@stardustmom I’m really talking about the underlying narrative themes of TV sci fi that made it popular with the general audience, rather than with scientists. Star Trek writers came up with the “prime directive” concept in order to accommodate an uncomfortable awareness that encounters with other cultures usually involves cultural imperialism (or at the very least, groups are changed by cross-cultural exchange). Later on, series such as Firefly and The Expanse are very open about the underlying motive of resource extraction as the primary mass motive for colonization of space, rather than a desire to understand the universe etc. The appeal of TV sci fi, for a lot of viewers, is that it offers cultural myths, not scientific education.