Writers like HG Wells, Phillip K. Dick and Douglas Adams may not feature in most English Literature classes – but they could find their way onto the science syllabus, if a visiting lecturer has his way.

Kenneth MacLeod, renowned Scottish science-fiction writer and Glasgow University alumnus, will this week deliver a lecture asking ‘Does science fiction contribute to the public understanding of science?’

Mr MacLeod, who has degrees in Zoology and Biomechanics, will argue that science fiction provides an open and lucid forum in which to discuss the implications of new technology.

Speaking to Guardian in advance of the talk, he said: “The issues raised by new technologies, such as neuroscience and stem cell science, are ones that require democratic discussion in advance of them being implemented. Science fiction does have something to contribute in that sense.”

Mr MacLeod even claims to have a list of scientific phrases and concepts that he learnt from science fiction, including the term ‘greenhouse effect’

 “Gas Giant, faster than light, hyperspace, wormhole, asteroid belt, alpha centuri, Hohmann transfer orbit – that’s how you get from one orbit to another – mutant and free fall. ‘Greenhouse effect’ was used back in the 60s long before it was a topic of public discussion.”

His most recent novel The Execution Channel (2007), is set in the middle of the 21st century in a world where the war on terror has escalated beyond all proportion and the ethnic cleansing of British Muslims has commenced.

MacLeod points to the science fiction of the 20th century by way of explaining today’s ‘war on terror’.