The targets are changing for Sci-fi. Add your own thoughts in the comments below.
Not Sci-fi at all
- Ion Drives
- Railguns
- Weaponized Lasers
- Autonomised all-terrain robots
- Robots that can walk
- Robots that can paint your nails
- Robots that can kill you (see cruise missiles)
Barely Sci-fi
- Re-growing organs/limbs
- Bionic Limbs controllers by the brain
- Suspended Animation (demonstrated with pigs, which don’t seem adversely affected, but then they can’t really tell us)
- Reading thoughts with computers
- Programming People (see Brainwashing)
- Fusion Power
- Genetically engineered/Designer humans
Still Sci-fi
- Jump Drives
- Travel to other stars
- Artificial Intelligence (we don’t even know what this is yet)
- Small Fusion Power Generators
- Aliens (except in the US)
- Manipulating gravity fields






