Science + superpowers has only two possible outcomes. 1: break the superpowers, science wins. 2: break the universe, superpowers win. Either your favorite hero is BS, or they could basically do anything they wanted.,(reply>), not really, you're still able to genetically modify yourself to give yourself an advantageous ability over everybody, of course not yet that tech doesnt exist yet but speaking of a realistic scenario, superpowers could exist.,(reply>), well some of them are basically gods,(reply>), @Adam Mullarkey<br>Where I feel Exarian seems to be missing the point, is that for science to "exist" or be a key feature in a work of fiction, it doesn't require the entire work to be flawlessly accurate. When a sci-fi (whether hard or soft), discusses or explains something in a scientific level of detail, it's very often there specifically for the readers appreciation of it's scientific value, regardless of how grounded the reality is or isn't. How accurate an individual case has to be varies by the reader, but to dismiss it as merely "an abstraction for the sake of storytelling" completely misunderstands what makes sci-fi sci-fi, rather than just 'fiction-with-spaceships'.<br><br>People that read hard Sci-Fi, don't read it purely for the story alone. They don't. They want to be able to nerd out at real world science and engineering, to the point that it was almost ripped out of a real technical design document or peer reviewed study. When a hard-SF story stops to include details on a piece of engineering, the story is just as often if not more often wrapped round the science than the other way around. And there may be mistakes. Just as in the the real scientific community, there often is. And just like in real science, there will be arguments and debate about it, because that's half the point. You'll never hear a hard-SF fan tell another to "Just deal with it. It's needed for the story."<br><br>Even when we go down to more conventional sci-fi's like Star Trek, where essentially all of the science is easily filled with holes. Much of what is presented to the audience is indeed simply for driving plot, but an easily equal amount is presented again for the inherent enjoyment of it being presented in a pseudo scientific manner. Fans enjoy learning the details, and crave the idea that "X Technology" could theoretically work (excluding key flaws they need not be informed of). They're not geeking out about how a warp drive supposedly works because it got Picard from A to B.<br><br>Even fans of Star Wars (which arguably is not actually sci-fi ) will readily dissect and discuss how a lightsaber works, in a similar manner to how ancient alchemists deduced that because wood burns it must contain fire. It may be bad science, and even barely recognisable to reality, but it's still a form of science, however flawed.,(reply>), @Adam Mullarkey No, that's not how that works. If I make up some kind of technology, and then later on someone comes along and makes something which they call the same kind of idea which doesn't actually work at <i>all</i> in the same way as my fake technology, that doesn't make my original story real science.<br><br>Like, we have androids nowadays, but that doesn't make R.U.R. a hard-scifi play.,(reply>), @Jeoshua Collins Maybe so, but if they succeed (as Alcubierre has, at least in theory), then that means the science is real, even if they didn't actually know it at the time they were making the show.