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Uplift (science fiction)
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<h2 id="history">History</h2> <p>The concept of uplift can be traced to <a href="/facts/H._G._Wells/J0Y372Km">H. G. Wells</a>'s 1896 novel <i><a href="/facts/The_Island_of_Doctor_Moreau/u9zbTPdp">The Island of Doctor Moreau</a></i>, in which the titular scientist transforms animals into horrifying parodies of humans through surgery and psychological torment. The resulting animal-people obsessively recite the Law, a series of prohibitions against a reversion to animal behaviors, with the haunting refrain of "Are we not men?". Wells's novel reflects Victorian concerns about <a href="/facts/Vivisection/7zwjD7XT">vivisection</a> and of the power of unrestrained scientific experimentation to do terrible harm. </p><p>Other early literary examples can be found in the following works: </p> <ul><li><a href="/facts/Franz_Kafka/VfEIcH7E">Franz Kafka</a>'s <i><a href="/facts/A_Report_to_an_Academy/CtgpRE3o">A Report to an Academy</a></i> (1917) is a short story in which Red Peter, an <a href="/facts/Ape/QdTk4pko">ape</a>, describes his capture by humans, adaptation and mimicry of their behavior, habits and speech (originally in order to escape), and subsequent integration into human society.</li> <li><a href="/facts/L._Sprague_de_Camp/SaAJ36LM">L. Sprague de Camp</a>'s "Johnny Black" stories (beginning with "<a href="/facts/The_Command_(short_story)/wPdhAB31">The Command</a>") about a black bear raised to human-level intelligence, published in <i><a href="/facts/Analog_Science_Fiction_and_Fact/wlsqI7yY">Astounding Science-Fiction</a></i> from 1938–1940.</li> <li>In <a href="/facts/Cordwainer_Smith/Bh3epo3U">Cordwainer Smith</a>'s <i><a href="/facts/Instrumentality_of_Mankind/8Kj81pqw">Instrumentality of Mankind</a></i> series "underpeople" are created from animals through unexplained technological means explicitly to be servants of humanity, and were often treated as less than slaves by the society that used them, until the laws were reformed in the story "<a href="/facts/The_Ballad_of_Lost_C%2527Mell/qzd4E2YS">The Ballad of Lost C'Mell</a>" (1962). Smith's characterizations of underpeople are frequently quite sympathetic, and one of his most memorable characters is C'Mell, the cat-woman who appears in "The Ballad of Lost C'Mell" and in <i><a href="/facts/Norstrilia/bG1vtl07">Norstrilia</a></i> (1975).</li></ul> <p>David Brin has stated that his <a href="/facts/Uplift_Universe/QBVlkz4v">Uplift Universe</a> was written at least in part in response to the common assumption in earlier science fiction such as Smith's work and <i><a href="/facts/Planet_of_the_Apes_(novel)/0bey68ko">Planet of the Apes</a></i> that uplifted animals would, or even should, be treated as possessions rather than people.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:4" href="#fn:4"><sup>4</sup></a> As a result, a significant part of the conflict in the series revolves around the differing policies of Galactics and humans toward their client races. Galactic races traditionally hold their uplifted "clients" in a hundred-millennium-long <a href="/facts/Indenture/S7H2hfh9">indenture</a>, during which the "patrons" have extensive rights and claims over clients' lives and labor power. In contrast, humans have given their uplifted <a href="/facts/Dolphin/NUxUP7Ph">dolphins</a> and chimpanzees near-equal <a href="/facts/Civil_rights/DBK7m6s2">civil rights</a>, with a few legal and economic disabilities related to their unfinished state. A key scene in <i><a href="/facts/Startide_Rising/1XylMR0P">Startide Rising</a></i> is a discussion between a self-aware computer (the Niss) and a leading human (Gillian) about how the events during their venture (and hence the novel's plot) relate to the morality of the Galactics' system of uplift. </p> <h2 id="analysis">Analysis</h2> <p>Some commentators, such as M. Keith Booker [de], have argued that some pieces of literature have used uplift as an <a href="/facts/Allegory/RKXvafFK">allegory</a> for the <a href="/facts/White_man%2527s_burden/h0jq60o2">white man's burden</a> and <a href="/facts/Colonialism/kvqx2DaV">colonialism</a>. Booker singles out <a href="/facts/Robert_Silverberg/xwFXah5c">Robert Silverberg</a>'s <i><a href="/facts/Downward_to_the_Earth/YFIhJdbo">Downward to the Earth</a></i> as a novel that mirrors <a href="/facts/Joseph_Conrad/WSrhX7pT">Joseph Conrad</a>'s <i><a href="/facts/Heart_of_Darkness/4SQlzfHw">Heart of Darkness</a></i> in a science-fiction setting.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:5" href="#fn:5"><sup>5</sup></a> Other authors, by contrast, have used uplift as a <a href="/facts/Foil_(narrative)/vyNEkhVJ">narrative foil</a> to colonialism, presenting uplift not only as benevolent but as a virtuous reversal of colonial attitudes.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:6" href="#fn:6"><sup>6</sup></a> </p> <h2 id="selected-works">Selected works</h2> <table><tbody><tr><th>Year</th><th>Series</th><th>Creator</th><th>Media type</th><th>Notes</th></tr><tr><td>1896</td><td><i><a href="/facts/The_Island_of_Doctor_Moreau/u9zbTPdp">The Island of Doctor Moreau</a></i></td><td><a href="/facts/H._G._Wells/J0Y372Km">H. G. Wells</a></td><td>Novel</td><td></td></tr><tr><td>1963</td><td><i><a href="/facts/Planet_of_the_Apes_(novel)/0bey68ko">Planet of the Apes</a></i></td><td><a href="/facts/Pierre_Boulle/vNKX1pc1">Pierre Boulle</a></td><td>Novel</td><td>The 1963 <a href="/facts/Science_fiction/d9hE2Lwt">science fiction</a> novel by French author Pierre Boulle was adapted into the 1968 film <i><a href="/facts/Planet_of_the_Apes_(1968_film)/uFnV0ftS">Planet of the Apes</a></i>, launching the <i><a href="/facts/Planet_of_the_Apes/9HLSrzVP">Planet of the Apes</a></i> media franchise.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:7" href="#fn:7"><sup>7</sup></a> The series also explores the opposite of uplift, the reduction of the human species to a regressed, atavistic, savage-like animal state.</td></tr><tr><td>1980–1998</td><td><i><a href="/facts/Uplift_Universe/QBVlkz4v">Uplift Universe</a></i></td><td><a href="/facts/David_Brin/4NHcXmxL">David Brin</a></td><td>Novel series</td><td>Starting with <a href="/facts/Sundiver/5Q2sgKod">Sundiver</a> in 1980, Brin's six novels (and several short stories) making up the Uplift War and Uplift Storm pair of trilogies describe a universe dominated by a society built around a process of uplift, where full sentience is deemed virtually impossible without the intervention of another species through uplift.</td></tr><tr><td>2007</td><td><i><a href="/facts/Race_for_the_Galaxy/YVVq7ASR">Race for the Galaxy</a></i></td><td>Thomas Lehmann</td><td>Board game</td><td>Uplift is a major theme. Some cards have "UPLIFT" highlighted in the title and can help score points and achieve goals. Designer Tom Lehmann attributes the inspiration for uplift to David Brin's Uplift series.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:8" href="#fn:8"><sup>8</sup></a></td></tr><tr><td>2007–2017</td><td><i><a href="/facts/Mass_Effect/1x3jXBW5">Mass Effect</a></i></td><td><a href="/facts/BioWare/UnC42kYl">BioWare</a></td><td>Video game series</td><td>Before the events of <a href="/facts/Mass_Effect_(video_game)/r28b68t2">the first game</a>, the Salarians, a hyper-intelligent but physically weak alien race, uplifted the <a href="/facts/Krogan/Gk08m3IM">Krogan</a>, a combative and <a href="/facts/R%2fK_selection_theory/QrfKyXlE">rapidly-reproducing</a> race, in order to defeat the Rachni, a <a href="/facts/Group_mind_(science_fiction)/Wd7PWm6U">hive-minded</a> species, in an interstellar conflict.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:9" href="#fn:9"><sup>9</sup></a> When the Rachni were defeated, the Krogan experienced a massive <a href="/facts/Population_growth/oxb6ttX0">population boom</a> found themselves in conflict with other species in the galaxy. In response, the Salarians launched a <a href="/facts/Biological_agent/4YnbS6Em">biological weapon</a> called the Genophage against them which only made 1 in 1,000 pregnancies viable with the rest being <a href="/facts/Stillbirth/x3UcW2P7">stillbirths</a>. The ethical ramifications of the uplift and bioweapon are used as plotlines throughout the series.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:10" href="#fn:10"><sup>10</sup></a></td></tr><tr><td>2015–2022</td><td><a href="/facts/Children_of_Time_(novel)/7XWebdGs"><i>Children of Time</i></a></td><td><a href="/facts/Adrian_Tchaikovsky/qJ8tj5j0">Adrian Tchaikovsky</a></td><td>Series of novels</td><td>Three novels (also including <i><a href="/facts/Children_of_Ruin/qJ8tj5j0">Children of Ruin</a></i> and <i><a href="/facts/Children_of_Memory_(novel)/mBCePzu5">Children of Memory</a></i>) explore how various earth animal species evolve and develop civilizations on <a href="/facts/Terraforming/ny4dMbl1">terraformed</a> <a href="/facts/Exoplanets/zjfmqfUf">exoplanets</a> when uplifted by a human-developed nanovirus originally intended for monkeys. Children of Time focuses on <a href="/facts/Spider/aqpU7eg3">spiders</a>, <a href="/facts/Children_of_Ruin/qJ8tj5j0">Children of Ruin</a>, <a href="/facts/Octopus/z5uokKFF">octopi</a>, and <a href="/facts/Children_of_Memory_(novel)/mBCePzu5">Children of Memory</a>, <a href="/facts/Corvid/PAr1u8fF">corvids</a>, though the novels have connected narratives and also portray interactions between these uplifted species and spacefaring humans.</td></tr></tbody></table> <h2 id="see-also">See also</h2> <ul><li><a href="/facts/Animal_cognition/LpP3H18I">Animal cognition</a></li> <li><a href="/facts/Eugenics/e7w6aSUV">Eugenics</a></li> <li><a href="/facts/Intelligence_amplification/QwLKWk9v">Intelligence amplification</a></li> <li><a href="/facts/Talking_animal/P6KRbu8z">Talking animal</a></li> <li><a href="/facts/Transhumanism/lTkdgFLo">Transhumanism</a></li> <li><i><a href="/facts/Heart_of_a_Dog/SNQ9rxmA">Heart of a Dog</a></i></li></ul> <h3>Citations</h3> <h3>Sources</h3> <ul><li>Booker, M. Keith [in German] (2015). <i>Historical Dictionary of Science Fiction in Literature</i>. <a href="/facts/Lanham%2c_Maryland/wLGBEQdJ">Lanham</a>: Rowman & Littlefield. <a href="/facts/ISBN_(identifier)/15AdSPa9">ISBN</a> 978-0-8108-7884-6.</li> <li>Polo, Susana (21 March 2017). <a href="https://www.polygon.com/mass-effect-andromeda-guide-walkthrough/2017/3/21/14311292/mass-effect-lore-story-beginners-guide-explainer-recap">"The lore of Mass Effect: A complete guide"</a>. <i><a href="/facts/Polygon_(website)/shfk0yXN">Polygon</a></i>. Retrieved 7 November 2024.</li></ul> <h2 id="further-reading">Further reading</h2> <ul><li>Pilkington, Ace G. (2017). <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=a2VEDgAAQBAJ&pg=PA145">"Uplift"</a>. <i>Science Fiction and Futurism: Their Terms and Ideas</i>. Critical Explorations in Science Fiction and Fantasy. Vol. 58. McFarland. pp. 145–149. <a href="/facts/ISBN_(identifier)/15AdSPa9">ISBN</a> 978-0-7864-9856-7.</li></ul> <h2 id="external-links">External links</h2> <ul><li><a href="http://jetpress.org/v18/dvorsky.htm">All Together Now: Developmental and Ethical Considerations for biologically uplifting nonhuman animals</a> by <a href="/facts/George_Dvorsky/c7qeIeLl">George Dvorsky</a></li> <li><a href="http://www.iowagreatapes.org/">Great Ape Trust</a></li> <li><a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20070402150740/http://web.syr.edu/~blbousfi/UPLIFBIB1.html">Fiction with "Uplifted" Animals: An Annotated Bibliography</a></li></ul> <h2 id="references">References</h2> <ol> <li id="fn:1"><p>Langford, David (2022). "Uplift". In Clute, John; Langford, David; Sleight, Graham (eds.). The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction (4th ed.). Retrieved 2024-03-24. <a href="/wiki/David_Langford" target="_blank">/wiki/David_Langford</a> <a href="#fnref:1" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:2"><p>Booker 2015, p. 311. - Booker, M. Keith [in German] (2015). Historical Dictionary of Science Fiction in Literature. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 978-0-8108-7884-6. <a href="#fnref:2" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:3"><p>Langford, David (2005). "Uplift". The Greenwood encyclopedia of science fiction and fantasy. Vol. 2. Greenwood Press. ISBN 9780313329524. <a href="9780313329524" target="_blank">9780313329524</a> <a href="#fnref:3" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:4"><p>David Brin at www.scifi.com <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20090325125822/http://www.scifi.com/sfw/issue25/interview.html" target="_blank">https://web.archive.org/web/20090325125822/http://www.scifi.com/sfw/issue25/interview.html</a> <a href="#fnref:4" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:5"><p>Booker 2015, p. 312. - Booker, M. Keith [in German] (2015). Historical Dictionary of Science Fiction in Literature. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 978-0-8108-7884-6. <a href="#fnref:5" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:6"><p>Booker 2015, p. 312. - Booker, M. Keith [in German] (2015). Historical Dictionary of Science Fiction in Literature. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 978-0-8108-7884-6. <a href="#fnref:6" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:7"><p>David L. Ulin (July 14, 2014). "The transformation of 'Planet of the Apes,' from book to movie legend". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved July 15, 2014. <a href="http://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-transformation-of-planet-of-the-planet-of-the-apes-book-to-movie20140710-story.html" target="_blank">http://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-transformation-of-planet-of-the-planet-of-the-apes-book-to-movie20140710-story.html</a> <a href="#fnref:7" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:8"><p>Lehmann, Tom. "Designer Diary: Race for the Galaxy". Retrieved 5 June 2011. <a href="http://www.boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/1931/designer-diary-race-for-the-galaxy" target="_blank">http://www.boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/1931/designer-diary-race-for-the-galaxy</a> <a href="#fnref:8" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:9"><p>Polo 2017, § The Rachni War. - Polo, Susana (21 March 2017). "The lore of Mass Effect: A complete guide". Polygon. Retrieved 7 November 2024. <a href="https://www.polygon.com/mass-effect-andromeda-guide-walkthrough/2017/3/21/14311292/mass-effect-lore-story-beginners-guide-explainer-recap" target="_blank">https://www.polygon.com/mass-effect-andromeda-guide-walkthrough/2017/3/21/14311292/mass-effect-lore-story-beginners-guide-explainer-recap</a> <a href="#fnref:9" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:10"><p>Polo 2017, § The Genophage. - Polo, Susana (21 March 2017). "The lore of Mass Effect: A complete guide". Polygon. Retrieved 7 November 2024. <a href="https://www.polygon.com/mass-effect-andromeda-guide-walkthrough/2017/3/21/14311292/mass-effect-lore-story-beginners-guide-explainer-recap" target="_blank">https://www.polygon.com/mass-effect-andromeda-guide-walkthrough/2017/3/21/14311292/mass-effect-lore-story-beginners-guide-explainer-recap</a> <a href="#fnref:10" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> </ol>