《三體》末日與《明朝》「墨日」的宇宙技術觀

Abstract

劉慈欣的《三體》三部曲描繪地球文明與其他宇宙文明的生死較量，地球人奮力鑽研現有科技的可能性，試圖追趕甚至超越先進異星文明以求生存。駱以軍自言其作品《明朝》沿用《三體》的世界觀，情節同樣環繞人類在此危急存亡之秋所採取的應對行動，但關於運用科技應對異星入侵危機的想像則大相逕庭，兩部作品的情節取向也因而迥異其趣。本文認為，《明朝》的「低科技」設定，不只是從《三體》三部曲星際科技整備競賽框架岔出的敘事分枝，亦是一種針對後者的「如果劉慈欣不完全是對的會怎樣」的後設提問，進而可能推演連結到「如果科幻小說將科技視為僅只是文化的一部份會怎樣」的整體反思。駱以軍並無意追究《三體》三部曲如何看待科技，但「明朝如此變態為何滋養出繁盛文明如斯」的創作命題，將焦點從科技推論轉移到文化全景，卻無心插柳地構成一個針對《三體》全面化宇宙科技系統與超人類主義的後設科幻問題。本文將援引許煜的宇宙技術論與行星思考，檢視《三體》三部曲與《明朝》的科幻取徑與科技觀，各自指向怎樣的道德宇宙動力學；而後者奠基於前者所能撐開的對話空間，尤其是對非現代科技與美感經驗的關注，又帶出了甚麼樣的後設科幻提問。

Cixin Liu's Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy depicts how Earth deals with the threat of interstellar invasion by developing suitable defense approaches and high-tech warfighting capabilities. The Ming Dynasty, intended by its author Yijun Luo to be read as a science fiction, adopts the same setting but provides a new look by exploring a scenario where human beings have to resort to relatively "low-tech" measures in response to the expected demise of the planet. While Liu's trilogy is widely regarded as a top example of hard science fiction packed with advanced scientific concepts and precise technical details, The Ming Dynasty seems to defy readers' expectations for the genre of science fiction by devoting its primary attention to the zeitgeist and arts of the period instead of a technological novum. This paper proposes to read The Ming Dynasty as more an instance of meta-science-fiction that calls into question the underlying assumptions about science and technology upheld in the Three-Body narratives than a mere spin-off of Liu's sci-fi masterpiece. One of the main themes explored in Luo's novel is why the morbid political scene in the Ming could have fostered such impressive cultural achievements. This approach enables revisiting the role of science and technology in relation to culture as a lived totality and thus inadvertently presents a challenge to the motifs of totalized cosmic technological system and transhumanism that are central to Liu's trilogy. The ideas of cosmotechnics and planetary thinking advanced by Yuk Hui would be drawn on to investigate respectively the configurations of technicity and different dynamics between the moral and the cosmos in the Three-Body trilogy and The Ming Dynasty. An emphasis will be placed on how the latter facilitates the reconceptualization of technicity and even science fiction with a focus on the aesthetic experience of the Ming period.