.

“We explored a lot of cool issues,” Marett says. “We’d talk about what identity is, and from there we’d end up discussing the identity of sentient robots. These discussions really roped me into philosophy.”

The STSC major encourages students to rigorously pursue their own interests. Marett became interested in futurology — the study of predicting the future — through conversations with his brother on potential applications for his academic interests.

“My brother is older, out in the workforce, and didn’t really understand my major for a while, until he realized you can use it to predict trends in technology,” says Marett. “I agreed that it’s a great application, but I felt like the courses didn’t quite prepare you for that. So, I met with my advisor and asked why there wasn’t a futurology course.”

Marett’s major advisor pointed him to Mark Adams, associate professor in the Department of History and Sociology of Science in the School of Arts & Sciences at Penn, and an expert in the history of science and science fiction. During the fall of his junior year, Marett found himself studying the history of futurology with Adams.

“We read a lot of books, mostly sci-fi, things by Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, H.G. Wells, Jules Verne,” says Marett. “I looked at the technology these writers envisioned and discovered there are lots of books that are either intentionally or uncannily accurate.”

It was during this independent study that Marett came across the first two books in the series that became the subject of his thesis: Daedalus, by British scientist J.B.S. Haldane, and Icarus, by philosopher Bertrand Russell. Published in 1924, the two books reach far beyond their time, imagining futures where humans are able to biologically engineer themselves and the planet. Daedalus coined the term “ectogenesis,” which describes the growth of an organism, such as a human embryo, in an artificial environment, and was a major influence on Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World.

“These two books were really the initial dialog that inspired the series,” says Marett. “They have been well studied, but the rest of the books have been forgotten.”

Marett ended up reading nearly thirty books in the series, all published between 1924 and 1931. The books are short, often essay-like, and cover wide-ranging topics in science, philosophy and futurism.

“The books’ themes run the gambit from, ‘Here’s what I think the future should or will be like,’ to, ‘Here’s how to live your life and be a productive citizen,’” says Marett.

Collectively, the series is a trove of knowledge about British attitudes toward science and the future during the 1920s.

“I’m trying to place the series in the context of the times,” says Marett, “What these books say about the place of science in society during this period.”

Marett has found major themes such as the concept of world unity and the growing importance of science in British society.

“There were debates during and after World War I about how Britain was disadvantaged during the war, because it didn’t invest enough in scientific research and education,” says Marett. “In a sense, this collection of books can be seen as a response. They represent part of an effort to bring science to the public, to those who couldn’t afford a university education.”

The series was also influential to future science fiction writers. A book by J.D. Bernal inspired philosopher Olaf Stapeldon’s vision of future humans living in space in self-sustaining spheres that harness energy from the sun. Stapeldon’s writings, in turn, directly influenced physicist Freeman Dyson’s conception of “Dyson spheres,” hypothetical megastructures that encompass and harness energy from stars, which became a hallmark of 20th century science fiction.

“I’m still fleshing out the tangible impacts the series had on society,” says Marett. These impacts are where Marett hopes his thesis will conclude.

For his own future, Marett wants to continue studying the intersection of science, philosophy and the future. He was recently admitted to the University of Cambridge’s Department of History and Philosophy of Science, where he is considering pursuing a Master’s of Philosophy.

Beyond his academic pursuits, Marett engages in diverse extracurricular activities. As president of the steering committee at Stouffer College House, he helps coordinate house social events. Over the last four years Marett has also traveled the world with Penn’s Glee Club, playing alto saxophone for their band.

“Last year, we went to Doha, Dubai and Tanzania, and this year we’re going to be traveling to Vienna, Prague and Germany,” says Marett. “It’s been an amazing experience.”

Marett also runs an art studio on behalf of the Penn Art Club, and pays visits to the Kelly Writers House, where he works on his own science fiction stories.

For Marett, making the most of his career at Penn was a no-brainer. “Four years is not a huge amount of time,” he says. “Why waste it?”