Yesterday, a friend asked me why I write science fiction.

It's not the first time I've been asked. Each time I respond with variations on a theme about hope for the future, of having been instilled since childhood with a belief that technology will provide solutions for our problems, and with a list of the TV shows from Space Patrol and Fireball XL5 to Doctor Who and Star Trek that reinforced my belief and inspired me to dream of a better future.

I'm still hopeful that technology will deliver on the promises of Tomorrow's World but I'm often left wondering why it's taking so dicing long. I'm not going to list the iniquities and failings of our world that could easily be fixed by the application of brains, money and willpower - you only have to turn on the news to hear those - but I'm with Arthur C. Clarke on this one; if mankind can't get it together to overcome its self-destructive tendencies then it really doesn't deserve to survive. Go on, wipe yourselves off the planet, leave room for the next species to evolve and do better, it will only take a few million years, a single heart-beat for a planet, for life to have another go at transcending itself.

Why SF? Because the present is so damned disappointing, that's why.