Hi guys,
If you're new, welcome to r/AskScienceFiction, and if you're a returning user, welcome back! This subreddit is designed to be like the r/AskScience subreddit, but for fictional universes, and with all questions and answers written from a Watsonian perspective. That is to say, the questions and answers should be based on the in-universe information, rules, and logic of the fictional work. All fictional works are welcome here, not just sci-fi.
Lately we've been seeing some confusion over what counts as Watsonian, what counts as Doylist, what sort of questions would be off-topic on this subreddit, and what sort of answers are allowed. This stickied post is meant to address such uncertainties and clear things up.
1) Watsonian vs Doylist
The term "Watsonian" means based on the in-universe information, rules, and logic of the fictional work. In contrast, "Doylist" means discussions based on out-of-universe considerations. So, for example, if someone asked, "Why didn't the Fellowship ride the Eagles to Mordor?", a possible Watsonian answer would be, "The Eagles are a proud and noble race, they are not a taxi service." Whereas a rule-breaking Doylist answer might be something like, "Because then the story would be over in ten minutes, and that'd be boring."
We should note that answering in a Watsonian fashion does not necessarily mean that we should pretend that these works are all real, or that we should ignore the fact that they are movies or shows or books or games, or that the creators' statements on the nature of these works should be disregarded.
To give an example, if someone asked, "How powerful would Darth Vader have been if he never got burned?", we can quote George Lucas:
"Anakin, as Skywalker, as a human being, was going to be extremely powerful, but he ended up losing his arms and a leg and became partly a robot. So a lot of his ability to use the Force, a lot of his powers, are curbed at this point, because, as a living form, there’s not that much of him left. So his ability to be twice as good as the Emperor disappeared, and now he’s maybe 20 percent less than the Emperor."
In such a case, "according to George Lucas, he would've been around twice as powerful as the Emperor" would be a perfectly acceptable Watsonian answer, because Lucas is also speaking from a Watsonian perspective.
Whereas if someone associated with the creation of Star Wars had said something like, "He'd be as powerful as we need him to be to make the story interesting", this would be a Doylist answer because it's based on out-of-universe reasoning. It would not be an acceptable answer on this subreddit even though it is also a quote from the creators of the fictional work.
2) General questions
General questions often do not have a meaningful Watsonian answer, because it frequently boils down to "whatever the author decides". For instance, if someone asked, "How does FTL space travel work?", the answer would vary widely with universe and author intent; how FTL works in Star Trek differs from how it works in Star Wars, which differs from how it works in Dune, which differs from how it works in Mass Effect, which differs from how it works in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, etc. General questions like this, in which the answer just boils down to "whatever the author wants", will be removed.
There are some general questions that can have meaningful Watsonian answers, though. For example, questions that are asking for specific examples of things can be given Watsonian answers. "Which superheroes have broken their no-kill rules?" or "Which fictional wars have had the highest casualty counts?" are examples of general questions that can be answered in a Watsonian way, because commenters can pull up specific in-universe information.
We address general questions on a case-by-case basis, so if you feel a question is too general to answer in a Watsonian way, please report the question and the mod team will review it.
3) r/WhatIfFiction
We want questions and answers here to be based on in-universe information and reasonable deductions that can be made from them. Questions that are too open-ended to give meaningful Watsonian answers should go on our sister subreddit, r/WhatIfFiction, which accepts a broader range of hypothetical questions and answers. Examples of questions that should go on r/WhatIfFiction include:
- "What if Tony Stark had been killed by the Ten Rings at the beginning of Iron Man? How would this change the MCU?" This question would be fun to speculate about, but the ripple effect from this one change would be too widespread to give a meaningful Watsonian answer, so this should go on r/WhatIfFiction.
- "What would (X character) from the (X universe) think if he was transported to (Y universe)?" Speculating about what characters would think or do if they were isekai'd to another universe can be fun, but since such crossover questions often involve wildly different settings and in-universe rules, the answers would be purely speculative and not meaningfully Watsonian, so such questions belong on r/WhatIfFiction.
We should note, though, that some hypothetical questions or crossover questions can have meaningful Watsonian answers. For example, if someone asked, "Can a Star Wars lightsaber cut through Captain America's shield?", we can actually say "Quite possibly yes, because vibranium's canonical melting point is 5,475 degrees Fahrenheit, while lightsabers are sticks of plasma, and plasma's temperature is 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit or more." This answer is meaningfully Watsonian because it involves a deduction using specific and canonical in-universe information, and is not simply purely speculative.
4) Reporting rule-breaking posts and comments
The r/AskScienceFiction mod team always endeavors to keep the subreddit on-topic and remove rule-breaking content as soon as possible, but because we're all volunteers with day jobs, sometimes things will escape our notice. Therefore, it'd be a great help if you, our users, could report rule-breaking posts or comments when you see them. This will bring the issue to the mod team's attention and allow us to review it as soon as we can.