On Hypotheses (From Fiction to Science-Fiction)

"Phenomena may well be suspected of anything, are capable of anything. Hypothesis proclaims the infinite; that is what gives hypothesis its greatness. Beneath the surface fact it seeks the real fact. It asks creation for her thoughts, and then for her second thoughts. The great scientific discoverers are those who hold nature suspect." (Victor Hugo, "The Toilers of the Sea", 1866)

"An hypothesis is only a habit - a habit of looking through a glass of one peculiar colour, which imparts its hue to all around it." (Frederick Marryat, "The King's Own", 1873) 

"If the fresh facts which come to our knowledge all fit themselves into the scheme, then our hypothesis may gradually become a solution." (Arthur C Doyle, "The Adventure of Wisteria Lodge", 1908)

"More often than not, nothingness is reluctantly and despairingly taken to be the only hypothesis possible when all the others have failed, since by definition it cannot be disproven and is beyond the scope of reason." (Georges Bernanos, "L'imposture" ["The Impostor"], 1927)

"Science fiction is that class of prose narrative treating of a situation that could not arise in the world we know, but which is hypothesised on the basis of some innovation in science or technology, or pseudo-science or pseudo-technology, whether human or extra-terrestrial in origin." (Kingsley Amis, "New Maps of Hell: A Survey of Science Fiction", 1960) 

"To the paranoid, nothing is a surprise; everything happens exactly as he expected, and sometimes even more so. It all fits into his system. For us, though, there can be no system; maybe all systems - that is, any theoretical, verbal, symbolic, semantic, etc. formulation that attempts to act as an all-encompassing, all-explaining hypothesis of what the universe is about - are manifestations of paranoia. We should be content with the mysterious, the meaningless, the contradictory, the hostile, and most of all the unexplainably warm and giving." (Philip K Dick, "The Android and the Human", [speech] 1972) 

"It does take great maturity to understand that the opinion we are arguing for is merely the hypothesis we favor, necessarily imperfect, probably transitory, which only very limited minds can declare to be a certainty or a truth." (Milan Kundera, "Encounter", 2009)