Many science-fiction technologies were small inventions that made life easier for future society. While these inventions rarely contributed to the overall plot, they are essential for creating the story's world. For example, the aerocar, or floating car, first appeared in "The Abduction of Alexandra Seine" by Fred C. Smale in 1900. Since then the flying car has been a staple of many science-fiction novelists. Some everyday inventions were prophetic. The adjustable television that appeared in Philip K. Dick's "The Simulacra" in 1964, allowed the protagonist to adjust the words of politicians and actors on-screen as he saw fit. The idea foresaw the computer chip that allows parents to censor programs on their home television. Another example is the "ansible," a high-powered long-distance phone introduced in Ursula LeGuinn's "Rocannon's World," published in 1966, allowed interstellar travelers to call home from planets light-years away.
The idea of life on other planets has intrigued humanity for ages. These life forms coming in contact with humans is the basis of many a science-fiction novel. While future life on Earth is often blended with fact to create a sense of reality, life on another planet does not have to function according to conventional rules and may be imbued with incredible improbabilities. H.G. Wells, for example, wrote about Selenites living in caves and crates on the moon in his book "The First Men in the Moon."
Science fiction presents ideas of extraordinary healing in a not-so-distant future. These ideas are often simple remedies for serious or fatal diseases offers an optimistic view for the future of medicine. An example of a medical miracle is the Anti-Onc cream used in David Brin's 1990 publication "Earth" that is used as a cancer remedy. Another example is a regimen of Atlotl or Gibiril that regrows a severed limb in Frank Herbert's "The Godmakers," published in 1972. But science fiction also presents a terrifying future for humanity in the form of artificial births and aggressive robot races. The Sheem robots are self-assembling robots modeled after spiders that appear in "The Witches of Karres" by James Schmitz, published in 1966. The Cyclons of the "Battlestar Galactica," a 2004 sci-fi miniseries created by David Eick and Ronald D. Moore, are another example of a robot race at war with their human counterparts.
Some science-fiction authors created worlds to make political statements about the real world. The intention of these otherworldly war machines is to strike fear into the heart of the reader, such as a "disruptor bomb" from Robert Silverberg's "The Man in the Maze." The bomb blows an object into molecules, which it then shoots into a billion different orbits. Other stories took inspiration from real world wars to illustrate the horror of battle. Kurt Vonnegut's "Slaughterhouse Five" was inspired by Vonnegut's experience in Word War II. The author spent time locked in the basement meat locker of a slaughterhouse at night while he was a prisoner of war. He used this experience to create a fictional world illustrating the absurdity of war.