From Dune to The 3 Body Problem, the sci-fi popular in the modern era has arguably become more outlandish than ever. The 3 Body Problem imagines a proton, ‘unfolded’ in 11 dimensions, and turned into a planet-sized supercomputer. Even in the realms of the imagination, the possibility of such future science appears far-fetched. Is the outlandishness of our sci-fi correlated with the size of the gaps in our current understanding? David Kyle Johnson argues the more we learn about the universe, the more there is to discover.
 

 “[T]oday's science fiction is tomorrow's truth.”

-- Hal McAllister, Thrilling Wonder Stories, April 1952, p. 127.

Although this quote (or something like it) is thought to have been said by Issac Asimov (it probably wasn’t), it is still a common sentiment. “What is science fiction today will be science fact tomorrow.” And if you believe this, you might think it explains why science fiction has gotten a bit more, shall we say, far-fetched lately.