Exploring Cloning Tropes In Science Fiction
Science fiction is more of an art form than a genre, stretched across every possible medium and expanded by the most creative minds in human history. One of the strangest things about the genre is the way in which multiple creators find themselves imagining the future and wind up agreeing on similar outcomes.
Cloning is an interesting sci-fi concept because it's essentially biological. Unlike many other tropes of the genre, it's based on the reproduction capabilities of real organisms. Sci-fi stories about cloning ask what would happen if science could allow humanity to replicate itself in much the same way as the marbled crayfish. These stories often feature a few interesting tropes that seem to reoccur across the decades.
The «Life Simulation» Sci-Fi Trope, Explained
Fyodor Dostoevsky's 1846 novella The Double told the brief tale of a man who wakes up one morning to discover a man who looks just like him living his life much better than he can. That story isn't science fiction, there's no explanation for the duplicate, but it did set a tone for one of the big subgenres of clone sci-fi. The idea of a lab-grown facsimile of the main character replacing and perfecting their life is simultaneously horrific and life-affirming. What would a physically identical person need to do to fully replace a human being? Could they succeed where their muse has failed? If they can, what does it say about the nature of the soul?
«Be Right Back» is the second season premiere of Charlie Brooker's seminal anthology Black Mirror. Like most episodes, the story follows the personal impact of a single technological innovation, in this case, AI replicants of deceased loved ones. In that story, the clone is a coping mechanism, a sad replacement for a
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