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} | m2d2_wiki | Fictional technology
Fictional technology is technology that does not exist. It may be an idea or design that has not yet been developed, or it may be a fictional device used in a novel.
Non-literary.
Emerging technologies.
Technical innovations which represent progressive developments within a field for competitive advantage.
Exploratory engineering.
Seeks to identify if a prospective technology can be designed in detail, and simulated, even if it cannot be built yet - this is often a prerequisite to venture capital funding, or investigation in weapons research.
Propaganda.
Often emphasizes a speculative potential of a specific technology in order to stimulate investment in it, or a counter-technology. This is a common motivation in any society dominated by a military-industrial complex.
Advertising.
Emphasizes some amazing potential of some technology that is "under development" (usually without any specific timelines) by a company that is seeking simply to present itself as being competent with technology.
In science fiction.
Many works of science fiction are centered around the use of fictional future innovations and technologies and their potential uses. This can sometimes result in inventors using these fictional technologies as inspiration for real-life devices and other emerging technologies.
In fantasy.
Fantasy genres like steampunk and dieselpunk explore the consequences of more advanced technology being developed earlier in history, while not necessarily entering into the realm of science fiction. Magic powered technology, colloquially known as "magitech", is also common in fantasy media, where it can be used as a substitute for modern technology while still giving the setting a fantasy atmosphere. Well-known examples are human-created golems and artificially levitating airships. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Generation ship
A generation ship, or generation starship, is a hypothetical type of interstellar ark starship that travels at sub-light speed.
Since such a ship might take centuries to thousands of years to reach even nearby stars, the original occupants of a generation ship would grow old and die, leaving their descendants to continue traveling.
Origin.
Rocket pioneer Robert H. Goddard was the first to write about long-duration interstellar journeys in his "The Ultimate Migration" (1918). In this he described the death of the Sun and the necessity of an "interstellar ark". The crew would travel for centuries in suspended animation and be awakened when they reached another star system.
Konstantin E. Tsiolkovsky, father of astronautic theory, first described the need for multiple generations of passengers in his essay, "The Future of Earth and Mankind" (1928), a space colony equipped with engines that travels thousands of years which he called "Noah's Ark".
Another early description of a generation ship is in the 1929 essay "The World, The Flesh, & The Devil" by J. D. Bernal. Bernal's essay was the first publication to reach the public and influence other writers. He wrote about the concept of human evolution and mankind's future in space through methods of living that we now describe as a generation starship, and which could be seen in the generic word "globes".
Definition.
According to Hein et al., a "generation ship" is a spacecraft on which a crew is living on-board for at least several decades, such that it comprises multiple generations. Several sub-categories of generation ships are distinguished: sprinter, slow boat, colony ship, world ship.
The Enzmann starship is categorised as "slow boat" because of the "Astronomy Magazine" title “Slow Boat to Centauri” (1977). Gregory Matloff's concept is called a "colony ship" and Alan Bond called his concept a "world ship". These definitions are essentially based on the velocity of the ship and population size.
Obstacles.
Biosphere.
Such a ship would have to be entirely self-sustaining, providing energy, food, air, and water for everyone on board. It must also have extraordinarily reliable systems that could be maintained by the ship's inhabitants over long periods of time. This would require testing whether thousands of humans could survive on their own before sending them beyond the reach of help. Small artificial closed ecosystems, such as the Biosphere 2, have been built in an attempt to work out the engineering difficulties in such a system, with mixed results.
Biology and society.
Generation ships would have to anticipate possible biological, social and morale problems, and would also need to deal with matters of self-worth and purpose for the various crews involved.
Estimates of the minimum reasonable population for a generation ship vary. Anthropologist John Moore has estimated that, even in the absence of cryonics or sperm banks, a population capacity of 160 people would allow normal family life (with the average individual having ten potential marriage partners) throughout a 200-year space journey, with little loss of genetic diversity; social engineering can reduce this estimate to 80 people. In 2013 anthropologist Cameron Smith reviewed existing literature and created a new computer model to estimate a minimum reasonable population in the tens of thousands. Smith's numbers were much larger than previous estimates such as Moore's, in part because Smith takes the risk of accidents and disease into consideration, and assumes at least one severe population catastrophe over the course of a 150-year journey.
In light of the multiple generations that it could take to reach even our nearest neighboring star systems such as Proxima Centauri, further issues on the viability of such interstellar arks include:
Size.
In order for a spacecraft to maintain a stable environment for multiple generations, it would have to be large enough to support a community of humans and a fully recycling ecosystem. However, a spacecraft of such a size would require a lot of energy to accelerate and decelerate. A smaller spacecraft, while able to accelerate more easily and thus make higher cruise velocities more practical, would reduce exposure to cosmic radiation and the time for malfunctions to develop in the craft, but would have challenges with resource metabolic flow and ecologic balance.
Social breakdown.
Generation ships travelling for long periods of time may see breakdowns in social structures. Changes in society (for example, mutiny) could occur over such periods and may prevent the ship from reaching its destination. This state was described by Algis Budrys in a 1966 book review:
Robert A. Heinlein's "Orphans of the Sky" (the "impeccable statement of this theme", Budrys said) and Brian Aldiss's "Non-Stop" (U.S. title: "Starship") discussed such societies.
Cosmic rays.
The radiation environment of deep space is very different from that on the Earth's surface, or in low earth orbit, due to the much larger influx of high-energy galactic cosmic rays (GCRs). Like other ionizing radiation, high-energy cosmic rays can damage DNA and increase the risk of cancer, cataracts, and neurological disorders. One known practical solution to this problem is surrounding the crewed parts of the ship with a thick enough shielding such as a thick layer of maintained ice as proposed in "The Songs of Distant Earth", a science fiction novel by Arthur C. Clarke (note: in this book the ship's mammoth ice shield is only in the forward part of the ship, preventing micrometeors from damaging the ship during its interstellar journey).
Technological progress.
If a generation ship is sent to a star system 20 light years away, and is expected to reach its destination in 200 years, a better ship may be later developed that can reach it in 50 years. Thus, the first generation ship may find a century-old human colony after its arrival at its destination.
Ethical considerations.
The success of a generation ship depends on children born aboard taking over the necessary duties, as well as having children themselves. Even if their quality of life might be better than, for example, that of people born into poverty on Earth, this raises the question of whether it is ethical to severely constrain life choices of individuals by locking them into a project they did not choose. A moral quandary exists regarding how intermediate generations, those destined to be born and die in transit without actually seeing tangible results of their efforts, might feel about their forced existence on such a ship.
Project Hyperion.
Project Hyperion, launched in December 2011 by Icarus Interstellar was to perform a preliminary study that defines integrated concepts for a crewed interstellar generation ship. This was a two-year study mainly based out of the WARR student group at the Technical University of Munich (TUM). The study aimed to provide an assessment of the feasibility of crewed interstellar flight using current and near-future technologies. It also aimed to guide future research and technology development plans as well as to inform the public about crewed interstellar travel. Notable results of the project include an assessment of world ship system architectures and adequate population size. The core team members have transferred to the Initiative for Interstellar Studies's world ship project and a survey paper on generation ships has been presented at the ESA Interstellar Workshop in 2019 as well as in ESA's Acta Futura journal. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Hypothetical types of biochemistry
Hypothetical types of biochemistry are forms of biochemistry agreed to be scientifically viable but not proven to exist at this time. The kinds of living organisms currently known on Earth all use carbon compounds for basic structural and metabolic functions, water as a solvent, and DNA or RNA to define and control their form. If life exists on other planets or moons it may be chemically similar, though it is also possible that there are organisms with quite different chemistries for instance, involving other classes of carbon compounds, compounds of another element, or another solvent in place of water.
The possibility of life-forms being based on "alternative" biochemistries is the topic of an ongoing scientific discussion, informed by what is known about extraterrestrial environments and about the chemical behaviour of various elements and compounds. It is of interest in synthetic biology and is also a common subject in science fiction.
The element silicon has been much discussed as a hypothetical alternative to carbon. Silicon is in the same group as carbon on the periodic table and, like carbon, it is tetravalent. Hypothetical alternatives to water include ammonia, which, like water, is a polar molecule, and cosmically abundant; and non-polar hydrocarbon solvents such as methane and ethane, which are known to exist in liquid form on the surface of Titan.
Shadow biosphere.
A shadow biosphere is a hypothetical microbial biosphere of Earth that uses radically different biochemical and molecular processes than currently known life. Although life on Earth is relatively well-studied, the shadow biosphere may still remain unnoticed because the exploration of the microbial world targets primarily the biochemistry of the macro-organisms.
Alternative-chirality biomolecules.
Perhaps the least unusual alternative biochemistry would be one with differing chirality of its biomolecules. In known Earth-based life, amino acids are almost universally of the form and sugars are of the form. Molecules using amino acids or sugars may be possible; molecules of such a chirality, however, would be incompatible with organisms using the opposing chirality molecules. Amino acids whose chirality is opposite to the norm are found on Earth, and these substances are generally thought to result from decay of organisms of normal chirality. However, physicist Paul Davies speculates that some of them might be products of "anti-chiral" life.
It is questionable, however, whether such a biochemistry would be truly alien. Although it would certainly be an alternative stereochemistry, molecules that are overwhelmingly found in one enantiomer throughout the vast majority of organisms can nonetheless often be found in another enantiomer in different (often basal) organisms such as in comparisons between members of Archaea and other domains, making it an open topic whether an alternative stereochemistry is truly novel.
Non-carbon-based biochemistries.
On Earth, all known living things have a carbon-based structure and system. Scientists have speculated about the pros and cons of using atoms other than carbon to form the molecular structures necessary for life, but no one has proposed a theory employing such atoms to form all the necessary structures. However, as Carl Sagan argued, it is very difficult to be certain whether a statement that applies to all life on Earth will turn out to apply to all life throughout the universe. Sagan used the term "carbon chauvinism" for such an assumption. He regarded silicon and germanium as conceivable alternatives to carbon (other plausible elements include but are not limited to palladium and titanium); but, on the other hand, he noted that carbon does seem more chemically versatile and is more abundant in the cosmos. Norman Horowitz devised the experiments to determine whether life might exist on Mars that were carried out by the Viking Lander of 1976, the first U.S. mission to successfully land an unmanned probe on the surface of Mars. Horowitz argued that the great versatility of the carbon atom makes it the element most likely to provide solutions, even exotic solutions, to the problems of survival on other planets. He considered that there was only a remote possibility that non-carbon life forms could exist with genetic information systems capable of self-replication and the ability to evolve and adapt.
Silicon biochemistry.
The silicon atom has been much discussed as the basis for an alternative biochemical system, because silicon has many chemical properties similar to those of carbon and is in the same group of the periodic table, the carbon group. Like carbon, silicon can create molecules that are sufficiently large to carry biological information.
However, silicon has several drawbacks as an alternative to carbon. Silicon, unlike carbon, lacks the ability to form chemical bonds with diverse types of atoms as is necessary for the chemical versatility required for metabolism, and yet this precise inability is what makes silicon less susceptible to bond with all sorts of impurities from which carbon, in comparison, is not shielded. Elements creating organic functional groups with carbon include hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorus, sulfur, and metals such as iron, magnesium, and zinc. Silicon, on the other hand, interacts with very few other types of atoms. Moreover, where it does interact with other atoms, silicon creates molecules that have been described as "monotonous compared with the combinatorial universe of organic macromolecules". This is because silicon atoms are much bigger, having a larger mass and atomic radius, and so have difficulty forming double bonds (the double-bonded carbon is part of the carbonyl group, a fundamental motif of carbon-based bio-organic chemistry).
Silanes, which are chemical compounds of hydrogen and silicon that are analogous to the alkane hydrocarbons, are highly reactive with water, and long-chain silanes spontaneously decompose. Molecules incorporating polymers of alternating silicon and oxygen atoms instead of direct bonds between silicon, known collectively as silicones, are much more stable. It has been suggested that silicone-based chemicals would be more stable than equivalent hydrocarbons in a sulfuric-acid-rich environment, as is found in some extraterrestrial locations.
Of the varieties of molecules identified in the interstellar medium , 84 are based on carbon, while only 8 are based on silicon. Moreover, of those 8 compounds, 4 also include carbon within them. The cosmic abundance of carbon to silicon is roughly 10 to 1. This may suggest a greater variety of complex carbon compounds throughout the cosmos, providing less of a foundation on which to build silicon-based biologies, at least under the conditions prevalent on the surface of planets. Also, even though Earth and other terrestrial planets are exceptionally silicon-rich and carbon-poor (the relative abundance of silicon to carbon in Earth's crust is roughly 925:1), terrestrial life is carbon-based. The fact that carbon is used instead of silicon may be evidence that silicon is poorly suited for biochemistry on Earth-like planets. Reasons for which this may be that silicon is less versatile than carbon in forming compounds, that the compounds formed by silicon are unstable, and that it blocks the flow of heat.
Even so, biogenic silica is used by some Earth life, such as the silicate skeletal structure of diatoms. According to the clay hypothesis of A. G. Cairns-Smith, silicate minerals in water played a crucial role in abiogenesis: they replicated their crystal structures, interacted with carbon compounds, and were the precursors of carbon-based life.
Although not observed in nature, carbon–silicon bonds have been added to biochemistry by using directed evolution (artificial selection). A heme containing cytochrome "c" protein from "Rhodothermus marinus" has been engineered using directed evolution to catalyze the formation of new carbon–silicon bonds between hydrosilanes and diazo compounds.
Silicon compounds may possibly be biologically useful under temperatures or pressures different from the surface of a terrestrial planet, either in conjunction with or in a role less directly analogous to carbon. Polysilanols, the silicon compounds corresponding to sugars, are soluble in liquid nitrogen, suggesting that they could play a role in very-low-temperature biochemistry.
In cinematic and literary science fiction, at a moment when man-made machines cross from nonliving to living, it is often posited, this new form would be the first example of non-carbon-based life. Since the advent of the microprocessor in the late 1960s, these machines are often classed as computers (or computer-guided robots) and filed under "silicon-based life", even though the silicon backing matrix of these processors is not nearly as fundamental to their operation as carbon is for "wet life".
Arsenic as an alternative to phosphorus.
Arsenic, which is chemically similar to phosphorus, while poisonous for most life forms on Earth, is incorporated into the biochemistry of some organisms. Some marine algae incorporate arsenic into complex organic molecules such as arsenosugars and arsenobetaines. Fungi and bacteria can produce volatile methylated arsenic compounds. Arsenate reduction and arsenite oxidation have been observed in microbes ("Chrysiogenes arsenatis"). Additionally, some prokaryotes can use arsenate as a terminal electron acceptor during anaerobic growth and some can utilize arsenite as an electron donor to generate energy.
It has been speculated that the earliest life forms on Earth may have used arsenic biochemistry in place of phosphorus in the structure of their DNA. A common objection to this scenario is that arsenate esters are so much less stable to hydrolysis than corresponding phosphate esters that arsenic is poorly suited for this function.
The authors of a 2010 geomicrobiology study, supported in part by NASA, have postulated that a bacterium, named GFAJ-1, collected in the sediments of Mono Lake in eastern California, can employ such 'arsenic DNA' when cultured without phosphorus. They proposed that the bacterium may employ high levels of poly-β-hydroxybutyrate or other means to reduce the effective concentration of water and stabilize its arsenate esters. This claim was heavily criticized almost immediately after publication for the perceived lack of appropriate controls. Science writer Carl Zimmer contacted several scientists for an assessment: "I reached out to a dozen experts ... Almost unanimously, they think the NASA scientists have failed to make their case".
Other authors were unable to reproduce their results and showed that the study had issues with phosphate contamination, suggesting that the low amounts present could sustain extremophile lifeforms.
Alternatively, it was suggested that GFAJ-1 cells grow by recycling phosphate from degraded ribosomes, rather than by replacing it with arsenate.
Non-water solvents.
In addition to carbon compounds, all currently known terrestrial life also requires water as a solvent. This has led to discussions about whether water is the only liquid capable of filling that role. The idea that an extraterrestrial life-form might be based on a solvent other than water has been taken seriously in recent scientific literature by the biochemist Steven Benner, and by the astrobiological committee chaired by John A. Baross. Solvents discussed by the Baross committee include ammonia, sulfuric acid, formamide, hydrocarbons, and (at temperatures much lower than Earth's) liquid nitrogen, or hydrogen in the form of a supercritical fluid.
Carl Sagan once described himself as both a carbon chauvinist and a water chauvinist; however, on another occasion he said that he was a carbon chauvinist but "not that much of a water chauvinist".
He speculated on hydrocarbons, hydrofluoric acid, and ammonia as possible alternatives to water.
Some of the properties of water that are important for life processes include:
Water as a compound is cosmically abundant, although much of it is in the form of vapour or ice. Subsurface liquid water is considered likely or possible on several of the outer moons: Enceladus (where geysers have been observed), Europa, Titan, and Ganymede. Earth and Titan are the only worlds currently known to have stable bodies of liquid on their surfaces.
Not all properties of water are necessarily advantageous for life, however. For instance, water ice has a high albedo, meaning that it reflects a significant quantity of light and heat from the Sun. During ice ages, as reflective ice builds up over the surface of the water, the effects of global cooling are increased.
There are some properties that make certain compounds and elements much more favorable than others as solvents in a successful biosphere. The solvent must be able to exist in liquid equilibrium over a range of temperatures the planetary object would normally encounter. Because boiling points vary with the pressure, the question tends not to be "does" the prospective solvent remain liquid, but "at what pressure". For example, hydrogen cyanide has a narrow liquid-phase temperature range at 1 atmosphere, but in an atmosphere with the pressure of Venus, with of pressure, it can indeed exist in liquid form over a wide temperature range.
Ammonia.
The ammonia molecule (NH3), like the water molecule, is abundant in the universe, being a compound of hydrogen (the simplest and most common element) with another very common element, nitrogen. The possible role of liquid ammonia as an alternative solvent for life is an idea that goes back at least to 1954, when J. B. S. Haldane raised the topic at a symposium about life's origin.
Numerous chemical reactions are possible in an ammonia solution, and liquid ammonia has chemical similarities with water. Ammonia can dissolve most organic molecules at least as well as water does and, in addition, it is capable of dissolving many elemental metals. Haldane made the point that various common water-related organic compounds have ammonia-related analogs; for instance the ammonia-related amine group (−NH2) is analogous to the water-related hydroxyl group (−OH).
Ammonia, like water, can either accept or donate an H+ ion. When ammonia accepts an H+, it forms the ammonium cation (NH4+), analogous to hydronium (H3O+). When it donates an H+ ion, it forms the amide anion (NH2−), analogous to the hydroxide anion (OH−). Compared to water, however, ammonia is more inclined to accept an H+ ion, and less inclined to donate one; it is a stronger nucleophile. Ammonia added to water functions as Arrhenius base: it increases the concentration of the anion hydroxide. Conversely, using a solvent system definition of acidity and basicity, water added to liquid ammonia functions as an acid, because it increases the concentration of the cation ammonium. The carbonyl group (C=O), which is much used in terrestrial biochemistry, would not be stable in ammonia solution, but the analogous imine group (C=NH) could be used instead.
However, ammonia has some problems as a basis for life. The hydrogen bonds between ammonia molecules are weaker than those in water, causing ammonia's heat of vaporization to be half that of water, its surface tension to be a third, and reducing its ability to concentrate non-polar molecules through a hydrophobic effect. Gerald Feinberg and Robert Shapiro have questioned whether ammonia could hold prebiotic molecules together well enough to allow the emergence of a self-reproducing system. Ammonia is also flammable in oxygen and could not exist sustainably in an environment suitable for aerobic metabolism.
A biosphere based on ammonia would likely exist at temperatures or air pressures that are extremely unusual in relation to life on Earth. Life on Earth usually exists within the melting point and boiling point of water at normal pressure, between 0 °C (273 K) and 100 °C (373 K); at normal pressure ammonia's melting and boiling points are between −78 °C (195 K) and −33 °C (240 K). Chemical reactions generally proceed more slowly at a lower temperature. Therefore, ammonia-based life, if it exists, might metabolize more slowly and evolve more slowly than life on Earth. On the other hand, lower temperatures could also enable living systems to use chemical species that would be too unstable at Earth temperatures to be useful.
Ammonia could be a liquid at Earth-like temperatures, but at much higher pressures; for example, at 60 atm, ammonia melts at −77 °C (196 K) and boils at 98 °C (371 K).
Ammonia and ammonia–water mixtures remain liquid at temperatures far below the freezing point of pure water, so such biochemistries might be well suited to planets and moons orbiting outside the water-based habitability zone. Such conditions could exist, for example, under the surface of Saturn's largest moon Titan.
Methane and other hydrocarbons.
Methane (CH4) is a simple hydrocarbon: that is, a compound of two of the most common elements in the cosmos: hydrogen and carbon. It has a cosmic abundance comparable with ammonia. Hydrocarbons could act as a solvent over a wide range of temperatures, but would lack polarity. Isaac Asimov, the biochemist and science fiction writer, suggested in 1981 that poly-lipids could form a substitute for proteins in a non-polar solvent such as methane. Lakes composed of a mixture of hydrocarbons, including methane and ethane, have been detected on the surface of Titan by the "Cassini" spacecraft.
There is debate about the effectiveness of methane and other hydrocarbons as a solvent for life compared to water or ammonia. Water is a stronger solvent than the hydrocarbons, enabling easier transport of substances in a cell. However, water is also more chemically reactive and can break down large organic molecules through hydrolysis. A life-form whose solvent was a hydrocarbon would not face the threat of its biomolecules being destroyed in this way. Also, the water molecule's tendency to form strong hydrogen bonds can interfere with internal hydrogen bonding in complex organic molecules. Life with a hydrocarbon solvent could make more use of hydrogen bonds within its biomolecules. Moreover, the strength of hydrogen bonds within biomolecules would be appropriate to a low-temperature biochemistry.
Astrobiologist Chris McKay has argued, on thermodynamic grounds, that if life does exist on Titan's surface, using hydrocarbons as a solvent, it is likely also to use the more complex hydrocarbons as an energy source by reacting them with hydrogen, reducing ethane and acetylene to methane. Possible evidence for this form of life on Titan was identified in 2010 by Darrell Strobel of Johns Hopkins University; a greater abundance of molecular hydrogen in the upper atmospheric layers of Titan compared to the lower layers, arguing for a downward diffusion at a rate of roughly 1025 molecules per second and disappearance of hydrogen near Titan's surface. As Strobel noted, his findings were in line with the effects Chris McKay had predicted if methanogenic life-forms were present. The same year, another study showed low levels of acetylene on Titan's surface, which were interpreted by Chris McKay as consistent with the hypothesis of organisms reducing acetylene to methane. While restating the biological hypothesis, McKay cautioned that other explanations for the hydrogen and acetylene findings are to be considered more likely: the possibilities of yet unidentified physical or chemical processes (e.g. a non-living surface catalyst enabling acetylene to react with hydrogen), or flaws in the current models of material flow. He noted that even a non-biological catalyst effective at 95 K would in itself be a startling discovery.
Azotosome.
A hypothetical cell membrane termed an "azotosome" capable of functioning in liquid methane in Titan conditions was computer-modeled in an article published in February 2015. Composed of acrylonitrile, a small molecule containing carbon, hydrogen, and nitrogen, it is predicted to have stability and flexibility in liquid methane comparable to that of a phospholipid bilayer (the type of cell membrane possessed by all life on Earth) in liquid water. An analysis of data obtained using the Atacama Large Millimeter / submillimeter Array (ALMA), completed in 2017, confirmed substantial amounts of acrylonitrile in Titan's atmosphere.
Hydrogen fluoride.
Hydrogen fluoride (HF), like water, is a polar molecule, and due to its polarity it can dissolve many ionic compounds. Its melting point is −84 °C, and its boiling point is 19.54 °C (at atmospheric pressure); the difference between the two is a little more than 100 K. HF also makes hydrogen bonds with its neighbor molecules, as do water and ammonia. It has been considered as a possible solvent for life by scientists such as Peter Sneath and Carl Sagan.
HF is dangerous to the systems of molecules that Earth-life is made of, but certain other organic compounds, such as paraffin waxes, are stable with it. Like water and ammonia, liquid hydrogen fluoride supports an acid–base chemistry. Using a solvent system definition of acidity and basicity, nitric acid functions as a base when it is added to liquid HF.
However, hydrogen fluoride is cosmically rare, unlike water, ammonia, and methane.
Hydrogen sulfide.
Hydrogen sulfide is the closest chemical analog to water, but is less polar and a weaker inorganic solvent. Hydrogen sulfide is quite plentiful on Jupiter's moon Io and may be in liquid form a short distance below the surface; astrobiologist Dirk Schulze-Makuch has suggested it as a possible solvent for life there. On a planet with hydrogen-sulfide oceans the source of the hydrogen sulfide could come from volcanos, in which case it could be mixed in with a bit of hydrogen fluoride, which could help dissolve minerals. Hydrogen-sulfide life might use a mixture of carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide as their carbon source. They might produce and live on sulfur monoxide, which is analogous to oxygen (O2). Hydrogen sulfide, like hydrogen cyanide and ammonia, suffers from the small temperature range where it is liquid, though that, like that of hydrogen cyanide and ammonia, increases with increasing pressure.
Silicon dioxide and silicates.
Silicon dioxide, also known as silica and quartz, is very abundant in the universe and has a large temperature range where it is liquid. However, its melting point is , so it would be impossible to make organic compounds in that temperature, because all of them would decompose. Silicates are similar to silicon dioxide and some have lower melting points than silica. Gerald Feinberg and Robert Shapiro have suggested that molten silicate rock could serve as a liquid medium for organisms with a chemistry based on silicon, oxygen, and other elements such as aluminium.
Other solvents or cosolvents.
Other solvents sometimes proposed:
Sulfuric acid in liquid form is strongly polar. It remains liquid at higher temperatures than water, its liquid range being 10 °C to 337 °C at a pressure of 1 atm, although above 300 °C it slowly decomposes. Sulfuric acid is known to be abundant in the clouds of Venus, in the form of aerosol droplets. In a biochemistry that used sulfuric acid as a solvent, the alkene group (C=C), with two carbon atoms joined by a double bond, could function analogously to the carbonyl group (C=O) in water-based biochemistry.
A proposal has been made that life on Mars may exist and be using a mixture of water and hydrogen peroxide as its solvent.
A 61.2% (by mass) mix of water and hydrogen peroxide has a freezing point of −56.5 °C and tends to super-cool rather than crystallize. It is also hygroscopic, an advantage in a water-scarce environment.
Supercritical carbon dioxide has been proposed as a candidate for alternative biochemistry due to its ability to selectively dissolve organic compounds and assist the functioning of enzymes and because "super-Earth"- or "super-Venus"-type planets with dense high-pressure atmospheres may be common.
Other speculations.
Non-green photosynthesizers.
Physicists have noted that, although photosynthesis on Earth generally involves green plants, a variety of other-colored plants could also support photosynthesis, essential for most life on Earth, and that other colors might be preferred in places that receive a different mix of stellar radiation than Earth.
These studies indicate that blue plants would be unlikely; however yellow or red plants may be relatively common.
Variable environments.
Many Earth plants and animals undergo major biochemical changes during their life cycles as a response to changing environmental conditions, for example, by having a spore or hibernation state that can be sustained for years or even millennia between more active life stages. Thus, it would be biochemically possible to sustain life in environments that are only periodically consistent with life as we know it.
For example, frogs in cold climates can survive for extended periods of time with most of their body water in a frozen state, whereas desert frogs in Australia can become inactive and dehydrate in dry periods, losing up to 75% of their fluids, yet return to life by rapidly rehydrating in wet periods. Either type of frog would appear biochemically inactive (i.e. not living) during dormant periods to anyone lacking a sensitive means of detecting low levels of metabolism.
Alanine world and hypothetical alternatives.
The genetic code evolved during the transition from the RNA world to a protein world. The Alanine World Hypothesis postulates that the evolution of the genetic code (the so-called GC phase) started with only four basic amino acids: alanine, glycine, proline and ornithine (now arginine). The evolution of the genetic code ended with 20 proteinogenic amino acids. From a chemical point of view, most of them are Alanine-derivatives particularly suitable for the construction of α-helices and β-sheets basic secondary structural elements of modern proteins. Direct evidence of this is an experimental procedure in molecular biology known as alanine scanning. The hypothetical "Proline World" would create a possible alternative life with the genetic code based on the proline chemical scaffold as the protein backbone. Similarly, "Glycine" and "Ornithine" worlds are also conceivable, but nature has chosen none of them. Evolution of life with Glycine, Proline or Ornithine as the basic structure for protein-like polymers (foldamers) would lead to parallel biological worlds. They would have morphologically radically different body plans and genetics from the living organisms of the known biosphere.
Nonplanetary life.
Dust and plasma-based.
In 2007, Vadim N. Tsytovich and colleagues proposed that lifelike behaviors could be exhibited by dust particles suspended in a plasma, under conditions that might exist in space. Computer models showed that, when the dust became charged, the particles could self-organize into microscopic helical structures, and the authors offer "a rough sketch of a possible model of...helical grain structure reproduction".
Life on a Neutron Star.
Frank Drake suggested in 1973 that intelligent life could inhabit neutron stars. Physical models in 1973 implied that Drake's creatures would be microscopic. In 1980, Robert L Forward wrote the science fiction novel Dragon's Egg using Drake's suggestion as a thesis.
Scientists who have published on this topic.
Scientists who have considered possible alternatives to carbon-water biochemistry include: |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Anti-gravity
Anti-gravity (also known as "non-gravitational field") is a hypothetical phenomenon of creating a place or object that is free from the force of gravity. It does not refer to the lack of weight under gravity experienced in free fall or orbit, or to balancing the force of gravity with some other force, such as electromagnetism or aerodynamic lift. Anti-gravity is a recurring concept in science fiction, particularly in the context of spacecraft propulsion. Examples are the gravity blocking substance "Cavorite" in H. G. Wells's "The First Men in the Moon" and the Spindizzy machines in James Blish's "Cities in Flight".
"Anti-gravity" is often used to refer to devices that look as if they reverse gravity even though they operate through other means, such as lifters, which fly in the air by moving air with electromagnetic fields.
What's commonly misconstrued is that while anti-gravity is the nullification of gravity, it is not repulsive gravity or negative gravity. Gravity plates and compensators as envisioned in contemporary science fiction also are not anti-gravity.
Historical attempts at understanding gravity.
The possibility of creating anti-gravity depends upon the detection and description of gravity at the quantum dimension; as of 2020 physicists have yet to discover the quantum nature of gravity.
During the summer of 1666, Isaac Newton observed an apple (variety "Flower of Kent") falling from the tree in his garden, thus realizing the principle of universal gravitation. Albert Einstein (1879-1955) conceived of gravity occurring specifically in the physical situation of matter and space being together, where gravity occurs as a consequence of matter causing deformation geometrically of outer (astronomical) space which is shaped flat, in Grundgedanken der allgemeinen Relativitätstheorie und Anwendung dieser Theorie in der Astronomie and Zur allgemeinen Relativitätstheorie, both published 1915. Einstein, both independently, and with Walther Mayer, attempted to unify Einstein's theory of gravity, the general theory of relativity, with electromagnetism, using the work of Theodor Kaluza (published 1921), and James Clerk Maxwell, in an attempt to include gravity with quantum field theory.
Theoretical quantum physicists have postulated the existence of a quantum gravity particle, the graviton. Various theoretical explanations of the reality of quantum gravity include the Superstring theory (Gabriele Veneziano 1968, et al.), the Asymptotic safety theory (Steven Weinberg, 1976) a quantum field theory of gravity, the Non-commutative geometry theory (Connes 1990), the theory of Causal fermion systems (Finster 2006; Holland 1998 Nikolić 2003), the E8 theory (Lisi 2007), and Emergence theory (Verlinde 2010).
Various theoretical addresses to the subject of quantum gravitation include, A Macias and H Dehnen, authors of a 1991 classical and quantum gravity paper in which they rejected the particulate 1/2 spin of the Kaluza–Klein theory. Stephane Collion and Michel Vaugon are authors of a 2017 paper proposing a new approach to the Kaluza–Klein idea of a five dimensional space-time unifying gravitation and electromagnetism as an extension to higher-dimensional space-time.
Hypothetical solutions.
In Newton's law of universal gravitation, gravity was an external force transmitted by unknown means. In the 20th century, Newton's model was replaced by general relativity where gravity is not a force but the result of the geometry of spacetime. Under general relativity, anti-gravity is impossible except under contrived circumstances.
Gravity shields.
In 1948 businessman Roger Babson (founder of Babson College) formed the Gravity Research Foundation to study ways to reduce the effects of gravity. Their efforts were initially somewhat "crankish", but they held occasional conferences that drew such people as Clarence Birdseye, known for his frozen-food products, and Igor Sikorsky, inventor of the helicopter. Over time the Foundation turned its attention away from trying to control gravity, to simply better understanding it. The Foundation nearly disappeared after Babson's death in 1967. However, it continues to run an essay award, offering prizes of up to $4,000. As of 2017, it is still administered out of Wellesley, Massachusetts, by George Rideout Jr., son of the foundation's original director. Winners include California astrophysicist George F. Smoot, who later won the 2006 Nobel Prize in physics.
General relativity research in the 1950s.
General relativity was introduced in the 1910s, but development of the theory was greatly slowed by a lack of suitable mathematical tools. It appeared that anti-gravity was outlawed under general relativity.
It is claimed the US Air Force also ran a study effort throughout the 1950s and into the 1960s. Former Lieutenant Colonel Ansel Talbert wrote two series of newspaper articles claiming that most of the major aviation firms had started gravity control propulsion research in the 1950s. However, there is little outside confirmation of these stories, and since they take place in the midst of the policy by press release era, it is not clear how much weight these stories should be given.
It is known that there were serious efforts underway at the Glenn L. Martin Company, who formed the Research Institute for Advanced Study. Major newspapers announced the contract that had been made between theoretical physicist Burkhard Heim and the Glenn L. Martin Company. Another effort in the private sector to master understanding of gravitation was the creation of the Institute for Field Physics, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1956, by Gravity Research Foundation trustee Agnew H. Bahnson.
Military support for anti-gravity projects was terminated by the Mansfield Amendment of 1973, which restricted Department of Defense spending to only the areas of scientific research with explicit military applications. The Mansfield Amendment was passed specifically to end long-running projects that had little to show for their efforts.
Under general relativity, gravity is the result of following spatial geometry (change in the normal shape of space) caused by local mass-energy. This theory holds that it is the altered shape of space, deformed by massive objects, that causes gravity, which is actually a property of deformed space rather than being a true force. Although the equations cannot normally produce a "negative geometry", it is possible to do so by using "negative mass". The same equations do not, of themselves, rule out the existence of negative mass.
Both general relativity and Newtonian gravity appear to predict that negative mass would produce a repulsive gravitational field. In particular, Sir Hermann Bondi proposed in 1957 that negative gravitational mass, combined with negative inertial mass, would comply with the strong equivalence principle of general relativity theory and the Newtonian laws of conservation of linear momentum and energy. Bondi's proof yielded singularity-free solutions for the relativity equations. In July 1988, Robert L. Forward presented a paper at the AIAA/ASME/SAE/ASEE 24th Joint Propulsion Conference that proposed a Bondi negative gravitational mass propulsion system.
Bondi pointed out that a negative mass will fall toward (and not away from) "normal" matter, since although the gravitational force is repulsive, the negative mass (according to Newton's law, F=ma) responds by accelerating in the opposite of the direction of the force. Normal mass, on the other hand, will fall away from the negative matter. He noted that two identical masses, one positive and one negative, placed near each other will therefore self-accelerate in the direction of the line between them, with the negative mass chasing after the positive mass. Notice that because the negative mass acquires negative kinetic energy, the total energy of the accelerating masses remains at zero. Forward pointed out that the self-acceleration effect is due to the negative inertial mass, and could be seen induced without the gravitational forces between the particles.
The Standard Model of particle physics, which describes all currently known forms of matter, does not include negative mass. Although cosmological dark matter may consist of particles outside the Standard Model whose nature is unknown, their mass is ostensibly known – since they were postulated from their gravitational effects on surrounding objects, which implies their mass is positive. The proposed cosmological dark energy, on the other hand, is more complicated, since according to general relativity the effects of both its energy density and its negative pressure contribute to its gravitational effect.
Unique force.
Under general relativity any form of energy couples with spacetime to create the geometries that cause gravity. A longstanding question was whether or not these same equations applied to antimatter. The issue was considered solved in 1960 with the development of CPT symmetry, which demonstrated that antimatter follows the same laws of physics as "normal" matter, and therefore has positive energy content and also causes (and reacts to) gravity like normal matter (see gravitational interaction of antimatter).
For much of the last quarter of the 20th century, the physics community was involved in attempts to produce a unified field theory, a single physical theory that explains the four fundamental forces: gravity, electromagnetism, and the strong and weak nuclear forces. Scientists have made progress in unifying the three quantum forces, but gravity has remained "the problem" in every attempt. This has not stopped any number of such attempts from being made, however.
Generally these attempts tried to "quantize gravity" by positing a particle, the graviton, that carried gravity in the same way that photons (light) carry electromagnetism. Simple attempts along this direction all failed, however, leading to more complex examples that attempted to account for these problems. Two of these, supersymmetry and the relativity related supergravity, both required the existence of an extremely weak "fifth force" carried by a graviphoton, which coupled together several "loose ends" in quantum field theory, in an organized manner. As a side effect, both theories also all but required that antimatter be affected by this fifth force in a way similar to anti-gravity, dictating repulsion away from mass. Several experiments were carried out in the 1990s to measure this effect, but none yielded positive results.
In 2013 CERN looked for an antigravity effect in an experiment designed to study the energy levels within antihydrogen. The antigravity measurement was just an "interesting sideshow" and was inconclusive.
General-relativistic "warp drives".
There are solutions of the field equations of general relativity which describe "warp drives" (such as the Alcubierre metric) and stable, traversable wormholes. This by itself is not significant, since "any" spacetime geometry is a solution of the field equations for some configuration of the stress–energy tensor field (see exact solutions in general relativity). General relativity does not constrain the geometry of spacetime unless outside constraints are placed on the stress–energy tensor. Warp-drive and traversable-wormhole geometries are well-behaved in most areas, but require regions of exotic matter; thus they are excluded as solutions if the stress–energy tensor is limited to known forms of matter. Dark matter and dark energy are not understood enough at this present time to make general statements regarding their applicability to a warp-drive.
Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Program.
During the close of the twentieth century NASA provided funding for the Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Program (BPP) from 1996 through 2002. This program studied a number of "far out" designs for space propulsion that were not receiving funding through normal university or commercial channels. Anti-gravity-like concepts were investigated under the name "diametric drive". The work of the BPP program continues in the independent, non-NASA affiliated Tau Zero Foundation.
Empirical claims and commercial efforts.
There have been a number of attempts to build anti-gravity devices, and a small number of reports of anti-gravity-like effects in the scientific literature. None of the examples that follow are accepted as reproducible examples of anti-gravity.
Gyroscopic devices.
Gyroscopes produce a force when twisted that operates "out of plane" and can appear to lift themselves against gravity. Although this force is well understood to be illusory, even under Newtonian models, it has nevertheless generated numerous claims of anti-gravity devices and any number of patented devices. None of these devices have ever been demonstrated to work under controlled conditions, and have often become the subject of conspiracy theories as a result.
Another "rotating device" example is shown in a series of patents granted to Henry Wallace between 1968 and 1974. His devices consist of rapidly spinning disks of brass, a material made up largely of elements with a total half-integer nuclear spin. He claimed that by rapidly rotating a disk of such material, the nuclear spin became aligned, and as a result created a "gravitomagnetic" field in a fashion similar to the magnetic field created by the Barnett effect. No independent testing or public demonstration of these devices is known.
In 1989, it was reported that a weight decreases along the axis of a right spinning gyroscope. A test of this claim a year later yielded null results. A recommendation was made to conduct further tests at a 1999 AIP conference.
Thomas Townsend Brown's gravitator.
In 1921, while still in high school, Thomas Townsend Brown found that a high-voltage Coolidge tube seemed to change mass depending on its orientation on a balance scale. Through the 1920s Brown developed this into devices that combined high voltages with materials with high dielectric constants (essentially large capacitors); he called such a device a "gravitator". Brown made the claim to observers and in the media that his experiments were showing anti-gravity effects. Brown would continue his work and produced a series of high-voltage devices in the following years in attempts to sell his ideas to aircraft companies and the military. He coined the names Biefeld–Brown effect and electrogravitics in conjunction with his devices. Brown tested his asymmetrical capacitor devices in a vacuum, supposedly showing it was not a more down-to-earth electrohydrodynamic effect generated by high voltage ion flow in air.
Electrogravitics is a popular topic in ufology, anti-gravity, free energy, with government conspiracy theorists and related websites, in books and publications with claims that the technology became highly classified in the early 1960s and that it is used to power UFOs and the B-2 bomber. There is also research and videos on the internet purported to show lifter-style capacitor devices working in a vacuum, therefore not receiving propulsion from ion drift or ion wind being generated in air.
Follow-up studies on Brown's work and other claims have been conducted by R. L. Talley in a 1990 US Air Force study, NASA scientist Jonathan Campbell in a 2003 experiment, and Martin Tajmar in a 2004 paper. They have found that no thrust could be observed in a vacuum and that Brown's and other ion lifter devices produce thrust along their axis regardless of the direction of gravity consistent with electrohydrodynamic effects.
Gravitoelectric coupling.
In 1992, the Russian researcher Eugene Podkletnov claimed to have discovered, whilst experimenting with superconductors, that a fast rotating superconductor reduces the gravitational effect. Many studies have attempted to reproduce Podkletnov's experiment, always to negative results.
Ning Li and Douglas Torr, of the University of Alabama in Huntsville proposed how a time dependent magnetic field could cause the spins of the lattice ions in a superconductor to generate detectable gravitomagnetic and gravitoelectric fields in a series of papers published between 1991 and 1993. In 1999, Li and her team appeared in "Popular Mechanics", claiming to have constructed a working prototype to generate what she described as "AC Gravity." No further evidence of this prototype has been offered.
Douglas Torr and Timir Datta were involved in the development of a "gravity generator" at the University of South Carolina. According to a leaked document from the Office of Technology Transfer at the University of South Carolina and confirmed to "Wired" reporter Charles Platt in 1998, the device would create a "force beam" in any desired direction and that the university planned to patent and license this device. No further information about this university research project or the "Gravity Generator" device was ever made public.
Göde Award.
The Institute for Gravity Research of the Göde Scientific Foundation has tried to reproduce many of the different experiments which claim any "anti-gravity" effects. All attempts by this group to observe an anti-gravity effect by reproducing past experiments have been unsuccessful thus far. The foundation has offered a reward of one million euros for a reproducible anti-gravity experiment.
In fiction.
The existence of anti-gravity is a common theme in fantasy and science fiction.
Apergy.
Apergy is a fictitious form of anti-gravitational energy first described by Percy Greg in his 1880 sword and planet novel "Across the Zodiac".
It is also used by John Jacob Astor IV in his 1894 science fiction novel, "A Journey in Other Worlds".
Apergy can also be found in an 1896 article by Clara Jessup Bloomfield-Moore, called "Some Truths About Keely". In it, apergy is used to describe the latent force John Keely harnessed, by using frequency to release the latent force found within all atomic matter.
In an 1897, ostensibly non-fictitious, article in "The San Francisco Call" titled "The Secret of Aerial Flight Revealed", science correspondent Frank M. Close, D. Sc., visits an unnamed Hindu man masquerading as a viticulturist somewhere on the Pacific coast who claims to have invented a flying boat that uses an "apergent"—a rare metal called "radlum"—to produce controlled apergic force, allowing the vessel to ascend and descend. The inventor describes apergy as "a force obtained by blending positive and negative electricity with ultheic, the third element or state of electric energy" and calls apergy a "second phase of gravity", hinting at a third phase as well.
In S. P. Meek's short story "Cold Light", which appeared in "Astounding Stories of Super-Science", March 1930, apergy is mentioned as the opposite force of gravity.
In Chris Roberson's short story "Annus Mirabilis" from the 2006 second volume of "Tales of the Shadowmen", Doctor Omega and Albert Einstein investigate apergy. Apergy is also mentioned in the Warren Ellis comic "Aetheric Mechanics", as being generated by Cavorite technology from "The First Men in the Moon".
Bibliography.
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} | m2d2_wiki | Catastrophes in popular culture
Catastrophes in popular culture includes real and fictional disasters, as depicted by the media, and are considered social events. Disaster movies made in Hollywood are part of the American pop culture. Catastrophe types can include hostile aliens, climate change/global warming, environmental disasters, financial crises, natural disaster, nuclear apocalypse, pandemics, super heros, terrorist attacks, zombies and other technological meltdowns.
History.
One of the earliest cultural catastrophic narratives is the flood myth, found among many civilizations in human history.
Theories.
There are different theories why audiences consume apocalyptic films, according to filmmaker Roland Emmerich, "They are somewhat cathartic. You see all this destruction and everything but at the end the right people save the day." Wheeler Winston Dixon notes, "I think they’re sort of preparing us for something that’s going to happen in the future."
According to , "What makes today’s obsession different from previous epochs’ is the sense of a “catastrophe without event,” a stealthily creeping process of disintegration. Ultimately, Horn argues, imagined catastrophes offer us intellectual tools that can render a future shadowed with apocalyptic possibilities affectively, epistemologically, and politically accessible." |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Total conversion (energy source)
In some science fiction stories, total conversion may mean higher or complete conversion of matter into energy, or vice versa in some proportion of "E = mc2".
Energy to matter conversion.
Positron and electron production: For photons at high-energy (MeV scale and higher), photon–photon collisions can efficiently convert the photon energy into matter in the form of a positron and an electron:
Proton and antiproton production: Conventional matter consists of protons and electrons, with electrons having insignificant mass compared to protons. One conventional model for producing protons from energy is extremely high-energy cosmic ray protons colliding with nuclei in the interstellar medium, via the reaction: + A → + + + A. (A represents an atom, p a proton, and an antiproton.) A portion of the kinetic energy of the initial proton is used to create two additional nuclei: another proton plus an antiproton.
Matter to energy conversion.
Conventional nuclear reactions such as nuclear fission and nuclear fusion convert relatively small amounts of matter only indirectly into useful energy, such as electricity or rocket thrust. For electricity production released nuclear energy in the form of heat is typically used to boil water to turn a turbine-generator.
Possibly matter is almost completely converted into energy in the cores of neutron stars and black holes by a process of nuclei collapse resulting in: proton → positron + 938 MeV, resulting in a >450 MeV positron-electron jet. Trace nuclei swept up in such a beam would achieve an approximate energy of (nucleus mass/electron mass) × 450 MeV, for example an iron atom could achieve about 45 TeV. An up to 45 TeV atom impacting a proton in the interstellar medium should result in the p + A process described above.
Ion-electron or positron-electron plasma with magnetic confinement theoretically allows direct conversion of particle energy to electricity by the separation of the positive particles from the negative particles with magnetic deflection. Direct conversion of particle energy to thrust is theoretically simpler, merely requiring magnetically directing a neutral plasma beam. Present lab production of relativistic 5 MeV positron-electron beams mimic on a small scale the relativistic jets from compact stars, and allow small scale studies how different elements interact with 5 MeV positron-electron beams, how energy is transferred to particles, the shock effect of gamma-ray bursts, and possible direct thrust and electricity generation from neutral plasmas. Lab positron-electron plasmas could be useful for studying compact star jets and other phenomena. However thrust generation or magnetically separating neutral beams for electrical generation will probably only be useful if there is a practical continuous process for generating neutral plasma by nuclear reactions. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Message from space (science fiction)
For other uses, see "Message from Space (disambiguation)".
"Message from space" is a type of "first contact" theme in science fiction . Stories of this type involve receiving an interstellar message which reveals the existence of other intelligent life in the universe.
History.
An early short story, "A Message from Space" (Joseph Schlossel, "Weird Tales", March 1926) tells of an amateur who builds a ham TV set and suddenly sees an alien on the screen. The alien realises it is being watched and tells its soap opera story. The verdict of Everett Franklin Bleiler: "original ideas, but clumsy handling".
While the use of this trope does predate the scientific Search for extraterrestrial intelligence ("SETI"), initiated with Project Ozma in 1960, the use of this as a plot element in science fiction greatly increased with the publicity given by various the SETI projects. Classic examples of this trope include the 1961 television script and a novel "A for Andromeda" by Fred Hoyle and John Elliot, the 1968 novel "His Master's Voice" by Stanislaw Lem, "The Listeners" by James E. Gunn and Carl Sagan's novel and subsequent film "Contact". |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Artificial world
Artificial worlds or artificial planets have been created by writers in the fields of science speculation, speculative fiction and fiction.
Such megastructures could have a variety of advantages over natural planets, such as efficient use of solar energy and immense living space, but their construction and/or maintenance would require technologies much in advance than that of 21st-century Earth.
It was often stated, that it is more possible to build a 2-gigaton Dyson sphere than a laser rifle, but still ringworlds etc. are treated in sci-fi as symbol of immense power, often relic of Precursor civilization or symbol of all-powerful future empire.
Examples of artificial worlds include:
In Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, an advanced race referred to as the Magratheans designed and built planets for the wealthy inhabitants of the galaxy, and the book went on to theorize that the Magratheans also designed and built Earth.
In Star Wars Legends continuity, a race called the Celestials (not to be confused with the Celestials of Marvel Comics) using Centerpoint Station, built the Corellian System. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Post-literate society
A post-literate society is a hypothetical society in which multimedia technology has advanced to the point where literacy, the ability to read or write, is no longer necessary or common. The term appears as early as 1962 in Marshall McLuhan's "The Gutenberg Galaxy". Many science-fiction societies are post-literate, as in Ray Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451", Dan Simmons' novel "Ilium", and Gary Shteyngart's "Super Sad True Love Story".
A post-literate society is different from a pre-literate one, as the latter has not yet created writing and communicates orally (oral literature and oral history, aided by art, dance, and singing), and the former has replaced the written word with recorded sounds (CDs, audiobooks), broadcast spoken word and music (radio), pictures (JPEG) and moving images (television, film, MPG, streaming video, video games, virtual reality). A post-literate society might still include people who are aliterate, who know how to read and write but choose not to. Most if not all people would be media literate, multimedia literate, visually literate, and transliterate.
In his book "The Empire of Illusion", Chris Hedges charts the recent, sudden rise of post-literate culture within the world culture as a whole. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Evil empire
An evil empire is a speculative fiction trope in which a major antagonist of the story is a technologically advanced nation, typically ruled by an evil emperor or empress, that aims to control the world or conquer some specific group. They are opposed by a hero from more common origins who uses their guile or the help of an underground resistance to fight them. Well-known examples are the Galactic Empire in "Star Wars", which forms upon the collapse of the more benevolent Galactic Republic and is opposed by Luke Skywalker, as well as the Galactic Empire in "Dune", whose Emperor plots the downfall of House Atreides, and is opposed by Paul Atreides. The theme also often appears in video games, such as the "Final Fantasy" series, starting with "Final Fantasy II", which was inspired by "Star Wars", and becoming a major part of "Final Fantasy VI" in the form of the Gestahl Empire.
Characteristics.
Fantastical evil empires typically make heavy use of technology and mechanization, refusing to coexist with nature and destroying or exploiting it instead. The hero or heroes of the story often make use of these natural elements to fight the empire, such as the Ewoks of Endor or the Sandworms of Arrakis. When the empire is defeated, the world returns to its natural state. This is often a metaphor for modern environmental problems caused by the negligence of global superpowers.
Use in politics.
The concept of an "evil empire" was appropriated from "Star Wars" by Ronald Reagan, who used it in his 1983 Evil Empire speech to describe the Soviet Union, dramatically raising the stakes in the arms race between it and the United States. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Mindwipe
A mindwipe is a fictional memory erasure procedure in which the subject's memories and sometimes personality are erased. Often those are replaced by new memories more useful to those who are carrying out the mindwiping. It is a more thorough form of brainwashing. It is sometimes used as an alternative to capital punishment, or to make the subject more useful to the system. The mindwipe can be performed by a hypnotic or magical ability, or by an electronic device. It is often coupled with stories where the characters have amnesia, although the latter concept includes cases that occur naturally or by accident instead of the result of a deliberate procedure. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Shapeshifting
In mythology, folklore and speculative fiction, shapeshifting is the ability to physically transform through an inherently superhuman ability, divine intervention, demonic manipulation, sorcery, spells or having inherited the ability. The idea of shapeshifting is in the oldest forms of totemism and shamanism, as well as the oldest existent literature and epic poems such as the "Epic of Gilgamesh" and the "Iliad". The concept remains a common trope in modern fantasy, children's literature and popular culture.
Folklore and mythology.
Popular shapeshifting creatures in folklore are werewolves and vampires (mostly of European, Canadian, and Native American/early American origin), the huli jing of East Asia (including the Japanese kitsune and Korean kumiho), and the gods, goddesses, and demons of numerous mythologies, such as the Norse Loki or the Greek Proteus. Shapeshifting to the form of a wolf is specifically known as lycanthropy, and such creatures who undergo such change are called lycanthropes. Therianthropy is the more general term for human-animal shifts, but it is rarely used in that capacity. It was also common for deities to transform mortals into animals and plants.
Other terms for shapeshifters include metamorph, the Navajo skin-walker, mimic, and therianthrope. The prefix "were-," coming from the Old English word for "man" (masculine rather than generic), is also used to designate shapeshifters; despite its root, it is used to indicate female shapeshifters as well.
While the popular idea of a shapeshifter is of a human being who turns into something else, there are numerous stories about animals that can transform themselves as well.
Greco-Roman.
Examples of shapeshifting in classical literature include many examples in Ovid's "Metamorphoses", Circe's transforming of Odysseus' men to pigs in Homer's "The Odyssey", and Apuleius's Lucius becoming a donkey in "The Golden Ass". Proteus was noted among the gods for his shapeshifting; both Menelaus and Aristaeus seized him to win information from him, and succeeded only because they held on during his various changes. Nereus told Heracles where to find the Apples of the Hesperides for the same reason.
The Titan Metis, the first wife of Zeus and the mother of the goddess Athena, was believed to be able to change her appearance into anything she wanted. In one story, she was so proud, that her husband, Zeus, tricked her into changing into a fly. He then swallowed her because he feared that he and Metis would have a son who would be more powerful than Zeus himself. Metis, however, was already pregnant. She stayed alive inside his head and built armor for her daughter. The banging of her metalworking made Zeus have a headache, so Hephaestus clove his head with an axe. Athena sprang from her father's head, fully grown, and in battle armor.
In Greek mythology, the transformation is often a punishment from the gods to humans who crossed them.
While the Greek gods could use transformation punitively – such as Medusa, turned to a monster for having sexual intercourse (raped in Ovid's version) with Poseidon in Athena's temple – even more frequently, the tales using it are of amorous adventure. Zeus repeatedly transformed himself to approach mortals as a means of gaining access:
Vertumnus transformed himself into an old woman to gain entry to Pomona's orchard; there, he persuaded her to marry him.
In other tales, the woman appealed to other gods to protect her from rape, and was transformed (Daphne into laurel, Cornix into a crow). Unlike Zeus and other gods' shapeshifting, these women were permanently metamorphosed.
In one tale, Demeter transformed herself into a mare to escape Poseidon, but Poseidon counter-transformed himself into a stallion to pursue her, and succeeded in the rape. Caenis, having been raped by Poseidon, demanded of him that she be changed to a man. He agreed, and she became Caeneus, a form he never lost, except, in some versions, upon death.
As a final reward from the gods for their hospitality, Baucis and Philemon were transformed, at their deaths, into a pair of trees.
In some variants of the tale of Narcissus, he is turned into a narcissus flower.
Sometimes metamorphoses transformed objects into humans. In the myths of both Jason and Cadmus, one task set to the hero was to sow dragon's teeth; on being sown, they would metamorphose into belligerent warriors, and both heroes had to throw a rock to trick them into fighting each other to survive. Deucalion and Pyrrha repopulated the world after a flood by throwing stones behind them; they were transformed into people. Cadmus is also often known to have transformed into a dragon or serpent towards the end of his life. Pygmalion fell in love with Galatea, a statue he had made. Aphrodite had pity on him and transformed the stone to a living woman.
British and Irish.
Fairies, witches, and wizards were all noted for their shapeshifting ability. Not all fairies could shapeshift, and some were limited to changing their size, as with the spriggans, and others to a few forms and other fairies might have only the appearance of shapeshifting, through their power, called "glamour," to create illusions. But others, such as the Hedley Kow, could change to many forms, and both human and supernatural wizards were capable of both such changes, and inflicting them on others.
Witches could turn into hares and in that form steal milk and butter.
Many British fairy tales, such as "Jack the Giant Killer" and "The Black Bull of Norroway", feature shapeshifting.
Celtic mythology.
Pwyll was transformed by Arawn into Arawn's own shape, and Arawn transformed himself into Pwyll's, so that they could trade places for a year and a day.
Llwyd ap Cil Coed transformed his wife and attendants into mice to attack a crop in revenge; when his wife is captured, he turned himself into three clergymen in succession to try to pay a ransom.
Math fab Mathonwy and Gwydion transform flowers into a woman named Blodeuwedd, and when she betrays her husband Lleu Llaw Gyffes, who is transformed into an eagle, they transform her again, into an owl.
Gilfaethwy committed rape on Goewin, Math fab Mathonwy's virgin footholder, with help from his brother Gwydion. Both were transformed into animals, for one year each. Gwydion was transformed into a stag, sow and wolf, and Gilfaethwy into a hind, boar and she-wolf. Each year, they had a child. Math turned the three young animals into boys.
Gwion, having accidentally taken some of the wisdom potion that Ceridwen was brewing for her son, fled from her through a succession of changes that she answered with changes of her own, ending with his being eaten, a grain of corn, by her as a hen. She became pregnant, and he was reborn in a new form, as Taliesin.
Tales abound about the selkie, a seal that can remove its skin to make contact with humans for only a short amount of time before it must return to the sea. Clan MacColdrum of Uist's foundation myths include a union between the founder of the clan and a shapeshifting selkie. Another such creature is the Scottish selkie, which needs its sealskin to regain its form. In "The Great Silkie of Sule Skerry" the (male) selkie seduces a human woman. Such stories surrounding these creatures are usually romantic tragedies.
Scottish mythology features shapeshifters, which allows the various creatures to trick, deceive, hunt, and kill humans. Water spirits such as the each-uisge, which inhabit lochs and waterways in Scotland, were said to appear as a horse or a young man. Other tales include kelpies who emerge from lochs and rivers in the disguise of a horse or woman in order to ensnare and kill weary travelers. Tam Lin, a man captured by the Queen of the Fairies is changed into all manner of beasts before being rescued. He finally turned into a burning coal and was thrown into a well, whereupon he reappeared in his human form. The motif of capturing a person by holding him through all forms of transformation is a common thread in folktales.
Perhaps the best-known Irish myth is that of Aoife who turned her stepchildren, the Children of Lir, into swans to be rid of them. Likewise, in the "Tochmarc Étaíne", Fuamnach jealously turns Étaín into a butterfly. The most dramatic example of shapeshifting in Irish myth is that of Tuan mac Cairill, the only survivor of Partholón's settlement of Ireland. In his centuries long life he became successively a stag, a wild boar, a hawk and finally a salmon prior to being eaten and (as in the Wooing of Étaín) reborn as a human.
The Púca is a Celtic faery, and also a deft shapeshifter. He can transform into many different, terrifying forms.
Sadhbh, the wife of the famous hero Fionn mac Cumhaill, was changed into a deer by the druid Fer Doirich when she spurned his amorous interests.
Norse.
There is a significant amount of literature about shapeshifters that appear in a variety of Norse tales.
In the Lokasenna, Odin and Loki taunt each other with having taken the form of females and nursing offspring to which they had given birth. A 13th-century Edda relates Loki taking the form of a mare to bear Odin's steed Sleipnir which was the fastest horse ever to exist, and also the form of a she-wolf to bear Fenrir.
Svipdagr angered Odin, who turned him into a dragon. Despite his monstrous appearance, his lover, the goddess Freyja, refused to leave his side. When the warrior Hadding found and slew Svipdagr, Freyja cursed him to be tormented by a tempest and shunned like the plague wherever he went. In the "Hyndluljóð", Freyja transformed her protégé Óttar into a boar to conceal him. She also possessed a cloak of falcon feathers that allowed her to transform into a falcon, which Loki borrowed on occasion.
The Volsunga saga contains many shapeshifting characters. Siggeir's mother changed into a wolf to help torture his defeated brothers-in-law with slow and ignominious deaths. When one, Sigmund, survived, he and his nephew and son Sinfjötli killed men wearing wolfskins; when they donned the skins themselves, they were cursed to become werewolves.
The dwarf Andvari is described as being able to magically turn into a pike. Alberich, his counterpart in Richard Wagner's "Der Ring des Nibelungen", using the Tarnhelm, takes on many forms, including a giant serpent and a toad, in a failed attempt to impress or intimidate Loki and Odin/Wotan.
Fafnir was originally a dwarf, a giant or even a human, depending on the exact myth, but in all variants he transformed into a dragon—a symbol of greed—while guarding his ill-gotten hoard. His brother, Ótr, enjoyed spending time as an otter, which led to his accidental slaying by Loki.
In Scandinavia, there existed, for example, the famous race of she-werewolves known with a name of Maras, women who took on the appearance of the night looking for huge half-human and half-wolf monsters. If a female at midnight stretches the membrane which envelopes the foal when it is brought forth, between four sticks and creeps through it, naked, she will bear children without pain; but all the boys will be shamans, and all the girls Maras.
The Nisse is sometimes said to be a shapeshifter. This trait also is attributed to Huldra.
Gunnhild, Mother of Kings ("Gunnhild konungamóðir") (c. 910 – c. 980), a quasi-historical figure who appears in the Icelandic Sagas, according to which she was the wife of Eric Bloodaxe, was credited with magic powers - including the power of shapeshifting
and turning at will into a bird. She is the central character of the novel "Mother of Kings" by Poul Anderson, which considerably elaborates on her shapeshifting abilities.
Other lore.
Armenian.
In Armenian mythology, shapeshifters include the "Nhang", a serpentine river monster than can transform itself into a woman or seal, and will drown humans and then drink their blood; or the beneficial "Shahapet", a guardian spirit that can appear either as a man or a snake.
Indian.
Ancient Indian mythology tells of Nāga, snakes that can sometimes assume human form. Scriptures describe shapeshifting Rakshasa (demons) assuming animal forms to deceive humans. The "Ramayana" also includes the Vanara, a group of apelike humanoids who possessed supernatural powers and could change their shapes.
Yoginis were associated with the power of shapeshifting into female animals.
In the Indian fable "The Dog Bride" from "Folklore of the Santal Parganas" by Cecil Henry Bompas, a buffalo herder falls in love with a dog that has the power to turn into a woman when she bathes.
In Kerala, there was a legend about the "Odiyan" clan, who in Kerala folklore are men believed to possess shapeshifting abilities and can assume animal forms.Odiyans are said to have inhabited the Malabar region of Kerala before the widespread use of electricity.
Philippines.
Philippine mythology includes the Aswang, a vampiric monster capable of transforming into a bat, a large black dog, a black cat, a black boar or some other form in order to stalk humans at night. The folklore also mentions other beings such as the Kapre, the Tikbalang and the Engkanto, which change their appearances to woo beautiful maidens. Also, talismans (called ""anting-anting" or "birtud"" in the local dialect), can give their owners the ability to shapeshift. In one tale, "Chonguita the Monkey Wife", a woman is turned into a monkey, only becoming human again if she can marry a handsome man.
Tatar.
Tatar folklore includes Yuxa, a hundred-year-old snake that can transform itself into a beautiful young woman, and seeks to marry men in order to have children.
Chinese.
Chinese mythology contains many tales of animal shapeshifters, capable of taking on human form. The most common such shapeshifter is the huli jing, a fox spirit which usually appears as a beautiful young woman; most are dangerous, but some feature as the heroines of love stories. "Madame White Snake" is one such legend; a snake falls in love with a man, and the story recounts the trials that she and her husband faced.
Japanese.
In Japanese folklore ōbake are a type of yōkai with the ability to shapeshift. The fox, or kitsune is among the most commonly known, but other such creatures include the bakeneko, the mujina and the tanuki.
Korean.
Korean mythology also contains a fox with the ability to shapeshift. Unlike its Chinese and Japanese counterparts, the kumiho is always malevolent. Usually its form is of a beautiful young woman; one tale recounts a man, a would-be seducer, revealed as a kumiho. The kumiho has nine tails and as she desires to be a full human, she uses her beauty to seduce men and eat their hearts (or in some cases livers where the belief is that 100 livers would turn her into a real human).
Somali.
In Somali mythology "Qori ismaris" ("One who rubs himself with a stick") was a man who could transform himself into a "Hyena-man" by rubbing himself with a magic stick at nightfall and by repeating this process could return to his human state before dawn.
Southern Africa.
ǀKaggen is Mantis, a demi-urge and folk hero of the ǀXam people of southern Africa. He is a trickster god who can shape shift, usually taking the form of a praying mantis but also a bull eland, a louse, a snake, and a caterpillar.
Trinidad and Tobago.
The Ligahoo or loup-garou is the shapeshifter of Trinidad and Tobago's folklore. This unique ability is believed to be handed down in some old creole families, and is usually associated with witch-doctors and practitioners of African magic.
Mapuche (Argentina and Chile).
The name of the Nahuel Huapi Lake in Argentina derives from the toponym of its major island in Mapudungun (Mapuche language): "Island of the Jaguar (or Puma)", from "nahuel", "puma (or jaguar)", and "huapí", "island". There is, however, more to the word "Nahuel" - it can also signify "a man who by sorcery has been transformed into a puma" (or jaguar).
Slavic Mythology.
In Slavic Mythology, one of the main gods Veles was a shapeshifting god of animals, magic and the underworld. He was often represented as a bear, wolf, snake or owl. He also became a dragon while fighting Perun, the Slavic storm god.
Themes.
Shapeshifting may be used as a plot device, such as when Puss in Boots in the fairy tales tricks the ogre into becoming a mouse to be eaten. Shapeshifting may also include symbolic significance, like the Beast's transformation in "Beauty and the Beast" indicates Belle's ability to accept him despite his appearance.
When a form is taken on involuntarily, the thematic effect can be one of confinement and restraint; the person is "bound" to the new form. In extreme cases, such as petrifaction, the character is entirely disabled. On the other hand, voluntary shapeshifting can be a means of escape and liberation. Even when the form is not undertaken to resemble a literal escape, the abilities specific to the form allow the character to act in a manner that was previously impossible.
Examples of this are in fairy tales. A prince who is forced into a bear's shape (as in "East of the Sun and West of the Moon") is a prisoner, but a princess who takes on a bear's shape voluntarily to flee a situation (as in "The She-Bear") escapes with her new shape. In the Earthsea books, Ursula K. Le Guin depicts an animal form as slowly transforming the wizard's mind, so that the dolphin, bear or other creature forgets it was human, making it impossible to change back. This makes an example for a voluntary shapeshifting becoming an imprisoning metamorphosis.
Beyond this, the uses of shapeshifting, transformation, and metamorphosis in fiction are as protean as the forms the characters take on. Some are rare, such as Italo Calvino's "The Canary Prince" is a Rapunzel variant in which shapeshifting is used to gain access to the tower.
Punitive changes.
In many cases, imposed forms are punitive in nature. This may be a just punishment, the nature of the transformation matching the crime for which it occurs; in other cases, the form is unjustly imposed by an angry and powerful person. In fairy tales, such transformations are usually temporary, but they commonly appear as the resolution of myths (as in many of the Metamorphoses) or produce origin myths.
Transformation chase.
In many fairy tales and ballads, as in Child Ballad #44, "The Twa Magicians" or "Farmer Weathersky", a magical chase occurs where the pursued endlessly takes on forms in an effort to shake off the pursuer, and the pursuer answers with shapeshifting, as, a dove is answered with a hawk, and a hare with a greyhound. The pursued may finally succeed in escape or the pursuer in capturing.
The Grimm Brothers fairy tale "Foundling-Bird" contains this as the bulk of the plot. In the Italian Campania Fables collection of "Pentamerone" by Gianbattista Basile, tells of a Neapolitan princess who, to escape from her father who had imprisoned her, becomes a huge she-bear. The magic happens due to a potion given to her by an old witch. The girl, once gone, can regain her human aspect.
In other variants, the pursued may transform various objects into obstacles, as in the fairy tale "The Master Maid", where the Master Maid transforms a wooden comb into a forest, a lump of salt into a mountain, and a flask of water into a sea. In these tales, the pursued normally escapes after overcoming three obstacles. This obstacle chase is literally found worldwide, in many variants in every region.
In fairy tales of the Aarne–Thompson type 313A, The Girl Helps the Hero Flee, such a chase is an integral part of the tale. It can be either a transformation chase (as in "The Grateful Prince", "King Kojata", "Foundling-Bird", "Jean, the Soldier, and Eulalie, the Devil's Daughter", or "The Two Kings' Children") or an obstacle chase (as in "The Battle of the Birds", "The White Dove", or "The Master Maid").
In a similar effect, a captive may shapeshift in order to break a hold on him. Proteus and Nereus's shapeshifting was to prevent heroes such as Menelaus and Heracles from forcing information from them. Tam Lin, once seized by Janet, was transformed by the faeries to keep Janet from taking him, but as he had advised her, she did not let go, and so freed him. The motif of capturing a person by holding him through many transformations is found in folktales throughout Europe, and Patricia A. McKillip references it in her "Riddle-Master trilogy": a shapeshifting Earthmaster finally wins its freedom by startling the man holding it.
Powers.
One motif is a shape change in order to obtain abilities in the new form. Berserkers were held to change into wolves and bears in order to fight more effectively. In many cultures, evil magicians could transform into animal shapes and thus skulk about.
In many fairy tales, the hero's talking animal helper proves to be a shapeshifted human being, able to help him in its animal form. In one variation, featured in "The Three Enchanted Princes" and "The Death of Koschei the Deathless", the hero's three sisters have been married to animals. These prove to be shapeshifted men, who aid their brother-in-law in a variant of tale types.
In an early Mayan text, the Shapeshifter, or Mestaclocan, has the ability to change his appearance and to manipulate the minds of animals. In one tale, the Mestaclocan finds a dying eagle. Changing into the form of an eagle, he convinces the dying bird that it is, in fact, not dying. As the story goes they both soar into the heavens, and lived together for eternity.
Bildungsroman.
"Beauty and the Beast" has been interpreted as a young woman's coming-of-age, in which she changes from being repulsed by sexual activity and regarding a husband therefore bestial, to a mature woman who can marry.
Needed items.
Some shapeshifters are able to change form only if they have some item, usually an article of clothing. In "Bisclavret" by Marie de France, a werewolf cannot regain human form without his clothing, but in wolf form does no harm to anyone. The most common use of this motif, however, is in tales where a man steals the article and forces the shapeshifter, trapped in human form, to become his bride. This lasts until she discovers where he has hidden the article, and she can flee. Selkies feature in these tales. Others include swan maidens and the Japanese "tennin".
Swedish writer Selma Lagerlöf, in "The Wonderful Adventures of Nils", included a version of the story with the typical elements (fisherman sees mermaids dancing on an island and steals the sealskin of one of them, preventing her from becoming a seal again so that he could marry her) and linked it to the founding of the city of Stockholm
Inner conflict.
The power to externally transform can symbolize an internal savagery; a central theme in many strands of werewolf mythology, and the inversion of the "liberation" theme, as in Dr Jekyll's transformation into Mr. Hyde.
Usurpation.
Some transformations are performed to remove the victim from his place, so that the transformer can usurp it. Bisclaveret's wife steals his clothing and traps him in wolf form because she has a lover. A witch, in "The Wonderful Birch", changed a mother into a sheep to take her place, and had the mother slaughtered; when her stepdaughter married the king, the witch transformed her into a reindeer so as to put her daughter in the queen's place. In the Korean "Transformation of the Kumiho", a kumiho, a fox with magical powers, transformed itself into an image of the bride, only being detected when her clothing is removed. In "Brother and Sister", when two children flee from their cruel stepmother, she enchants the streams along the way to transform them. While the brother refrains from the first two, which threaten to turn them into tigers and wolves, he is too thirsty at the third, which turns him into a deer. "The Six Swans" are transformed into swans by their stepmother, as are the Children of Lir in Irish mythology.
Ill-advised wishes.
Many fairy-tale characters have expressed ill-advised wishes to have any child at all, even one that has another form, and had such children born to them. At the end of the fairy tale, normally after marriage, such children metamorphose into human form. "Hans My Hedgehog" was born when his father wished for a child, even a hedgehog. Even stranger forms are possible: Giambattista Basile included in his "Pentamerone" the tale of a girl born as a sprig of myrtle, and Italo Calvino, in his "Italian Folktales", a girl born as an apple.
Sometimes, the parent who wishes for a child is told how to gain one, but does not obey the directions perfectly, resulting in the transformed birth. In "Prince Lindworm", the woman eats two onions, but does not peel one, resulting in her first child being a lindworm. In "Tatterhood", a woman magically produces two flowers, but disobeys the directions to eat only the beautiful one, resulting her having a beautiful and sweet daughter, but only after a disgusting and hideous one.
Less commonly, ill-advised wishes can transform a person after birth. "The Seven Ravens" are transformed when their father thinks his sons are playing instead of fetching water to christen their newborn and sickly sister, and curses them. In "Puddocky", when three princes start to quarrel over the beautiful heroine, a witch curses her because of the noise.
Monstrous bride/bridegroom.
Such wished-for children may become monstrous brides or bridegrooms. These tales have often been interpreted as symbolically representing arranged marriages; the bride's revulsion to marrying a stranger being symbolized by his bestial form.
The heroine must fall in love with the transformed groom. The hero or heroine must marry, as promised, and the monstrous form is removed by the wedding. Sir Gawain thus transformed the Loathly lady; although he was told that this was half-way, she could at his choice be beautiful by day and hideous by night, or vice versa, he told her that he would choose what she preferred, which broke the spell entirely. In "Tatterhood", Tatterhood is transformed by her asking her bridegroom why he didn't ask her why she rode a goat, why she carried a spoon, and why she was so ugly, and when he asked her, denying it and therefore transforming her goat into a horse, her spoon into a fan, and herself into a beauty. Puddocky is transformed when her prince, after she had helped him with two other tasks, tells him that his father has sent him for a bride. A similar effect is found in Child ballad 34, "Kemp Owyne", where the hero can transform a dragon back into a maiden by kissing her three times.
Sometimes the bridegroom removes his animal skin for the wedding night, whereupon it can be burned. "Hans My Hedgehog", "The Donkey" and "The Pig King" fall under this grouping. At an extreme, in "Prince Lindworm", the bride who avoids being eaten by the lindworm bridegroom arrives at her wedding wearing every gown she owns, and she tells the bridegroom she will remove one of hers if he removes one of his; only when her last gown comes off has he removed his last skin, and become a white shape that she can form into a man.
In some tales, the hero or heroine must obey a prohibition; the bride must spend a period of time not seeing the transformed groom in human shape (as in "East of the Sun and West of the Moon"), or the bridegroom must not burn the animals' skins. In "The Brown Bear of Norway", "The Golden Crab", "The Enchanted Snake" and some variants of "The Frog Princess", burning the skin is a catastrophe, putting the transformed bride or bridegroom in danger. In these tales, the prohibition is broken, invariably, resulting in a separation and a search by one spouse for the other.
Death.
Ghosts sometimes appear in animal form. In "The Famous Flower of Serving-Men", the heroine's murdered husband appears to the king as a white dove, lamenting her fate over his own grave. In "The White and the Black Bride" and "The Three Little Men in the Wood", the murdered – drowned – true bride reappears as a white duck. In "The Rose Tree" and "The Juniper Tree", the murdered children become birds who avenge their own deaths. There are African folk tales of murder victims avenging themselves in the form of crocodiles that can shapeshift into human form.
In some fairy tales, the character can reveal himself in every new form, and so a usurper repeatedly kills the victim in every new form, as in "Beauty and Pock Face", "A String of Pearls Twined with Golden Flowers", and "The Boys with the Golden Stars". This eventually leads to a form in which the character (or characters) can reveal the truth to someone able to stop the villain.
Similarly, the transformation back may be acts that would be fatal. In "The Wounded Lion", the prescription for turning the lion back into a prince was to kill him, chop him to pieces, burn the pieces, and throw the ash into water. Less drastic but no less apparently fatal, the fox in "The Golden Bird", the foals in "The Seven Foals", and the cats in "Lord Peter" and "The White Cat" tell the heroes of those stories to cut off their heads; this restores them to human shape. In the Greek tale of Scylla, Scylla's father Nisus turns into an eagle after death and drowns her daughter for betraying her father. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Transhumanism
Transhumanism is a philosophical movement, the proponents of which
advocate and predict the enhancement of the human condition by developing and making widely available sophisticated technologies able to greatly enhance longevity, mood and cognitive abilities.
Transhumanist thinkers study the potential benefits and dangers of emerging technologies that could overcome fundamental human limitations as well as the ethics of using such technologies. Some transhumanists believe that human beings may eventually be able to transform themselves into beings with abilities so greatly expanded from the current condition as to merit the label of posthuman beings.
Another topic of transhumanist research is how to protect humanity against existential risks, such as nuclear war or asteroid collision.
The contemporary meaning of the term "transhumanism" was foreshadowed by one of the first professors of futurology, a man who changed his name to FM-2030. In the 1960s, he taught "new concepts of the human" at The New School when he began to identify people who adopt technologies, lifestyles and worldviews "transitional" to posthumanity as "transhuman". The assertion would lay the intellectual groundwork for the British philosopher Max More to begin articulating the principles of transhumanism as a futurist philosophy in 1990, and organizing in California a school of thought that has since grown into the worldwide transhumanist movement.
Influenced by seminal works of science fiction, the transhumanist vision of a transformed future humanity has attracted many supporters and detractors from a wide range of perspectives, including philosophy and religion.
In 2017, Penn State University Press, in cooperation with philosopher Stefan Lorenz Sorgner and sociologist James Hughes, established the "Journal of Posthuman Studies" as the first academic journal explicitly dedicated to the posthuman, with the goal of clarifying the notions of posthumanism and transhumanism, as well as comparing and contrasting both.
History.
Precursors of transhumanism.
According to Nick Bostrom, transcendentalist impulses have been expressed at least as far back as the quest for immortality in the "Epic of Gilgamesh", as well as in historical quests for the Fountain of Youth, the Elixir of Life, and other efforts to stave off aging and death.
One of the early precursors to transhumanist ideas is Discourse on Method (1637) by René Descartes. In the Discourse, Descartes envisioned a new kind of medicine that could grant both physical immortality and stronger minds.
In his first edition of "Political Justice" (1793), William Godwin included arguments favoring the possibility of "earthly immortality" (what would now be called physical immortality). Godwin explored the themes of life extension and immortality in his gothic novel "St. Leon", which became popular (and notorious) at the time of its publication in 1799, but is now mostly forgotten. "St. Leon" may have provided inspiration for his daughter Mary Shelley's novel "Frankenstein".
There is debate about whether the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche can be considered an influence on transhumanism, despite its exaltation of the "Übermensch" (overman or superman), due to its emphasis on self-actualization rather than technological transformation. The transhumanist philosophies of Max More and Stefan Lorenz Sorgner have been influenced strongly by Nietzschean thinking. By way of contrast, The Transhumanist Declaration ""...advocates the well-being of all sentience (whether in artificial intellects, humans, posthumans, or non-human animals)".
The late 19th to early 20th century movement known as Russian cosmism also incorporated some ideas which later developed into the core of the transhumanist movement in particular by early protagonist Russian philosopher N. F. Fyodorov.
Early transhumanist thinking.
Fundamental ideas of transhumanism were first advanced in 1923 by the British geneticist J. B. S. Haldane in his essay "Daedalus: Science and the Future", which predicted that great benefits would come from the application of advanced sciences to human biology—and that every such advance would first appear to someone as blasphemy or perversion, "indecent and unnatural". In particular, he was interested in the development of the science of eugenics, ectogenesis (creating and sustaining life in an artificial environment), and the application of genetics to improve human characteristics, such as health and intelligence.
His article inspired academic and popular interest. J. D. Bernal, a crystallographer at Cambridge, wrote "The World, the Flesh and the Devil" in 1929, in which he speculated on the prospects of space colonization and radical changes to human bodies and intelligence through bionic implants and cognitive enhancement. These ideas have been common transhumanist themes ever since.
The biologist Julian Huxley is generally regarded as the founder of transhumanism after using the term for the title of an influential 1957 article. The term itself, however, derives from an earlier 1940 paper by the Canadian philosopher W. D. Lighthall. Huxley describes transhumanism in these terms:
Huxley's definition differs, albeit not substantially, from the one commonly in use since the 1980s. The ideas raised by these thinkers were explored in the science fiction of the 1960s, notably in Arthur C. Clarke's "", in which an alien artifact grants transcendent power to its wielder.
Japanese Metabolist architects produced a manifesto in 1960 which outlined goals to "encourage active metabolic development of our society" through design and technology. In the Material and Man section of the manifesto, Noboru Kawazoe suggests that:After several decades, with the rapid progress of communication technology, every one will have a "brain wave receiver" in his ear, which conveys directly and exactly what other people think about him and vice versa. What I think will be known by all the people. There is no more individual consciousness, only the will of mankind as a whole.
Artificial intelligence and the technological singularity.
The concept of the technological singularity, or the ultra-rapid advent of superhuman intelligence, was first proposed by the British cryptologist I. J. Good in 1965:
Computer scientist Marvin Minsky wrote on relationships between human and artificial intelligence beginning in the 1960s. Over the succeeding decades, this field continued to generate influential thinkers such as Hans Moravec and Raymond Kurzweil, who oscillated between the technical arena and futuristic speculations in the transhumanist vein. The coalescence of an identifiable transhumanist movement began in the last decades of the 20th century. In 1966, FM-2030 (formerly F. M. Esfandiary), a futurist who taught "new concepts of the human" at The New School, in New York City, began to identify people who adopt technologies, lifestyles and world views transitional to posthumanity as "transhuman". In 1972, Robert Ettinger, whose 1964 "Prospect of Immortality" founded the cryonics movement, contributed to the conceptualization of "transhumanity" with his 1972 "Man into Superman." FM-2030 published the "Upwingers Manifesto" in 1973.
Growth of transhumanism.
The first self-described transhumanists met formally in the early 1980s at the University of California, Los Angeles, which became the main center of transhumanist thought. Here, FM-2030 lectured on his "Third Way" futurist ideology. At the EZTV Media venue, frequented by transhumanists and other futurists, Natasha Vita-More presented "Breaking Away", her 1980 experimental film with the theme of humans breaking away from their biological limitations and the Earth's gravity as they head into space. FM-2030 and Vita-More soon began holding gatherings for transhumanists in Los Angeles, which included students from FM-2030's courses and audiences from Vita-More's artistic productions. In 1982, Vita-More authored the "Transhumanist Arts Statement" and, six years later, produced the cable TV show "TransCentury Update "on transhumanity, a program which reached over 100,000 viewers.
In 1986, Eric Drexler published "Engines of Creation: The Coming Era of Nanotechnology," which discussed the prospects for nanotechnology and molecular assemblers, and founded the Foresight Institute. As the first non-profit organization to research, advocate for, and perform cryonics, the Southern California offices of the Alcor Life Extension Foundation became a center for futurists. In 1988, the first issue of "Extropy Magazine" was published by Max More and Tom Morrow. In 1990, More, a strategic philosopher, created his own particular transhumanist doctrine, which took the form of the "Principles of Extropy," and laid the foundation of modern transhumanism by giving it a new definition:
In 1992, More and Morrow founded the Extropy Institute, a catalyst for networking futurists and brainstorming new memeplexes by organizing a series of conferences and, more importantly, providing a mailing list, which exposed many to transhumanist views for the first time during the rise of cyberculture and the cyberdelic counterculture. In 1998, philosophers Nick Bostrom and David Pearce founded the World Transhumanist Association (WTA), an international non-governmental organization working toward the recognition of transhumanism as a legitimate subject of scientific inquiry and public policy. In 2002, the WTA modified and adopted "The Transhumanist Declaration." "The Transhumanist FAQ", prepared by the WTA (later Humanity+), gave two formal definitions for transhumanism:
In possible contrast with other transhumanist organizations, WTA officials considered that social forces could undermine their futurist visions and needed to be addressed. A particular concern is the equal access to human enhancement technologies across classes and borders. In 2006, a political struggle within the transhumanist movement between the libertarian right and the liberal left resulted in a more centre-leftward positioning of the WTA under its former executive director James Hughes. In 2006, the board of directors of the Extropy Institute ceased operations of the organization, stating that its mission was "essentially completed". This left the World Transhumanist Association as the leading international transhumanist organization. In 2008, as part of a rebranding effort, the WTA changed its name to "Humanity+". In 2012, the transhumanist Longevity Party had been initiated as an international union of people who promote the development of scientific and technological means to significant life extension, that for now has more than 30 national organisations throughout the world.
The Mormon Transhumanist Association was founded in 2006. By 2012, it consisted of hundreds of members.
The first transhumanist elected member of a parliament has been Giuseppe Vatinno, in Italy.
Theory.
It is a matter of debate whether transhumanism is a branch of posthumanism and how this philosophical movement should be conceptualised with regard to transhumanism. The latter is often referred to as a variant or activist form of posthumanism by its conservative, Christian and progressive critics.
A common feature of transhumanism and philosophical posthumanism is the future vision of a new intelligent species, into which humanity will evolve and eventually will supplement or supersede it. Transhumanism stresses the evolutionary perspective, including sometimes the creation of a highly intelligent animal species by way of cognitive enhancement (i.e. biological uplift), but clings to a "posthuman future" as the final goal of participant evolution.
Nevertheless, the idea of creating intelligent artificial beings (proposed, for example, by roboticist Hans Moravec) has influenced transhumanism. Moravec's ideas and transhumanism have also been characterised as a "complacent" or "apocalyptic" variant of posthumanism and contrasted with "cultural posthumanism" in humanities and the arts. While such a "cultural posthumanism" would offer resources for rethinking the relationships between humans and increasingly sophisticated machines, transhumanism and similar posthumanisms are, in this view, not abandoning obsolete concepts of the "autonomous liberal subject", but are expanding its "prerogatives" into the realm of the posthuman. Transhumanist self-characterisations as a continuation of humanism and Enlightenment thinking correspond with this view.
Some secular humanists conceive transhumanism as an offspring of the humanist freethought movement and argue that transhumanists differ from the humanist mainstream by having a specific focus on technological approaches to resolving human concerns (i.e. technocentrism) and on the issue of mortality. However, other progressives have argued that posthumanism, whether it be its philosophical or activist forms, amounts to a shift away from concerns about social justice, from the reform of human institutions and from other Enlightenment preoccupations, toward narcissistic longings for a transcendence of the human body in quest of more exquisite ways of being.
As an alternative, humanist philosopher Dwight Gilbert Jones has proposed a renewed Renaissance humanism through DNA and genome repositories, with each individual genotype (DNA) being instantiated as successive phenotypes (bodies or lives via cloning, "Church of Man", 1978). In his view, native molecular DNA "continuity" is required for retaining the "self" and no amount of computing power or memory aggregation can replace the essential "stink" of our true genetic identity, which he terms "genity". Instead, DNA/genome stewardship by an institution analogous to the Jesuits' 400 year vigil is a suggested model for enabling humanism to become our species' common credo, a project he proposed in his speculative novel "The Humanist – 1000 Summers" (2011), wherein humanity dedicates these coming centuries to harmonizing our planet and peoples.
The philosophy of transhumanism is closely related to technoself studies, an interdisciplinary domain of scholarly research dealing with all aspects of human identity in a technological society and focusing on the changing nature of relationships between humans and technology.
Aims.
While many transhumanist theorists and advocates seek to apply reason, science and technology for the purposes of reducing poverty, disease, disability and malnutrition around the globe, transhumanism is distinctive in its particular focus on the applications of technologies to the improvement of human bodies at the individual level. Many transhumanists actively assess the potential for future technologies and innovative social systems to improve the quality of all life, while seeking to make the material reality of the human condition fulfill the promise of legal and political equality by eliminating congenital mental and physical barriers.
Transhumanist philosophers argue that there not only exists a perfectionist ethical imperative for humans to strive for progress and improvement of the human condition, but that it is possible and desirable for humanity to enter a transhuman phase of existence in which humans enhance themselves beyond what is naturally human. In such a phase, natural evolution would be replaced with deliberate participatory or directed evolution.
Some theorists such as Ray Kurzweil think that the pace of technological innovation is accelerating and that the next 50 years may yield not only radical technological advances, but possibly a technological singularity, which may fundamentally change the nature of human beings. Transhumanists who foresee this massive technological change generally maintain that it is desirable. However, some are also concerned with the possible dangers of extremely rapid technological change and propose options for ensuring that advanced technology is used responsibly. For example, Bostrom has written extensively on existential risks to humanity's future welfare, including ones that could be created by emerging technologies. In contrast, some proponents of transhumanism view it as essential to humanity's survival. For instance, Stephen Hawking points out that the "external transmission" phase of human evolution, where knowledge production and knowledge management is more important than transmission of information via evolution, may be the point at which human civilization becomes unstable and self-destructs, one of Hawking's explanations for the Fermi paradox. To counter this, Hawking emphasizes either self-design of the human genome or mechanical enhancement (e.g., brain-computer interface) to enhance human intelligence and reduce aggression, without which he implies human civilization may be too stupid collectively to survive an increasingly unstable system, resulting in societal collapse.
While many people believe that all transhumanists are striving for immortality, it is not necessarily true. Hank Pellissier, managing director of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies (2011–2012), surveyed transhumanists. He found that, of the 818 respondents, 23.8% did not want immortality. Some of the reasons argued were boredom, Earth's overpopulation and the desire "to go to an afterlife".
Empathic fallibility and conversational consent.
Certain transhumanist philosophers hold that since all assumptions about what others experience are fallible, and that therefore all attempts to help or protect beings that are not capable of correcting what others assume about them no matter how well-intentioned are in danger of actually hurting them, all sentient beings deserve to be sapient. These thinkers argue that the ability to discuss in a falsification-based way constitutes a threshold that is not arbitrary at which it becomes possible for an individual to speak for themselves in a way that is not dependent on exterior assumptions. They also argue that all beings capable of experiencing something deserve to be elevated to this threshold if they are not at it, typically stating that the underlying change that leads to the threshold is an increase in the preciseness of the brain's ability to discriminate. This includes increasing the neuron count and connectivity in animals as well as accelerating the development of connectivity in order to shorten or ideally skip non-sapient childhood incapable of independently deciding for oneself. Transhumanists of this description stress that the genetic engineering that they advocate is general insertion into both the somatic cells of living beings and in germ cells, and not purging of individuals without the modifications, deeming the latter not only unethical but also unnecessary due to the possibilities of efficient genetic engineering.
Ethics.
Transhumanists engage in interdisciplinary approaches to understand and evaluate possibilities for overcoming biological limitations by drawing on futurology and various fields of ethics. Unlike many philosophers, social critics and activists who place a moral value on preservation of natural systems, transhumanists see the very concept of the specifically natural as problematically nebulous at best and an obstacle to progress at worst. In keeping with this, many prominent transhumanist advocates, such as Dan Agin, refer to transhumanism's critics, on the political right and left jointly, as "bioconservatives" or "bioluddites", the latter term alluding to the 19th century anti-industrialisation social movement that opposed the replacement of human manual labourers by machines.
A belief of counter-transhumanism is that transhumanism can cause unfair human enhancement in many areas of life, but specifically on the social plane. This can be compared to steroid use, where athletes who use steroids in sports have an advantage over those who do not. The same scenario happens when people have certain neural implants that give them an advantage in the work place and in educational aspects. Additionally, there are many, according to M.J. McNamee and S.D. Edwards, who fear that the improvements afforded by a specific, privileged section of society will lead to a division of the human species into two different and distinct species. The idea of two human species, one being at a great physical and economic advantage in comparison with the other, is a troublesome one at best. One may be incapable of breeding with the other, and may by consequence of lower physical health and ability, be considered of a lower moral standing than the other.
Currents.
There is a variety of opinions within transhumanist thought. Many of the leading transhumanist thinkers hold views that are under constant revision and development. Some distinctive currents of transhumanism are identified and listed here in alphabetical order:
Spirituality.
Although many transhumanists are atheists, agnostics, and/or secular humanists, some have religious or spiritual views. Despite the prevailing secular attitude, some transhumanists pursue hopes traditionally espoused by religions, such as immortality, while several controversial new religious movements from the late 20th century have explicitly embraced transhumanist goals of transforming the human condition by applying technology to the alteration of the mind and body, such as Raëlism. However, most thinkers associated with the transhumanist movement focus on the practical goals of using technology to help achieve longer and healthier lives, while speculating that future understanding of neurotheology and the application of neurotechnology will enable humans to gain greater control of altered states of consciousness, which were commonly interpreted as spiritual experiences, and thus achieve more profound self-knowledge. Transhumanist Buddhists have sought to explore areas of agreement between various types of Buddhism and Buddhist-derived meditation and mind-expanding neurotechnologies. However, they have been criticised for appropriating mindfulness as a tool for transcending humanness.
Some transhumanists believe in the compatibility between the human mind and computer hardware, with the theoretical implication that human consciousness may someday be transferred to alternative media (a speculative technique commonly known as mind uploading). One extreme formulation of this idea, which some transhumanists are interested in, is the proposal of the Omega Point by Christian cosmologist Frank Tipler. Drawing upon ideas in digitalism, Tipler has advanced the notion that the collapse of the Universe billions of years hence could create the conditions for the perpetuation of humanity in a simulated reality within a megacomputer and thus achieve a form of "posthuman godhood". Before Tipler, the term Omega Point was used by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, a paleontologist and Jesuit theologian who saw an evolutionary telos in the development of an encompassing noosphere, a global consciousness.
Viewed from the perspective of some Christian thinkers, the idea of mind uploading is asserted to represent a denigration of the human body, characteristic of gnostic manichaean belief. Transhumanism and its presumed intellectual progenitors have also been described as neo-gnostic by non-Christian and secular commentators.
The first dialogue between transhumanism and faith was a one-day conference held at the University of Toronto in 2004. Religious critics alone faulted the philosophy of transhumanism as offering no eternal truths nor a relationship with the divine. They commented that a philosophy bereft of these beliefs leaves humanity adrift in a foggy sea of postmodern cynicism and anomie. Transhumanists responded that such criticisms reflect a failure to look at the actual content of the transhumanist philosophy, which, far from being cynical, is rooted in optimistic, idealistic attitudes that trace back to the Enlightenment. Following this dialogue, William Sims Bainbridge, a sociologist of religion, conducted a pilot study, published in the Journal of Evolution and Technology, suggesting that religious attitudes were negatively correlated with acceptance of transhumanist ideas and indicating that individuals with highly religious worldviews tended to perceive transhumanism as being a direct, competitive (though ultimately futile) affront to their spiritual beliefs.
Since 2006, the Mormon Transhumanist Association sponsors conferences and lectures on the intersection of technology and religion. The Christian Transhumanist Association was established in 2014.
Since 2009, the American Academy of Religion holds a "Transhumanism and Religion" consultation during its annual meeting, where scholars in the field of religious studies seek to identify and critically evaluate any implicit religious beliefs that might underlie key transhumanist claims and assumptions; consider how transhumanism challenges religious traditions to develop their own ideas of the human future, in particular the prospect of human transformation, whether by technological or other means; and provide critical and constructive assessments of an envisioned future that place greater confidence in nanotechnology, robotics and information technology to achieve virtual immortality and create a superior posthuman species.
The physicist and transhumanist thinker Giulio Prisco states that "cosmist religions based on science, might be our best protection from reckless pursuit of superintelligence and other risky technologies." Prisco also recognizes the importance of spiritual ideas, such as the ones of Nikolai Fyodorovich Fyodorov, to the origins of the transhumanism movement.
Practice.
While some transhumanists take an abstract and theoretical approach to the perceived benefits of emerging technologies, others have offered specific proposals for modifications to the human body, including heritable ones. Transhumanists are often concerned with methods of enhancing the human nervous system. Though some, such as Kevin Warwick, propose modification of the peripheral nervous system, the brain is considered the common denominator of personhood and is thus a primary focus of transhumanist ambitions.
In fact, Warwick has gone a lot further than merely making a proposal. In 2002 he had a 100 electrode array surgically implanted into the median nerves of his left arm in order to link his nervous system directly with a computer and thus to also connect with the internet. As a consequence, he carried out a series of experiments. He was able to directly control a robot hand using his neural signals and to feel the force applied by the hand through feedback from the fingertips. He also experienced a form of ultrasonic sensory input and conducted the first purely electronic communication between his own nervous system and that of his wife who also had electrodes implanted.<ref name="doi10.1001/archneur.60.10.1369|noedit"></ref>
As proponents of self-improvement and body modification, transhumanists tend to use existing technologies and techniques that supposedly improve cognitive and physical performance, while engaging in routines and lifestyles designed to improve health and longevity. Depending on their age, some transhumanists express concern that they will not live to reap the benefits of future technologies. However, many have a great interest in life extension strategies and in funding research in cryonics in order to make the latter a viable option of last resort, rather than remaining an unproven method. Regional and global transhumanist networks and communities with a range of objectives exist to provide support and forums for discussion and collaborative projects.
While most transhumanist theory focuses on future technologies and the changes they may bring, many today are already involved in the practice on a very basic level. It is not uncommon for many to receive cosmetic changes to their physical form via cosmetic surgery, even if it is not required for health reasons. Human growth hormones attempt to alter the natural development of shorter children or those who have been born with a physical deficiency. Doctors prescribe medicines such as Ritalin and Adderall to improve cognitive focus, and many people take "lifestyle" drugs such as Viagra, Propecia, and Botox to restore aspects of youthfulness that have been lost in maturity.
Other transhumanists, such as cyborg artist Neil Harbisson, use technologies and techniques to improve their senses and perception of reality. Harbisson's antenna, which is permanently implanted in his skull, allows him to sense colours beyond human perception such as infrareds and ultraviolets.
Technologies of interest.
Transhumanists support the emergence and convergence of technologies including nanotechnology, biotechnology, information technology and cognitive science (NBIC), as well as hypothetical future technologies like simulated reality, artificial intelligence, superintelligence, 3D bioprinting, mind uploading, chemical brain preservation and cryonics. They believe that humans can and should use these technologies to become more than human. Therefore, they support the recognition and/or protection of cognitive liberty, morphological freedom and procreative liberty as civil liberties, so as to guarantee individuals the choice of using human enhancement technologies on themselves and their children. Some speculate that human enhancement techniques and other emerging technologies may facilitate more radical human enhancement no later than at the midpoint of the 21st century. Kurzweil's book "The Singularity is Near" and Michio Kaku's book "Physics of the Future" outline various human enhancement technologies and give insight on how these technologies may impact the human race.
Some reports on the converging technologies and NBIC concepts have criticised their transhumanist orientation and alleged science fictional character. At the same time, research on brain and body alteration technologies has been accelerated under the sponsorship of the U.S. Department of Defense, which is interested in the battlefield advantages they would provide to the supersoldiers of the United States and its allies. There has already been a brain research program to "extend the ability to manage information", while military scientists are now looking at stretching the human capacity for combat to a maximum 168 hours without sleep.
Neuroscientist Anders Sandberg has been practicing on the method of scanning ultra-thin sections of the brain. This method is being used to help better understand the architecture of the brain. As of now, this method is currently being used on mice. This is the first step towards hypothetically uploading contents of the human brain, including memories and emotions, onto a computer.
Debate.
The very notion and prospect of human enhancement and related issues arouse public controversy. Criticisms of transhumanism and its proposals take two main forms: those objecting to the likelihood of transhumanist goals being achieved (practical criticisms) and those objecting to the moral principles or worldview sustaining transhumanist proposals or underlying transhumanism itself (ethical criticisms). Critics and opponents often see transhumanists' goals as posing threats to human values.
Some of the most widely known critiques of the transhumanist program are novels and fictional films. These works of art, despite presenting imagined worlds rather than philosophical analyses, are used as touchstones for some of the more formal arguments. Various arguments have been made to the effect that a society that adopts human enhancement technologies may come to resemble the dystopia depicted in the 1932 novel "Brave New World, "by Aldous Huxley.
On another front, some authors consider that humanity is already transhuman, because medical advances in recent centuries have significantly altered our species. However, it is not in a conscious and therefore transhumanistic way. From such perspective, transhumanism is perpetually aspirational: as new technologies become mainstream, the adoption of new yet-unadopted technologies becomes a new shifting goal.
Feasibility.
In a 1992 book, sociologist Max Dublin pointed to many past failed predictions of technological progress and argued that modern futurist predictions would prove similarly inaccurate. He also objected to what he saw as scientism, fanaticism and nihilism by a few in advancing transhumanist causes. Dublin also said that historical parallels existed between Millenarian religions and Communist doctrines.
Although generally sympathetic to transhumanism, public health professor Gregory Stock is skeptical of the technical feasibility and mass appeal of the cyborgization of humanity predicted by Raymond Kurzweil, Hans Moravec and Kevin Warwick. He said that, throughout the 21st century, many humans would find themselves deeply integrated into systems of machines, but would remain biological. Primary changes to their own form and character would arise not from cyberware, but from the direct manipulation of their genetics, metabolism and biochemistry.
In her 1992 book "Science as Salvation", philosopher Mary Midgley traces the notion of achieving immortality by transcendence of the material human body (echoed in the transhumanist tenet of mind uploading) to a group of male scientific thinkers of the early 20th century, including J. B. S. Haldane and members of his circle. She characterizes these ideas as "quasi-scientific dreams and prophesies" involving visions of escape from the body coupled with "self-indulgent, uncontrolled power-fantasies". Her argument focuses on what she perceives as the pseudoscientific speculations and irrational, fear-of-death-driven fantasies of these thinkers, their disregard for laymen and the remoteness of their eschatological visions.
Another critique is aimed mainly at "algeny" (a portmanteau of "alchemy" and "genetics"), which Jeremy Rifkin defined as "the upgrading of existing organisms and the design of wholly new ones with the intent of 'perfecting' their performance". It emphasizes the issue of biocomplexity and the unpredictability of attempts to guide the development of products of biological evolution. This argument, elaborated in particular by the biologist Stuart Newman, is based on the recognition that cloning and germline genetic engineering of animals are error-prone and inherently disruptive of embryonic development. Accordingly, so it is argued, it would create unacceptable risks to use such methods on human embryos. Performing experiments, particularly ones with permanent biological consequences, on developing humans would thus be in violation of accepted principles governing research on human subjects (see the 1964 Declaration of Helsinki). Moreover, because improvements in experimental outcomes in one species are not automatically transferable to a new species without further experimentation, it is claimed that there is no ethical route to genetic manipulation of humans at early developmental stages.
As a practical matter, however, international protocols on human subject research may not present a legal obstacle to attempts by transhumanists and others to improve their offspring by germinal choice technology. According to legal scholar Kirsten Rabe Smolensky, existing laws would protect parents who choose to enhance their child's genome from future liability arising from adverse outcomes of the procedure.
Transhumanists and other supporters of human genetic engineering do not dismiss practical concerns out of hand, insofar as there is a high degree of uncertainty about the timelines and likely outcomes of genetic modification experiments in humans. However, bioethicist James Hughes suggests that one possible ethical route to the genetic manipulation of humans at early developmental stages is the building of computer models of the human genome, the proteins it specifies and the tissue engineering he argues that it also codes for. With the exponential progress in bioinformatics, Hughes believes that a virtual model of genetic expression in the human body will not be far behind and that it will soon be possible to accelerate approval of genetic modifications by simulating their effects on virtual humans. Public health professor Gregory Stock points to artificial chromosomes as an alleged safer alternative to existing genetic engineering techniques.
Thinkers who defend the likelihood of accelerating change point to a past pattern of exponential increases in humanity's technological capacities. Kurzweil developed this position in his 2005 book "The Singularity Is Near".
Intrinsic immorality.
It has been argued that, in transhumanist thought, humans attempt to substitute themselves for God. The 2002 Vatican statement "Communion and Stewardship: Human Persons Created in the Image of God," stated that "changing the genetic identity of man as a human person through the production of an infrahuman being is radically immoral", implying, that "man has full right of disposal over his own biological nature". The statement also argues that creation of a superhuman or spiritually superior being is "unthinkable", since true improvement can come only through religious experience and "realizing more fully the image of God". Christian theologians and lay activists of several churches and denominations have expressed similar objections to transhumanism and claimed that Christians attain in the afterlife what radical transhumanism promises, such as indefinite life extension or the abolition of suffering. In this view, transhumanism is just another representative of the long line of utopian movements which seek to create "heaven on earth". On the other hand, religious thinkers allied with transhumanist goals such as the theologians Ronald Cole-Turner and Ted Peters hold that the doctrine of "co-creation" provides an obligation to use genetic engineering to improve human biology.
Other critics target what they claim to be an instrumental conception of the human body in the writings of Marvin Minsky, Hans Moravec and some other transhumanists. Reflecting a strain of feminist criticism of the transhumanist program, philosopher Susan Bordo points to "contemporary obsessions with slenderness, youth and physical perfection", which she sees as affecting both men and women, but in distinct ways, as "the logical (if extreme) manifestations of anxieties and fantasies fostered by our culture." Some critics question other social implications of the movement's focus on body modification. Political scientist Klaus-Gerd Giesen, in particular, has asserted that transhumanism's concentration on altering the human body represents the logical yet tragic consequence of atomized individualism and body commodification within a consumer culture.
Nick Bostrom responds that the desire to regain youth, specifically, and transcend the natural limitations of the human body, in general, is pan-cultural and pan-historical, and is therefore not uniquely tied to the culture of the 20th century. He argues that the transhumanist program is an attempt to channel that desire into a scientific project on par with the Human Genome Project and achieve humanity's oldest hope, rather than a puerile fantasy or social trend.
Loss of human identity.
In his 2003 book "Enough: Staying Human in an Engineered Age", environmental ethicist Bill McKibben argued at length against many of the technologies that are postulated or supported by transhumanists, including germinal choice technology, nanomedicine and life extension strategies. He claims that it would be morally wrong for humans to tamper with fundamental aspects of themselves (or their children) in an attempt to overcome universal human limitations, such as vulnerability to aging, maximum life span and biological constraints on physical and cognitive ability. Attempts to "improve" themselves through such manipulation would remove limitations that provide a necessary context for the experience of meaningful human choice. He claims that human lives would no longer seem meaningful in a world where such limitations could be overcome technologically. Even the goal of using germinal choice technology for clearly therapeutic purposes should be relinquished, since it would inevitably produce temptations to tamper with such things as cognitive capacities. He argues that it is possible for societies to benefit from renouncing particular technologies, using as examples Ming China, Tokugawa Japan and the contemporary Amish.
Biopolitical activist Jeremy Rifkin and biologist Stuart Newman accept that biotechnology has the power to make profound changes in organismal identity. They argue against the genetic engineering of human beings because they fear the blurring of the boundary between human and artifact. Philosopher Keekok Lee sees such developments as part of an accelerating trend in modernization in which technology has been used to transform the "natural" into the "artefactual". In the extreme, this could lead to the manufacturing and enslavement of "monsters" such as human clones, human-animal chimeras, or bioroids, but even lesser dislocations of humans and non-humans from social and ecological systems are seen as problematic. The film "Blade Runner" (1982) and the novels "The Boys From Brazil" (1976) and "The Island of Doctor Moreau" (1896) depict elements of such scenarios, but Mary Shelley's 1818 novel "Frankenstein" is most often alluded to by critics who suggest that biotechnologies could create objectified and socially unmoored people as well as subhumans. Such critics propose that strict measures be implemented to prevent what they portray as dehumanizing possibilities from ever happening, usually in the form of an international ban on human genetic engineering.
Science journalist Ronald Bailey claims that McKibben's historical examples are flawed and support different conclusions when studied more closely. For example, few groups are more cautious than the Amish about embracing new technologies, but, though they shun television and use horses and buggies, some are welcoming the possibilities of gene therapy since inbreeding has afflicted them with a number of rare genetic diseases. Bailey and other supporters of technological alteration of human biology also reject the claim that life would be experienced as meaningless if some human limitations are overcome with enhancement technologies as extremely subjective.
Writing in "Reason" magazine, Bailey has accused opponents of research involving the modification of animals as indulging in alarmism when they speculate about the creation of subhuman creatures with human-like intelligence and brains resembling those of "Homo sapiens". Bailey insists that the aim of conducting research on animals is simply to produce human health care benefits.
A different response comes from transhumanist personhood theorists who object to what they characterize as the anthropomorphobia fueling some criticisms of this research, which science fiction writer Isaac Asimov termed the "Frankenstein complex". For example, Woody Evans argues that, provided they are self-aware, human clones, human-animal chimeras and uplifted animals would all be unique persons deserving of respect, dignity, rights, responsibilities, and citizenship. They conclude that the coming ethical issue is not the creation of so-called monsters, but what they characterize as the "yuck factor" and "human-racism", that would judge and treat these creations as monstrous.
At least one public interest organization, the U.S.-based Center for Genetics and Society, was formed, in 2001, with the specific goal of opposing transhumanist agendas that involve transgenerational modification of human biology, such as full-term human cloning and germinal choice technology. The Institute on Biotechnology and the Human Future of the Chicago-Kent College of Law critically scrutinizes proposed applications of genetic and nanotechnologies to human biology in an academic setting.
Socioeconomic effects.
Some critics of libertarian transhumanism have focused on the likely socioeconomic consequences in societies in which divisions between rich and poor are on the rise. Bill McKibben, for example, suggests that emerging human enhancement technologies would be disproportionately available to those with greater financial resources, thereby exacerbating the gap between rich and poor and creating a "genetic divide". Even Lee M. Silver, the biologist and science writer who coined the term "reprogenetics" and supports its applications, has expressed concern that these methods could create a two-tiered society of genetically engineered "haves" and "have nots" if social democratic reforms lag behind implementation of enhancement technologies. The 1997 film "Gattaca" depicts a dystopian society in which one's social class depends entirely on genetic potential and is often cited by critics in support of these views.
These criticisms are also voiced by non-libertarian transhumanist advocates, especially self-described democratic transhumanists, who believe that the majority of current or future social and environmental issues (such as unemployment and resource depletion) need to be addressed by a combination of political and technological solutions (like a guaranteed minimum income and alternative technology). Therefore, on the specific issue of an emerging genetic divide due to unequal access to human enhancement technologies, bioethicist James Hughes, in his 2004 book "Citizen Cyborg: Why Democratic Societies Must Respond to the Redesigned Human of the Future", argues that progressives or, more precisely, techno-progressives must articulate and implement public policies (i.e., a universal health care voucher system that covers human enhancement technologies) in order to attenuate this problem as much as possible, rather than trying to ban human enhancement technologies. The latter, he argues, might actually worsen the problem by making these technologies unsafe or available only to the wealthy on the local black market or in countries where such a ban is not enforced.
Sometimes, as in the writings of Leon Kass, the fear is that various institutions and practices judged as fundamental to civilized society would be damaged or destroyed. In his 2002 book "Our Posthuman Future" and in a 2004 "Foreign Policy" magazine article, political economist and philosopher Francis Fukuyama designates transhumanism as the world's most dangerous idea because he believes that it may undermine the egalitarian ideals of democracy (in general) and liberal democracy (in particular) through a fundamental alteration of "human nature". Social philosopher Jürgen Habermas makes a similar argument in his 2003 book "The Future of Human Nature", in which he asserts that moral autonomy depends on not being subject to another's unilaterally imposed specifications. Habermas thus suggests that the human "species ethic" would be undermined by embryo-stage genetic alteration. Critics such as Kass, Fukuyama and a variety of authors hold that attempts to significantly alter human biology are not only inherently immoral, but also threaten the social order. Alternatively, they argue that implementation of such technologies would likely lead to the "naturalizing" of social hierarchies or place new means of control in the hands of totalitarian regimes. AI pioneer Joseph Weizenbaum criticizes what he sees as misanthropic tendencies in the language and ideas of some of his colleagues, in particular Marvin Minsky and Hans Moravec, which, by devaluing the human organism per se, promotes a discourse that enables divisive and undemocratic social policies.
In a 2004 article in the libertarian monthly "Reason," science journalist Ronald Bailey contested the assertions of Fukuyama by arguing that political equality has never rested on the facts of human biology. He asserts that liberalism was founded not on the proposition of effective equality of human beings, or "de facto" equality, but on the assertion of an equality in political rights and before the law, or "de jure" equality. Bailey asserts that the products of genetic engineering may well ameliorate rather than exacerbate human inequality, giving to the many what were once the privileges of the few. Moreover, he argues, "the crowning achievement of the Enlightenment is the principle of tolerance". In fact, he says, political liberalism is already the solution to the issue of human and posthuman rights since in liberal societies the law is meant to apply equally to all, no matter how rich or poor, powerful or powerless, educated or ignorant, enhanced or unenhanced. Other thinkers who are sympathetic to transhumanist ideas, such as philosopher Russell Blackford, have also objected to the appeal to tradition and what they see as alarmism involved in "Brave New World"-type arguments.
Cultural aesthetics.
In addition to the socio-economic risks and implications of transhumanism, there are indeed implications and possible consequences in regard to cultural aesthetics. Currently, there are a number of ways in which people choose to represent themselves in society. The way in which a person dresses, hair styles, and body alteration all serve to identify the way a person presents themselves and is perceived by society. According to Foucault, society already governs and controls bodies by making them feel watched. This "surveillance" of society dictates how the majority of individuals choose to express themselves aesthetically.
One of the risks outlined in a 2004 article by Jerold Abrams is the elimination of differences in favor of universality. This, he argues, will eliminate the ability of individuals to subvert the possibly oppressive, dominant structure of society by way of uniquely expressing themselves externally. Such control over a population would have dangerous implications of tyranny. Yet another consequence of enhancing the human form not only cognitively, but physically, will be the reinforcement of "desirable" traits which are perpetuated by the dominant social structure. Physical traits which are seen as "ugly" or "undesirable" and thus deemed less-than, will be summarily cut out by those who can afford to do it, while those who cannot will be forced into a relative caste of undesirable people. Even if these physical "improvements" are made completely universal, they will indeed eliminate what makes each individual uniquely human in their own way.
Specter of coercive eugenicism.
Some critics of transhumanism see the old eugenics, social Darwinist, and master race ideologies and programs of the past as warnings of what the promotion of eugenic enhancement technologies might unintentionally encourage. Some fear future "eugenics wars" as the worst-case scenario: the return of coercive state-sponsored genetic discrimination and human rights violations such as compulsory sterilization of persons with genetic defects, the killing of the institutionalized and, specifically, segregation and genocide of "races"" "perceived as inferior. Health law professor George Annas and technology law professor Lori Andrews are prominent advocates of the position that the use of these technologies could lead to such human-posthuman caste warfare.
The major transhumanist organizations strongly condemn the coercion involved in such policies and reject the racist and classist assumptions on which they were based, along with the pseudoscientific notions that eugenic improvements could be accomplished in a practically meaningful time frame through selective human breeding. Instead, most transhumanist thinkers advocate a "new eugenics", a form of egalitarian liberal eugenics. In their 2000 book "From Chance to Choice: Genetics and Justice", non-transhumanist bioethicists Allen Buchanan, Dan Brock, Norman Daniels and Daniel Wikler have argued that liberal societies have an obligation to encourage as wide an adoption of eugenic enhancement technologies as possible (so long as such policies do not infringe on individuals' reproductive rights or exert undue pressures on prospective parents to use these technologies) in order to maximize public health and minimize the inequalities that may result from both natural genetic endowments and unequal access to genetic enhancements. Most transhumanists holding similar views nonetheless distance themselves from the term "eugenics" (preferring "germinal choice" or "reprogenetics") to avoid having their position confused with the discredited theories and practices of early-20th-century eugenic movements.
Existential risks.
In his 2003 book "Our Final Hour", British Astronomer Royal Martin Rees argues that advanced science and technology bring as much risk of disaster as opportunity for progress. However, Rees does not advocate a halt to scientific activity. Instead, he calls for tighter security and perhaps an end to traditional scientific openness. Advocates of the precautionary principle, such as many in the environmental movement, also favor slow, careful progress or a halt in potentially dangerous areas. Some precautionists believe that artificial intelligence and robotics present possibilities of alternative forms of cognition that may threaten human life.
Transhumanists do not necessarily rule out specific restrictions on emerging technologies so as to lessen the prospect of existential risk. Generally, however, they counter that proposals based on the precautionary principle are often unrealistic and sometimes even counter-productive as opposed to the technogaian current of transhumanism, which they claim is both realistic and productive. In his television series "Connections", science historian James Burke dissects several views on technological change, including precautionism and the restriction of open inquiry. Burke questions the practicality of some of these views, but concludes that maintaining the "status quo" of inquiry and development poses hazards of its own, such as a disorienting rate of change and the depletion of our planet's resources. The common transhumanist position is a pragmatic one where society takes deliberate action to ensure the early arrival of the benefits of safe, clean, alternative technology, rather than fostering what it considers to be anti-scientific views and technophobia.
Nick Bostrom argues that even barring the occurrence of a singular global catastrophic event, basic Malthusian and evolutionary forces facilitated by technological progress threaten to eliminate the positive aspects of human society.
One transhumanist solution proposed by Bostrom to counter existential risks is control of differential technological development, a series of attempts to influence the sequence in which technologies are developed. In this approach, planners would strive to retard the development of possibly harmful technologies and their applications, while accelerating the development of likely beneficial technologies, especially those that offer protection against the harmful effects of others. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Videotelephony
Videotelephony comprises the technologies for the reception and transmission of audio-video signals by users in different locations, for communication between people in real time. A videophone is a telephone with a video display, capable of simultaneous video and audio for communication between people in real time. Videoconferencing implies the use of this technology for a group or organizational meeting rather than for individuals, in a videoconference. Telepresence may refer either to a high-quality videotelephony system (where the goal is to create the illusion that remote participants are in the same room) or to meetup technology, which goes beyond video into robotics (such as moving around the room or physically manipulating objects). Videoconferencing has also been called "visual collaboration" and is a type of groupware.
While development of video conferencing started in the late 19th century, the technology only became available to the public starting in the 1930s. These early demonstrations were installed at "booths" in post offices and shown at various world expositions. It took until 1970 for AT&T to launch the first true video conferencing system, wherein anyone could subscribe to the service and have the technology in their home or office. Videotelephony also included "image phones" which would exchange still images between units every few seconds over conventional plain old telephone service (POTS) lines, essentially the same as slow-scan TV. The development of advanced video codecs, more powerful CPUs, and high-bandwidth Internet telecommunication services in the late 1990s allowed videophones to provide high quality low-cost colour service between users almost any place in the world where the Internet is available.
Although not as widely used in everyday communications as audio-only and text communication, useful applications include sign language transmission for deaf and speech-impaired people, distance education, telemedicine, and overcoming mobility issues. It is also used in commercial and corporate settings to facilitate meetings and conferences, typically between parties that already have established relationships. News media organizations have begun to use desktop technologies like Skype to provide higher-quality audio than the cellular phone network, and video links at much lower cost than sending professional equipment or using a professional studio. More popular videotelephony technologies use the Internet rather than the traditional landline phone network, even accounting for modern digital packetized phone network protocols, and even though videotelephony software commonly runs on smartphones.
History.
The concept of videotelephony was first conceived in the late 1870s, both in the United States and in Europe, although the basic sciences to permit its very earliest trials would take nearly a half century to be discovered. This was first embodied in the device which came to be known as the video telephone, or videophone, and it evolved from intensive research and experimentation in several telecommunication fields, notably electrical telegraphy, telephony, radio, and television.
Simple analog videophone communication could be established as early as the invention of the television. Such an antecedent usually consisted of two closed-circuit television systems connected via coax cable or radio. An example of that was the German Reich Postzentralamt (post office) video telephone network serving Berlin and several German cities via coaxial cables between 1936 and 1940.
The development of video conferencing as a subscription service started in the latter half of the 1920s in the United Kingdom and the United States, spurred notably by John Logie Baird and AT&T's Bell Labs. This occurred in part, at least with AT&T, to serve as an adjunct supplementing the use of the telephone. A number of organizations believed that videotelephony would be superior to plain voice communications. Attempts at using normal telephony networks to transmit slow-scan video, such as the first systems developed by AT&T Corporation, first researched in the 1950s, failed mostly due to the poor picture quality and the lack of efficient video compression techniques.
During the first manned space flights, NASA used two radio-frequency (UHF or VHF) video links, one in each direction. TV channels routinely use this type of videotelephony when reporting from distant locations. The news media were to become regular users of mobile links to satellites using specially equipped trucks, and much later via special satellite videophones in a briefcase. This technique was very expensive, though, and could not be used for applications such as telemedicine, distance education, and business meetings.
Decades of research and development culminated in the 1970 commercial launch of AT&T's Picturephone service, available in select cities. However, the system was a commercial failure, chiefly due to consumer apathy, high subscription costs, and lack of network effect—with only a few hundred Picturephones in the world, users had extremely few contacts they could actually call, and interoperability with other videophone systems would not exist for decades.
Very expensive videoconferencing systems continued to evolve throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Proprietary equipment, software, and network requirements gave way to standards-based technologies that were available for anyone to purchase at a reasonable cost. Only in the late 20th century with the advent of powerful video codecs combined with high-speed Internet broadband and ISDN service did videotelephony become a practical technology for regular use.
Digital.
Practical digital videotelephony was made possible only with advances in video compression, due to the impractically high bandwidth requirements of uncompressed video. To achieve Video Graphics Array (VGA) quality video (480p resolution and 256 colors) with raw uncompressed video, it would require a bandwidth of over 92Mbps. The most important compression technique that enabled practical digital videotelephony and videoconferencing is the discrete cosine transform (DCT). The DCT, a form of lossy compression, was conceived in 1972 by Nasir Ahmed, who developed the algorithm with T. Natarajan and K. R. Rao at the University of Texas in 1973. The DCT algorithm became the basis for the first practical video coding standard that was useful for online videoconferencing, H.261, standardised by the ITU-T in 1988, and subsequent H.26x video coding standards.
In the 1980s, digital telephony transmission networks became possible, such as with ISDN networks, assuring a minimum bit rate (usually 128 kilobits/s) for compressed video and audio transmission. During this time, there was also research into other forms of digital video and audio communication. Many of these technologies, such as the Media space, are not as widely used today as videoconferencing but were still an important area of research. The first dedicated systems started to appear as ISDN networks were expanding throughout the world. One of the first commercial videoconferencing systems sold to companies came from PictureTel Corp., which had an initial public offering in November, 1984.
In 1984, Concept Communication in the United States replaced the hundred pound, US$100,000 computers necessary for teleconferencing, with a $12,000 circuit board that doubled the video frame rate from 15 to 30 frames per second, and which reduced the equipment to the size of a circuit board fitting into standard personal computers. The company also secured a patent for a codec for full-motion videoconferencing, first demonstrated at AT&T Bell Labs in 1986.
Videoconferencing systems throughout the 1990s rapidly evolved from very expensive proprietary equipment, software, and network requirements to a standards-based technology readily available to the general public at a reasonable cost.
Finally, in the 1990s, Internet Protocol-based videoconferencing became possible, and more efficient video compression technologies were developed, permitting desktop, or personal computer (PC)-based videoconferencing. In 1992 CU-SeeMe was developed at Cornell by Tim Dorcey et al. In 1995 the first public videoconference between North America and Africa took place, linking a technofair in San Francisco with a techno-rave and cyberdeli in Cape Town. At the 1998 Winter Olympics opening ceremony in Nagano, Japan, Seiji Ozawa conducted the Ode to Joy from Beethoven's Ninth Symphony simultaneously across five continents in near-real-time.
While videoconferencing technology was initially used primarily within internal corporate communication networks, one of the first community service usages of the technology started in 1992 through a unique partnership with PictureTel and IBM Corporations which at the time were promoting a jointly developed desktop based videoconferencing product known as the PCS/1. Over the next 15 years, Project DIANE (Diversified Information and Assistance Network) grew to utilize a variety of videoconferencing platforms to create a multi-state cooperative public service and distance education network consisting of several hundred schools, libraries, science museums, zoos and parks, and many other community oriented organizations.
Kyocera conducted a two-year development campaign from 1997 to 1999 that resulted in the release of the VP-210 Visual Phone, the first mobile colour videophone that also doubled as a camera phone for still photos. The camera phone was the same size as similar contemporary mobile phones, but sported a large camera lens and a 5 cm (2 inch) colour TFT display capable of displaying 65,000 colors, and was able to process two video frames per second.
Videotelephony was popularized in the 2000s, via free Internet services such as Skype and iChat, web plugins supporting H.26x video standards, and on-line telecommunication programs that promoted low cost, albeit lower quality, videoconferencing to virtually every location with an Internet connection.
With the rapid improvements and popularity of the Internet, videotelephony has become widespread through the deployment of video-enabled mobile phones such as 2010's iPhone 4, plus videoconferencing and computer webcams which utilize Internet telephony. In the upper echelons of government, business, and commerce, telepresence technology, an advanced form of videoconferencing, has helped reduce the need to travel.
In May 2005, the first high definition video conferencing systems, produced by LifeSize Communications, were displayed at the Interop trade show in Las Vegas, Nevada, able to provide video at 30 frames per second with a 1280 by 720 display resolution. Polycom introduced its first high definition video conferencing system to the market in 2006. As of the 2010s, high definition resolution for videoconferencing became a popular feature, with most major suppliers in the videoconferencing market offering it.
Technological developments by videoconferencing developers in the 2010s have extended the capabilities of video conferencing systems beyond the boardroom for use with hand-held mobile devices that combine the use of video, audio and on-screen drawing capabilities broadcasting in real time over secure networks, independent of location. Mobile collaboration systems now allow people in previously unreachable locations, such as workers on an offshore oil rig, the ability to view and discuss issues with colleagues thousands of miles away. Traditional videoconferencing system manufacturers have begun providing mobile applications as well, such as those that allow for live and still image streaming.
The highest ever video call (other than those from aircraft and spacecraft) took place on May 19, 2013, when British adventurer Daniel Hughes used a smartphone with a BGAN satellite modem to make a videocall to the BBC from the summit of Mount Everest, at above sea level.
The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in a significant increase in the use of videoconferencing. Berstein Research found that Zoom added more subscribers during the first two months of 2020 alone than in the entire year 2019. GoToMeeting had a 20 percent increase in usage, according to LogMeIn. UK based StarLeaf reported a 600 percent increase in national call volumes. Videoconferencing became so widespread during the pandemic that the term "Zoom fatigue" came to prominence, referring to the taxing nature of spending long periods of time on videocalls.
Major categories.
Videotelephony can be categorized by its functionality, that is to its intended purpose, and also by its method of transmissions.
Videophones were the earliest form of videotelephony, dating back to initial tests in 1927 by AT&T. During the late 1930s, the post offices of several European governments established public videophone services for person-to-person communications utilizing dual cable circuit telephone transmission technology. In the present day, standalone videophones and UMTS video-enabled mobile phones are usually used on a person-to-person basis.
Videoconferencing saw its earliest use with AT&T's Picturephone service in the early 1970s. Transmissions were analog over short distances, but converted to digital forms for longer calls, again using telephone transmission technology. Popular corporate video-conferencing systems in the present day have migrated almost exclusively to digital ISDN and IP transmission modes due to the need to convey the very large amounts of data generated by their cameras and microphones. These systems are often intended for use in conference mode, that is by many people in several different locations, all of whom can be viewed by every participant at each location.
Telepresence systems are a newer, more advanced subset of videoconferencing systems, meant to allow higher degrees of video and audio fidelity. Such high-end systems are typically deployed in corporate settings.
Mobile collaboration systems are another recent development, combining the use of video, audio, and on-screen drawing capabilities using newest generation hand-held electronic devices broadcasting over secure networks, enabling multi-party conferencing in real time, independent of location.
A more recent technology encompassing these functions is TV cams. TV cams enable people to make video "phone" calls using video calling services, like Skype on their TV, without using a PC connection. TV cams are specially designed video cameras that feed images in real time to another TV camera or other compatible computing devices like smartphones, tablets and computers.
"Webcams" are popular, relatively low cost devices which can provide live video and audio streams via personal computers, and can be used with many software clients for both video calls and videoconferencing.
Each of the systems has its own advantages and disadvantages, including video quality, capital cost, degrees of sophistication, transmission capacity requirements, and cost of use.
By cost and quality of service.
From the least to the most expensive systems:
Security concerns.
Computer security experts have shown that poorly configured or inadequately supervised videoconferencing system can permit an easy "virtual" entry by computer hackers and criminals into company premises and corporate boardrooms, via their own videoconferencing systems.
Adoption.
For over a century, futurists have envisioned a future where telephone conversations will take place as actual face-to-face encounters with video as well as audio. Sometimes it is simply not possible or practical to have face-to-face meetings with two or more people. Sometimes a telephone conversation or conference call is adequate. Other times, e-mail exchanges are adequate. However, videoconferencing adds another possible alternative, and can be considered when:
Bill Gates said in 2001 that he used video conferencing "three or four times a year", because digital scheduling was difficult and "if the overhead is super high, then you might as well just have a face-to-face meeting". Some observers argue that three outstanding issues have prevented videoconferencing from becoming a widely adopted form of communication, despite the ubiquity of videoconferencing-capable systems.
These are some of the reasons many systems are often used for internal corporate use only, as they are less likely to result in lost sales. One alternative to companies lacking dedicated facilities is the rental of videoconferencing-equipped meeting rooms in cities around the world. Clients can book rooms and turn up for the meeting, with all technical aspects being prearranged and support being readily available if needed. The issue of eye-contact may be solved with advancing technology, including smartphones which have the screen and camera in essentially the same place. The ubiquity of smartphones, tablet computers, and computers with built-in audio and webcams in developed countries obviates the need to buy expensive hardware.
Technology.
Components and types.
The core technology used in a videotelephony system is digital compression of audio and video streams in real time. The hardware or software that performs compression is called a codec (coder/decoder). Compression rates of up to 1:500 can be achieved. The resulting digital stream of 1s and 0s is subdivided into labeled packets, which are then transmitted through a digital network of some kind (usually ISDN or IP).
The other components required for a videoconferencing system include:
There are basically two kinds of videoconferencing and videophone systems:
Videoconferencing modes.
Videoconferencing systems use two methods to determine which video feed or feeds to display.
"Continuous Presence" simply displays all participants at the same time, usually with the exception that the viewer either does not see their own feed, or sees their own feed in miniature.
"Voice-Activated Switch" selectively chooses a feed to display at each endpoint, with the goal of showing the person who is currently speaking. This is done by choosing the feed (other than the viewer) which has the loudest audio input (perhaps with some filtering to avoid switching for very short-lived volume spikes). Often if no remote parties are currently speaking, the feed with the last speaker remains on the screen.
Echo cancellation.
Acoustic echo cancellation (AEC) is a processing algorithm that uses the knowledge of audio output to monitor audio input and filter from it noises that echo back after some time delay. If unattended, these echoes can be re-amplified several times, leading to problems including:
Echo cancellation is a processor-intensive task that usually works over a narrow range of sound delays.
Bandwidth requirements.
Videophones have historically employed a variety of transmission and reception bandwidths, which can be understood as data transmission speeds. The lower the transmission/reception bandwidth, the lower the data transfer rate, resulting in a progressively limited and poorer image quality (i.e. lower resolution and/or frame rate). Data transfer rates and live video image quality are related, but are also subject to other factors such as data compression techniques. Some early videophones employed very low data transmission rates with a resulting poor video quality.
"Broadband bandwidth" is often called "high-speed", because it usually has a high rate of data transmission. In general, any connection of 256 kbit/s (0.256 Mbit/s) or greater is more concisely considered broadband Internet. The International Telecommunication Union Telecommunication Standardization Sector (ITU-T) recommendation I.113 has defined broadband as a transmission capacity at 1.5 to 2Mbit/s. The Federal Communications Commission (United States) definition of broadband is 25 Mbit/s.
Currently, adequate video for some purposes becomes possible at data rates lower than the ITU-T broadband definition, with rates of 768 kbit/s and 384 kbit/s used for some video conferencing applications, and rates as low as 100 kbit/s used for videophones using H.264/MPEG-4 AVC compression protocols. The newer MPEG-4 video and audio compression format can deliver high-quality video at 2Mbit/s, which is at the low end of cable modem and ADSL broadband performance.
Standards.
The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) has three umbrellas of standards for videoconferencing:
The Unified Communications Interoperability Forum (UCIF), a non-profit alliance between communications vendors, launched in May 2010. The organization's vision is to maximize the interoperability of UC based on existing standards. Founding members of UCIF include HP, Microsoft, Polycom, Logitech/LifeSize Communications, and Juniper Networks.
Call setup.
Videoconferencing in the late 20th century was limited to the H.323 protocol (notably Cisco's SCCP implementation was an exception), but newer videophones often use SIP, which is often easier to set up in home networking environments. It is a text-based protocol, incorporating many elements of the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) and the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP). H.323 is still used, but more commonly for business videoconferencing, while SIP is more commonly used in personal consumer videophones. A number of call-setup methods based on instant messaging protocols such as Skype also now provide video.
Another protocol used by videophones is H.324, which mixes call setup and video compression. Videophones that work on regular phone lines typically use H.324, but the bandwidth is limited by the modem to around 33 kbit/s, limiting the video quality and frame rate. A slightly modified version of H.324 called 3G-324M defined by 3GPP is also used by some cellphones that allow video calls, typically for use only in UMTS networks.
There is also H.320 standard, which specified technical requirements for narrow-band visual telephone systems and terminal equipment, typically for videoconferencing and videophone services. It applied mostly to dedicated circuit-based switched network (point-to-point) connections of moderate or high bandwidth, such as through the medium-bandwidth ISDN digital phone protocol or a fractionated high bandwidth T1 lines. Modern products based on H.320 standard usually support also H.323 standard.
The IAX2 protocol also supports videophone calls natively, using the protocol's own capabilities to transport alternate media streams. A few hobbyists obtained the Nortel 1535 Color SIP Videophone cheaply in 2010 as surplus after Nortel's bankruptcy and deployed the sets on the Asterisk (PBX) platform. While additional software is required to patch together multiple video feeds for conference calls or convert between dissimilar video standards, SIP calls between two identical handsets within the same PBX were relatively straightforward.
Conferencing layers.
The components within a videoconferencing system can be divided up into several different layers: User Interface, Conference Control, Control or Signaling Plane, and Media Plane.
Videoconferencing User Interfaces (VUI) can be either graphical or voice-responsive. Many in the industry have encountered both types of interface, and normally a graphical interface is encountered on a computer. User interfaces for conferencing have a number of different uses; they can be used for scheduling, setup, and making a videocall. Through the user interface the administrator is able to control the other three layers of the system.
Conference Control performs resource allocation, management, and routing. This layer along with the User Interface creates meetings (scheduled or unscheduled) or adds and removes participants from a conference.
Control (Signaling) Plane contains the stacks that signal different endpoints to create a call and/or a conference. Signals can be, but aren't limited to, H.323 and Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) Protocols. These signals control incoming and outgoing connections as well as session parameters.
The Media Plane controls the audio and video mixing and streaming. This layer manages Real-Time Transport Protocols, User Datagram Packets (UDP) and Real-Time Transport Control Protocol (RTCP). The RTP and UDP normally carry information such the payload type which is the type of codec, frame rate, video size, and many others. RTCP on the other hand acts as a quality control Protocol for detecting errors during streaming.
Multipoint control.
Simultaneous videoconferencing among three or more remote points is possible in a hardware-based system by means of a Multipoint Control Unit (MCU). This is a bridge that interconnects calls from several sources (in a similar way to the audio conference call). All parties call the MCU, or the MCU can also call the parties which are going to participate, in sequence. There are MCU bridges for IP and ISDN-based videoconferencing. There are MCUs which are pure software, and others which are a combination of hardware and software. An MCU is characterised according to the number of simultaneous calls it can handle, its ability to conduct transposing of data rates and protocols, and features such as Continuous Presence, in which multiple parties can be seen on-screen at once. MCUs can be stand-alone hardware devices, or they can be embedded into dedicated videoconferencing units.
The MCU consists of two logical components:
The MC controls the conferencing while it is active on the signaling plane, which is simply where the system manages conferencing creation, endpoint signaling and in-conferencing controls. This component negotiates parameters with every endpoint in the network and controls conferencing resources.
While the MC controls resources and signaling negotiations, the MP operates on the media plane and receives media from each endpoint. The MP generates output streams from each endpoint and redirects the information to other endpoints in the conference.
Some systems are capable of multipoint conferencing with no MCU, stand-alone, embedded or otherwise. These use a standards-based H.323 technique known as "decentralized multipoint", where each station in a multipoint call exchanges video and audio directly with the other stations with no central "manager" or other bottleneck. The advantages of this technique are that the video and audio will generally be of higher quality because they don't have to be relayed through a central point. Also, users can make ad hoc multipoint calls without any concern for the availability or control of an MCU. This added convenience and quality comes at the expense of some increased network bandwidth, because every station must transmit to every other station directly.
Cloud storage.
Cloud-based video conferencing can be used without the hardware generally required by other video conferencing systems, and can be designed for use by SMEs, or larger international or multinational corporations like Facebook. Cloud-based systems can handle either 2D or 3D video broadcasting. Cloud-based systems can also implement mobile calls, VOIP, and other forms of video calling. They can also come with a video recording function to archive past meetings.
Impact.
High speed Internet connectivity has become more widely available at a reasonable cost and the cost of video capture and display technology has decreased. Consequently, personal videoconferencing systems based on a webcam, personal computer system, software compression, and broadband Internet connectivity have become progressively more affordable to the general public. Also, the hardware used for this technology has continued to improve in quality, and prices have dropped dramatically. The availability of freeware (often as part of chat programs) has made software based videoconferencing accessible to many.
The widest deployment of video telephony now occurs in mobile phones. Nearly all mobile phones supporting UMTS networks can work as videophones using their internal cameras and are able to make video calls wirelessly to other UMTS users in the same country or internationally. As of the second quarter of 2007, there are over 131 million UMTS users (and hence potential videophone users), on 134 networks in 59 countries. Mobile phones can also use broadband wireless Internet, whether through the cell phone network or over a local Wi-Fi connection, along with software-based videophone apps to make calls to any video-capable Internet user, whether mobile or fixed.
Deaf, hard-of-hearing, and mute individuals have a particular role in the development of affordable high-quality videotelephony as a means of communicating with each other in sign language. Unlike Video Relay Service, which is intended to support communication between a caller using sign language and another party using spoken language, videoconferencing can be used directly between two deaf signers.
Videophones are increasingly used in the provision of telemedicine to the elderly, disabled, and to those in remote locations, where the ease and convenience of quickly obtaining diagnostic and consultative medical services are readily apparent. In one single instance quoted in 2006: "A nurse-led clinic at Letham has received positive feedback on a trial of a video-link which allowed 60 pensioners to be assessed by medics without travelling to a doctor's office or medical clinic." A further improvement in telemedical services has been the development of new technology incorporated into special videophones to permit remote diagnostic services, such as blood sugar level, blood pressure, and vital signs monitoring. Such units are capable of relaying both regular audio-video plus medical data over either standard (POTS) telephone or newer broadband lines.
Videotelephony has also been deployed in corporate teleconferencing, also available through the use of public access videoconferencing rooms. A higher level of videoconferencing that employs advanced telecommunication technologies and high-resolution displays is called "telepresence".
Today the principles, if not the precise mechanisms, of a videophone are employed by many users worldwide in the form of webcam videocalls using personal computers, with inexpensive webcams, microphones, and free videocalling Web client programs. Thus an activity that was disappointing as a separate service has found a niche as a minor feature in software products intended for other purposes.
According to Juniper Research, smartphone videophone users will reach 29 million by 2015 globally.
A study conducted by Pew Research in 2010, revealed that 7% of Americans have made a mobile video call.
Government and law.
In the United States, videoconferencing has allowed testimony to be used for an individual who is unable or prefers not to attend the physical legal settings or would be subjected to severe psychological stress in doing so, however, there is a controversy on the use of testimony by foreign or unavailable witnesses via video transmission, regarding the violation of the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
In a military investigation in North Carolina, Afghan witnesses have testified via videoconferencing.
In Hall County, Georgia, videoconferencing systems are used for initial court appearances. The systems link jails with court rooms, reducing the expenses and security risks of transporting prisoners to the courtroom.
The U.S. Social Security Administration (SSA), which oversees the world's largest administrative judicial system under its Office of Disability Adjudication and Review (ODAR), has made extensive use of videoconferencing to conduct hearings at remote locations. In Fiscal Year (FY) 2009, the U.S. Social Security Administration (SSA) conducted 86,320 videoconferenced hearings, a 55% increase over FY 2008. In August 2010, the SSA opened its fifth and largest videoconferencing-only National Hearing Center (NHC), in St. Louis, Missouri. This continues the SSA's effort to use video hearings as a means to clear its substantial hearing backlog. Since 2007, the SSA has also established NHCs in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Baltimore, Maryland, Falls Church, Virginia, and Chicago.
Education.
Videoconferencing provides students with the opportunity to learn by participating in two-way communication forums. Furthermore, teachers and lecturers worldwide can be brought to remote or otherwise isolated educational facilities. Students from diverse communities and backgrounds can come together to learn about one another through practices known as telecollaboration(in foreign language education) and virtual exchange, although language barriers will continue to be present. Such students are able to explore, communicate, analyze, and share information and ideas with one another. Through videoconferencing, students can visit other parts of the world to speak with their peers, as well as visit museums and other cultural and educational facilities. Such virtual field trips can provide enriched learning opportunities to students, especially those in geographically isolated locations, and to the economically disadvantaged. Small schools can use these technologies to pool resources and provide courses, such as in foreign languages, which could not otherwise be offered.
A few examples of benefits that videoconferencing can provide in campus environments include:
Medicine and health.
Videoconferencing is a highly useful technology for real time telemedicine and telenursing applications, such as diagnosis, consulting, transmission of medical images, etc. With videoconferencing, patients may contact nurses and physicians in emergency or routine situations; physicians and other paramedical professionals can discuss cases across large distances. Rural areas can use this technology for diagnostic purposes, thus saving lives and making more efficient use of health care money. For example, a rural medical center in Ohio used videoconferencing to successfully cut the number of transfers of sick infants to a hospital away. This had previously cost nearly $10,000 per transfer.
Special peripherals such as microscopes fitted with digital cameras, videoendoscopes, medical ultrasound imaging devices, otoscopes, etc., can be used in conjunction with videoconferencing equipment to transmit data about a patient. Recent developments in mobile collaboration on hand-held mobile devices have also extended video-conferencing capabilities to locations previously unreachable, such as a remote community, long-term care facility, or a patient's home.
Business.
Videoconferencing can enable individuals in distant locations to participate in meetings on short notice, with time and money savings. Technology such as VoIP can be used in conjunction with desktop videoconferencing to enable low-cost face-to-face business meetings without leaving the desk, especially for businesses with widespread offices. The technology is also used for telecommuting, in which employees work from home. One research report based on a sampling of 1,800 corporate employees showed that, as of June 2010, 54% of the respondents with access to video conferencing used it "all of the time" or "frequently".
Intel Corporation have used videoconferencing to reduce both costs and environmental impacts of its business operations.
Videoconferencing is also currently being introduced on online networking websites, in order to help businesses form profitable relationships quickly and efficiently without leaving their place of work. This has been leveraged by banks to connect busy banking professionals with customers in various locations using video banking technology.
Videoconferencing on hand-held mobile devices (mobile collaboration technology) is being used in industries such as manufacturing, energy, healthcare, insurance, government, and public safety. Live, visual interaction removes traditional restrictions of distance and time, often in locations previously unreachable, such as a manufacturing plant floor thousands of miles away.
In the increasingly globalized film industry, videoconferencing has become useful as a method by which creative talent in many different locations can collaborate closely on the complex details of film production. For example, for the 2013 award-winning animated film "Frozen", Burbank-based Walt Disney Animation Studios hired the New York City-based husband-and-wife songwriting team of Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez to write the songs, which required two-hour-long transcontinental videoconferences nearly every weekday for about 14 months.
With the development of lower cost endpoints, cloud based infrastructure and technology trends such as WebRTC, Video Conferencing is moving from just a business-to-business offering, to a business-to-business and business-to-consumer offering.
Although videoconferencing has frequently proven its value, research has shown that some non-managerial employees prefer not to use it due to several factors, including anxiety. Some such anxieties can be avoided if managers use the technology as part of the normal course of business. Remote workers can also adopt certain behaviors and best practices to stay connected with their co-workers and company.
Researchers also find that attendees of business and medical videoconferences must work harder to interpret information delivered during a conference than they would if they attended face-to-face. They recommend that those coordinating videoconferences make adjustments to their conferencing procedures and equipment.
Press.
The concept of press videoconferencing was developed in October 2007 by the PanAfrican Press Association (APPA), a Paris France-based non-governmental organization, to allow African journalists to participate in international press conferences on developmental and good governance issues.
Press videoconferencing permits international press conferences via videoconferencing over the Internet. Journalists can participate on an international press conference from any location, without leaving their offices or countries. They need only be seated by a computer connected to the Internet in order to ask their questions.
In 2004, the International Monetary Fund introduced the Online Media Briefing Center, a password-protected site available only to professional journalists. The site enables the IMF to present press briefings globally and facilitates direct questions to briefers from the press. The site has been copied by other international organizations since its inception. More than 4,000 journalists worldwide are currently registered with the IMF.
Sign language.
One of the first demonstrations of the ability for telecommunications to help sign language users communicate with each other occurred when AT&T's videophone (trademarked as the "Picturephone") was introduced to the public at the 1964 New York World's Fair—two deaf users were able to communicate freely with each other between the fair and another city. Various universities and other organizations, including British Telecom's Martlesham facility, have also conducted extensive research on signing via videotelephony.
The use of sign language via videotelephony was hampered for many years due to the difficulty of its use over slow analogue copper phone lines, coupled with the high cost of better quality ISDN (data) phone lines. Those factors largely disappeared with the introduction of more efficient and powerful video codecs and the advent of lower cost high-speed ISDN data and IP (Internet) services in the 1990s.
21st-century improvements.
Significant improvements in video call quality of service for the deaf occurred in the United States in 2003 when Sorenson Media Inc. (formerly Sorenson Vision Inc.), a video compression software coding company, developed its VP-100 model stand-alone videophone specifically for the deaf community. It was designed to output its video to the user's television in order to lower the cost of acquisition, and to offer remote control and a powerful video compression codec for unequaled video quality and ease of use with video relay services. Favourable reviews quickly led to its popular usage at educational facilities for the deaf, and from there to the greater deaf community.
Coupled with similar high-quality videophones introduced by other electronics manufacturers, the availability of high speed Internet, and sponsored video relay services authorized by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission in 2002, VRS services for the deaf underwent rapid growth in that country.
Using such video equipment in the present day, the deaf, hard-of-hearing, and speech-impaired can communicate between themselves and with hearing individuals using sign language. The United States and several other countries compensate companies to provide "Video Relay Services" (VRS). Telecommunication equipment can be used to talk to others via a sign language interpreter, who uses a conventional telephone at the same time to communicate with the deaf person's party. Video equipment is also used to do on-site sign language translation via Video Remote Interpreting (VRI). The relatively low cost and widespread availability of 3G mobile phone technology with video calling capabilities have given deaf and speech-impaired users a greater ability to communicate with the same ease as others. Some wireless operators have even started free sign language gateways.
Sign language interpretation services via VRS or by VRI are useful in the present day where one of the parties is deaf, hard-of-hearing, or speech-impaired (mute). In such cases the interpretation flow is normally within the same principal language, such as French Sign Language (LSF) to spoken French, Spanish Sign Language (LSE) to spoken Spanish, British Sign Language (BSL) to spoken English, and American Sign Language (ASL) also to spoken English (since BSL and ASL are completely distinct from each other), German Sign Language (DGS) to spoken German, and so on.
Multilingual sign language interpreters, who can also translate as well across principal languages (such as a multilingual interpreter interpreting a call from a deaf person using ASL to reserve a hotel room at a hotel in the Dominican Republic whose staff speaks Spanish only, therefore the interpreter has to utilize ASL, spoken Spanish, and spoken English to facilitate the call for the deaf person), are also available, albeit less frequently. Such activities involve considerable mental processing efforts on the part of the translator, since sign languages are distinct natural languages with their own construction, semantics and syntax, different from the aural version of the same principal language.
With video interpreting, sign language interpreters work remotely with live video and audio feeds, so that the interpreter can see the deaf or mute party, and converse with the hearing party, and vice versa. Much like telephone interpreting, video interpreting can be used for situations in which no on-site interpreters are available. However, video interpreting cannot be used for situations in which all parties are speaking via telephone alone. VRS and VRI interpretation requires all parties to have the necessary equipment. Some advanced equipment enables interpreters to control the video camera remotely, in order to zoom in and out or to point the camera toward the party that is signing.
Descriptive names and terminology.
The name "videophone" never became as standardized as its earlier counterpart "telephone", resulting in a variety of names and terms being used worldwide, and even within the same region or country. Videophones are also known as "video phones", "videotelephones" (or "video telephones") and often by an early trademarked name "Picturephone", which was the world's first commercial videophone produced in volume. The compound name "videophone" slowly entered into general use after 1950,
although "video telephone" likely entered the lexicon earlier after "video" was coined in 1935.
"Videophone calls" (also: "videocalls", "video chat") as well as "Skype" and "Skyping" in verb form differ from videoconferencing in that they expect to serve individuals, not groups. However that distinction has become increasingly blurred with technology improvements such as increased bandwidth and sophisticated software clients that can allow for multiple parties on a call. In general everyday usage the term "videoconferencing" is now frequently used instead of "videocall" for point-to-point calls between two units. Both videophone calls and videoconferencing are also now commonly referred to as a "video link".
"Webcams" are popular, relatively low-cost devices which can provide live video and audio streams via personal computers, and can be used with many software clients for both video calls and videoconferencing.
A "videoconference system" is generally higher cost than a videophone and deploys greater capabilities. A "videoconference" (also known as a "videoteleconference") allows two or more locations to communicate via live, simultaneous two-way video and audio transmissions. This is often accomplished by the use of a multipoint control unit (a centralized distribution and call management system) or by a similar non-centralized multipoint capability embedded in each videoconferencing unit. Again, technology improvements have circumvented traditional definitions by allowing multiple party videoconferencing via web-based applications.
A "telepresence system" is a high-end videoconferencing system and service usually employed by enterprise-level corporate offices. Telepresence conference rooms use state-of-the art room designs, video cameras, displays, sound-systems and processors, coupled with high-to-very-high capacity bandwidth transmissions.
Typical use of the various technologies described above include calling or conferencing on a one-on-one, one-to-many or many-to-many basis for personal, business, educational, deaf Video Relay Service and tele-medical, diagnostic and rehabilitative use or services. New services utilizing videocalling and videoconferencing, such as teachers and psychologists conducting online sessions, personal videocalls to inmates incarcerated in penitentiaries, and videoconferencing to resolve airline engineering issues at maintenance facilities, are being created or evolving on an ongoing basis.
Other names for "videophone" that have been used in English are: "Viewphone" (the British Telecom equivalent to ), and "visiophone", a common French translation that has also crept into limited English usage, as well as over twenty less common names and expressions. Latin-based translations of "videophone" in other languages include "vidéophone" (French), "Bildtelefon" (German), "videotelefono" (Italian), both "videófono" and "videoteléfono" (Spanish), both "beeldtelefoon" and "videofoon" (Dutch), and "videofonía" (Catalan).
A "telepresence robot" (also telerobotics) is a robotically controlled and motorized video conferencing display to help give a better sense of remote physical presence for communication and collaboration in an office, home, school, etc. when one cannot be there in person. The robotic avatar device can move about and look around at the command of the remote person it represents.
Popular culture.
In science fiction literature, names commonly associated with videophones include "telephonoscope", "telephote", "viewphone", "vidphone", "vidfone", and "visiphone". The first example was probably the cartoon "Edison's Telephonoscope" by George du Maurier in "Punch" 1878. In «In the year 2889», published 1889, the French author Jules Verne predicts that «"The transmission of speech is an old story; the transmission of images by means of sensitive mirrors connected by wires is a thing but of yesterday."» In many science fiction movies and TV programs that are set in the future, videophones were used as a primary method of communication. One of the first movies where a videophone was used was Fritz Lang's "Metropolis" (1927).
Other notable examples of videophones in popular culture include an iconic scene from the 1968 film set on Space Station V. The movie was released shortly before AT&T began its efforts to commercialize its Picturephone Mod II service in several cities and depicts a video call to Earth using an advanced AT&T videophone—which it predicts will cost $1.70 for a two-minute call in 2001 (a fraction of the company's real rates on Earth in 1968). Film director Stanley Kubrick strove for scientific accuracy, relying on interviews with scientists and engineers at Bell Labs in the United States. Dr. Larry Rabiner of Bell Labs, discussing videophone research in the documentary "2001: The Making of a Myth", stated that in the mid-to late-1960s videophones "...captured the imagination of the public and... of Mr. Kubrick and the people who reported to him". In one "2001" movie scene a central character, Dr. Heywood Floyd, calls home to contact his family, a social feature noted in the "Making of a Myth". Floyd talks with and views his daughter from a space station in orbit above the Earth, discussing what type of present he should bring home for her.
A portable videophone is also featured prominently in the 2009 science fiction movie "Moon", where the story's protagonist, Sam Bell, also calls home as well to communicate with loved ones. Bell, the lone occupant of a mining station on the far side of the Earth's moon, finally succeeds in making his video call after an extended work period, but becomes traumatized when viewing his daughter.
Other earlier examples of videophones in popular culture included a videophone that was featured in the Warner Bros. cartoon, "Plane Daffy", in which the female spy Hatta Mari used a videophone to communicate with Adolf Hitler (1944), as well as a device with the same functionality has been used by the comic strip character "Dick Tracy", who often used his "2-way wrist TV" to communicate with police headquarters. (1964–1977).
By the early 2010s videotelephony and videophones had become commonplace and unremarkable in various forms of media, in part due to their real and ubiquitous presence in common electronic devices and laptop computers. Additionally, TV programming increasingly utilized videophones to interview subjects of interest and to present live coverage by news correspondents, via the Internet or by satellite links. In the mass market media, the popular U.S. TV talk show hostess Oprah Winfrey incorporated videotelephony into her TV program on a regular basis from May 21, 2009, with an initial episode called "Where the Skype Are You?", as part of a marketing agreement with the Internet telecommunication company Skype.
Additionally, videophones have been featured in: |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Cyborg
A cyborg ()—a portmanteau of cybernetic" and organism"—is a being with both organic and biomechatronic body parts. The term was coined in 1960 by Manfred Clynes and Nathan S. Kline.
Definition and distinctions.
"Cyborg" is not the same thing as bionic, biorobot, or android; it applies to an organism that has restored function or enhanced abilities due to the integration of some artificial component or technology that relies on some sort of feedback. While cyborgs are commonly thought of as mammals, including humans, they might also conceivably be any kind of organism.
D. S. Halacy's "Cyborg: Evolution of the Superman" (1965) featured an introduction which spoke of a "new frontier" that was "not merely space, but more profoundly the relationship between 'inner space' to 'outer space' – a bridge...between mind and matter."
Biosocial definition.
According to some definitions of the term, the physical attachments that humans have with even the most basic technologies have already made them cyborgs. In a typical example, a human with an artificial cardiac pacemaker or implantable cardioverter-defibrillator would be considered a cyborg, since these devices measure voltage potentials in the body, perform signal processing, and can deliver electrical stimuli, using this synthetic feedback mechanism to keep that person alive. Implants, especially cochlear implants, that combine mechanical modification with any kind of feedback response are also cyborg enhancements. Some theorists cite such modifications as contact lenses, hearing aids, smartphones, or intraocular lenses as examples of fitting humans with technology to enhance their biological capabilities.
As cyborgs currently are on the rise, some theorists argue there is a need to develop new definitions of aging. (For instance, a bio-techno-social definition of "aging" has been suggested.)
The term is also used to address human-technology mixtures in the abstract. This includes not only commonly-used pieces of technology such as phones, computers, the Internet, and so on, but also artifacts that may not popularly be considered technology; for example, pen and paper, and speech and language. When augmented with these technologies and connected in communication with people in other times and places, a person becomes capable of much more than they were before. An example is a computer, which gains power by using Internet protocols to connect with other computers. Another example are social-media bots—either bot-assisted humans or human-assisted-bots—used to target social media with likes and shares. Cybernetic technologies include highways, pipes, electrical wiring, buildings, electrical plants, libraries, and other infrastructure that people hardly notice, but which are critical parts of the cybernetics that humans work within.
Bruce Sterling, in his Shaper/Mechanist universe, suggested an idea of an alternative cyborg called 'Lobster', which is made not by using internal implants, but by using an external shell (e.g. a powered exoskeleton). Unlike human cyborgs, who appear human externally but are synthetic internally (e.g., the Bishop type in the "Alien" franchise), Lobster looks inhuman externally but contains a human internally (such as in "Elysium" and "RoboCop"). The computer game "" prominently featured cyborgs called Omar, which is a Russian translation of the word 'Lobster' (as the Omar are of Russian origin in the game).
Visual appearance of fictional cyborgs.
In science fiction, the most stereotypical portrayal of a cyborg is a person (or, more rarely, an animal) with visible added mechanical parts. These include superhero Cyborg (DC Comics) and the Borg ("Star Trek").
However, cyborgs can also be portrayed as looking more robotic or more organic. They may appear as humanoid robots, such as Robotman (from DC's "Doom Patrol") or most varieties of the Cybermen ("Doctor Who"); they can appear as non-humanoid robots such as the Daleks (again, from "Doctor Who") or like the majority of the motorball players in "Battle Angel Alita".
More human-appearing cyborgs may cover up their mechanical parts with armor or clothing, such as Darth Vader ("Star Wars") or Misty Knight (Marvel Comics). Cyborgs may have mechanical parts or bodies that appear human. For example, the eponymous Six Million Dollar Man and the Bionic Woman (from their respective television series) have prostheses externally identical to the body parts that they replace; while Motoko Kusanagi ("Ghost in the Shell") is a full-body cyborg whose body appears human. In these examples, among others, it is common for cyborgs to have superhuman (physical or mental) abilities, including great strength, enhanced senses, computer-assisted brains, or built-in weaponry.
Origins.
The concept of a man-machine mixture was widespread in science fiction before World War II. As early as 1843, Edgar Allan Poe described a man with extensive prostheses in the short story "The Man That Was Used Up". In 1911, Jean de La Hire introduced the Nyctalope, a science fiction hero who was perhaps the first literary cyborg, in "Le Mystère des XV" (later translated as "The Nyctalope on Mars"). Nearly two decades later, Edmond Hamilton presented space explorers with a mixture of organic and machine parts in his 1928 novel "The Comet Doom". He later featured the talking, living brain of an old scientist, Simon Wright, floating around in a transparent case, in all the adventures of his famous hero, Captain Future. In 1944, in the short story "No Woman Born", C. L. Moore wrote of Deirdre, a dancer, whose body was burned completely and whose brain was placed in a faceless but beautiful and supple mechanical body.
In 1960, the term "cyborg" was coined by Manfred E. Clynes and Nathan S. Kline to refer to their conception of an enhanced human being who could survive in extraterrestrial environments:
Their concept was the outcome of thinking about the need for an intimate relationship between human and machine as the new frontier of space exploration was beginning to open up. A designer of physiological instrumentation and electronic data-processing systems, Clynes was the chief research scientist in the Dynamic Simulation Laboratory at Rockland State Hospital in New York.
The term first appears in print 5 months earlier when "The New York Times" reported on the "Psychophysiological Aspects of Space Flight Symposium" where Clynes and Kline first presented their paper:
Thereafter, Hamilton would first use the term "cyborg" explicitly in the 1962 short story, "After a Judgment Day", to describe the "mechanical analogs" called "Charlies," explaining that "[c]yborgs, they had been called from the first one in the 1960s...cybernetic organisms."
In 2001, a book titled "Cyborg: Digital Destiny and Human Possibility in the Age of the Wearable Computer" was published by Doubleday. Some of the ideas in the book were incorporated into the 35-mm motion picture film "Cyberman" that same year.
Cyborg tissues in engineering.
Cyborg tissues structured with carbon nanotubes and plant or fungal cells have been used in artificial tissue engineering to produce new materials for mechanical and electrical uses.
Such work was presented by Raffaele Di Giacomo, Bruno Maresca, and others, at the Materials Research Society's spring conference on 3 April 2013. The cyborg obtained was inexpensive, light and had unique mechanical properties. It could also be shaped in the desired forms. Cells combined with multi-walled nanotubes (MWCNTs) co-precipitated as a specific aggregate of cells and nanotubes that formed a viscous material. Likewise, dried cells still acted as a stable matrix for the MWCNT network. When observed by optical microscopy, the material resembled an artificial "tissue" composed of highly packed cells. The effect of cell drying was manifested by their "ghost cell" appearance. A rather specific physical interaction between MWCNTs and cells was observed by electron microscopy, suggesting that the cell wall (the most outer part of fungal and plant cells) may play a major active role in establishing a carbon nanotube's network and its stabilization. This novel material can be used in a wide range of electronic applications, from heating to sensing. For instance, using Candida albicans cells cyborg tissue materials with temperature sensing properties have been reported.
Actual cyborgization attempts.
In current prosthetic applications, the C-Leg system developed by Otto Bock HealthCare is used to replace a human leg that has been amputated because of injury or illness. The use of sensors in the artificial C-Leg aids in walking significantly by attempting to replicate the user's natural gait, as it would be prior to amputation. Prostheses like the C-Leg and the more advanced iLimb are considered by some to be the first real steps towards the next generation of real-world cyborg applications. Additionally cochlear implants and magnetic implants which provide people with a sense that they would not otherwise have had can additionally be thought of as creating cyborgs.
In vision science, direct brain implants have been used to treat non-congenital (acquired) blindness. One of the first scientists to come up with a working brain interface to restore sight was a private researcher William Dobelle.
Dobelle's first prototype was implanted into "Jerry", a man blinded in adulthood, in 1978. A single-array BCI containing 68 electrodes was implanted onto Jerry's visual cortex and succeeded in producing phosphenes, the sensation of seeing light. The system included cameras mounted on glasses to send signals to the implant. Initially, the implant allowed Jerry to see shades of grey in a limited field of vision at a low frame-rate. This also required him to be hooked up to a two-ton mainframe, but shrinking electronics and faster computers made his artificial eye more portable and now enable him to perform simple tasks unassisted.
In 1997, Philip Kennedy, a scientist and physician, created the world's first human cyborg from Johnny Ray, a Vietnam veteran who suffered a stroke. Ray's body, as doctors called it, was "locked in". Ray wanted his old life back so he agreed to Kennedy's experiment. Kennedy embedded an implant he designed (and named "neurotrophic electrode") near the part of Ray's brain so that Ray would be able to have some movement back in his body. The surgery went successfully, but in 2002, Johnny Ray died.
In 2002, Canadian Jens Naumann, also blinded in adulthood, became the first in a series of 16 paying patients to receive Dobelle's second-generation implant, marking one of the earliest commercial uses of BCIs. The second-generation device used a more sophisticated implant enabling better mapping of phosphenes into a coherent vision. Phosphenes are spread out across the visual field in what researchers call the starry-night effect. Immediately after his implant, Naumann was able to use his imperfectly restored vision to drive slowly around the parking area of the research institute.
In contrast to replacement technologies, in 2002, under the heading Project Cyborg, a British scientist, Kevin Warwick, had an array of 100 electrodes fired into his nervous system in order to link his nervous system into the internet to investigate enhancement possibilities. With this in place, Warwick successfully carried out a series of experiments including extending his nervous system over the internet to control a robotic hand, also receiving feedback from the fingertips in order to control the hand's grip. This was a form of extended sensory input. Subsequently, he investigated ultrasonic input in order to remotely detect the distance to objects. Finally, with electrodes also implanted into his wife's nervous system, they conducted the first direct electronic communication experiment between the nervous systems of two humans.<ref name="doi10.1001/archneur.60.10.1369|noedit"></ref>
Since 2004, British artist Neil Harbisson has had a cyborg antenna implanted in his head that allows him to extend his perception of colors beyond the human visual spectrum through vibrations in his skull. His antenna was included within his 2004 passport photograph which has been claimed to confirm his cyborg status. In 2012 at TEDGlobal, Harbisson explained that he started to feel cyborg when he noticed that the software and his brain had united and given him an extra sense. Neil Harbisson is a co-founder of the Cyborg Foundation (2004) and cofounded the Transpecies Society in 2017, which is an association that empowers the individuals with non-human identities and supports them in their decisions to develop unique senses and new organs. Neil Harbisson is a global advocate for the rights of cyborgs.
Rob Spence, a Toronto-based film-maker, who titles himself a real-life "Eyeborg," severely damaged his right eye in a shooting accident on his grandfather's farm as a child.
Many years later, in 2005, he decided to have his ever-deteriorating and now technically blind eye surgically removed, whereafter he wore an eye patch for some time before he later, after having played for some time with the idea of installing a camera instead, contacted professor Steve Mann at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, an expert in wearable computing and cyborg technology.
Under Mann's guidance, Spence, at age 36, created a prototype in the form of the miniature camera which could be fitted inside his prosthetic eye; an invention would come to be named by Time magazine as one of the best inventions of 2009. The bionic eye records everything he sees and contains a 1.5 mm-square, low-resolution video camera, a small round printed circuit board, a wireless video transmitter, which allows him to transmit what he is seeing in real-time to a computer, and a 3-voltage rechargeable Varta microbattery. The eye is not connected to his brain and has not restored his sense of vision. Additionally, Spence has also installed a laser-like LED light in one version of the prototype.
Furthermore, many cyborgs with multifunctional microchips injected into their hand are known to exist. With the chips they are able to swipe cards, open or unlock doors, operate devices such as printers or, with some using a cryptocurrency, buy products, such as drinks, with a wave of the hand.
bodyNET.
bodyNET is an application of human-electronic interaction currently in development by researchers from Stanford University. The technology is based on stretchable semiconductor materials (Elastronic). According to their article in "Nature", the technology is composed of smart devices, screens, and a network of sensors that can be implanted into the body, woven into the skin or worn as clothes. It has been suggested, that this platform can potentially replace the smartphone in the future.
Animal cyborgs.
The US-based company Backyard Brains released what they refer to as the "world's first commercially available cyborg" called the RoboRoach. The project started as a senior design project for a University of Michigan biomedical engineering student in 2010, and was launched as an available beta product on 25 February 2011.
The RoboRoach was officially released into production via a TED talk at the TED Global conference; and via the crowdsourcing website Kickstarter in 2013, the kit allows students to use microstimulation to momentarily control the movements of a walking cockroach (left and right) using a bluetooth-enabled smartphone as the controller.
Other groups have developed cyborg insects, including researchers at North Carolina State University, UC Berkeley, and Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, but the RoboRoach was the first kit available to the general public and was funded by the National Institute of Mental Health as a device to serve as a teaching aid to promote an interest in neuroscience. Several animal welfare organizations including the RSPCA and PETA have expressed concerns about the ethics and welfare of animals in this project.
In the late 2010s, scientists created cyborg jellyfish using a microelectronic prosthetic that propels the animal to swim almost three times faster while using just twice the metabolic energy of their unmodified peers. The prosthetics can be removed without harming the jellyfish.
Practical applications.
In medicine.
In medicine, there are two important and different types of cyborgs: the restorative and the enhanced. Restorative technologies "restore lost function, organs, and limbs." The key aspect of restorative cyborgization is the repair of broken or missing processes to revert to a healthy or average level of function. There is no enhancement to the original faculties and processes that were lost.
On the contrary, the enhanced cyborg "follows a principle, and it is the principle of optimal performance: maximising output (the information or modifications obtained) and minimising input (the energy expended in the process)". Thus, the enhanced cyborg intends to exceed normal processes or even gain new functions that were not originally present.
Although prostheses in general supplement lost or damaged body parts with the integration of a mechanical artifice, bionic implants in medicine allow model organs or body parts to mimic the original function more closely. Michael Chorost wrote a memoir of his experience with cochlear implants, or bionic ear, titled "Rebuilt: How Becoming Part Computer Made Me More Human". Jesse Sullivan became one of the first people to operate a fully robotic limb through a nerve-muscle graft, enabling him a complex range of motions beyond that of previous prosthetics. By 2004, a fully functioning artificial heart was developed. The continued technological development of bionic and nanotechnologies begins to raise the question of enhancement, and of the future possibilities for cyborgs which surpass the original functionality of the biological model. The ethics and desirability of "enhancement prosthetics" have been debated; their proponents include the transhumanist movement, with its belief that new technologies can assist the human race in developing beyond its present, normative limitations such as aging and disease, as well as other, more general incapacities, such as limitations on speed, strength, endurance, and intelligence. Opponents of the concept describe what they believe to be biased which propel the development and acceptance of such technologies; namely, a bias towards functionality and efficiency that may compel assent to a view of human people which de-emphasizes as defining characteristics actual manifestations of humanity and personhood, in favor of definition in terms of upgrades, versions, and utility.
A brain-computer interface, or BCI, provides a direct path of communication from the brain to an external device, effectively creating a cyborg. Research of Invasive BCIs, which utilize electrodes implanted directly into the grey matter of the brain, has focused on restoring damaged eyesight in the blind and providing functionality to paralyzed people, most notably those with severe cases, such as Locked-In syndrome. This technology could enable people who are missing a limb or are in a wheelchair the power to control the devices that aid them through neural signals sent from the brain implants directly to computers or the devices. It is possible that this technology will also eventually be used with healthy people.
Deep brain stimulation is a neurological surgical procedure used for therapeutic purposes. This process has aided in treating patients diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease, Tourette syndrome, epilepsy, chronic headaches, and mental disorders. After the patient is unconscious, through anesthesia, brain pacemakers or electrodes, are implanted into the region of the brain where the cause of the disease is present. The region of the brain is then stimulated by bursts of electric current to disrupt the oncoming surge of seizures. Like all invasive procedures, deep brain stimulation may put the patient at a higher risk. However, there have been more improvements in recent years with deep brain stimulation than any available drug treatment.
Retinal implants are another form of cyborgization in medicine. The theory behind retinal stimulation to restore vision to people suffering from retinitis pigmentosa and vision loss due to aging (conditions in which people have an abnormally low number of ganglion cells) is that the retinal implant and electrical stimulation would act as a substitute for the missing ganglion cells (cells which connect the eye to the brain.)
While work to perfect this technology is still being done, there have already been major advances in the use of electronic stimulation of the retina to allow the eye to sense patterns of light. A specialized camera is worn by the subject, such as on the frames of their glasses, which converts the image into a pattern of electrical stimulation. A chip located in the user's eye would then electrically stimulate the retina with this pattern by exciting certain nerve endings which transmit the image to the optic centers of the brain and the image would then appear to the user. If technological advances proceed as planned this technology may be used by thousands of blind people and restore vision to most of them.
A similar process has been created to aid people who have lost their vocal cords. This experimental device would do away with previously used robotic-sounding voice simulators. The transmission of sound would start with a surgery to redirect the nerve that controls the voice and sound production to a muscle in the neck, where a nearby sensor would be able to pick up its electrical signals. The signals would then move to a processor which would control the timing and pitch of a voice simulator. That simulator would then vibrate producing a multi-tonal sound that could be shaped into words by the mouth.
An article published in "Nature Materials" in 2012 reported a research on "cyborg tissues" (engineered human tissues with embedded three-dimensional mesh of nanoscale wires), with possible medical implications.
In 2014, researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign and Washington University in St. Louis had developed a device that could keep a heart beating endlessly. By using 3D printing and computer modeling these scientists developed an electronic membrane that could successfully replace pacemakers. The device utilizes a "spider-web like network of sensors and electrodes" to monitor and maintain a normal heart rate with electrical stimuli. Unlike traditional pacemakers that are similar from patient to patient, the elastic heart glove is made custom by using high-resolution imaging technology. The first prototype was created to fit a rabbit's heart, operating the organ in an oxygen and nutrient-rich solution. The stretchable material and circuits of the apparatus were first constructed by Professor John A. Rogers in which the electrodes are arranged in an s-shape design to allow them to expand and bend without breaking. Although the device is only currently used as a research tool to study changes in heart rate, in the future the membrane may serve as a safeguard from heart attacks.
The Artificial Pancreas is a substitute for lack of endogenous insulin production, most notably in Type 1 Diabetes. Currently available systems combine a Continuous glucose monitor with an Insulin pump that can be remote controlled, forming a control loop that automatically adjusts the insulin dosage depending on the current blood glucose level. Examples of commercial systems that implement such a control loop are the MiniMed 670g from Medtronic and the t:slim x2 from Tandem Diabetes Care. Do-it-yourself artificial pancreas technologies also exist, though these are not verified or approved by any regulatory agency. Upcoming next-generation artificial pancreas technologies include automatic glucagon infusion in addition to insulin, to help prevent hypoglycemia and improve efficiency. One example of such a bi-hormonal system is the Beta Bionics iLet.
In the military.
Military organizations' research has recently focused on the utilization of cyborg animals for the purposes of a supposed tactical advantage. DARPA has announced its interest in developing "cyborg insects" to transmit data from sensors implanted into the insect during the pupa stage. The insect's motion would be controlled from a microelectromechanical system (MEMS) and could conceivably survey an environment or detect explosives and gas. Similarly, DARPA is developing a neural implant to remotely control the movement of sharks. The shark's unique senses would then be exploited to provide data feedback in relation to enemy ship movement or underwater explosives.
In 2006, researchers at Cornell University invented a new surgical procedure to implant artificial structures into insects during their metamorphic development. The first insect cyborgs, moths with integrated electronics in their thorax, were demonstrated by the same researchers. The initial success of the techniques has resulted in increased research and the creation of a program called Hybrid-Insect-MEMS (HI-MEMS). Its goal, according to DARPA's Microsystems Technology Office, is to develop "tightly coupled machine-insect interfaces by placing micro-mechanical systems inside the insects during the early stages of metamorphosis."
The use of neural implants has recently been attempted, with success, on cockroaches. Surgically applied electrodes were put on the insect, which was remotely controlled by a human. The results, although sometimes different, basically showed that the cockroach could be controlled by the impulses it received through the electrodes. DARPA is now funding this research because of its obvious beneficial applications to the military and other areas
In 2009 at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) MEMS conference in Italy, researchers demonstrated the first "wireless" flying-beetle cyborg. Engineers at the University of California, Berkeley, have pioneered the design of a "remote-controlled beetle", funded by the DARPA HI-MEMS Program. This was followed later that year by the demonstration of wireless control of a "lift-assisted" moth-cyborg.
Eventually researchers plan to develop HI-MEMS for dragonflies, bees, rats, and pigeons. For the HI-MEMS cybernetic bug to be considered a success, it must fly from a starting point, guided via computer into a controlled landing within of a specific end point. Once landed, the cybernetic bug must remain in place.
In 2020, an article published in "Science Robotics" by researchers at the University of Washington reported a mechanically steerable wireless camera attached to beetles. Miniature cameras weighing 248 mg were attached to live beetles of the Tenebrionid genera "Asbolus" and "Eleodes". The camera wirelessly streamed video to a smartphone via Bluetooth for up to 6 hours and the user could remotely steer the camera to achieve a bug's-eye view.
In sports.
In 2016, Cybathlon became the first cyborg 'Olympics'; celebrated in Zurich, Switzerland, it was the first worldwide and official celebration of cyborg sports. In this event, 16 teams of people with disabilities used technological developments to turn themselves into cyborg athletes. There were 6 different events and its competitors used and controlled advanced technologies such as powered prosthetic legs and arms, robotic exoskeletons, bikes, and motorized wheelchairs.
This was already a remarkable improvement, as it allowed disabled people to compete and showed the several technological enhancements that are already making a difference; however, it showed that there is still a long way to go. For instance, the exoskeleton race still required its participants to stand up from a chair and sit down, navigate a slalom and other simple activities such as walking over stepping stones and climbing up and down stairs. Despite the simplicity of these activities, 8 of the 16 teams that participated in the event drop off before the start.
Nonetheless, one of the main goals of this event and such simple activities is to show how technological enhancements and advanced prosthetics can make a difference in people's lives. The next Cybathlon that was expected to occur in 2020, was cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic.
In art.
The concept of the cyborg is often associated with science fiction. However, many artists have tried to create public awareness of cybernetic organisms; these can range from paintings to installations. Some artists who create such works are Neil Harbisson, Moon Ribas, Patricia Piccinini, Steve Mann, Orlan, H. R. Giger, Lee Bul, Wafaa Bilal, Tim Hawkinson, and Stelarc.
Stelarc is a performance artist who has visually probed and acoustically amplified his body. He uses medical instruments, prosthetics, robotics, virtual reality systems, the Internet and biotechnology to explore alternate, intimate and involuntary interfaces with the body. He has made three films of the inside of his body and has performed with a third hand and a virtual arm. Between 1976 and 1988 he completed 25 body suspension performances with hooks into the skin. For 'Third Ear', he surgically constructed an extra ear within his arm that was internet-enabled, making it a publicly accessible acoustical organ for people in other places. He is presently performing as his avatar from his second life site.
Tim Hawkinson promotes the idea that bodies and machines are coming together as one, where human features are combined with technology to create the Cyborg. Hawkinson's piece "Emoter" presented how society is now dependent on technology.
Wafaa Bilal is an Iraqi-American performance artist who had a small 10-megapixel digital camera surgically implanted into the back of his head, part of a project entitled 3rd I. For one year, beginning 15 December 2010, an image is captured once per minute 24 hours a day and streamed live to and the Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art. The site also displays Bilal's location via GPS. Bilal says that the reason why he put the camera in the back of the head was to make an "allegorical statement about the things we don't see and leave behind." As a professor at NYU, this project has raised privacy issues, and so Bilal has been asked to ensure that his camera does not take photographs in NYU buildings.
Machines are becoming more ubiquitous in the artistic process itself, with computerized drawing pads replacing pen and paper, and drum machines becoming nearly as popular as human drummers. Composers such as Brian Eno have developed and utilized software that can build entire musical scores from a few basic mathematical parameters.
Scott Draves is a generative artist whose work is explicitly described as a "cyborg mind". His Electric Sheep project generates abstract art by combining the work of many computers and people over the internet.
Artists as cyborgs.
Artists have explored the term "cyborg" from a perspective involving imagination. Some work to make an abstract idea of technological and human-bodily union apparent to reality in an art form utilizing varying mediums, from sculptures and drawings to digital renderings.
Artists who seek to make cyborg-based fantasies a reality often call themselves cyborg artists, or may consider their artwork "cyborg". How an artist or their work may be considered cyborg will vary depending upon the interpreter's flexibility with the term.
Scholars that rely upon a strict, technical description of a cyborg, often going by Norbert Wiener's cybernetic theory and Manfred E. Clynes and Nathan S. Kline's first use of the term, would likely argue that most cyborg artists do not qualify to be considered cyborgs. Scholars considering a more flexible description of cyborgs may argue it incorporates more than cybernetics. Others may speak of defining subcategories, or specialized cyborg types, that qualify different levels of cyborg at which technology influences an individual. This may range from technological instruments being external, temporary, and removable to being fully integrated and permanent. Nonetheless, cyborg artists are artists. Being so, it can be expected for them to incorporate the cyborg idea rather than a strict, technical representation of the term, seeing how their work will sometimes revolve around other purposes outside of cyborgism.
In body modification.
As medical technology becomes more advanced, some techniques and innovations are adopted by the body modification community. While not yet cyborgs in the strict definition of Manfred Clynes and Nathan Kline, technological developments like implantable silicon silk electronics, augmented reality and QR codes are bridging the disconnect between technology and the body. Hypothetical technologies such as digital tattoo interfaces would blend body modification aesthetics with interactivity and functionality, bringing a transhumanist way of life into present day reality.
In addition, it is quite plausible for anxiety expression to manifest. Individuals may experience pre-implantation feelings of fear and nervousness. To this end, individuals may also embody feelings of uneasiness, particularly in a socialized setting, due to their post-operative, technologically augmented bodies, and mutual unfamiliarity with the mechanical insertion. Anxieties may be linked to notions of otherness or a cyborged identity.
In space.
Sending humans to space is a dangerous task in which the implementation of various cyborg technologies could be used in the future for risk mitigation. Stephen Hawking, a renowned physicist, stated "Life on Earth is at the ever-increasing risk of being wiped out by a disaster such as sudden global warming, nuclear war... I think the human race has no future if it doesn't go into space." The difficulties associated with space travel could mean it might be centuries before humans ever become a multi-planet species. There are many effect of spaceflight on the human body. One major issue of space exploration is the biological need for oxygen. If this necessity was taken out of the equation, space exploration would be revolutionized. A theory proposed by Manfred E. Clynes and Nathan S. Kline is aimed at tackling this problem. The two scientists theorized that the use of an inverse fuel cell that is "capable of reducing CO2 to its components with the removal of the carbon and re-circulation of the oxygen..." could make breathing unnecessary. Another prominent issue is radiation exposure. Yearly, the average human on earth is exposed to approximately 0.30 rem of radiation, while an astronaut aboard the International Space Station for 90 days is exposed to 9 rem. To tackle the issue, Clynes and Kline theorized a cyborg containing a sensor that would detect radiation levels and a Rose osmotic pump "which would automatically inject protective pharmaceuticals in appropriate doses." Experiments injecting these protective pharmaceuticals into monkeys have shown positive results in increasing radiation resistance.
Although the effects of spaceflight on our bodies are an important issue, the advancement of propulsion technology is just as important. With our current technology, it would take us about 260 days to get to Mars. A study backed by NASA proposes an interesting way to tackle this issue through deep sleep, or torpor. With this technique, it would "reduce astronauts' metabolic functions with existing medical procedures." So far experiments have only resulted in patients being in torpor state for one week. Advancements to allow for longer states of deep sleep would lower the cost of the trip to Mars as a result of reduced astronaut resource consumption.
In cognitive science.
Theorists such as Andy Clark suggest that interactions between humans and technology result in the creation of a cyborg system. In this model, "cyborg" is defined as a part-biological, part-mechanical system that results in the augmentation of the biological component and the creation of a more complex whole. Clark argues that this broadened definition is necessary to an understanding of human cognition. He suggests that any tool which is used to offload part of a cognitive process may be considered the mechanical component of a cyborg system. Examples of this human and technology cyborg system can be very low tech and simplistic, such as using a calculator to perform basic mathematical operations or pen and paper to make notes, or as high tech as using a personal computer or phone. According to Clark, these interactions between a person and a form of technology integrate that technology into the cognitive process in a way that is analogous to the way that a technology that would fit the traditional concept of cyborg augmentation becomes integrated with its biological host. Because all humans in some way use technology to augment their cognitive processes, Clark comes to the conclusion that we are "natural-born cyborgs."
Future scope and regulation of implantable technologies.
Given the technical scope of current and future implantable sensory/telemetric devices, such devices will be greatly proliferated, and will have connections to commercial, medical, and governmental networks. For example, in the medical sector, patients will be able to log in to their home computer, and thus visit virtual doctor's offices, medical databases, and receive medical prognoses from the comfort of their own home from the data collected through their implanted telemetric devices. However, this online network presents huge security concerns because it has been proven by several U.S. universities that hackers could get onto these networks and shut down peoples' electronic prosthetics.
These sorts of technologies are already present in the U.S. workforce as a firm in River Falls, Wisconsin, called Three Square Market partnered with a Swedish firm Biohacks Technology to implant RFID microchips (which are about the size of a grain of rice) in the hands of its employees that allow employees to access offices, computers, and even vending machines. More than 50 of the firm's 85 employees were chipped. It was confirmed that the American Food and Drug Administration approved of these implantations. If these devices are to be proliferated within society, then the question that begs to be answered is what regulatory agency will oversee the operations, monitoring, and security of these devices? According to this case study of Three Square Market, it seems that the FDA is assuming a role in regulating and monitoring these devices. It has been argued that a new regulatory framework needs to be developed so that the law keeps up with developments in implantable technologies.
Cyborg Foundation.
In 2010, the Cyborg Foundation became the world's first international organization dedicated to help humans become cyborgs. The foundation was created by cyborg Neil Harbisson and Moon Ribas as a response to the growing number of letters and emails received from people around the world interested in becoming a cyborg. The foundation's main aims are to extend human senses and abilities by creating and applying cybernetic extensions to the body, to promote the use of cybernetics in cultural events and to defend cyborg rights. In 2010, the foundation, based in Mataró (Barcelona), was the overall winner of the Cre@tic Awards, organized by Tecnocampus Mataró.
In 2012, Spanish film director Rafel Duran Torrent, created a short film about the Cyborg Foundation. In 2013, the film won the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival's Focus Forward Filmmakers Competition and was awarded US$100,000.
In popular culture.
Cyborgs have become a well-known part of science fiction literature and other media. Although many of these characters may be technically androids, they are often referred to as cyborgs.
Perhaps the best known examples of cyborgs in popular culture are the Terminator and the Daleks and Cybermen from "Doctor Who." Other prominent cyborgs include RoboCop, Evangelion, United States Air Force Colonel Steve Austin in both the novel "Cyborg" and, as acted out by Lee Majors, "The Six Million Dollar Man," the Replicants from "Blade Runner", the Borg from "Star Trek", Darth Vader, Lobot, and General Grievous from "Star Wars", Inspector Gadget and the Cylons from the 2004 "Battlestar Galactica" series.
From American comic books are characters including Deathlok and Victor "Cyborg" Stone; and manga and anime characters including 8 Man (the inspiration for "RoboCop"), Kamen Rider, Rudol von Stroheim, and "Ghost in the Shell" 's Motoko Kusanagi.
Player characters such as Kano, Jax, Cyrax, and Sektor from the "Mortal Kombat" franchise, as well as Genji, an advanced cyborg ninja, who appears in "Overwatch" and "Heroes of the Storm", are examples of cyborgs in video games. The "Deus Ex" video game series deals extensively with the near-future rise of cyborgs and their corporate ownership, as does the "Syndicate" series.
William Gibson's "Neuromancer" features one of the first female cyborgs, a "Razorgirl" named Molly Millions, who has extensive cybernetic modifications and is one of the most prolific cyberpunk characters in the science fiction canon. The cyborg was also a central part of singer Janelle Monáe's 48-minute video corresponding with the release of her 2018 album "Dirty Computer." This "emotion picture" intertwined the relationship between human and technology, highlighting the power of the digital on a futuristic, dystopian society. Monáe has previously referred to herself as an android, depicting herself as a mechanical organism often conforming to idealistic standards, thus using the cyborg as a way to detach from these oppressive structures.
Further reading.
Reference entries |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Artificial gravity in fiction
Artificial gravity is a common theme in fiction, particularly science fiction.
Rotational gravity.
In the film "", and the same-named novel, a rotating centrifuge in the "Discovery" spacecraft provides artificial gravity. The people could walk, run, sit, or sleep along a curving "floor" that continually rotates inside the exterior shell of the spacecraft; the entry from the non-rotating part of the ship is through the centrifuge's central hub. To film the effect, a rotating circular set was used with the actors at the bottom; the set turned as the actors walked or jogged along the curved floor. One scene required one actor to be strapped in place while the set (and actor) rotated and the other actor walked towards him. The movie also features a large rotating space station; its full-scale interior set was a section of curved floor that did not rotate.
In ', the 1982 novel and second in a series of four by Arthur C. Clarke, the "Leonov" spacecraft does not have the "luxury" of gravity, yet in ', Peter Hyams' 1984 sci-fi film adaptation and sequel to "", Syd Mead's "Leonov" spacecraft design in the movie features centrifugal force artificial gravity very similar to the Europa One mission in "Europa Report", a 2013 science fiction film. In the "2010" movie, a Russian unmanned probe mysteriously disappears near the surface of Europa omitting the novel's premise of a space race to Jupiter with the joint Soviet-American mission following a faster Chinese ship, the "Tsien" that must land on Europa to refuel with water from the icy moon. The "Tsien" is ambushed and destroyed by an indigenous Europan life-form attracted to lights stranding the only survivor—also strikingly similar to events in "Europa Report".
Larry Niven's novel "Ringworld" featured a gigantic habitat encircling a star, which created artificial gravity through rotation. Niven also makes a reference to the Coriolis effect when the protagonists see what looks like a giant eye above the horizon. When they get closer, they realise that it is in fact a hurricane, but rotating about an axis parallel to the ground rather than perpendicular to it. Large hurricanes on Earth rotate the way they do due to the Coriolis effect. A number of early Known Space and Man-Kzin Wars stories also make use of rotational gravity, prior to the adoption of "gravity polarizer" technology which generates artificial gravity fields.
In the Gundam universe, gigantic space habitats similar to O'Neill cylinders, called Colonies, are an important aspect to the plot. They spin to generate artificial gravity. Some ships, such as the Argama or Archangel, have rotating sections inside in living areas.
In the anime "Cowboy Bebop", the Bebop possesses a ringed area that generates artificial gravity and is often seen being used (with the rest of the ship not rotating).
The book "Rendezvous with Rama" and the sequels featured an alien construct similar to an O'Neill habitat which was able to generate approximately 0.6 on the intentionally habitable ground section. The plot employed significant use of the difference in strength of artificial gravity as an object approaches the center of the rotating cylinder.
In the television series "Babylon 5", the Earth Alliance made extensive use of rotational gravity in its space stations and some larger military vessels, as well as civilian cruise ships. It has been suggested that the cruise ships would alter their rate of spin gradually en route to match the destination, helping to acclimate the passengers to the new gravity they would find upon arrival. Earlier Earth Force ships using straps and harnesses to hold crew in place, and the Minbari later share the secret of artificial gravity as part of the Interstellar Alliance.
In the stories based on Sid Meier's "Alpha Centauri", the Unity provided artificial gravity by spinning, though the game made allusions to less conventional technologies developed later on.
In John Varley's "Gaea" trilogy ("Titan", "Wizard", and "Demon"), the title world Gaea (one of a race of interstellar beings called "Titans"), being a living torus with a diameter of 1300 kilometers, spins at a rate of one revolution per sixty-one minutes, producing an apparent internal gravity of one-quarter on the floor of the torus. While the 3 values of diameter (1300 km), rotational period (61 minutes; the basis of all time measurements in the wheel, called simply a "Rev"), and apparent gravity ( ), are quoted consistently many times throughout all 3 novels, those 3 values are actually not mutually consistent. According to the standard formula for artificial gravity inside a spinning object (), an object with a rotational period () of 3660 seconds (61 minutes) and a radius () of 650,000 meters would create an acceleration () of 1.9156 m/sec2, which compared to standard earth gravity of 9.8 m/sec2, is 0.1955 , or slightly less than not the stated often in the novels.
In Iain M. Banks's Culture series, Orbitals are made ten million kilometres in circumference so that they spin with a rate that gives a natural day/night cycle while the center is in orbit around a star.
In the game "", the main location of the story is an artificial ringworld that creates artificial gravity by computer-controlled rotational spin (inspired by the aforementioned Larry Niven's novel "Ringworld" but also uses some form of field or other artificially generated gravity as it is stated in Halo: The Flood, the ring world does not spin nearly fast enough to create the amount of gravity it possesses. "Halo" (or "Installation 04") is approximately 10,000 km in diameter and is eventually destroyed by the same forces keeping it in operation. A fusion explosion weakens part of the ringworld, and centrifugal forces tear the ring apart.
In "The Martian" and the film of the same title, the "Hermes" spacecraft achieves artificial gravity by design; it employs a ringed structure, at whose periphery forces around 40% of Earth's gravity are experienced. Such artificial gravity is similar in strength to the gravity on Mars. At the center of the ringed structure, lack of gravity makes the astronauts practically weightless.
In the "Expanse" series by James S. A. Corey, space stations generate artificial gravity by rotating, as do spun-up, hollowed-out asteroids, usually at around 0.3 . Moving ships under constant thrust also simulate gravity by linear acceleration.
In the video game "", the various large space stations seen throughout the galaxy rotate in order to create artificial gravity for the people who live and work on them. One class of these stations is the Coriolis starport, in reference to the eponymous effect it uses to generate gravity.
In the movie "Interstellar (film)" co-produced by "Christopher Nolan", the "Endurance" space stations and capsules create artificial gravity by rotating at a certain rotational frequency to simulate gravity. At the outer ring of the structure, the gravity experienced is similar to that on Earth.
In the TV show Away (TV series), the spaceship shown in the movie has artificial gravity in the crew quarters, which are orbiting the main part of the ship which does not have artificial gravity.
Field generators.
In many science fiction stories, there are artificial gravity generators that create a gravitational field based on a mass that does not exist. It helps the story by creating a more Earth-like spaceship, and in the case of a movie or television program, it reduces production costs by eliminating the need for special effects to simulate weightlessness.
In the "Star Trek" universe, artificial gravity is achieved by the use of "gravity plating" embedded in a starship's deck.
In Gene Roddenberry's "Andromeda", set thousands of years in the future, gravity field generators not only provide gravity for the people inside the ship, but also reduce inertial mass of ships such as the "Andromeda Ascendant" to just under a kilogram. This greatly increases the efficiency of their Magneto-Plasma Dynamic Drive, allowing them to go from a stop to percentages of light speed very quickly. It can also be easily manipulated to do things like increase gravity and immobilize intruders (though prepared intruders can use an antigravity harness to prepare for this possibility), and reversed to expel things from the ship.
In the anime "Dragon Ball Z", gravity simulation plays a key part in various characters' training regime. It is also used to demonstrate the characters' increasing strength. For example, when Goku first arrives on King Kai's planet, he is nearly crushed by the gravity, which is ten times that of Earth's. By the end of his visit, nearly a year later, he is able to move at great speed under such conditions. This method of training gradually appears more and more in the universe, and the gravity gets stronger as well. Ten times Earth's gravity goes from a seemingly indomitable level of opposition to nothing, and several hundred times Earth's gravity becomes the standard. Vegeta even had a Gravity Room built into his house.
In the "Doctor Who" story "The Sontaran Experiment", a Sontaran used similar technology to make a bar above a human very heavy, so that his friends had to lift it up with as much force as they could to prevent him being crushed. The Sontaran gradually increased the bar's weight as part of an experiment to study not only their physical strength but also their loyalty, as their friend had recently attempted to betray them.
In the BioWare series "Mass Effect", the eponymous "mass effect" is responsible for the manipulation of gravity or kinetic forces (if the mass effect field is alternating), caused by subjecting a quantity of fictional "element zero" to an electric current. A negative current reduces the mass of anything within the field, a positive current increases mass, and an alternating current will create a barrier force of immense power that can shield or crush anything the force is directed at. Mass effect is used in faster than light travel, artificial gravity on spacecraft, weapon technology, kinetic barriers and shields, and much more. Individuals exposed to element zero are known as "biotics," the nodules of element zero embedded into their nervous systems allow them to use neural impulses to create mass effect fields themselves if the power of the element is amplified with a biotic amp, granting specific types of abilities such as certain types of telekinesis. An individual exposed to this "eezo" would often rather cause cancer.
In the video game "Dead Space", artificial gravity plates are used to simulate an Earth-like environment in outer space. In several levels, gravity plating is off and the player has to navigate in weightlessness using 'Zero-Gravity Boots', similar to magnetic boots. Defective gravity plates are also encountered sometimes, which push objects upward rather than downward with great force, killing the player or enemies instantly if they step on them.
In the 2014 film, "Guardians of the Galaxy", Peter Quill uses a device called a "Gravity Mine" which creates a powerful short-range artificial gravity field that attracts all nearby objects towards it. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Dyson tree
A Dyson tree is a hypothetical genetically engineered plant (perhaps resembling a tree) capable of growing inside a comet, suggested by the physicist Freeman Dyson. Plants may be able to produce a breathable atmosphere within the hollow spaces of the comet (or maybe even within the plants themselves), utilising solar energy for photosynthesis and cometary materials for nutrients, thus providing self-sustaining habitats for humanity in the outer solar system analogous to a greenhouse in space, a shell grown by a mollusc or the actions of thermogenic plants, such as the skunk cabbage or the voodoo lilly.
A Dyson tree might consist of a few main trunk structures growing out from a comet nucleus, branching into limbs and foliage that intertwine, forming a spherical structure possibly dozens of kilometers across.
Dyson trees in science fiction.
Dyson trees are mentioned a number of times in science fiction, beginning in the 1980s: |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Communalness
Communalness, as suggested by Robert A. Freitas Jr., is a level of an emergent phenomenon which originates from electronic sentience, and represents a broader mode of thinking than just normal consciousness. While consciousness is limited to the individual, communalness describes a complex organization of numerous individuals which on a higher level is tightly connected to each other. Such an organization would maybe have the same intimate awareness of its own existence as a whole as people have consciousness of their own bodies. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | List of religious ideas in science fiction
Science fiction will sometimes address the topic of religion. Often religious themes are used to convey a broader message, but others confront the subject head-on—contemplating, for example, how attitudes towards faith might shift in the wake of ever-advancing technological progress, or offering creative scientific explanations for the apparently mystical events related in religious texts (gods as aliens, prophets as time travelers, etc.). As an exploratory medium, science fiction rarely takes religion at face value by simply accepting or rejecting it; when religious themes are presented, they tend to be investigated deeply.
Some science fiction works portray invented religions, either placed into a contemporary Earth society (such as the Earthseed religion in Octavia Butler's "Parable of the Sower"), or in the far future (as seen in "Dune" by Frank Herbert, with its Orange Catholic Bible). Other works examine the role of existing religions in a futuristic or alternate society. The classic "A Canticle for Leibowitz" explores a world in which Catholicism is one of the few institutions to survive an apocalypse, and chronicles its slow re-achievement of prominence as civilisation returns.
Christian science fiction also exists, sometimes written as allegory for inspirational purposes.
Orson Scott Card has criticized the genre for oversimplifying religion, which he claims is always shown as "ridiculous and false".
Heaven and paradise.
"Elizabeth Shaw": Before that thing ripped your head off, what did he say, David?
"David (AI)": "Thing;" Dr. Shaw? Not too long ago, you considered them gods.
"Elizabeth Shaw": God never tried to kill me. So... what did he say? Where did he come from?
"David": There is no direct translation, but... Several of your ancient cultures had a word similar to it... "Paradise".
Theocracy.
Depictions of a fictional society dominated by a theocracy are a recurring theme in science fiction. Such depictions are mostly dystopian, in some cases humorous or satirical and rarely positive.
<ref>various warhammer 40k titles Black Library
https://www.blacklibrary.com/ |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Parallel universes in fiction
Parallel universe, also known as an alternate universe, or alternate reality, is a hypothetical self-contained plane of existence, co-existing with one's own. The sum of all potential parallel universes that constitute reality is often called a "multiverse".
While the three terms are generally synonymous and can be used interchangeably in most cases, there is sometimes an additional connotation implied with the term "alternate universe/reality" that implies that the reality is a variant of our own, with some overlap with the similarly-named alternate history. The term "parallel universe" is more general, without implying a relationship, or lack of relationship, with our own universe. A universe where the very laws of nature are different – for example, one in which there are no Laws of Motion – would in general count as a parallel universe but not an alternative reality and a concept between both fantasy world and Earth.
Overview.
Fiction has long borrowed an idea of "another world" from myth, legend and religion. Heaven, Hell, Olympus, and Valhalla as shown in vikings are all "alternative universes" different from the familiar material realm. Plato reflected deeply on the parallel realities, resulting in Platonism, in which the upper reality is perfect while the lower earthly reality is an imperfect shadow of the heavenly. The lower reality is similar but with flaws.
The concept is also found in ancient Hindu mythology, in texts such as the Puranas, which expressed an infinite number of universes, each with its own gods. Similarly in Persian literature, "The Adventures of Bulukiya", a tale in the "One Thousand and One Nights", describes the protagonist Bulukiya learning of alternative worlds/universes that are similar to but still distinct from his own.
One of the first science fiction examples is Murray Leinster's "Sidewise in Time", in which portions of alternative universes replace corresponding geographical regions in this universe. "Sidewise in Time" describes it in the manner that similar to requiring both longitude and latitude coordinates in order to mark your location on Earth, so too does time: traveling along latitude is akin to time travel moving through past, present and future, while traveling along longitude is to travel perpendicular to time and to other realities, hence the name of the short story. Thus, another common term for a parallel universe is "another dimension", stemming from the idea that if the 4th dimension is time, the 5th dimension - a direction at a right angle to the fourth - are alternate realities.
In modern literature, a parallel universe can be roughly divided into two categories: to allow for stories where elements that would ordinarily violate the laws of nature; and to serve as a starting point for speculative fiction, asking oneself "What if [event] turned out differently?". Examples of the former include Terry Pratchett's Discworld and C. S. Lewis's The Chronicles of Narnia, while examples of the latter include Harry Turtledove's Worldwar series.
A parallel universe—or more specifically, continued interaction between the parallel universe and our own—may serve as a central plot point, or it may simply be mentioned and quickly dismissed, having served its purpose of establishing a realm unconstrained by realism. The aforementioned Discworld, for example, only very rarely mentions our world or any other worlds, as setting the books on a parallel universe instead of "our" reality is to allow for magic on the Disc. The Chronicles of Narnia also utilizes this to a lesser extent - the idea of parallel universes is brought up but only briefly mentioned in the introduction and ending, its main purpose to bring the protagonist from "our" reality to the setting of the books.
Science fiction.
While technically incorrect, and looked down upon by hard science-fiction fans and authors, the idea of another "dimension" has become synonymous with the term "parallel universe". The usage is particularly common in movies, television and comic books and much less so in modern prose science fiction. The idea of a parallel world was first introduced in comic books with the publication of "The Flash" #123, "Flash of Two Worlds".
In written science fiction, "new dimension" more commonly – and more accurately – refer to additional coordinate axes, beyond the three spatial axes with which we are familiar. By proposing travel along these extra axes, which are not normally perceptible, the traveler can reach worlds that are otherwise unreachable and invisible.
In 1884, Edwin A. Abbott wrote the seminal novel exploring this concept called "Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions". It describes a world of two dimensions inhabited by living squares, triangles, and circles, called Flatland, as well as Pointland (0 dimensions), Lineland (1 dimension), and Spaceland (three dimensions) and finally posits the possibilities of even greater dimensions. Isaac Asimov, in his foreword to the Signet Classics 1984 edition, described "Flatland" as "The best introduction one can find into the manner of perceiving dimensions".
In 1895, "The Time Machine" by H. G. Wells used time as an additional "dimension" in this sense, taking the four-dimensional model of classical physics and interpreting time as a space-like dimension in which humans could travel with the right equipment. Wells also used the concept of parallel universes as a consequence of time as the fourth dimension in stories like "The Wonderful Visit" and "Men Like Gods", an idea proposed by the astronomer Simon Newcomb, who talked about both time and parallel universes; "Add a fourth dimension to space, and there is room for an indefinite number of universes, all alongside of each other, as there is for an indefinite number of sheets of paper when we pile them upon each other."
There are many examples where authors have explicitly created additional spatial dimensions for their characters to travel in, to reach parallel universes. In "Doctor Who", the Doctor accidentally enters a parallel universe while attempting to repair the TARDIS console in "Inferno". Douglas Adams, in the last book of the "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" series, "Mostly Harmless", uses the idea of probability as an extra axis in addition to the classical four dimensions of space and time similar to the many-worlds interpretation of quantum physics, although according to the novel they were more a model to capture the continuity of space, time and probability. Robert A. Heinlein, in "The Number of the Beast", postulated a six-dimensional universe. In addition to the three spatial dimensions, he invoked symmetry to add two new temporal dimensions, so there would be two sets of three. Like the fourth dimension of H. G. Wells' "Time Traveller", these extra dimensions can be traveled by persons using the right equipment.
Hyperspace.
Perhaps the most common use of the concept of a parallel universe in science fiction is the concept of hyperspace. Used in science fiction, the concept of "hyperspace" often refers to a parallel universe that can be used as a faster-than-light shortcut for interstellar travel. Rationales for this form of hyperspace vary from work to work, but the two common elements are:
Sometimes "hyperspace" is used to refer to the concept of additional coordinate axes. In this model, the universe is thought to be "crumpled" in some higher spatial dimension, and that traveling in this higher spatial dimension, a ship can move vast distances in the common spatial dimensions. An analogy is to crumple a newspaper into a ball and stick a needle straight through: the needle will make widely spaced holes in the two-dimensional surface of the paper. While this idea invokes a "new dimension", it is not an example of a parallel universe. It "is" a more scientifically plausible use of hyperspace. (See wormhole.)
While the use of hyperspace is common, it is mostly used as a plot device and thus of secondary importance. While a parallel universe may be invoked by the concept, the nature of the universe is not often explored. So, while stories involving hyperspace might be the most common use of the parallel universe concept in fiction, it is not the most common source of fiction "about" parallel universes.
Time travel and alternative history.
Technically, alternative histories as a result of time travel are not parallel universes: while multiple parallel universes can co-exist simultaneously, only one history or alternative history can exist at any one moment, as alternative history usually involves, in essence, overriding the original timeline with a new one. As a result, travel between alternative histories is not possible without reverting the timeline back to the original.
There are exceptions to the above, and an alternate history doesn't necessarily overwrite the old one. There are no rules written in stone regarding this. Modern ideas of time travel pose the idea of branching timelines, such as the 2009 "Star Trek" reboot and "". Technically, if a timeline isn't explicitly stated to have been erased, it's still there.
Parallel universes as a result of time travel can serve simply as the backdrop, or it may be a central plot point. "The Guns of the South" by Harry Turtledove, where the Confederate Army is given thousands of AK-47 rifles and ends up winning the American Civil War, is a good example of the former, while Fritz Leiber's novel "The Big Time" where a war between two alternative futures manipulating history to create a timeline that results in or realizes their own world is a good example of the latter.
Subscribing to the many-worlds interpretation of quantum physics, alternative histories in fiction can arise as a natural phenomenon of the universe. In these works, the idea is that each choice every person makes, each leading to a different result, both occur, so when a person decides between jam or butter on his toast, two universes are created: one where that person chose jam, and another where that person chose butter. The concept of "sidewise" time travel, a term taken from Murray Leinster's "Sidewise in Time", is used to allow characters to pass through many different alternative histories, all descendant from some common branch point.
Often, worlds that are more similar to each other are considered closer to each other in terms of this sidewise travel. For example, a universe where World War II ended differently would be "closer" to us than one where Imperial China colonized the New World in the 15th century. H. Beam Piper used this concept, naming it "paratime" and writing a series of stories involving the Paratime Police who regulated travel between these alternative realities as well as the technology to do so. Keith Laumer used the same concept of "sideways" time travel in his 1962 novel "Worlds of the Imperium". More recently, novels such as Frederik Pohl's "The Coming of the Quantum Cats" and Neal Stephenson's "Anathem" explore human-scale readings of the "many worlds" interpretation, postulating that historical events or human consciousness spawns or allows "travel" among alternative universes.
Universe 'types' frequently explored in sidewise and alternative history works include worlds whose Nazis won the Second World War, as in "The Man in the High Castle" by Philip K. Dick, "SS-GB" by Len Deighton, and "Fatherland" by Robert Harris, and worlds whose Roman Empire never fell, as in "Roma Eterna" by Robert Silverberg. "Romanitas" by Sophia McDougall, and "Warlords of Utopia" by Lance Parkin.
Counter-Earth.
The concept of Counter-Earth might seem similar to a parallel universe but is actually a distinct idea. A counter-earth is a planet that shares Earth's orbit but is on opposition, therefore, cannot be seen from Earth. There would be no necessity that such a planet would be like Earth in any way, although typically in fiction it is practically identical to Earth. Since Counter-Earth is not only within our universe but within our own Solar System, reaching it can be accomplished with ordinary space travel.
Gerry and Sylvia Anderson used this concept in their 1969 movie "Doppelgänger" (released outside Europe as "Journey to the Far Side of the Sun"), in which a Counter-Earth is detected by astronomers and a manned mission launched by a US-European space consortium to explore it.
Though not impossible, the idea is rather implausible - since none of the other planets in the Solar System has such a "twin" sharing its orbit. Over a long period of time, gravitational influences would make such an orbit unstable, resulting in a collision or repulsion of the two planets.
H.G. Wells placed the world of his 1903 "Modern Utopia" within our own universebut much further away: However, Wells did not explain how such a precise duplication of our world could occur, nor how could a person be suddenly transported in twinkling of an eye from our world to the precise equivalent spot in that other world.
Convergent evolution.
Convergent evolution is a biological concept whereby unrelated species acquire similar traits because they adapted to a similar environment and/or played similar roles in their ecosystems. In fiction, the concept is extended whereby similar planets will result in races with similar cultures and/or histories.
Again, this is not a true parallel universe since such planets exist within the same universe as our own, but the stories are similar in some respects. " frequently explored such worlds:
Convergent evolution due to contamination.
A similar concept in biology is gene flow. In this case, a planet may start out differently from Earth, but due to the influence of Earth's culture, the planet comes to resemble Earth in some way. "Star Trek" also frequently used this theory as well: in "", a planet is discovered to be very similar to Nazi Germany due to the influence of a historian that came to reside there, who believed that the Nazi fascism itself was not evil and under benevolent leadership could be "good government"; while in "", the "Enterprise" crew visits a planet that, 100 years after a book "Chicago Mobs of the Twenties" that had been left behind by previous Earth craft, their society resembles mob ruled cities of the Prohibition era United States.
Simulated reality.
Simulated realities are digital constructs featured in science fiction such as "The Matrix".
The Parallel Universe Theory.
In 1954, Princeton University doctoral applicant Hugh Everett III proposed that parallel universes co-exist with and diverge from our own universe. Everett's Many-Worlds Theory, as it came to be known, was his endeavor to respond to some unanswered inquiries raised in the developing field of quantum material science.
Fantasy.
Stranger in a strange land.
It is common in fantasy for authors to find ways to bring a protagonist from "our" world to the fantasy world. Before the mid-20th century, this was most often done by hiding fantastic worlds within unknown, distant locations on Earth; peasants who seldom, if ever, traveled far from their villages could not conclusively say that it was impossible that an ogre or other fantastical beings could live an hour away. Characters in the author's world could board a ship and find themselves on a fantastic island, as Jonathan Swift does in "Gulliver's Travels" or in the 1949 novel "Silverlock" by John Myers Myers, or be sucked up into a tornado and land in Oz. These "lost world" stories can be seen as geographic equivalents of a "parallel universe", as the worlds portrayed are separate from our own, and hidden to everyone except those who take the difficult journey there. The geographic "lost world" can blur into a more explicit "parallel universe" when the fantasy realm overlaps a section of the "real" world, but is much larger inside than out, as in Robert Holdstock's novel "Mythago Wood".
However, increasing geographical knowledge meant that such locations had to be farther and farther off. Perhaps influenced by ideas from science fiction, many works chose a setting that takes place in another, separate reality. As it is now not possible to reach these worlds via conventional travel, a common trope is a portal or artifact that connects our world and the fantasy world together, examples being the wardrobe in C. S. Lewis' "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" or the sigil in James Branch Cabell's "The Cream of the Jest".
In some cases, physical travel is not even possible, and the character in our reality travels in a dream or some other altered state of consciousness. Examples include the "Dream Cycle" stories by H. P. Lovecraft or the "Thomas Covenant" stories of Stephen R. Donaldson. Often, stories of this type have as a major theme the nature of reality itself, questioning whether the dream-world is as real as the waking world. Science fiction often employs this theme in the ideas of cyberspace and virtual reality.
Between the worlds.
As mentioned above, the parallel universe mold in many stories is used to transport a character from a known world into a fantasy world where the bulk of the action takes place. Whatever method is used ceases to be important for most of the story until the ending until the protagonists return to our world (assuming they do so).
However, in a few cases, the interaction between the worlds is an important element, so that the focus is not on simply the fantasy world, but on ours as well. Sometimes the intent is to let them mingle and see what would happen, such as introducing a computer programmer into a high fantasy world as seen in Rick Cook's "Wizardry" series, while other times an attempt to keep them from mingling becomes a major plot point, such as in Aaron Allston's "Doc Sidhe" our "grim world" is paralleled by a "fair world" where the elves live and history echoes ours, where a major portion of the plot deals with preventing a change in interactions between the worlds.
Fantasy multiverses.
The idea of a multiverse is as fertile a subject for fantasy as it is for science fiction, allowing for epic settings and godlike protagonists. One example of an epic and far-ranging fantasy "multiverse" is that of Michael Moorcock, who actually named the concept in a 1963 science fiction novel "The Sundered Worlds". Like many authors after him, Moorcock was inspired by the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, saying, "It was an idea in the air, as most of these are, and I would have come across a reference to it in "New Scientist" (one of my best friends was then editor) ... [or] physicist friends would have been talking about it. ... Sometimes what happens is that you are imagining these things in the context of fiction while the physicists and mathematicians are imagining them in terms of science. I suspect it is the romantic imagination working, as it often does, perfectly efficiently in both the arts and the sciences."
Unlike many science-fiction interpretations, Moorcock's "Eternal Champion" stories go far beyond alternative history to include mythic and sword and sorcery settings as well as worlds more similar to, or the same as, our own.
The term 'polycosmos' was coined as an alternative to 'multiverse' by the author and editor Paul le Page Barnett (also known by the pseudonym John Grant), and is built from Greek rather than Latin morphemes. It is used by Barnett to describe a concept binding together a number of his works, its nature meaning that "all characters, real or fictional [...] have to co-exist in all possible real, created or dreamt worlds; [...] they're playing hugely different roles in their various manifestations, and the relationships between them can vary quite dramatically, but the essence of them remains the same."
Fictional universe as alternative universe.
There are many examples of the meta-fictional idea of having the author's created universe (or any author's universe) rise to the same level of "reality" as the universe we're familiar with. The theme is present in works as diverse as H.G. Wells' "Men Like Gods", Myers' "Silverlock", and Heinlein's "Number of the Beast". Fletcher Pratt and L. Sprague de Camp took the protagonist of the Harold Shea series through the worlds of Norse myth, Edmund Spenser's "The Faerie Queene", Ludovico Ariosto's "Orlando Furioso", and the "Kalevala" – without ever quite settling whether writers created these parallel worlds by writing these works, or received impressions from the worlds and wrote them down. In an interlude set in "Xanadu", a character claims that the universe is dangerous because the poem went unfinished, but whether this was his misapprehension or not is not established.
Some fictional approaches definitively establish the independence of the parallel world, sometimes by having the world differ from the book's account; other approaches have works of fiction create and affect the parallel world: L. Sprague de Camp's "Solomon's Stone", taking place on an astral plane, is populated by the daydreams of mundane people, and in Rebecca Lickiss's "Eccentric Circles", an elf is grateful to Tolkien for transforming elves from dainty little creatures. These stories often place the author, or authors in general, in the same position as Zelazny's characters in Amber. Questioning, in a literal fashion, if writing is an act of creating a new world, or an act of discovery of a pre-existing world.
Occasionally, this approach becomes self-referential, treating the literary universe of the work itself as explicitly parallel to the universe where the work was created. Stephen King's seven-volume "Dark Tower" series hinges upon the existence of multiple parallel worlds, many of which are King's own literary creations. Ultimately the characters become aware that they are only "real" in King's literary universe (this can be debated as an example of breaking the fourth wall), and even travel to a world – twice – in which (again, within the novel) they meet Stephen King and alter events in the real Stephen King's world outside of the books. An early instance of this was in works by Gardner Fox for DC Comics in the 1960s, in which characters from the Golden Age (which was supposed to be a series of comic books within the DC Comics universe) would cross over into the main DC Comics universe. One comic book did provide an explanation for a fictional universe existing as a parallel universe. The parallel world does "exist" and it resonates into the "real world". Some people in the "real world" pick up on this resonance, gaining information about the parallel world which they then use to write stories.
Robert Heinlein, in "The Number of the Beast", quantizes the many parallel fictional universes - in terms of "fictons". A number of fictional universes are accessible along one of the three axes of time which Dr. Jacob Burroughs' "time twister" can access. Each quantum level change - a "ficton" - along this time axis corresponds to a different universe from one of several bodies of fiction known to all four travellers in the inter-universal, time travelling vehicle "Gay Deceiver". Heinlein also "breaks the fourth wall" by having "both Heinleins" (Robert and his wife Virginia) visit an inter-universal science-fiction and fantasy convention in the book's last chapter. The convention was convened on Heinlein character Lazarus Long's estate on the planet "Tertius" to attract the evil "Black Hats" who pursued the main characters of "The Number of the Beast" through space and time in order to destroy Dr. Burroughs and his invention. Heinlein continues this literary conceit in "The Cat Who Walks Through Walls" and "To Sail Beyond the Sunset", using characters from throughout his science-fictional career, hauled forth from their own "fictons" to unite in the war against the "Black Hats".
Heinlein also wrote a stand-alone novel, "", whose two protagonists fall from alternative universe into alternative universe (often naked), and after a number of such adventures die and enter a stereotypically Fundamentalist Christian Heaven (with many of its internal contradictions explored in the novel). Their harrowing adventures through the universes are then revealed to have been "destruction testing" of their souls by Loki, sanctioned by the Creator person of the Christian God (Yahweh). The Devil appears as the most sympathetic of the gods in the story, who expresses contempt for the other gods' cavalier treatment of the story's main characters.
Thus, "" rings in the theological dimension (if only for the purpose of satirizing evangelical Christianity) of parallel universes, that their existence can be used by God (or a number of gods, Loki seems to have made himself available to do Yahweh's dirty work in this novel). It manages also to have a fictional multiverse angle in that references are made to Heinlein's early SF/fantasy short story "They", a solipistic tale in which reality is constantly being transmogrified behind the scenes to throw the central character off his guard and keep him from seeing reality as it is, which was set in the same Heinlein fictional universe as "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress".
Elfland.
Elfland, or Faerie, the otherworldly home not only of elves and fairies but goblins, trolls, and other folkloric creatures, has an ambiguous appearance in folklore.
On one hand, the land often appears to be contiguous with 'ordinary' land. Thomas the Rhymer might, on being taken by the Queen of Faerie, be taken on a road like one leading to Heaven or Hell.
This is not exclusive to English or French folklore. In Norse mythology, Elfland (Alfheim) was also the name of what today is the Swedish province of Bohuslän. In the sagas, it said that the people of this petty kingdom were more beautiful than other people, as they were related to the elves, showing that not only the territory was associated with elves, but also the race of its people.
While sometimes folklore seems to show fairy intrusion into human lands – "Tam Lin" does not show any otherworldly aspects about the land in which the confrontation takes place – at other times the otherworldly aspects are clear. Most frequently, time can flow differently for those trapped by the fairy dance than in the lands they come from; although, in an additional complication, it may only be an appearance, as many returning from Faerie, such as Oisín, have found that time "catches up" with them as soon as they have contact with ordinary lands.
Fantasy writers have taken up the ambiguity. Some writers depict the land of the elves as a full-blown parallel universe, with portals the only entry – as in Josepha Sherman's Prince of the Sidhe series or Esther Friesner's "Elf Defense" – and others have depicted it as the next land over, possibly difficult to reach for magical reasons – Hope Mirrlees's "Lud-in-the-Mist", or Lord Dunsany's "The King of Elfland's Daughter". In some cases, the boundary between Elfland and more ordinary lands is not fixed. Not only the inhabitants but Faerie itself can pour into more mundane regions. Terry Pratchett's "Discworld" series proposes that the world of the Elves is a "parasite" universe, that drifts between and latches onto others such as Discworld and our own world (referred to as "Roundworld" in the novels). In the young teenage book "Mist" by Kathryn James, the Elven world lies through a patch of mist in the woods. It was constructed when the Elven were thrown out of our world. Travel to and fro is possible by those in the know, but can have lethal consequences.
Isekai.
Isekai, is a subgenre of Japanese fantasy light novels, manga, anime, and video games revolving around a normal person being transported to or trapped in a parallel universe. Often, this universe already exists in the protagonist's world as a fictional universe, but it may also be unbeknownst to them.
Films.
The most famous treatment of the alternative universe concept in film could be considered "The Wizard of Oz", which portrays a parallel world, famously separating the magical realm of the Land of Oz from the mundane world by filming it in Technicolor while filming the scenes set in Kansas in sepia. At times, alternative universes have been featured in small scale independent productions such as Kevin Brownlow and Andrew Mollo's "It Happened Here" (1964), featuring an alternative United Kingdom which had undergone Operation Sea Lion in 1940 and had been defeated and occupied by Nazi Germany. It focused on moral questions related to the professional ethics of Pauline, a nurse forced into Nazi collaboration.
Another common use of the theme is as a prison for villains or demons. The idea is used in the first two "Superman" movies starring Christopher Reeve where Kryptonian villains were sentenced to the Phantom Zone from where they eventually escaped. An almost exactly parallel use of the idea is presented in the campy cult film "The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension", where the "8th dimension" is essentially a "phantom zone" used to imprison the villainous Red Lectroids. Uses in horror films include the 1986 film "From Beyond" (based on the H. P. Lovecraft story of the same name) where a scientific experiment induces the experimenters to perceive aliens from a parallel universe, with bad results. The 1987 John Carpenter film "Prince of Darkness" is based on the premise that the essence of a being described as Satan, trapped in a glass canister and found in an abandoned church in Los Angeles, is actually an alien being that is the 'son' of something even more evil and powerful, trapped in another universe. The protagonists accidentally free the creature, who then attempts to release his "father" by reaching in through a mirror.
Some films present parallel realities that are actually different contrasting versions of the narrative itself. Commonly this motif is presented as different points of view revolving around a central (but sometimes unknowable) "truth", the seminal example being Akira Kurosawa's "Rashomon". Conversely, often in film noir and crime dramas, the alternative narrative is a fiction created by a central character, intentionally – as in "The Usual Suspects" – or unintentionally – as in "Angel Heart". Less often, the alternative narratives are given equal weight in the story, making them truly alternative universes, such as in the German film "Run Lola Run", the short-lived British West End musical "Our House" and the British film "Sliding Doors".
More recent films that have explicitly explored parallel universes are: the 2000 film "The Family Man", the 2001 cult film "Donnie Darko", which deals with what it terms a "tangent universe" that erupts from our own universe; "Super Mario Bros." (1993) has the eponymous heroes cross over into a parallel universe ruled by humanoids who evolved from dinosaurs; "The One" (2001) starring Jet Li, in which there is a complex system of realities in which Jet Li's character is a police officer in one universe and a serial killer in another, who travels to other universes to destroy versions of himself, so that he can take their energy; and "" (2004), the main character runs away from a totalitarian nightmare, and he enters into a cyber-afterlife alternative reality. The current "Star Trek" films are set in an alternative universe created by the first film's villain traveling back in time, thus allowing the franchise to be rebooted without affecting the continuity of any other "Star Trek" film or show. The 2011 science-fiction thriller "Source Code" employs the concepts of quantum reality and parallel universes. The characters in "The Cloverfield Paradox", the third installment of the franchise, accidentally create a ripple in the time-space continuum and travel into an alternative universe, where the monster and the events in the first film transpired. This concept has been also been passively depicted in the view of a romantic couple in the Indian Tamil Film Irandam Ulagam.
In the 2000 film The Beach starring Leonardo Di Caprio, his character Richard while sitting on the beach with love interest Francoís (Virginie Ledoyen) describes their utopia the have found in Thailand as their own parallel universe.
Television.
The idea of parallel universes have received treatment in a number of television series, usually as a single story or episode in a more general science fiction or fantasy storyline.
As an ongoing subplot.
Sometimes a television series will use parallel universes as an ongoing subplot. ', ' and ' elaborated on the premise of the original series' "Mirror" universe and developed multi-episode story arcs based on the premise. Other examples are the science fiction series "Stargate SG-1", the fantasy/horror series "Buffy the Vampire Slayer", "Supernatural" and the romance/fantasy '.
Following the precedent set by "Star Trek", these story arcs show alternative universes that have turned out "worse" than the "original" universe: in "Stargate SG-1" the first two encountered parallel realities featured Earth being overwhelmed by an unstoppable Goa'uld onslaught; in "Buffy", two episodes concern a timeline in which Buffy came to Sunnydale too late to stop the vampires from taking control; "Lois & Clark" repeatedly visits an alternative universe where Clark Kent's adoptive parents, Jonathan and Martha Kent, died when he was ten years of age, and Lois Lane is also apparently dead. Clark eventually becomes Superman, with help from the "original" Lois Lane, but he is immediately revealed as Clark Kent and so has no life of his own.
In addition to following "Star Trek's" lead, showing the "evil" variants of the main storyline gives the writers an opportunity to show what is at stake by portraying the worst that could happen and the consequences if the protagonists fail or the importance of a character's presence.
"Once Upon a Time" often talks about alternative realms or universes in which all different forms of magic, and non-magic may occur, depending on the realm. According to the Mad Hatter (Sebastian Stan), they "touch each other in a long line of lands, each just as real as the last". He referred to our world's tendency to deny such things as arrogant.
In the season 1 finale of "The Flash", the Reverse-Flash opens a singularity that connects his world to a parallel universe called Earth-2. In the second season, The Flash starts facing villains from that earth who also have doppelgangers on Earth-1 sent by Zoom. The array of Earth-2 villains consists of Atom Smasher, Sand Demon, King Shark, and Dr. Light; all are sent by Zoom to kill The Flash with the assurance of being taken back home. However, they are not the only ones who arrive from the singularity; this also includes the Earth-2 Flash after a close death and loss of speed from a confrontation with Zoom. When the Earth-2 Flash (called Jay Garrick) introduces himself to Team Flash, Barry (The Flash) distrusts him at first and places him in the metahuman pipeline at S.T.A.R. Labs. When The Flash starts having a hard time facing off against Sand Demon, he frees Jay so that he could help him as well as train him in his speed. With a new trick taught by Jay, Barry defeats Sand Demon. Later on, the Earth-2 counterpart of the Reverse-Flash, Harrison Wells, arrives in Earth-1 as well. He steals a weapon from Mercury Labs and saves Barry from the Earth-2 King Shark. When Jay confronts and sees Wells again, the argument gets heated between them before Barry intercedes.
The "Alf Stewart Rape Dungeon" series, created by artist Mr Doodleburger, uses footage from the Australian TV drama show Home and Away, but through the use of clever overlaid audio tracks, casts one of the main characters of the show, long running character Alf Stewart as a vicious violent character in a parallel version of Home and Away. "see main article" Alf Stewart Rape Dungeon Series
Television series involving parallel universes.
There have been a few series where parallel universes were central to the series itself.
Books.
"Time Echoes Trilogy" by Bryan Davis addresses the idea of parallel worlds as it delves into a plot in which the main character travels between three different "earth's" each moving at a different speed of time so one earth is 20 years in the past while another one is 10 minutes into the future when compared to the earth from which the character exists.
"Overstrike" by C. M. Angus features high-functioning schizophrenics with the ability to simultaneously perceive multiple realities.
Comic books.
Parallel universes in modern comics have become particularly rich and complex, in large part due to the continual problem of continuity faced by the major two publishers, Marvel Comics and DC Comics. The two publishers have used the multiverse concept to fix problems arising from integrating characters from other publishers into their own canon, and from having major serial protagonists having continuous histories lasting, as in the case of Superman, over 70 years. Additionally, both publishers have used new alternative universes to re-imagine their own characters. (See "Multiverse (DC Comics)" and "Multiverse (Marvel Comics)") DC's "Michael Moorcock's Multiverse" collected 12 issues in 1999 with an introduction by Moorcock which offered a sophisticated description of his rationale.
DC Comics inaugurated its multiverse in the early 1960s, with the reintroduction of Golden Age superheroes the Justice Society of America now located on Earth-Two, and devised a "mirror universe" scenario of inverted morality and supervillain domination of Earth-Three shortly afterwards, several years before "" devised its own darker alternative universe. There was a lull before DC inaugurated additional alternative universes in the seventies, such as Earth-X, where there was an Axis victory in World War II, Earth-S, home to the Fawcett Comics superheroes of the forties and fifties, such as Captain Marvel, and Earth-Prime, where superheroes only existed in fictional forms.
Therefore, comic books, in general, are one of the few entertainment mediums where the concept of parallel universes are a major and ongoing theme. DC in particular periodically revisits the idea in major crossover storylines, such as "Crisis on Infinite Earths" and "Infinite Crisis", where Marvel has a series called "What If..." that's devoted to exploring alternative realities, which sometimes impact the "main" universe's continuity. DC's version of "What If..." is the Elseworlds imprint.
DC Comics series "52" heralded the return of the Multiverse. "52" was a mega-crossover event tied to "Infinite Crisis" which was the sequel to the 1980s "Crisis on Infinite Earths". The aim was to yet again address many of the problems and confusions brought on by the Multiverse in the DCU. Now 52 Earths exist and including some Elseworld tales such as "Kingdom Come", DC's imprint WildStorm and an Earth devoted to the Charlton Comics heroes of DC. "Countdown" and "Countdown Presents: The Search for Ray Palmer" and the "Tales of the Multiverse" stories expand upon this new Multiverse.
Marvel has also had many large crossover events which depicted an alternative universe, many springing from events in the X-Men books, such as 1981's "Days of Future Past", 1995's "Age of Apocalypse", and 2006's "House of M". In addition, the Squadron Supreme is a DC inspired Marvel Universe that has been used several times, often crossing over into the mainstream Universe in the Avengers comic. Exiles is an offshoot of the "X-Men" franchise that allows characters to hop from one alternative reality to another, leaving the original, main Marvel Universe intact. The Marvel UK line has long had multiverse stories including the Jaspers' Warp storyline of Captain Britain's first series (it was here that the designation Earth-616 was first applied to the mainstream Marvel Universe).
Marvel Comics, as of 2000, launched their most popular parallel universe, the Ultimate Universe. It is a smaller subline to the mainstream titles and features Ultimate Spider-Man, Ultimate X-Men, Ultimate Fantastic Four and the Ultimates (their "Avengers").
The graphic novel Watchmen is set in an alternative history, in 1985 where superheroes exist, the Vietnam War was won by the United States, and Richard Nixon is in his fifth term as President of the United States. The Soviet Union and the United States are still locked in an escalating "Cold War" as in our own world, but as the Soviet Union invades Afghanistan in this world and threatens Pakistan, nuclear war may be imminent.
In 1973, Tammy published "The Clock and Cluny Jones", where a mysterious grandfather clock hurls bully Cluny Jones into a harsh alternative reality where she becomes the bullied. This story was reprinted in Misty annual 1985 as "Grandfather's Clock."
In 1978, Misty published "The Sentinels". The Sentinels were two crumbling apartment blocks that connected the mainstream world with an alternative reality where Hitler conquered Britain in 1940.
In 1981, Jinty published "Worlds Apart." Six girls experience alternative worlds ruled by greed, sports-mania, vanity, crime, intellectualism, and fear. These are in fact their dream worlds becoming real after they are knocked out by a mysterious gas from a chemical tanker that crashed into their school. In 1977 Jinty also published "Land of No Tears" where a lame girl travels to a future world where people with things wrong with them are cruelly treated, and emotions are banned.
The parallel universe concept has also appeared prominently in the "Sonic the Hedgehog" comic series from Archie Comics. The first and most oft-recurring case of this is another "mirror universe" where Sonic and his various allies are evil or anti-heroic while the counterpart of the evil Dr. Robotnik is good. Another recurring universe featured in the series is a perpendicular dimension that runs through all others, known as the No Zone. The inhabitants of this universe monitor travel between the others, often stepping in with their Zone Cop police force to punish those who travel without authorization between worlds.
In more recent years, the comic has adapted the alternative dimension from the video games Sonic Rush and Sonic Rush Adventure, home to Sonic's ally Blaze the Cat. The continuities seen in various other Sonic franchises also exist in the comic, most notably those based on the cartoon series Sonic Underground and Sonic X. For some years, a number of other universes were also featured that parodied various popular franchises, such as Sailor Moon, Godzilla, and various titles from Marvel Comics. Archie has also used this concept as the basis for crossovers between Sonic and other titles that they publish, including Sabrina the Teenage Witch and Mega Man.
The various Transformers comics also feature the parallel universe concept, and feature the various continuities from different branches of the franchise as parallel worlds that occasionally make contact with each other. Quite notably, the annual Botcon fan convention introduced a comic storyline that featured Cliffjumper, an Autobot from the original Transformers series, entering an alternative universe where his fellow Autobots are evil and the Decepticons are good. This universe is known as the "Shattered Glass" universe, and continued on in comics and text based stories after its initial release. |
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Human outposts are artificially-created, controlled s located in environments inhospitable for humans, such as on the ocean floor, in the Antarctic, in space, or on another planet.
The logistics and difficulties inherent in such ventures have been heavily explored in science fiction.
Outposts by environment.
Polar.
Polar research stations have been built and advanced by many states and for many purposes. For more see the articles about research stations in Antarctica and Arctic drifting ice stations.
Under sea.
NASA trains astronauts in an underwater habitat, to simulate living and working in the International Space Station. They conduct scientific research on the human body and coral reefs, and build undersea structures to simulate space station assembly spacewalk tasks. The program is also being used to study how isolation affects human behaviour, to prepare for the first human outposts on the Moon and Mars.
Outer space.
The Salyut 1 space station in low Earth orbit was the first human outpost in space. The only current human outpost in space is the International Space Station, after China de-orbited its Tiangong-2 in 2019.
NanoRacks, after finalizing its contract with NASA, and after winning NextSTEPs Phase II award, is now developing its concept Independence-1 (previously known as Ixion), the first 'outpost' in NanoRacks' Space Outpost Program, which would turn spent rocket tanks into a habitable living area, often known as a wet workshop.
Planning and design for Lunar and Martian outposts is underway.
In fiction.
Human outposts in other worlds are a common motif in science fiction, whether established and occupied solely by humans or in cooperation – or competition – with alien species. The setting may be another planet, Earth-like or otherwise; or a spaceship large enough to house a city. |
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Organ theft is the forcible removal of a person's organs to be used as transplants and sold on the black market. While some supposed cases of organ theft are urban legends, others have been found to be true. It is also a commonly used trope in science fiction.
The urban legend.
As an urban legend the story has been around since at least the early 1990s and mostly involves the theft of one or both of the victims kidneys. According to Jan Harold Brunvand it's possible that the story originated due to a news story wherein a Turkish man, Ahmet Koc, claimed to have had his kidney stolen at a hospital but had in fact sold his kidney and was unhappy at the amount of money he'd been paid.
There is certainly a worldwide organ trafficking issue but actual organ theft is highly unlikely. Benjamin Radford notes that organ transplantation is extremely complicated, requires specific matches coupled with fairly tight time frames, and highly specialized medical training. As such, the common variations on the legend where either a lone traveler is drugged or otherwise subdued or where a child is kidnapped and harvested against their will are simply not possible scenarios for such theft to occur.
Credible occurrences.
There are some cases that have been proven or are at least strongly suspected to be real occurrences. As you can read below these are generally institutional settings with the systems and expertise available for the transplantation of the organ to occur.
China.
According to reports there are more organ donations than there are official donors and it's suspected that prisoners of conscience are making up the difference against their will. The U.S. House of Representatives and the European Parliament have passed resolutions condemning the practice.
The allegations are strongly supported by a 2017 report. The report itself is an update to two separate works of investigative journalism:
On June 17, 2019 the China Tribunal, an independent tribunal looking into the accusations of forced organ harvesting in China, released their final report and judgement. The tribunal in part determined that:
As a result of the tribunal's report and China previously admitting to harvesting organs (although they claimed to have ceased the practice in 2015) several prominent journals are instituting stronger controls to ensure that papers produced on organ transplantation only use voluntarily obtained organs.
India.
The multi-billion rupee Gurgaon kidney scandal came to light in January 2008 when police arrested several people for running a kidney transplant racket in Gurgaon, an industrial township near New Delhi, India. Kidneys from most of the victims, who were the poor hailing from the nearby western Uttar Pradesh, were transplanted into clients from the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Saudi Arabia and Greece. The police raid was prompted by complaints by the locals from Moradabad about illegal kidney sales. The man accused of the scandal, Amit Kumar, was arrested in Nepal on 7 February 2008 and has denied any hand in criminal activity. According to the Gurgaon police, the scandal at a local clinic was going on for six to seven years. The donors were lured with offerings of about Rs. 30,000 for kidney removal. First, they were lured to the clinic on the pretext of job opportunities. They were instead asked for donating their kidneys for the fee and all those who resisted this were drugged against their will and subsequently operated upon.
Kosovo.
Organ theft in Kosovo has been widely reported.
In science fiction.
Organ theft is a common trope in science fiction, being popularized by the Known Space universe created by Larry Niven, where it is called "organlegging", a portmanteau of "organ" and "bootlegging". Due to organ transplantation becoming safe and universally effective, a huge potential black market in body parts was able to be exploited by murderous racketeers. |
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Many works of fiction have featured UFOs. In most cases, as the fictional story progresses, the Earth is being invaded by hostile alien forces from outer space, usually from Mars, as depicted in early science fiction, or the people are being destroyed by alien forces, as depicted in the film "Independence Day". Some fictional UFO encounters may be based on real UFO reports, such as "Night Skies". "Night Skies" is based on the 1997 Phoenix UFO Incident.
UFOs appear in many forms of fiction other than film, such as video games in the "Destroy All Humans!" or the X-COM series and Halo series and print, "The War of the Worlds" or Iriya no Sora, UFO no Natsu. Typically a small group of people or the military (which one depending on where the film was made), will fight off the invasion, however the monster Godzilla has fought against many UFOs.
Television.
UFOs in television programs fall into three basic categories: real UFOs, hoaxes, and misidentified terrestrial spacecraft (often landing in a backward rural area or traveling back in time as in "Lost in Space" and "Star Trek").
Shows depicting real UFOs include: "The Outer Limits, The Invaders, The Monkees, The Bionic Woman, Dark Skies, Roswell, Wonder Woman, V", and "The X-Files".
Hoax stories include: "Batman, The Beverly Hillbillies, The Brady Bunch, The Green Hornet, The Man from U.N.C.L.E., The Girl from U.N.C.L.E., Mission: Impossible", and "The Wild Wild West" (a hoax story with a real sighting at the end)
Earth ships mistaken for UFOs appear in: "I Dream of Jeannie, The Munsters, Lost in Space, Star Trek: The Original Series, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine", and "Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C." (Pyle witnesses the location filming of a science fiction film).
Alphabetical Order |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Planets in science fiction
Planets in science fiction are fictional planets that appear in various media of the science fiction genre as story-settings or depicted locations.
Before Galileo turned his telescope to the heavens, the planets of the Solar System were not widely recognized as worlds, or places where a person could potentially set foot; they were visible to observers merely as bright points of light, distinguishable from stars only by their motion.
In the system of Claudius Ptolemy ("fl. c." 150), the Alexandrian astronomer whose works were the basis of all European astronomy throughout the Middle Ages and Renaissance, the planets were lights set into a series of transparent spheres turning around the Earth, which was the center of the one and only universe. Dante (1265–1321), in his Paradiso, describes the ascent of his narrator through the spheres of the Moon, the planets from Mercury to Saturn, and thence to the sphere of the fixed stars and the heavens of the angels. Dante implies that the light of the planets is a combination of light imparted by Divine will and the radiance of the blessed souls that inhabit the spheres. These planets are, however, entirely ethereal; they have light but no physical form and no geography.
Planets as places.
Ludovico Ariosto, in his epic "Orlando Furioso" (1513), jestingly sent his hero Astolfo to a Moon where everything lost on Earth eventually turns up, guarded by Saint Peter; but it was not until Galileo discovered (1609–1610) that the Moon had surface features, and that the other planets could, at least, be resolved into disks, that the concept that the planets were real physical bodies came to be taken seriously. In 1543, Nicolaus Copernicus had already posited that the planets orbited the Sun as the Earth does; combined, these two concepts led to the thought that the planets might be "worlds" similar to the Earth. Public expression of such concepts could be dangerous, however; Giordano Bruno was martyred in 1600 for, among other things, imagining an infinite number of other worlds, and claiming that "Innumerable suns exist; innumerable Earths revolve about these suns ... Living beings inhabit these worlds" in "De l'infinito universo e mondi" ("Concerning the Infinite Universe and Worlds", 1584).
At the time, such speculation was of a rather rarefied sort, and was limited to astronomers like Christiaan Huygens who wrote a book, "Cosmotheoros" (1698) considering the possibility of life on other planets; or to philosophers like Campanella, who wrote in defense of Galileo. The concept of life on distant planets was not, however, much utilized in fiction. The most popular target of 17th century "science fiction" was the Moon ("visited" in fiction by Kepler, Godwin, Cyrano, and Defoe). Oddly, none of these fictions made use of the lunar maps contemporaneously created by Hevelius, Riccioli and others.
It was quite some time before such "extraordinary voyages" went beyond the lunar sphere. Eberhard Kindermann sent an airship to the planets in 1744 in "Die Geschwinde Reise auf dem Lufft-schiff nach der obern Welt" ("The Airship's Speedy Journey to the Upper World"); while a traveller from the star Sirius passes inward through the Solar System, stopping at various planets in Voltaire's "Micromégas" (1752); followed by another outward voyage in Marie-Anne de Roumier-Robert's "Voyage de Milord Céton dans les Sept Planètes" ("Lord Seton's Voyage Among the Seven Planets", 1765). These stories were generally unscientific and tended towards the satirical rather than the purely entertaining; their subject-matter was probably inspired by the popular writings of Fontenelle, notably his "Entretiens sur la pluralité des mondes" ("Conversations on the Multiplicity of Worlds", 1686).
With the rapid developments in the magnifying and resolving power of telescopes in the course of the 19th century, it finally became possible to distinguish surface features on other planets and even to draw maps of some of them, notably Mars. In 1877, Asaph Hall reported two moons of Mars and Giovanni Schiaparelli found the surface of Mars to be adorned with continents, seas, and channels, and a very suitable habitat for life. From the beginning of the 1880s, fictions – some more, some less scientific – involving travels to and from Mars began to be produced in great quantities, even though the observations of Percival Lowell required reassessment of Mars as a more marginal desert planet. Mars remained a favored destination for fictional travellers down to the early 1960s (see Mars in fiction). Since probes revealed the absence of any indications of intelligent life on Mars, the science fictional Mars has changed to a possible future home for the human race, e.g. through terraforming.
Venus was never quite so popular as Mars, probably because it obdurately refused to display any surface features (it is covered with sulfuric acid clouds only dimly translucent to visible light), making any statement about its nature disturbingly speculative. In 1918, chemist Svante Arrhenius, deciding that Venus' cloud cover was necessarily water, decreed in "The Destinies of the Stars" that "A very great part of the surface of Venus is no doubt covered with swamps" and compared Venus' humidity to the tropical rain forests of the Congo. Venus thus became, until the early 1960s, a place for science fiction writers to place all manner of unusual life forms, from quasi-dinosaurs to intelligent carnivorous plants, and where hostile interactions with Venusian natives were reminiscent of European colonial projects in Africa and Asia (see Venus in fiction). In fact Venus's surface is hot enough to melt lead, and it is extremely hostile to life.
Various planets of the Solar System were used as settings for science fiction stories in the first half of the 20th century; but dissatisfaction with the limits imposed by science led many writers early on to forsake the Solar System for fictional planets around distant stars. As increasing knowledge of the Solar System made the prospects of life in the vicinity of Earth marginal at best, the extrasolar planet has become almost the only venue for contemporary science fiction.
In many works of science fiction, planets are only described casually, as points of origin and departure, or as interchangeable backdrops for space battles. This is particularly true of space opera. In other works, the planet is the center stage, the primary scene of events, and particular attention is paid to its environment and any culture that may exist there. Adventure stories that stick to a single, well-described planet are sometimes called planetary romances; some of these planets are not very realistic and are effectively fantasy worlds.
Planets may be treated in different ways depending both on the interests of the author and the genre he or she is writing in. In some stories, a planet is mainly considered as an object in space: the interest of the fiction depends upon its astronomical characteristics, such as its mass, its geological composition, its atmosphere, how many moons it has and what size they are, how close it is to its sun (or suns) and how hot they are. Such considerations are found prominently though not exclusively in the hard science fiction genre.
In other stories, a planet is considered as a world or setting. Such a planet will be described from the point of view of a person dwelling on it, rather than from the point of view of an outside observer: the fiction may describe its geography, its history, and the social and cultural characteristics of its civilizations. Since authors usually adopt human protagonists, such planets are typically described as very hospitable to human life and, other than in geography, nearly indistinguishable from Earth; Brian Stableford calls such planets "Earth-Clones". Conversely some fictional worlds are never more than marginally habitable, which has a profound effect on societies that developed or moved there. Numerous examples of this are to be found in the Known Space stories of Larry Niven.
In some works of fiction, such as Pournelle's "CoDominium" or Card's "Ender's Game" series, certain planets are settled by specific ethnic groups. However, in novels set in distant futures, e.g. "Dune", the inhabitants have usually forgotten about the original settlers.
While some authors choose to treat a planet in depth, considering it to have a wide diversity of geography, climate, politics and culture, others prefer to characterize their planets by some single global characteristic. Many of these uniform settings have become stereotypes, used in a variety of science fictional works. Such stereotypes include: the planet covered by a single city; the planet whose surface is entirely desert; the planet covered by ocean, with no landmasses; the planet on which it is perpetually winter; the planet that is self-aware; and the planet which has been artificially constructed.
Other planets appear in humorous or comical settings, sometimes spoofing more conventional science fiction. Such planets are often described with no pretense to scientific accuracy; their strange characteristics are primarily intended to amuse.
For the "Star Trek" universe, a detailed planetary classification system has been devised; it is not actually used by scientists.
Planet lists.
For planets from specific fictional milieux, use the following lists and categories:
Planet types.
For a more scientific approach to classifying planet types from Orion's Arm
Ice planets.
Ice planets have figured prominently in science fiction, such as Hoth, an ice planet featured in "The Empire Strikes Back", or Gethen, an ice planet in the novel The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin.
An ice planet named Fichina is featured in the "Star Fox" video game series.
Ancient Mesa (Ancient Mare in the Japanese version) is a venue in "". Its tracks includes the Split and Skating Circuits. Another ice planet appears in the name of White Land in every other F-Zero games. Described as covered in crystals in the first game, its appearance in the anime F-Zero: Falcon Densetsu and the games based on this media shows ice and snow as the dominant features of this venue.
Lava planets.
Lava worlds can be seen occasionally in science fiction. In "Star Wars", one such planet is , with its heat caused by tidal forces from nearby gas giants. Mustafar scenes take place in "".
A lava world called Solar is also featured in "Star Fox 64".
A venue named Fire Field appears in the F-Zero franchise, where it is the last track of the King League in the first game. It is also notable for being one of the few venues to appear in every game of the franchise.
The Pyronite homeworld in Ben 10 is a planet-like star called which has multiple active volcanos.
Excalbia is a planet with a mostly molten lava surface, featured in "" (episode The Savage Curtain). Silicon-based beings native to the planet (Excalbians) create a habitable earthlike area on the surface. There, Kirk and Spock, along with replicas of Abraham Lincoln and Surak are pitted against replicas of four historical figures considered "evil" by the Federation. Ostensibly this is so that they can gain an understanding of the concept of "good vs. evil"
Desert planets.
Mars as a desert planet.
Before, and certainly after, the results sent back by the Viking landers, some science fiction set on Mars portrayed it as a desert planet. Science fiction stories that do so include:
Fictional desert planets.
Other desert planets have been used as story motifs in fictional works:
Alphabetical list.
Contains planets not found in the preceding lists.
Other lists.
Parallel Earths.
These planets are identical or nearly identical to Earth physically, but have a history that differs to some degree from that of our Earth.
Artificial planets.
Some writers, scientists and artists have speculated about artificial worlds or planet-equivalents; these planets include:
Fantastic planets.
Some invented planets have physically impossible shapes, and may be regarded as fantasy worlds:
Comic planets.
These planets are not so much carefully constructed worlds as they are humorous backgrounds or gag references in various comedy shows and games: |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Isolated brain
An isolated brain is a brain kept alive in vitro, either by perfusion or by a blood substitute, often an oxygenated solution of various salts, or by submerging the brain in oxygenated artificial cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). It is the biological counterpart of brain in a vat. A related concept, attaching the brain or head to the circulatory system of another organism, is called a head transplant. An isolated brain, however, is more typically attached to an artificial perfusion device rather than a biological body.
The brains of many different organisms have been kept alive in vitro for hours, or in some cases days. The central nervous system of invertebrate animals is often easily maintained as they need less oxygen and to a larger extent get their oxygen from CSF; for this reason their brains are more easily maintained without perfusion. Mammalian brains, on the other hand, have a much lesser degree of survival without perfusion and an artificial blood perfusate is usually used.
For methodological reasons, most research on isolated mammalian brains has been done with guinea pigs. These animals have a significantly larger basilar artery (a major artery of the brain) compared to rats and mice, which makes cannulation (to supply CSF) much easier.
In philosophy.
In philosophy, the brain in a vat is any of a variety of thought experiments intended to draw out certain features of our ideas about knowledge, reality, truth, mind, and meaning. A contemporary version of the argument originally given by Descartes in "Meditations on First Philosophy" (i.e., that he could not trust his perceptions on the grounds that an evil demon might, conceivably, be controlling his every experience), the "brain in a vat" is the idea that a brain can be fooled into anything when fed appropriate stimuli.
The inherently philosophical idea has also become a staple of many science fiction stories, with many such stories involving a mad scientist who might remove a person's brain from the body, suspend it in a vat of life-sustaining liquid, and connect its neurons by wires to a supercomputer which would provide it with electrical impulses identical to those the brain normally receives. According to such science fiction stories, the computer would then be simulating a virtual reality (including appropriate responses to the brain's own output) and the person with the "disembodied" brain would continue to have perfectly normal conscious experiences without these being related to objects or events in the real world.
No such procedure in humans has ever been reported by a research paper in a scholarly journal, or other reliable source. Also, the ability to send external electric signals to the brain of a sort that the brain can interpret, and the ability to communicate thoughts or perceptions to any external entity by wire, is, except for very basic commands, well beyond current (2021) technology.
Grown.
In 2004 Thomas DeMarse and Karl Dockendorf made an "adaptive flight control with living neuronal networks on microelectrode arrays".
Teams at the Georgia Institute of Technology and the University of Reading have created neurological entities integrated with a robot body. The brain receives input from sensors on the robot body and the resultant output from the brain provides the robot's only motor signals.
In fiction.
The concept of a brain in a jar (or brain in a vat) is a common theme in science fiction. |
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A warp drive is a theoretical superluminal spacecraft propulsion system in many science fiction works, most notably "Star Trek", and a subject of ongoing physics research. A spacecraft equipped with a warp drive may travel at speeds greater than that of light by many orders of magnitude. In contrast to some other fictitious faster-than-light technologies such as a jump drive, the warp drive does not permit instantaneous travel and transfers between two points, but rather involves a measurable passage of time which is pertinent to the concept. In contrast to hyperspace, spacecraft at warp velocity would continue to interact with objects in "normal space". The general concept of "warp drive" was introduced by John W. Campbell in his 1957 novel "Islands of Space".
Einstein's theory of special relativity states that energy and mass are interchangeable, and speed of light travel is impossible for material objects that, unlike photons, have a non-zero rest mass. The problem of a material object exceeding light speed is that an infinite amount of kinetic energy would be required to travel at exactly the speed of light. This can theoretically be solved by warping space to move an object instead of increasing the kinetic energy of the object to do so. Such a solution to the faster than light travel problem leads to two directly opposite approaches to light-speed travel in science fiction: in the first, spaceships themselves are brought to light speed and beyond; in the second, not-yet-local space itself is made to come to the ship while the ship moves at sub-light speeds.
Real-world theories and science.
In 1994, physicist Miguel Alcubierre formulated a theoretical solution, called the Alcubierre drive, for faster-than-light travel which models the warp drive concept. Calculations found that such a model would require prohibitive amounts of negative energy or mass.
In 2018, the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency made public a 2010 report that surveyed multiple different approaches to faster-than-light travel. Caltech professor Sean Carroll, who reviewed the report, explained that, while the theories were legitimate, they did not represent "something that's going to connect with engineering anytime soon, probably anytime ever".
In 2021, physicist Erik Lentz described a way warp drives sourced from only known purely positive energy could exist. Previously unexplored geometries of spacetime could allow for warp bubbles based on superluminal self-reinforcing soliton waves from large, but possibly reducible, amounts of positive energy. Signatures of positive-energy soliton geometries may be detectable at magnetars.
"Star Trek".
Original warp scale ("The Original Series", "The Animated Series", "Enterprise", and "Discovery").
Warp drive is one of the fundamental features of the "Star Trek" franchise; in the first pilot episode of "", "The Cage", it is referred to as a "hyperdrive", with Captain Pike stating the speed to reach planet TalosIV as "time warp, factor 7". When beginning to explain travel times to the illusion survivors (before being interrupted by the sight of Vina), crewmember Jose stated that "the time barrier's been broken", allowing a group of interstellar travelers to return to Earth far sooner than would have otherwise been possible. Later in the pilot, when Spock is faced with the only action of escaping, he announces to the crew they have no choice but to leave, stating "Our time warp factor..." before the ship's systems start failing. In the second pilot for "The Original Series", "Where No Man Has Gone Before", "time" was dropped from the speed setting with Kirk ordering speeds in the simple "ahead warp factor one" that became so familiar from then on.
The warp drive velocity in "Star Trek" is generally expressed in "warp factor" units, which—according to "Star Trek Star Fleet Technical Manual"—corresponds to the magnitude of the warp field. Achieving warp factor1 is equal to breaking the light barrier, while the actual velocity corresponding to higher factors is determined using an ambiguous formula.
According to the "Star Trek" episode writer's guide for "The Original Series", warp factors are converted to multiples of the speed of light by multiplication with the cubic function of the warp factor itself. Accordingly, "warp 1" is equivalent to the speed of light, "warp 2" is eight times the speed of light, "warp 3" is 27 times the speed of light, etc. Several episodes of "The Original Series" placed the "Enterprise" in peril by having it travel at high warp factors. However, the velocity (in present dimensional units) of any given warp factor is rarely the subject of explicit expression, and travel times for specific interstellar distances are not consistent through the various series. In the "" it was written that the real warp speed depends on external factors such as particle density or electromagnetic fields and only roughly corresponds with the calculated speed of current warp factor. The reference work "Star Trek Maps" established the theory of subspace (or warp) highways. In certain regions, a spaceship can fly at a multiple of the speed that corresponds to the current warp factor.
In "The Original Series", warp factor6 was established as the common speed of the USS "Enterprise" NCC-1701. In some cases, the starship traveled at warp7 or above, but with risk of damaging the ship or the engines. Warp9 in "The Original Series" was the "never exceed" speed for the hulls and engines of "Constitution-"class starships, equivalent to the aircraft VNE V-speed. Warp6 was the VNO "Normal Operation" maximum "safe" cruising speed for that vessel class. Only five stories in the original "Star Trek" series involved the "Enterprise" traveling beyond warp9. In each instance, it was a result of the influence of alien beings or foreign technology. The warp 14.1 incident in "That Which Survives" was the result of runaway engines which brought the hull within seconds of structural failure before power was disengaged.
Later on, a prequel series titled "" describes the warp engine technology as a "Gravimetric Field Displacement Manifold" (Commander Tucker's tour, ""), and describes the device as being powered by a matter/anti-matter reaction which powers the two separate nacelles (one on each side of the ship) to create a displacement field. "Enterprise", set in 2151 and onwards, follows the voyages of the first human ship capable of traveling at warp factor 5.2, which under the old warp table formula (the cube of the warp factor times the speed of light), is about 140 times the speed of light (i.e., 5.2 cubed). In the series pilot episode "", Capt. Archer equates warp 4.5 to "Neptune and back [from Earth] in six minutes" (which would correspond to a distance of 547 light-minutes or 66 au, consistent with Neptune's being a minimum of 29 au distant from Earth).
Modified warp scale ("The Next Generation", "Deep Space Nine", "Voyager", and "Picard").
For ' and the subsequent series, "Star Trek" artist Michael Okuda drew up a new warp scale and devised a formula based on the original one but with an important difference: In the half-open interval from 9to 10, the exponent"w" increases toward infinity. Thus, in the Okuda scale, warp velocities approach warp 10 asymptotically. According to the ' there is no exact formula for this interval because the quoted velocities are based on a hand-drawn curve; what can be said is that at velocities greater than warp 9, the form of the warp function changes because of an increase in the exponent of the warp factor"w". Due to the resultant increase in the derivative, even minor changes in the warp factor eventually correspond to a greater than exponential change in velocity. Warp factor 10 was set as an unattainable maximum (according to the new scale, reaching or exceeding warp 10 required an infinite amount of energy). This is described in "Star Trek Technical Manuals" as "Eugene's limit", in homage to creator/producer Gene Roddenberry.
In "Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual" it was established that the normal operating speed of the "Enterprise"-D ("Galaxy"-class) was warp6 (new scale), the maximum rated cruise was warp 9.2 and the maximum design speed of warp factor 9.6. In two episodes, the "Enterprise"-D could travel at warp 9.8 at "extreme risk", while fleeing from an enemy. According to the "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Technical Manual" the "Galaxy"-class starships and some other starfleet vessels like "Nebula"-class or "Excelsior"-class were refitted during the Dominion War with newer technology including modifications which increased their maximum speed to warp 9.9.
According to the reference book "USS Enterprise Owners' Workshop Manual" the "Enterprise"-E can reach a maximum velocity of warp 9.95. The "" reference book states that the "Intrepid"-class starship "Voyager" has a maximum sustainable cruising speed of warp 9.975, while the "Prometheus"-class can reach a maximum of warp 9.99, with maximum cruising speed of warp 9.9.
As stated in the collection "Star Trek Fact Files", no ship, including highly developed ships like the Borg cube, may exceed warp factor 9.99 with their normal warp drive. To achieve higher speeds, the use of transwarp technology is required.
Warp velocities.
In the book "Star Trek Encyclopedia", some warp velocities are given directly. For comparison, the following table shows these values and also the calculated speeds of the original warp scale, the calculated speeds of a simplified Okuda scale and some canonical reference values for warp speeds from onscreen sources.
Transwarp.
Transwarp generally refers to speeds and technologies that are beyond conventional warp drives. The warp drive has a natural physical or economical limit beyond which higher speeds are no longer possible. The reference work "Star Trek Fact Files" indicates this limit at warp factor 9.99. This is the highest conventional warp speed mentioned for a spaceship (Borg cube). Also in the episode "Threshold" ("Star Trek Voyager") the warp factor 9.99 is suggested as the limit. This is the last warp factor mentioned before the leap takes place in the transwarp state.
In the book "" the authors describes the idea of transwarp: Finally, we had to create a back door for various powerful aliens like Q who got the knack of hurling the ship through the room for millions of light years during a commercial break.
The transwarp concept itself is not tied to any particular technology or speed limit.
The first mention of a transwarp drive took place in the movie '. There, the Starfleet developed a new spaceship type, the USS "Excelsior" (NX-2000), which should have a superior engine. The "Excelsior" captain plans to break the speed record of the USS "Enterprise" (warp 14.1 cubic scale). The principle of this drive is not explained. Later, in ', the USS "Excelsior" had a normal warp drive. In " Star Trek Fact Files " it is stated that the experiment was a failure and the spaceship was converted to a normal warp drive.
The entire episode "Threshold" from "Star Trek Voyager" is about a transwarp experiment by the USS "Voyager" crew. To get home faster, a shuttle is modified with novel dilithium crystals. The crew is trying to break the transwarp threshold. This threshold is between warp 9.99 and warp 10, and transwarp itself represented the infinite speed. The shuttle allegedly found itself at all points in the universe at the same time during the flight. However, the pilot suffers genetic mutations after the flight, so it is not repeated. Due to the shuttle's limited memory, only a small portion of the sensor data was recorded. The entire experiment is described in the reference work "Star Trek Fact Files".
Some episodes later, fictionalized a few months later, the crew of USS "Voyager" encounters a species called the Voth. This species has spaceships with transwarp drive. However, this drive does not work on the basis of transwarp conduits, as the transwarp drive of the Borg, but is a further development of the conventional warp drive.
The mention of a second transwarp technology took place in the episode ' of the series "Star Trek: The Next Generation". A group of renegade Borg used transwarp conduits. These are wormhole-like tunnels through subspace. It was said in the dialogue that the flight through these tunnels was 20 times faster than the flight with maximum warp speed of the "Enterprise". The flight itself was described as follows: "falling into a fast-moving river and getting swept away by the current." In the episode ' it is explained that the origin of these corridors was in six transwarp hubs spread across the galaxy. There were two ways to use these conduits outside these hubs. In "The Next Generation", the "Enterprise" was able to open such a channel with a precisely modulated tachyon impulse, traveling 65 light-years. However, when the USS "Voyager" tried the same thing in "Day of Honor", the attempt failed and almost destroyed the ship. The second possibility is the use of the transwarp coil. In episode "Dark Frontier" the crew of "Voyager" steals such a coil from the Borg and is able to shorten their journey home by 15 years, before the coil burns out.
Quantum slipstream.
Another form of transwarp used in "Star Trek" is called "Quantum Slipstream".
Similar to the Borg transwarp conduits, the slipstream is a narrowly focused, directed field that is initiated by manipulating the fabric of the space-time continuum using the starship's navigational deflector array. This creates a subspace tunnel, which is projected ahead of the vessel. Once a ship has entered this tunnel, the forces inside propel it at incredible speed. To maintain the slipstream, a ship has to constantly modify the quantum field with its deflector dish. The speed of the drive is inversely proportional to the time and distance. When the crew enters the "Dauntless" in the episode "Hope and Fear" for the first time and accidentally activates the propulsion system, the spaceship flies a flight of 15 light-years over a period of about 10 seconds. That is equivalent to approximately 50 million times the speed of light. After realizing that they would have to leave "Voyager" forever to get home with the "Dauntless", the crew tries to match the drive of the USS "Voyager" to the parameters of the "Dauntless". The modified "Voyager" is able to cover a distance of 300 light years with the slipstream modification before the system becomes unstable. The way back to Earth is stated in a fake message, created by Arturis, with seven months aboard the "Dauntless". For this period, the stocks are filled. At a residual distance of 60,000 light years at this time, this would correspond to a speed of about 100,000 times the speed of light or 1/500th of the time of a short slipstream jump.
However, in the episode "Timeless", the technology proved to be dangerously unstable, resulting in the loss of all hands of the "Voyager" in an alternate timeline. Due to a phase variance, the slipstream tunnel, produced by a replica slipstream drive of the "Voyager", collapsed during the flight and the ship crashed on a planet near the edge of the Beta Quadrant. Harry Kim and Chakotay survived, because they used the "Delta Flyer", which flew ahead of the "Voyager", and reached the Earth safely. They used, some years after this event, a temporal communication device to change the timeline and rescue the ship and the crew.
Folding space.
In addition to the possibility to let a spaceship glide through space in a warp field, there is also space folding in "Star Trek". Spatial folding means that two points of space-time are directly connected and an instantaneous change takes place. The space between is simply folded into a higher-dimensional hyperspace or subspace.
In the episode "That Which Survives" of "The Original Series", the "Enterprise" encountered the remains of people called Kalandans. These are able to instantaneously teleport spaceships as well as people over long distances.
In the episode "" of the series "Star Trek: The Next Generation", the "Enterprise"-D discovered the former homeworld of the Iconians. These people were able to instantaneously teleport people over long distances with the help of Iconian Gateways. To ensure the gateway did not fall into the wrong hands, Captain Picard destroyed it.
A year later, in "", terrorists on the planet RutiaIV used a space folding teleporter called an inverter. However, this caused progressive physical harm to people during transport; multiple use almost always ended in death.
The USS "Voyager" came in touch with this technology several times on their way home. In the episode ' the crew tried to buy a Spatial Trajector from the Sikarians. This wraps an object in a kind of subspace bubble, and teleports it to another location using spatial folding. The range was 40,000 light-years. But the Sikarian magistrate refused to share the technology, even when the captain tried to exchange Voyager's library for it. However a civilian offers to give the technology to Voyager, but Captain Janeway is reluctant to authorize an illegal trade and orders the crew to leave. Meanwhile, Torres and Seska decide to disobey Janeway's orders and trade voyager's library for the technology, but they are caught by Tuvok. But to their surprise, Tuvok beams down to the surface and makes the trade. However, the technology was not compatible with the warp core and almost destroyed "Voyager" when it tried to use. In the series ' it is said that the Borg have assimilated this technology and built it into every cube as an emergency transport for the Borg queen.
Three years later, in the episode "", "Voyager" discovered a stranded spaceship with a coaxial warp drive. This also used spatial folding for locomotion. But the system was very unstable and if there is a fault in the drive it could cause a tear in the space-time continuum. A replica of the drive was only tested in a shuttle and never used for the "Voyager".
Last but not least, spatial folding appeared as a Geodesic Fold in the episode "". A geodesic fold occurs when a Verteron beam is fired at the atmosphere of a giant star at two different locations. This connects both points in space and creates a short lived passage. However, this was not usable because of deadly radiation that occurred during flight. A Ferengi ship's faked message from the Alpha Quadrant made the crew believe there was a safe passage. However, the Ferengi only wanted to get the Borg technology aboard "Voyager" and would have let the crew die. At the last moment, travel through the passage was aborted.
Fictional history.
The episode "Metamorphosis", from "The Original Series", establishes a backstory for the invention of warp drive on Earth, in which Zefram Cochrane discovered the "space warp". Cochrane is repeatedly referred to afterwards, but the exact details of the first warp trials were not shown until the second ' movie, '. The movie depicts Cochrane as having first operated a warp drive on Earth in 2063. This successful first trial led directly to first contact with the Vulcans.
It was also established that many other civilizations had warp drive before humans; "First Contact" co-writer Ronald D. Moore suggested Cochrane's drive was in some way superior to forms which existed beforehand, and was gradually adopted by the galaxy at large.
Slingshot effect.
The "slingshot effect" is first depicted in "Tomorrow Is Yesterday" (1967) as a method of time travel. The procedure involves traveling at a high warp velocity in the proximity to a star, on a precisely calculated "slingshot" path; if successful, it causes a ship to enter a time warp, leading to the past or future. The same technique is used in the episode " (1968) for historic research. The term "time warp"" was first used in "The Naked Time" (1966) when a previously untried cold-start intermix of matter and antimatter threw the "Enterprise" back three days in time. The term was later used in "Star TrekIV" in describing the slingshot effect. The technique was mentioned as a viable method of time travel in "The Next Generation" episode "" (1989). The equations used to calculate the time warp trajectory are extremely complicated, understood only by a select few, with even the most minuscule error resulting in catastrophe.
This "slingshot" effect has been explored in theoretical physics: it is hypothetically possible to slingshot oneself "around" the event horizon of a black hole. As a result of the black hole's extreme gravitation, time would pass at a slower rate near the event horizon, relative to the outside universe; the traveler would experience the passage of only several minutes or hours, while hundreds of years would pass in 'normal' space.
Warp core.
A primary component of the warp drive method of propulsion in the "Star Trek" universe is the "gravimetric field displacement manifold", more commonly referred to as a "warp core". It is a fictional reactor that taps the energy released in a matter-antimatter annihilation to provide the energy necessary to power a starship's warp drive, allowing faster-than-light travel. Starship warp cores generally also serve as powerplants for other primary ship systems.
When matter and antimatter come into contact, they annihilate—both matter and antimatter are converted directly and entirely into enormous quantities of energy, in the form of subnuclear particles and electromagnetic radiation (specifically, mesons and gamma rays). In the "Star Trek" universe, fictional "dilithium crystals" are used to regulate this reaction. These crystals are described as being non-reactive to anti-matter when bombarded with high levels of radiation.
Usually, the reactants are deuterium, which is an isotope of hydrogen, and antideuterium (its antimatter counterpart). In "The Original Series" and in-universe chronologically subsequent series, the warp core reaction chamber is often referred to as the "dilithium intermix chamber" or the "matter/antimatter reaction chamber", depending upon the ship's intermix type. The reaction chamber is surrounded by powerful magnetic fields to contain the anti-matter. If the containment fields ever fail, the subsequent interaction of the antimatter fuel with the container walls would result in a catastrophic release of energy, with the resultant explosion capable of utterly destroying the ship. Such "warp core breaches" are used as plot devices in many "Star Trek" episodes, most notably . An intentional warp core breach can also be deliberately created, as one of the methods by which a starship can be made to self-destruct.
The mechanism that provides a starship's propulsive force is the "warp nacelle", a cylindrical pod (or pods) offset from the hull. Nacelles generate the actual "warp bubble" outside the ship; destruction of a nacelle will cripple the ship and possibly cause a warp core breach. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Retrofuturism
Retrofuturism (adjective "retrofuturistic" or "retrofuture") is a movement in the creative arts showing the influence of depictions of the future produced in an earlier era. If futurism is sometimes called a "science" bent on anticipating what will come, retrofuturism is the remembering of that anticipation. Characterized by a blend of old-fashioned "retro styles" with futuristic technology, retrofuturism explores the themes of tension between past and future, and between the alienating and empowering effects of technology. Primarily reflected in artistic creations and modified technologies that realize the imagined artifacts of its parallel reality, retrofuturism can be seen as "an animating perspective on the world".
Etymology.
According to the "Oxford English Dictionary", an early use of the term appears in a Bloomingdales advertisement in a 1983 issue of "The New York Times". The ad talks of jewellery that is "silverized steel and sleek grey linked for a retro-futuristic look". In an example more related to retrofuturism as an exploration of past visions of the future, the term appears in the form of “retro-futurist” in a 1984 review of the film "Brazil" in "The New Yorker". Critic Pauline Kael writes, "[Terry Gilliam] presents a retro-futurist fantasy."
Several websites have referenced a supposed 1967 book published by Pelican Books called "Retro-Futurism" by T. R. Hinchliffe as the origin of the term, but this account is unverified. There exist no records of this book or author.
Historiography.
Retrofuturism builds on ideas of futurism, but the latter term functions differently in several different contexts. In avant-garde artistic, literary and design circles, futurism is a long-standing and well established term. But in its more popular form, futurism (sometimes referred to as futurology) is "an early optimism that focused on the past and was rooted in the nineteenth century, an early-twentieth-century 'golden age' that continued long into the 1960s' Space Age".
Retrofuturism is first and foremost based on modern but changing notions of "the future". As Guffey notes, retrofuturism is "a recent neologism", but it "builds on futurists' fevered visions of space colonies with flying cars, robotic servants, and interstellar travel on display there; where futurists took their promise for granted, retro-futurism emerged as a more skeptical reaction to these dreams". It took its current shape in the 1970s, a time when technology was rapidly changing. From the advent of the personal computer to the birth of the first test tube baby, this period was characterized by intense and rapid technological change. But many in the general public began to question whether applied science would achieve its earlier promise—that life would inevitably improve through technological progress. In the wake of the Vietnam War, environmental depredations, and the energy crisis, many commentators began to question the benefits of applied science. But they also wondered, sometimes in awe, sometimes in confusion, at the scientific positivism evinced by earlier generations. Retrofuturism "seeped into academic and popular culture in the 1960s and 1970s", inflecting George Lucas's "Star Wars" and the paintings of pop artist Kenny Scharf alike". Surveying the optimistic futurism of the early twentieth century, the historians Joe Corn and Brian Horrigan remind us that retrofuturism is "a history of an idea, or a system of ideas—an ideology. The future, or course, does not exist except as an act of belief or imagination."
Characteristics.
Retrofuturism incorporates two overlapping trends which may be summarized as "the future as seen from the past" and "the past as seen from the future".
The first trend, retrofuturism proper, is directly inspired by the imagined future which existed in the minds of writers, artists, and filmmakers in the pre-1960 period who attempted to predict the future, either in serious projections of existing technology (e.g. in magazines like "Science and Invention") or in science fiction novels and stories. Such futuristic visions are refurbished and updated for the present, and offer a nostalgic, counterfactual image of what the future might have been, but is not.
The second trend is the inverse of the first: futuristic retro. It starts with the retro appeal of old styles of art, clothing, mores, and then grafts modern or futuristic technologies onto it, creating a mélange of past, present, and future elements. Steampunk, a term applying both to the retrojection of futuristic technology into an alternative Victorian age, and the application of neo-Victorian styles to modern technology, is a highly successful version of this second trend. In the movie "Space Station 76" (2014), mankind has reached the stars, but clothes, technology, furnitures and above all social taboos are purposely highly reminiscent of the mid-1970s.
In practice, the two trends cannot be sharply distinguished, as they mutually contribute to similar visions. Retrofuturism of the first type is inevitably influenced by the scientific, technological, and social awareness of the present, and modern retrofuturistic creations are never simply copies of their pre-1960 inspirations; rather, they are given a new (often wry or ironic) twist by being seen from a modern perspective.
In the same way, futuristic retro owes much of its flavor to early science fiction (e.g. the works of Jules Verne and H. G. Wells), and in a quest for stylistic authenticity may continue to draw on writers and artists of the desired period.
Both retrofuturistic trends in themselves refer to no specific time. When a time period is supplied for a story, it might be a counterfactual present with unique technology; a fantastic version of the future; or an alternate past in which the imagined (fictitious or projected) inventions of the past were indeed real.
The import of retrofuturism has, in recent years, come under considerable discussion. Some, like the German architecture critic Niklas Maak, see retrofuturism as "nothing more than an aesthetic feedback loop recalling a lost belief in progress, the old images of the once radically new". Bruce McCall calls retrofuturism a "faux nostalgia"—the nostalgia for a future that never happened.
Themes.
Although retrofuturism, due to the varying time-periods and futuristic visions to which it alludes, does not provide a unified thematic purpose or experience, a common thread is dissatisfaction or discomfort with the present, to which retrofuturism provides a nostalgic contrast.
A similar theme is dissatisfaction with the modern world itself. A world of high-speed air transport, computers, and space stations is (by any past standard) "futuristic"; yet the search for alternative and perhaps more promising futures suggests a feeling that the desired or expected future has failed to materialize. Retrofuturism suggests an alternative path, and in addition to pure nostalgia, may act as a reminder of older but now forgotten ideals. This dissatisfaction also manifests as political commentary in Retrofuturistic literature, in which visionary nostalgia is paradoxically linked to a utopian future modelled after conservative values as seen in the example of Fox News' use of BioShock's aesthetic in a 2014 broadcast.
Retrofuturism also implies a reevaluation of technology. Unlike the total rejection of post-medieval technology found in most fantasy genres, or the embrace of any and all possible technologies found in some science-fiction, retrofuturism calls for a human-scale, largely comprehensible technology, amenable to tinkering and less opaque than modern black-box technology.
Retrofuturism is not universally optimistic, and when its points of reference touch on gloomy periods like World War II, or the paranoia of the Cold War, it may itself become bleak and dystopian. In such cases, the alternative reality inspires fear, not hope, though it may still be coupled with nostalgia for a world of greater moral as well as mechanical transparency.
Genres.
Genres of retrofuturism include cyberpunk, steampunk, dieselpunk, atompunk, and Raygun Gothic, each referring to a technology from a specific time period.
The first of these to be named and recognized as its own genre was cyberpunk, originating in the early to mid-1980s in literature with the works of Bruce Bethke, William Gibson, Bruce Sterling, and Pat Cadigan. Its setting is almost always a dystopian future, with a strong emphasis either upon outlaws hacking the futuristic world's machinery (often computers and computer networks), or even upon post-apocalyptic settings. The post-apocalyptic variant is the one usually associated with retrofuturism, where characters will rely upon a mixture of old and new technologies. Furthermore, synthwave and vaporwave are nostalgic, humorous and often retrofuturistic revivals of early cyberpunk aesthetic.
The second to be named and recognized was steampunk, in the late 1980s. It is generally more optimistic and brighter than cyberpunk, set within an alternate history closely resembling our Long 19th century from circa the Regency era onwards and up to circa 1914, only that 20th-century or even futuristic technologies are based upon steam power. The genre themes also often involve references to electricity as a yet-as-of-now mysterious force that is considered the utopian power source of the future and sometimes even regarded as possessing mystical healing powers (much as with nuclear energy around the middle of the 20th century). The genre often strongly resembles the original scientific romances and utopic novels of genre predecessors H. G. Wells and Jules Verne, and began in its modern form with literature such as Mervyn Peake's "Titus Alone" (1959), Ronald W. Clark's "Queen Victoria's Bomb" (1967), Michael Moorcock's "A Nomad of the Time Streams" series (1971–1981), K. W. Jeter's "Morlock Night" (1979), and William Gibson & Bruce Sterling's "The Difference Engine" (1990), and with films such as "The Time Machine" (1960) or "Castle in the Sky" (1986). A notable early example of steampunk in comics is the Franco-Belgian graphic novel series "Les Cités obscures", started by its creators François Schuiten and Benoît Peeters in the early 1980s. At times, steampunk as a genre crosses into that of Weird West.
The most recently named and recognized retrofuturistic genre is dieselpunk aka decodence (the term dieselpunk is often associated with a more pulpish form and decodence, named after the contemporary art movement of Art Deco, with a more sophisticated form), set in alternate versions of an era located circa in the period of the 1920s–1950s. Early examples include the 1970s concept albums, their designs and marketing materials of the German band Kraftwerk (see below), the comic-book character Rocketeer (first appearing in his own series in 1982), the "Fallout" series of video games, and films such as "Brazil" (1985), "Batman" (1989), "The Rocketeer" (1991), "Batman Returns" (1992), "The Hudsucker Proxy" (1994), "The City of Lost Children" (1995), and "Dark City" (1998). Especially the lower end of the genre strongly mimic the pulp literature of the era (such as the 2004 film "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow"), and films of the genre often reference the cinematic styles of film noir and German Expressionism. At times, the genre overlaps with the alternate history genre of a different World War II, such as with an Axis victory.
Design and arts.
Although loosely affiliated with early-twentieth century Futurism, retrofuturism draws from a wider range of sources. To be sure, retrofuturist art and literature often draws from the factories, buildings, cities, and transportation systems of the machine age. But it might be said that 20th century futuristic vision found its ultimate expression in the development of Googie or Populuxe design. As applied to fiction, this brand of retrofuturistic visual style began to take shape in William Gibson's short story "The Gernsback Continuum". Here and elsewhere it is referred to as Raygun Gothic, a catchall term for a visual style that incorporates various aspects of the Googie, Streamline Moderne, and Art Deco architectural styles when applied to retrofuturistic science fiction environments.
Although Raygun Gothic is most similar to the Googie or Populuxe style and sometimes synonymous with it, the name is primarily applied to images of science fiction. The style is also still a popular choice for retro sci-fi in film and video games. Raygun Gothic's primary influences include the set designs of Kenneth Strickfaden and Fritz Lang. The term was coined by William Gibson in his story "The Gernsback Continuum": "Cohen introduced us and explained that Dialta [a noted pop-art historian] was the prime mover behind the latest Barris-Watford project, an illustrated history of what she called 'American Streamlined Modern'. Cohen called it 'raygun Gothic'. Their working title was "The Airstream Futuropolis: The Tomorrow That Never Was.""
Aspects of this form of retrofuturism can also be associated with the late 1970s and early 1980s the neo-Constructivist revival that emerged in art and design circles. Designers like David King in the UK and Paula Scher in the US imitated the cool, futuristic look of the Russian avant-garde in the years following the Russian Revolution.
With three of their 1970s albums, German band Kraftwerk tapped into a larger retrofuturist vision, by combining their futuristic pioneering electronic music with nostalgic visuals. Kraftwerk's retro-futurism in their 1970s visual language has been referred to by German literary critic Uwe Schütte, a reader at Aston University, Birmingham, as "clear retro-style", and in the 2008 three-hour documentary "Kraftwerk and the Electronic Revolution", Irish-British music scholar Mark J. Prendergast refers to Kraftwerk's peculiar "nostalgia for the future" clearly referencing "an interwar "[progressive]" Germany that never was but could've been, and now "[due to their influence as a band]" hopefully could happen again". Design historian Elizabeth Guffey has written that if Kraftwerk's machine imagery was lifted from Russian design motifs that were once considered futuristic, they also presented a "compelling, if somewhat chilling, vision of the world in which musical ecstasy is rendered cool, mechanical and precise." Kraftwerk's three retrofuturist albums are:
From their 1981 album "Computer World" onwards, Kraftwerk have largely abandoned their retro notions and appear mainly futuristic only. The only references to their earlier retro style today appear in excerpts from their 1970s' promo clips that are projected in between more modern segments in their stage shows during the performance of these old song.
Fashion.
[Retro]futuristic clothing is a particular imagined vision of the clothing that might be worn in the distant future, typically found in science fiction and science fiction films of the 1940s onwards, but also in journalism and other popular culture. The garments envisioned have most commonly been either one-piece garments, skin-tight garments, or both, typically ending up looking like either overalls or leotards, often worn together with plastic boots. In many cases, there is an assumption that the clothing of the future will be highly uniform.
The cliché of futuristic clothing has now become part of the idea of retrofuturism. Futuristic fashion plays on these now-hackneyed stereotypes, and recycles them as elements into the creation of real-world clothing fashions.
"We've actually seen this look creeping up on the runway as early as 1995, though it hasn't been widely popular or acceptable street wear even through 2008," said Brooke Kelley, fashion editor and "Glamour" magazine writer. "For the last 20 years, fashion has reviewed the times of past, decade by decade, and what we are seeing now is a combination of different eras into one complete look. Future fashion is a style beyond anything we've yet dared to wear, and it's going to be a trend setter's paradise."
Architecture.
Retrofuturism has appeared in some examples of postmodern architecture. To critics such as Niklas Maak, the term suggests that the "future style" is "a mere quotation of its own iconographic tradition" and retrofuturism is little more than "an aesthetic feedback loop" In the example seen at right, the upper portion of the building is not intended to be integrated with the building but rather to appear as a separate object—a huge flying saucer-like space ship only incidentally attached to a conventional building. This appears intended not to evoke an even remotely possible future, but rather a past imagination of that future, or a reembracing of the futuristic vision of Googie architecture.
The once-futuristic Los Angeles International Airport Theme Building was built in 1961 as an expression of the then new jet and space ages, incorporating what later came to be known as Googie and Populuxe design elements. Plans unveiled in 2008 for LAX's expansion featured retrofuturist flying-saucer/spaceship themes in proposals for new terminals and concourses.
Video games.
Retrofuturism has been also applied to video games, such as the following:
References.
Informational notes
Citations
Further reading |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Dystopia
A dystopia (from Ancient Greek δυσ- "bad, hard" and τόπος "place"; alternatively cacotopia or simply anti-utopia) is a fictional community or society that is undesirable or frightening. It is often treated as an antonym of "utopia", a term that was coined by Sir Thomas More and figures as the title of his best known work, published in 1516, which created a blueprint for an ideal society with minimal crime, violence and poverty. But the relationship between utopia and dystopia is more complex than this, as there exist utopian elements in many dystopias, and vice-versa.
Dystopias are often characterized by writers, tyrannical governments, environmental disaster, or other characteristics associated with a cataclysmic decline in society. While there are certain overlaps, there is however a difference between dystopia and post-apocalyptic fiction and an undesirable society is not necessarily dystopian. Dystopian societies appear in many fictional works and artistic representations, particularly in stories set in the future. The best known by far is George Orwell's "Nineteen Eighty-Four", which has outsold all the rest put together, and thus necessarily is the starting-point for any study of the subject. Other famous examples are Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World" (1932), and Ray Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451" (1953). Dystopian societies appear in many sub-genres of fiction and are often used to draw attention to society, environment, politics, economics, religion, psychology, ethics, science or technology. Some authors use the term to refer to existing societies, many of which are, or have been, totalitarian states or societies in an advanced state of collapse. Dystopias, through an exaggerated worst-case scenario, often make a criticism about a current trend, societal norm, or political system.
The entire substantial sub-genre of Alternative History works depicting a world in which Nazi Germany won the Second World War can be considered as Dystopias. So can other works of Alternative History, in which a historical turning point led to a manifestly repressive world. For example, the 2004 mockumentary ","and Ben Winters' "Underground Airlines", in which slavery in the United States continues to the present, with "electronic slave auctions" carried out via the Internet and slaves controlled by electronic devices implanted in their spines, or Keith Roberts "Pavane" in which 20th Century Britain is ruled by a Catholic theocracy and the Inquisition is actively torturing and burning "heretics".
Some scholars, such as Gregory Claeys and Lyman Tower Sargent, make certain distinctions between typical synonyms of dystopias. For example, Claeys and Sargent define "literary dystopias" as societies imagined as substantially worse than the society in which the author writes. Some of these are anti-utopias, which criticise attempts to implement various concepts of utopia. In the most comprehensive treatment of the literary and real expressions of the concept, "Dystopia: A Natural History", Claeys offers a historical approach to these definitions. Here the tradition is traced from early reactions to the French Revolution. Its commonly anti-collectivist character is stressed, and the addition of other themes—the dangers of science and technology, of social inequality, of corporate dictatorship, of nuclear war—are also traced. A psychological approach is also favoured here, with the principle of fear being identified with despotic forms of rule, carried forward from the history of political thought, and group psychology introduced as a means of understanding the relationship between utopia and dystopia. Andrew Norton-Schwartzbard noted that "written many centuries before the concept "dystopia" existed, Dante's "Inferno" in fact includes most of the typical characteristics associated with this genre - even if placed in a religious framework rather than in the future of the mundane world, as modern dystopias tend to be".
Etymology.
Though several earlier usages are known, "dystopia" was used as an antonym for "utopia" by John Stuart Mill in one of his 1868 Parliamentary Speeches ("Hansard Commons") by adding the prefix "dys" ( "bad") to "topia", reinterpreting the initial "u" as the prefix "eu" ( "good") instead of "ou" ( "not"). It was used to denounce the government's Irish land policy: "It is, perhaps, too complimentary to call them Utopians, they ought rather to be called dys-topians, or caco-topians. What is commonly called Utopian is something too good to be practicable; but what they appear to favour is too bad to be practicable".
Decades before the first documented use of the word "dystopia" was "cacotopia"/"kakotopia" (using , "bad, wicked") originally proposed in 1818 by Jeremy Bentham, "As a match for utopia (or the imagined seat of the best government) suppose a cacotopia (or the imagined seat of the worst government) discovered and described". Though dystopia became the most popular term, cacotopia finds occasional use; Anthony Burgess, author of "A Clockwork Orange", said it was a better fit for Orwell's "Nineteen Eighty-Four" because "it sounds worse than dystopia".
Society.
Dystopias typically reflect contemporary sociopolitical realities and extrapolate worst-case scenarios as warnings for necessary social change or caution. Dystopian fictions invariably reflect the concerns and fears of their creators' contemporaneous culture. Due to this, they can be considered a subject of social studies. In dystopias, citizens may live in a dehumanized state, be under constant surveillance, or have a fear of the outside world. In the film What Happened To Monday the protagonist risk their lives by taking turns onto the outside world because of a one-child policy place in this futuristic dystopian society.
In a 1967 study, Frank Kermode suggests that the failure of religious prophecies led to a shift in how society apprehends this ancient mode. Christopher Schmidt notes that, while the world goes to waste for future generations, people distract themselves from disaster by passively watching it as entertainment.
In the 2010s, there was a surge of popular dystopian young adult literature and blockbuster films. Some have commented on this trend, saying that "it is easier to imagine the end of the world than it is to imagine the end of capitalism". Cultural theorist and critic Mark Fisher identified the phrase as encompassing the theory of capitalist realism ‐ the perceived "widespread sense that not only is capitalism the only viable political and economic system, but also that it is now impossible even to imagine a coherent alternative to it" - and used the above quote as the title to the opening chapter of his book, "Capitalist Realism: Is There No Alternative?". In the book, he also refers to dystopian film such as "Children of Men" (originally a novel by P. D. James) to illustrate what he describes as the "slow cancellation of the future". Theo James, an actor in "Divergent" (originally a novel by Veronica Roth), explains that "young people in particular have such a fascination with this kind of story [...] It's becoming part of the consciousness. You grow up in a world where it's part of the conversation all the time – the statistics of our planet warming up. The environment is changing. The weather is different. There are things that are very visceral and very obvious, and they make you question the future and how we will survive. It's so much a part of everyday life that young people inevitably – consciously or not – are questioning their futures and how the Earth will be. I certainly do. I wonder what kind of world my children's kids will live in."
Common themes.
Politics.
In "When the Sleeper Wakes", H. G. Wells depicted the governing class as hedonistic and shallow. George Orwell contrasted Wells's world to that depicted in Jack London's "The Iron Heel", where the dystopian rulers are brutal and dedicated to the point of fanaticism, which Orwell considered more plausible.
The political principles at the root of fictional utopias (or "perfect worlds") are idealistic in principle and result in positive consequences for the inhabitants; the political principles on which fictional dystopias are based, while often based on utopian ideals, result in negative consequences for inhabitants because of at least one fatal flaw.
Dystopias are often filled with pessimistic views of the ruling class or a government that is brutal or uncaring, ruling with an "iron fist". Dystopian governments are sometimes ruled by a fascist or communist regime or dictator. These dystopian government establishments often have protagonists or groups that lead a "resistance" to enact change within their society, as is seen in Alan Moore's "V for Vendetta".
Dystopian political situations are depicted in novels such as "We", "Parable of the Sower", "Darkness at Noon", "Nineteen Eighty-Four", "Brave New World", "The Handmaid’s Tale", "The Hunger Games", "Divergent" and "Fahrenheit 451" and such films as "Metropolis", "Brazil", "Battle Royale", "", "Soylent Green", "Logan's Run", and "The Running Man".
Economics.
The economic structures of dystopian societies in literature and other media have many variations, as the economy often relates directly to the elements that the writer is depicting as the source of the oppression. There are several archetypes that such societies tend to follow. A theme is the dichotomy of planned economies versus free market economies, a conflict which is found in such works as Ayn Rand's "Anthem" and Henry Kuttner's short story "The Iron Standard". Another example of this is reflected in Norman Jewison's 1975 film "Rollerball".
Some dystopias, such as that of "Nineteen Eighty-Four", feature black markets with goods that are dangerous and difficult to obtain or the characters may be at the mercy of the state-controlled economy. Kurt Vonnegut's "Player Piano" depicts a dystopia in which the centrally controlled economic system has indeed made material abundance plentiful but deprived the mass of humanity of meaningful labor; virtually all work is menial, unsatisfying and only a small number of the small group that achieves education is admitted to the elite and its work. In Tanith Lee's "Don't Bite the Sun", there is no want of any kind – only unabashed consumption and hedonism, leading the protagonist to begin looking for a deeper meaning to existence. Even in dystopias where the economic system is not the source of the society's flaws, as in "Brave New World", the state often controls the economy; a character, reacting with horror to the suggestion of not being part of the social body, cites as a reason that everyone works for everyone else.
Other works feature extensive privatization and corporatism; both consequences of capitalism, where privately owned and unaccountable large corporations have replaced the government in setting policy and making decisions. They manipulate, infiltrate, control, bribe, are contracted by and function as government. This is seen in the novels "Jennifer Government" and "Oryx and Crake" and the movies "Alien", "Avatar", "RoboCop", "Visioneers", "Idiocracy", "Soylent Green", "THX 1138", "WALL-E" and "Rollerball". Corporate republics are common in the cyberpunk genre, as in Neal Stephenson's "Snow Crash" and Philip K. Dick's "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" (as well as the film "Blade Runner", influenced by and based upon Dick's novel).
Class.
Dystopian fiction frequently draws stark contrasts between the privileges of the ruling class and the dreary existence of the working class. In the 1931 novel "Brave New World" by Aldous Huxley, a class system is prenatally determined with Alphas, Betas, Gammas, Deltas and Epsilons, with the lower classes having reduced brain-function and special conditioning to make them satisfied with their position in life. Outside of this society there also exist several human settlements that exist in the "conventional" way but which the class system describe as "savages".
In "Ypsilon Minus" by Herbert W. Franke, people are divided into numerous alphabetically ranked groups.
In the film "Elysium", the majority of Earth's population on the surface lives in poverty with little access to health care and are subject to worker exploitation and police brutality, while the wealthy live above the Earth in luxury with access to technologies that cure all diseases, reverse aging, and regenerate body parts.
Written a century earlier, the future society depicted in H.G. Wells' "The Time Machine" had started in a similar way to "Elysium" - the workers consigned to living and working in underground tunnels while the wealthy live on a surface made into an enormous beautiful garden. But over a long time period the roles were eventually reversed - the rich degenerated and became a decadent "livestock" regularly caught and eaten by the underground cannibal Morlocks.
Family.
Some fictional dystopias, such as "Brave New World" and "Fahrenheit 451", have eradicated the family and keep it from re-establishing itself as a social institution. In "Brave New World", where children are reproduced artificially, the concepts of "mother" and "father" are considered obscene. In some novels, such as "We", the state is hostile to motherhood, as a pregnant woman from One State is in revolt.
Religion.
Religious groups play the role of the oppressed and oppressors. In "Brave New World" the establishment of the state included lopping off the tops of all crosses (as symbols of Christianity) to make them "T"s, (as symbols of Henry Ford's Model T). Margaret Atwood's novel "The Handmaid's Tale" takes place in a future United States under a Christian-based theocratic regime. One of the earliest examples of this theme is Robert Hugh Benson's "Lord of the World", about a futuristic world where the Freemasons have taken over the world and the only other religion left is a Roman Catholic minority.
Identity.
In the Russian novel "We" by Yevgeny Zamyatin, first published in 1921, people are permitted to live out of public view twice a week for one hour and are only referred to by numbers instead of names. The latter feature also appears in the later, unrelated film "THX 1138". In some dystopian works, such as Kurt Vonnegut's "Harrison Bergeron", society forces individuals to conform to radical egalitarian social norms that discourage or suppress accomplishment or even competence as forms of inequality.
Violence.
Violence is prevalent in many dystopias, often in the form of war, but also in urban crimes led by (predominately teenage) gangs (e.g. "A Clockwork Orange"), or rampant crime met by blood sports (e.g. "Battle Royale", "The Running Man", "The Hunger Games", "Divergent", and "The Purge"). It is also explained in Suzanne Berne's essay "Ground Zero", where she explains her experience of the aftermath of September 11, 2001.
Nature.
Fictional dystopias are commonly urban and frequently isolate their characters from all contact with the natural world. Sometimes they require their characters to avoid nature, as when walks are regarded as dangerously anti-social in Ray Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451", as well as within Bradbury's short story "The Pedestrian". In C. S. Lewis's "That Hideous Strength", science coordinated by government is directed toward the control of nature and the elimination of natural human instincts. In "Brave New World", the lower class is conditioned to be afraid of nature but also to visit the countryside and consume transport and games to promote economic activity. Lois Lowry's "The Giver" shows a society where technology and the desire to create a utopia has led humanity to enforce climate control on the environment, as well as to eliminate many undomesticated species and to provide psychological and pharmaceutical repellent against human instincts. E. M. Forster's "The Machine Stops" depicts a highly changed global environment which forces people to live underground due to an atmospheric contamination. As Angel Galdon-Rodriguez points out, this sort of isolation caused by external toxic hazard is later used by Hugh Howey in his series of dystopias of the Silo Series.
Excessive pollution that destroys nature is common in many dystopian films, such as "The Matrix", "RoboCop", "WALL-E", "April and the Extraordinary World" and "Soylent Green". A few "green" fictional dystopias do exist, such as in Michael Carson's short story "The Punishment of Luxury", and Russell Hoban's "Riddley Walker". The latter is set in the aftermath of nuclear war, "a post-nuclear holocaust Kent, where technology has reduced to the level of the Iron Age".
Science and technology.
Contrary to the technologically utopian claims, which view technology as a beneficial addition to all aspects of humanity, technological dystopia concerns itself with and focuses largely (but not always) on the negative effects caused by new technology.
Typical dystopian claims.
1. "Technologies reflect and encourage the worst aspects of human nature."
Jaron Lanier, a digital pioneer, has become a technological dystopian. "I think it’s a way of interpreting technology in which people forgot taking responsibility", he says.
“'Oh, it’s the computer that did it, not me.' 'There’s no more middle class? Oh, it’s not me. The computer did it'” (Lanier). This quote explains that people begin to not only blame the technology for the changes in lifestyle but also believe that technology is an omnipotence. It also points to a technological determinist perspective in terms of reification.
2. "Technologies harm our interpersonal communication, relationships, and communities."
3. "Technologies reinforce hierarchies - concentrate knowledge and skills; increase surveillance and erode privacy; widen inequalities of power and wealth; giving up control to machines). "
Douglas Rushkoff, a technological utopian, states in his article that the professional designers "re-mystified" the computer so it wasn't so readable anymore; users had to depend on the special programs built into the software that was incomprehensible for normal users.
4. "New technologies are sometimes regressive (worse than previous technologies)."
5. "The unforeseen impacts of technology are negative."
“ 'The most common way is that there’s some magic artificial intelligence in the sky or in the cloud or something that knows how to translate, and what a wonderful thing that this is available for free. But there’s another way to look at it, which is the technically true way: You gather a ton of information from real live translators who have translated phrases… It’s huge but very much like Facebook, it’s selling people back to themselves… [With translation] you’re producing this result that looks magical but in the meantime, the original translators aren’t paid for their work… You’re actually shrinking the economy.'”
6. "More efficiency and choices can harm our quality of life (by causing stress, destroying jobs, making us more materialistic)."
In his article "Prest-o! Change-o!,” technological dystopian James Gleick mentions the remote control being the classic example of technology that does not solve the problem "it is meant to solve". Gleick quotes Edward Tenner, a historian of technology, that the ability and ease of switching channels by the remote control serves to increase distraction for the viewer. Then it is only expected that people will become more dissatisfied with the channel they are watching.
7. "New technologies cannot solve problems of old technologies or just create new problems."
The remote control example explains this claim as well, for the increase in laziness and dissatisfaction levels was clearly not a problem in times without the remote control. He also takes social psychologist Robert Levine's example of Indonesians “'whose main entertainment consists of watching the same few plays and dances, month after month, year after year,’ and with Nepalese Sherpas who eat the same meals of potatoes and tea through their entire lives. The Indonesians and Sherpas are perfectly satisfied". Because of the invention of the remote control, it merely created more problems.
8. "Technologies destroy nature (harming human health and the environment). "
The need for business replaced community and the "story online" replaced people as the "soul of the Net". Because information was now able to be bought and sold, there was not as much communication taking place... |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Teleportation in fiction
Teleportation is the theoretical transfer of matter and/or energy from one point to another without traversing the physical space between them. It is a common subject in science fiction and fantasy literature, film, video games, and television. In some situations, teleporting is presented as time traveling across space.
The use of matter transmitters in science fiction originated at least as early as the 19th century. An early example of scientific teleportation (as opposed to magical or spiritual teleportation) is found in the 1897 novel "To Venus in Five Seconds" by Fred T. Jane. Jane's protagonist is transported from a strange-machinery-containing gazebo on Earth to planet Venus.
Overview.
The notion of a teleporter is useful in fiction as it avoids the necessity to depict lengthy transportation sequences by rocket or other means. Usually for story purposes the transmission between source and destination is considered to be faster than the speed of light.
The mechanics of teleportation vary depending on the scientific theories available to the author. For example, in Edgar Rice Burroughs's series of Mars novels, the protagonist arrives at Mars by wishing. Other modalities of teleportation include electricity, radio, nuclear explosions, black holes, quantum entanglement, and the temporary conversion of matter to energy. The authors of such stories nearly always disregard the practicalities of handing the exajoules of energy that would result from the conversion of a 55 kg protagonist to immaterial form. The matter transmitter system may require elaborate machinery at the sending end, the receiving end, or both. Sending a receiver to a destination may require slower-than-light travel, but subsequent transmissions may then be instantaneous. In later installments of the "Star Trek" films, the rationale for interstellar spaceships was undermined by the introduction of a small portable transporter device capable of sending a person over interstellar distances.
The teleportation process is usually considered to make an exact duplicate of the original, but some stories use the process as a way to alter the duplicate in some way. For example, in Larry Niven's novel "World out of Time", the widely used transporters of the story have a variant that is used to enhance longevity, theoretically by removing accumulated debris from cells. Sometimes the alterations are inadvertent and destructive; for example, in the film "The Fly", a teleporter accident results in the fusion of a human being with a fly.
Often a story will describe the consequences of the use of a teleporter, especially on human beings. Where the teleporter essentially creates a remote duplicate of the transmitted person, the story may analyze the consequences of an interruption or communication failure on the original person. There may be an investigation of the morality of destroying the original so that the remote duplicate retains the identity of the individual. An example is the novelette "Think Like a Dinosaur" where the protagonist is compelled to destroy a woman who was inadvertently revived following a communication error with the receiving station. Occasionally remote duplication is used as a method to allow characters to remotely explore environments too dangerous to otherwise investigate. Sometimes the story postulates some form of mental telepathy "link" between the duplicate and the original, facilitating communication of observations from the hazardous environment. One example of this approach is in the Algis Budrys short story "Rogue Moon".
In fictional settings where teleportation is common, the action is often referred to be another term, such as: beam ("Star Trek"), jaunte ("The Stars My Destination", "The Tomorrow People"), jump ("Jumper"), blink or shimmer ("Charmed"), spring ("Thousand Cultures"), or transmat ("Doctor Who").
Interstellar transporters.
An interstellar teleporter is a hypothetical technology appearing in science fiction, typically in soft science fiction, which teleports people or objects over interstellar distances instantaneously.
List of fiction containing teleportation.
Live performance.
William Shakespeare considers the notion of teleportation in "The Tempest" (1610–1611).
Teleportation illusions have featured in live performances throughout history, often under the fiction of miracles, psychic phenomenon, or magic. The cups and balls trick has been performed since 3 BC and can involve balls vanishing, reappearing, teleporting and transposing (objects in two locations interchanging places). A common trick of close-up magic is the apparent teleportation of a small object, such as a marked playing card, which can involve sleight-of-hand, misdirection, and pickpocketing. Magic shows were popular entertainments at fairs in the 18th century and moved into permanent theatres in the mid-19th century. Theatres provided greater control of the environment and viewing angles for more elaborate illusions, and teleportation tricks grew in scale and ambition. To increase audience excitement, the teleportation illusion could be conducted under the theme of a predicament escape. Magic shows achieved widespread success during the Golden Age of Magic in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Video games.
Teleportation is common in video games, often used as a transition when a character enters or exits a level or chapter. It is typically explained as technological in science fiction settings and magical in fantasy settings.
Fast travel is a common game mechanic in open world games which allows a character to revisit certain previously discovered locations. It is often framed as teleportation, though in some games physical travel between locations is implied but not shown.
Games which include a teleportation mechanic will often employ it for several playable characters and adversaries, typically with different restrictions and effects. If teleporting to a location occupied by another character, that character will often receive damage or be instantly killed, referred to as a "telefrag".
Teleportation and teleportation experiments may be story elements in games. They provide the premise for the enemy's appearance in "Doom" and "Outbreak". |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Force field (technology)
In speculative fiction, a force field, sometimes known as an energy shield, force shield, force bubble, defence shield or deflector shield, is a barrier made of things like energy, negative energy, dark energy, electromagnetic fields, gravitational fields, electric fields, quantum fields, plasma, particles, radiation, solid light, or pure force. It protects a person, area, or object from attacks or intrusions or even deflects energy attacks back at the attacker. This fictional technology is created as a field of energy without mass that acts as a wall, so that objects affected by the particular force relating to the field are unable to pass through the field and reach the other side, are deflected or destroyed. This concept has become a staple of many science-fiction works, so much that authors frequently do not even bother to explain or justify them to their readers, treating them almost as established fact and attributing whatever capabilities the plot requires.
The ability to create forcefields has become a frequent superpower in superhero media.
History.
The concept of a force field goes back at least as far as early 20th century. "The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction" suggests that the first use of the term in science fiction appears to happen in 1931, in "Spacehounds of IPC" by E.E. 'Doc' Smith.
An early precursor of what is now called "force field" may be found in William Hope Hodgson's "The Night Land" (1912), where the Last Redoubt, the fortress of the remnants of a far-future humanity, is kept safe by "The Air Clog" generated by the burning "Earth-Current".
In Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" universe, personal shields have been developed by scientists specializing in the miniaturization of planet-based shields. As they are primarily used by Foundation Traders, most other inhabitants of the Galactic Empire do not know about this technology. In an unrelated short story "Breeds There a Man...?" by Asimov, scientists are working on a force field ("energy so channelled as to create a wall of matter-less inertia"), capable of protecting the population in case of a nuclear war. The force field demonstrated in the end is a solid hemisphere, apparently completely opaque and reflective from both sides. Asimov explores the force field concept again in the short story Not Final!.
The concept of force fields as a defensive measure from enemy attack or as a form of attack can be regularly found in modern video games as well as in film, such as in "The War of the Worlds" (1953, George Pál) and "Independence Day".
The ability to create a force field has been a common superpower in comic books and associated media. While only a few characters have the explicit ability to create force fields (for example, the Invisible Woman of the Fantastic Four and Violet Parr from "The Incredibles"), it has been emulated via other powers, such as Green Lantern's energy constructs, Jean Grey's telekinesis, and Magneto's manipulation of electromagnetic fields. Apart from this, its importance is also highlighted in Dr. Michio Kaku's books (such as "Physics of the Impossible").
Fictional uses.
Science fiction and fantasy avenues suggest a number of potential uses of force fields
The capabilities and functionality of force fields vary; in some works of fiction (such as in the "Star Trek" universe), energy shields can nullify or mitigate the effects of both energy and particle (e.g., phasers) and conventional weapons, as well as supernatural forces. In many fictional scenarios, the shields function primarily as a defensive measure against weapons fired from other spacecraft. Force fields in these stories also generally prevent transporting. There are generally two kinds of force fields postulated: one in which energy is projected as a flat plane from emitters around the edges of a spacecraft and another where energy surrounds a ship like a bubble.
Scientific research.
In 2005, NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts devised a way to protect from radiation by applying electric field to spheres made of a thin, nonconductive material coated with a layer of gold with either positive or negative charges, which could be arranged to bend charged particles shield to protect from radiation.
In 2006, a University of Washington group in Seattle has been experimenting with using a bubble of charged plasma, contained by a fine mesh of superconducting wire, to surround a spacecraft. This would protect the spacecraft from interstellar radiation and some particles without needing physical shielding.
Likewise, Rutherford Appleton Laboratory is attempting to design an actual test satellite, which would orbit Earth with a charged plasma field around it.
In 2008, "Cosmos Magazine" reported on research into creating an artificial replica of Earth's magnetic field around a spacecraft to protect astronauts from dangerous cosmic rays. British and Portuguese scientists used a mathematical simulation to prove that it would be possible to create a "mini-magnetosphere" bubble several hundred meters wide, possibly generated by a small unmanned vessel that could accompany a future manned mission to Mars.
In 2014, a group of students from the University of Leicester released a study describing functioning of spaceship plasma deflector shields.
In 2015, Boeing was granted a patent on a force field system designed to protect against shock waves generated by explosions. It is not intended to protect against projectiles, radiation, or energy weapons such as lasers. The field purportedly works by using a combination of lasers, electricity and microwaves to rapidly heat up the air creating a field of (ionised) superheated air-plasma which disrupts, or at least attenuates, the shock wave. As of March 2016, no working models are known to have been demonstrated.
In 2016, Rice University scientists discovered that the Tesla coils can generate force fields able to manipulate matter (process called teslaphoresis).
Michio Kaku proposes force fields consisting of three layers. The first is the high-powered plasma window which can vaporize incoming objects, block radiation, and particles. The second layer will consist of thousands of laser beams arranged in a tight lattice configuration to vaporize any objects that managed to went through plasma screen, by the laser beams. The third layer is an invisible but stable sheet of material like carbon nanotubes, or graphene that is only one atom thick, and thus transparent, but stronger than steel to block possible debris from destroyed objects.
Superpower.
The ability to create forcefields has become a frequent superpower in superhero media.
While sometimes an explicit power, forcefields have also been attributed to other fictional superpowers. Marvel Comics' Jean Grey is able to use her telekinesis to create a barrier of telekinetic energy that acts as a forcefield by repelling objects. Magneto is able to use his magnetism to manipulate magnetic fields into acting as shields.
The most common superpower link seen with forcefields is the power of invisibility. This is seen with Marvel Comics' Invisible Woman and Disney Pixar's Violet Parr.
Forcefields often vary in what they are made of, though are commonly made of energy. In the 2017 series The Gifted, Lauren Strucker has the ability to create shields by pushing molecules together. This results in her being able to construct forcefields out of air and water. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Interdimensional being
An interdimensional being (also extra-dimensional, intra-dimensional and other-dimensional) is a type of hypothetical entity in a dimension beyond our own. Such beings are common in science fiction, fantasy and supernatural fiction.
Science fiction.
Implementation of dimensional portals.
In the Star Trek universe, wormhole theory states that if a section in the fabric of spacetime joins together with another section of spacetime, a direct connection can be made between the two, allowing speedy travel between the two (normally unrelated) spacetime coordinates. Black holes are one such way of stretching the fabric of spacetime; so it's theoretically possible to create wormholes
using a pair of singularities, at least in the fictional universe of Star Trek. The NASA Web site has a somewhat dated article called "The Science of Star Trek", by physicist David Allen Batchelor (5 May 2009), which considers some of the implementations in Star Trek. He says it's "the only science fiction series crafted with such respect for real science and intelligent writing", with some "imaginary science" mixed in; and considers it to be the "only science fiction series that many scientists watch regularly", like himself. He says it's "more faithful to science than any other science fiction series ever shown on television".
In literature.
"The Time Machine" (H. G. Wells).
"The Time Machine" by H. G. Wells describes time travelers as interdimensionally capable.
The protagonist describes the passing of time, and also treats it as if it were a spatial dimension. This is exactly how H. G. Wells devises the time machine mechanism in this particular work of fiction. H. G. Wells supposes that if time could simply be treated as space, then time machines would indeed operate correctly. In this case, the H. G. Wells definition of a time traveler must be equivalent to that of an interdimensional being – an entity capable of traveling through unusual dimensional rifts that few other entities can enter.
From H. G. Wells' Work: 'Clearly,' the Time Traveller proceeded, 'any real body must have extension in four directions: it must have Length, Breadth, Thickness, and—Duration. But through a natural infirmity of the flesh, which I will explain to you in a moment, we incline to overlook this fact. There are really four dimensions, three which we call the three planes of Space, and a fourth, Time. There is, however, a tendency to draw an unreal distinction between the former three dimensions and the latter, because it happens that our consciousness moves intermittently in one direction along the latter from the beginning to the end of our lives.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (Douglas Adams).
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams describes that mice are 'merely the protrusion into our dimension of vast hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional beings.' The old man, Slartibartfast, from Magrathea told the protagonist, Arthur, that the planet he lived on, Earth, 'was commissioned, paid for, and run by mice.' and that the mice were furious when it was destroyed.
Flatland.
Flatland by Edwin Abbott Abbott describes the interactions of a two-dimensional square with an interdimensional being from a coexisting three-dimensional spacetime.
Fantasy.
Universe dimensionality.
An additional fictional work that does include universe dimensionality of some sort includes the Buffy the Vampire Slayer series, according to a particular academic source. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Earthling
Earthlings (also known as Earthers or Gaians, or Terrans) are inhabitants of planet Earth. The word is first attested in this sense in the 1590s, and was used in science fiction as early as 1949, in "Red Planet" by Robert A. Heinlein.
History.
Historically, the term "earthling" referred to a mortal inhabitant of the Earth as opposed to spiritual or divine entities. In Early Modern English, the word was used with the intention of contrasting "earth" with "heaven", and so presenting man as an inhabitant of the sublunary sphere, as opposed to heavenly creatures or deities. The derivation from the noun "earth" by means of the suffix "-ling" is already seen in Old English "yrþling", in the meaning "ploughman". The sense of "inhabitant of earth" is first attested in the 1590s. It was used in science fiction as early as 1949, in "Red Planet" by Robert A. Heinlein.
The word "man" and "human" has the same imposed meaning, since it originates from a Proto-Indo-European word "*ǵʰmṓ" "earthling" < "*dʰéǵʰōm" "earth". Compare Latin "homo" "human" and "humus" "earth, soil".
Modern use.
Its modern use in science fiction literature contrasts Earth (the planet) with outer space or hypothetical other planets with sapient life. The term was often used in 1950s science fiction film and novels by aliens to express a disdainful or patronizing tone towards creatures from Earth. The meaning "creature from planet Earth" in the context of space travel may be extended to non-human species, as in "Russia fetes dog Laika, first earthling in space".
In some science fiction media (such as the "Star Trek" franchise and the 2014 movie "Guardians of the Galaxy") the term "Terran" is used as a term for humans, stemming from "terra", the Latin word for Earth. Others, such as The Expanse, use the word "Earther." In the original run of the BBC series "Doctor Who", the phrase "tellurian" is used. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | List of fictional cyborgs
This list is for fictional cyborgs.
Comics and manga.
1960s.
Cybermen Doctor Who The Tenth Planet episode October 291966 |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Superhuman
The term superhuman refers to humans or human-like lifeforms with enhanced qualities and abilities that exceed those naturally found in humans. These qualities may be acquired through natural ability, self-actualization or technological aids. The related concept of a super race refers to an entire category of beings with the same or varying superhuman characteristics, created from present-day human beings by deploying various means such as eugenics, euthenics, genetic engineering, nanotechnology, and/or brain-computer interfacing to accelerate the process of human evolution.
Throughout history, the discussion of superhuman traits and the idea of the ideal human in physical, mental, or spiritual form has influenced politics, policy, philosophy, science and various social movements, as well as featuring prominently in culture. Groups advocating the deliberate pursuit of superhuman qualities for philosophical, political, or moral reasons are sometimes referred to as superhumanist.
Modern depictions of this have evolved and are shown in superhero fiction or through technologically aided people or cyborgs.
In philosophy.
Nietzsche.
The "Übermensch" or "Superman" was postulated in the later writings of Friedrich Nietzsche as a type of supreme, ultra-aristocratic achievement which becomes possible in the transcendence of modernity, morals or nihilism. Nietzsche believed in creating the perfect human, or at least a definition of one, and achieving this perfection through the enhancement of individual and cultural health, creativity, and power, and that to be a successful human one would focus on the realities of our world, rather than the beyond world, or afterlife.
Nietzsche explores the idea of a superhuman in his work "Thus Spoke Zarathustra", in which he discusses the reality of humans existing as just that, and their potential to be more, through risks taken to advance humanity. This belief focuses not on a man who is bettering oneself but instead establishes values which create a meaning to life greater than one person, and positively influencing the lives of others with an overarching goal of humanity. These goals help one overcome life's feeling of meaninglessness.
Transhumanism.
In transhumanism and futurology, superhuman abilities are the technological aim either of human enhancement by genetic modification or cybernetic implants or of future superhuman artificial intelligence.
Human enhancement is an attempt to temporarily or permanently overcome the current limitations of the human body through natural or artificial means. Human enhancement may be through the use of technological means to select or alter human characteristics and capacities, whether or not the alteration results in characteristics and capacities that lie beyond the existing human range.
Some bioethicists restrict the term to the non-therapeutic application of specific technologies — neuro-, cyber-, gene- and nano-technologies — to human biology.
According to transhumanist thinkers, a posthuman is a hypothetical future being "whose basic capacities so radically exceed those of present humans as to be no longer unambiguously human by our current standards."
Fictionalized accounts of transhumanism include the characters from the "X-Men" franchise and cyborgs such as those found in the "Ghost in the Shell" franchise.
Ray Kurzweil.
In 2005, the inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil predicted that over a 40-year period between 2005 and 2045, most human beings will gradually evolve into a super race of immortal cyborgs called "Transhumans" with super-bodies and super-brains (the super brains of the humanoid androids will have greater capacity not only in and of themselves, but also because they will be able to function more efficiently by storing some of their mental capacity in the cloud of the future greatly expanded Internet through brain-computer interfacing) by gradually replacing their biological cells with new cells having a more efficient cellular energy processing system that will be based on nanobots manufactured using nanotechnology. These nanobot based cells will enable those who possess these initially quasi android bodies ("Human body 2.0") to have much greater physical endurance as if they were permanently on steroids, and many Olympic records will be routinely broken. The five senses will be enhanced first by genetic enhancement and then by additional brain-computer interfacing. By about 2040, most humans will have become fully android ("Human body 3.0").
Finally, predicts Kurzweil, by 2045, because of the operation of Moore's law, supercomputers linked together by the Internet will have developed enough memory capacity such that most of the now mostly android human race (except those who don't want to) will be able to upload themselves into the worldwide Internet supercomputer of 2045 and live forever after in virtual reality—an event he calls the "Singularity".
Kurzweil predicts that soon after the "Singularity", the worldwide supercomputer will deploy other humanoid androids and robots in the meat world. A space navy of these androids and robots will radiate outward from Earth (by now itself a gigantic worldwide supercomputer, except for extensive areas of the surface of Earth set up as nature reserves for those humans who wanted to remain in their natural state as well as to preserve the plants and animals in their natural ecosystems) on large fleets of interplanetary spaceships that will rocket outward into the solar system and convert all the matter they encounter into megacomputers made of computronium (such as Jupiter Brains) in order to continually expand the computer capacity of the solar system and thus create ever more realistic virtual reality and solve ever more complex computer problems. Once the matter of the solar system has been mostly converted to computer substrate, forming a Matrioshka brain, according to Kurzweil, by about the beginning of the 22nd century, life will then expand outward into interstellar space in all directions, deploying miniature starships (to save on expensive anti matter starship fuel) that will be Von Neumann probes crewed by swarms of nanobots, to colonize the entire Milky Way Galaxy. When these nanobots arrive in a planetary system, the nanobots will be programmed with software to begin converting some of the matter they encounter into more androids and robots. While in the process of doing so, they will continue converting all other matter they encounter not being used to create additional androids and robots into more megacomputers — the androids and robots created by the nanobots will build interplanetary spaceships to fan out into the planetary system and themselves help get this job done. Some of the androids and robots will then settle down in the meat world as immortal colonists on the surfaces of the Matrioshka brains thus constructed (regularly making backup copies of the contents of their brains so they can be reconstructed if they are killed in an accident), while others will upload themselves into the virtual reality based on these Matrioshka brains, keeping their bodies in cryonic storage. Eventually, the entire Galaxy, then the Local group, then the Virgo Supercluster, then the Pisces-Cetus Supercluster Complex and ultimately the entire Universe will be turned into a gigantic megacomputer.
Artificial intelligence.
"Superhuman" is one of the stages in classification of progress in artificial intelligence where an entity of artificial intelligence performs better than most humans do in a specific task. Examples of where computers have achieved superhuman performance include Backgammon, Bridge, Chess, Reversi, Scrabble, Go and Jeopardy!.
Anarchist philosophy.
It is suggested that there is a relationship between the fall of a society and the perfection of mankind. Many economic, social and environmental factors, which all contribute to the sustainability of a society, are built upon the need for a solution to a problem. Superhumanism requires the ability to overcome these problems, either through physical, mental or emotional triumphs of purity and self-actualization. Through the elimination of these problems, many economies and social structures would be collapsed. Also, through advancement in areas such as Transhumanism, some believe that people humans will advance to a point of education and readiness that war will break out between one another, or tyrannies will reign, due to the high levels of advancements being achieved hence correlating with a need for power, eventually leading to an ultimate state of anarchy.
Religious connotations.
As a major defining factor of the superhumanism philosophy, humans are expected to possess traits that are considered to be those of high moral grounds, dignity and intrinsic values. Many people who believe in superhumanism value the importance of independent responsibility in making the world a better, and more moral place. This often means being in, or establishing some sort of spirituality which allows one to follow guidelines and grounds of a moral structure, and achieve a certain level of clarity and purity in their self and their path to righteousness and betterment. Superhumanism is often referred to as a combination between religion and philosophy, which suggests that there should be a correlation between the actions of man, and the patterns of the earth, in which this unity established with God, nature and man can allow for super human feats to become possible.
In history.
Nazi Germany.
The Nietzschean notion of bettering one's self as an individual was expanded within the philosophy of Nazism to apply to whole groups and nations. Nazi racialist thinkers proposed perfecting the Aryan race through controlled breeding and coercive eugenics (including the murder of those deemed unfit) as a way of improving their racial stock and purifying their society. They intended to create a "herrenvolk" (race of masters) wherein the Germanic "Übermenschen" would rule over so-called inferior "untermenschen" such as Slavs and West Asians.
Homo Galactica.
The Neo-Nazi David Myatt advocated in the early 1990s that after the "Western Imperium", a proposed future autocratic state governing all the areas inhabited by the Aryan race, is established, and the birth rate of the Aryan race is brought up from its present level of about 1.6 to a replacement rate of 2.1, that then a new super-race called "Homo Galactica" should be created by genetic engineering from the most perfect Aryans, which by then will have themselves been improved through genetic enhancement. This new super race would be genetically engineered to have super brains, super senses, and more delicate hands to be able to travel in starships, which would be sent out to colonize the entire Milky Way Galaxy with the descendants of Aryans.
Real life examples.
Athletics.
Many acts performed by elite athletes are seen as superhuman. Elite athletes perform at a level that is perceived as unattainable by normal standards of performance. These are the result of a mixture of genetics, physical training, and mental conditioning. For example, the highest VO2 max test results ever recorded were from Norwegian cross-country skier, Bjorn Daehlie, who scored a 96 ml/kg/min. The average range for VO2 Max is between 35-40 milliliters of oxygen per kilogram of body weight per minute (ml/kg/min) for men and 27-31 ml/kg/min for women. Another man, Dean Karnazes ran 50 marathons in 50 days in all 50 states in 2006. On February 4, 2015 actor and power lifter Hafthor Bjornsson broke a 1000-year-old record by carrying a 1,433 pound log on his back for 5 steps.
Outside of athletics, many people have performed superhuman feats. The Blue Angels flight acrobatics team regularly pulls maneuvers equal to 4-6 times the force of gravity (g), with some turns as high as 8g. One man, Greg Poe, is a pilot who was able withstand turns of 12g.
There are also many stories of people lifting extremely heavy objects under extreme stress, known as hysterical strength. These situations are created when abnormal tasks are completed due to the brains heightened need for achievement.
Science.
One modern day method of achieving above average abilities include performance-enhancing drugs; these include substances such as painkillers, blood boosters, stimulants, and anabolic steroids, but can also encompass substances that aren't fully recognized as enhancers such as caffeine, protein supplements, and vitamins. While drugs as a form of achieving superhuman capabilities is a well known concept in fiction, such as films like "Limitless" and the Marvel Comics character Nuke, in real life the current substances that are known and available don't produce such fantastical abilities. The results from some of these drugs are minimal, and often short term. However, they can still produce detrimental side effects, including many adverse psychological effects. SARMS and DMAA are safer forms to enhance physical performance. Other forms of enhancement include strengthening the material properties of bone by integrating it with titanium foam. More studies are needed to assess the long term effects of these emerging technologies.
Technology can also be used to improve on human sensory and communication abilities as has been shown through experimentation with nervous system implants. In this way humans can take on senses such as ultrasonics for an accurate indication of distance and communicate much more directly between brains.
In popular culture.
Fiction.
Speculation about human nature and the possibilities of both human enhancement and future human evolution have made superhumans a popular subject of science fiction. Superhuman abilities are also associated with superhero fiction.
Art.
In 1979, the British artist Nicholas Treadwell wrote a book entitled "Superhumanism", followed by "Superhumanism 2" in 1982. Treadwell defined his movement as "the first people's art movement – a movement, first and foremost, inspired by life, as opposed to inspired by art. It is a movement of art by the people, for the people, and about the people. It is about tolerance and human understanding. Initially, a superhumanist work will move you to feel – to laugh, to cry, to shudder, to be overwhelmed with compassion. They do not include any aesthetic gesture to distract from the vivid nature of the image. A superhumanist work will take a down to earth subject, and use original technical means to exaggerate it, achieving an over-the-top impact of its humanist theme". Treadwell used this art movement to emphasize the connection between mundane nature of humans, and the superior characteristics that exist in that simplicity.
Documentaries.
"Stan Lee's Superhumans" was a television show devoted to finding people around the world who exhibit abilities that exceed normal human capabilities. The most flexible man in the world, is an example of a superhuman who travels the world finding physical and mental feats that expand the realm of what humans can do.
"" is a Discovery Channel show that explains what happens to people's strength, sight, brainpower, and sensing abilities when placed under extreme stress. These circumstances can lead to short-term superhuman abilities, which allow people to excel in advanced, or impossible tasks.
"How to Be Superhuman" is a podcast series by Red Bull about people who have gone close to the limits of human endurance. The host Rob Pope, who was described as the "real life Forrest Gump" after running across the United States five times, interviews people who have achieved "superhuman" feats, such as Mark Beaumont, who cycled around the world in 78 days, and Diana Nyad, who completed a 110-mile swim from Cuba to Florida without a shark cage at the age of 64. |
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In science fiction, uplift is a developmental process to transform a certain species of animals into more intelligent beings by other, already-intelligent beings. This is usually accomplished by cultural, technological, or evolutional interventions like genetic engineering but any fictional or real process can be used. The earliest appearance of the concept is in H. G. Wells' 1896 novel "The Island of Doctor Moreau", and more recently appears in David Brin's "Uplift series" and other science fiction works.
History of the concept.
The concept can be traced to H. G. Wells' novel "The Island of Doctor Moreau" (1896), in which the titular scientist transforms animals into horrifying parodies of humans through surgery and psychological torment. The resulting animal-people obsessively recite the Law, a series of prohibitions against reversion to animal behaviors, with the haunting refrain of "Are we not men?" Wells' novel reflects Victorian concerns about vivisection and of the power of unrestrained scientific experimentation to do terrible harm.
Other early literary examples can be found in the following works:
David Brin has stated that his Uplift Universe was written at least in part in response to the common assumption in earlier science fiction such as Smith's work and "Planet of the Apes" that uplifted animals would, or even should, be treated as possessions rather than people. As a result, a significant part of the conflict in the series revolves around the differing policies of Galactics and humans toward their client races. Galactic races traditionally hold their uplifted "clients" in a hundred-millennium-long indenture, during which the "patrons" have extensive rights and claims over clients' lives and labor power. In contrast, humans have given their uplifted dolphins and chimpanzees near-equal civil rights, with a few legal and economic disabilities related to their unfinished state. A key scene in "Startide Rising" is a discussion between a self-aware computer (the Niss) and a leading human (Gillian) about how the events during their venture (and hence the novel's plot) relate to the morality of the Galactics' system of uplift. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Telepathy
Telepathy (from the Greek τῆλε, "tele" meaning "distant" and πάθος/-πάθεια, "pathos" or "-patheia" meaning "feeling, perception, passion, affliction, experience") is the purported vicarious transmission of information from one person to another without using any known human sensory channels or physical interaction. The term was first coined in 1882 by the classical scholar Frederic W. H. Myers, a founder of the Society for Psychical Research (SPR), and has remained more popular than the earlier expression "thought-transference".
Telepathy experiments have historically been criticized for lack of proper controls and repeatability. There is no convincing evidence that telepathy exists, and the topic is generally considered by the scientific community to be pseudoscience.
Origins of the concept.
According to historians such as Roger Luckhurst and Janet Oppenheim the origin of the concept of telepathy in Western civilization can be tracked to the late 19th century and the formation of the Society for Psychical Research. As the physical sciences made significant advances, scientific concepts were applied to mental phenomena (e.g., animal magnetism), with the hope that this would help to understand paranormal phenomena. The modern concept of telepathy emerged in this context.
Psychical researcher Eric Dingwall criticized SPR founding members Frederic W. H. Myers and William F. Barrett for trying to "prove" telepathy rather than objectively analyze whether or not it existed.
Thought reading.
In the late 19th century, the magician and mentalist, Washington Irving Bishop would perform "thought reading" demonstrations. Bishop claimed no supernatural powers and ascribed his powers to muscular sensitivity (reading thoughts from unconscious bodily cues). Bishop was investigated by a group of scientists including the editor of the "British Medical Journal" and the psychologist Francis Galton. Bishop performed several feats successfully such as correctly identifying a selected spot on a table and locating a hidden object. During the experiment Bishop required physical contact with a subject who knew the correct answer. He would hold the hand or wrist of the helper. The scientists concluded that Bishop was not a genuine telepath but using a highly trained skill to detect ideomotor movements.
Another famous thought reader was the magician Stuart Cumberland. He was famous for performing blindfolded feats such as identifying a hidden object in a room that a person had picked out or asking someone to imagine a murder scene and then attempt to read the subject's thoughts and identify the victim and reenact the crime. Cumberland claimed to possess no genuine psychic ability and his thought reading performances could only be demonstrated by holding the hand of his subject to read their muscular movements. He came into dispute with psychical researchers associated with the Society for Psychical Research who were searching for genuine cases of telepathy. Cumberland argued that both telepathy and communication with the dead were impossible and that the mind of man cannot be read through telepathy, but only by muscle reading.
Case studies.
In the late 19th century the Creery Sisters (Mary, Alice, Maud, Kathleen, and Emily) were tested by the Society for Psychical Research and believed to have genuine psychic ability. However, during a later experiment they were caught utilizing signal codes and they confessed to fraud. George Albert Smith and Douglas Blackburn were claimed to be genuine psychics by the Society for Psychical Research but Blackburn confessed to fraud:
For nearly thirty years the telepathic experiments conducted by Mr. G. A. Smith and myself have been accepted and cited as the basic evidence of the truth of thought transference...
...the whole of those alleged experiments were bogus, and originated in the honest desire of two youths to show how easily men of scientific mind and training could be deceived when seeking for evidence in support of a theory they were wishful to establish.
Between 1916 and 1924, Gilbert Murray conducted 236 experiments into telepathy and reported 36% as successful, however, it was suggested that the results could be explained by hyperaesthesia as he could hear what was being said by the sender. Psychologist Leonard T. Troland had carried out experiments in telepathy at Harvard University which were reported in 1917. The subjects produced below chance expectations.
Arthur Conan Doyle and W. T. Stead were duped into believing Julius and Agnes Zancig had genuine psychic powers. Both Doyle and Stead wrote the Zancigs performed telepathy. In 1924, Julius and Agnes Zancig confessed that their mind reading act was a trick and published the secret code and all the details of the trick method they had used under the title of "Our Secrets!!" in a London newspaper.
In 1924, Robert H. Gault of Northwestern University with Gardner Murphy conducted the first American radio test for telepathy. The results were entirely negative. One of their experiments involved the attempted thought transmission of a chosen number between one and one-thousand. Out of 2,010 replies, none was correct. This is below the theoretical chance figure of two correct replies in such a situation.
In February 1927, with the co-operation of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), V. J. Woolley who was at the time the Research Officer for the SPR, arranged a telepathy experiment in which radio listeners were asked to take part. The experiment involved 'agents' thinking about five selected objects in an office at Tavistock Square, whilst listeners on the radio were asked to identify the objects from the BBC studio at Savoy Hill. 24, 659 answers were received. The results revealed no evidence for telepathy.
A famous experiment in telepathy was recorded by the American author Upton Sinclair in his book "Mental Radio" which documents Sinclair's test of psychic abilities of Mary Craig Sinclair, his second wife. She attempted to duplicate 290 pictures which were drawn by her husband. Sinclair claimed Mary successfully duplicated 65 of them, with 155 "partial successes" and 70 failures. However, these experiments were not conducted in a controlled scientific laboratory environment. Science writer Martin Gardner suggested that the possibility of sensory leakage during the experiment had not been ruled out:
The Turner-Ownbey long distance telepathy experiment was discovered to contain flaws. May Frances Turner positioned herself in the Duke Parapsychology Laboratory whilst Sara Ownbey claimed to receive transmissions 250 miles away. For the experiment Turner would think of a symbol and write it down whilst Ownbey would write her guesses. The scores were highly successful and both records were supposed to be sent to J. B. Rhine; however, Ownbey sent them to Turner. Critics pointed out this invalidated the results as she could have simply written her own record to agree with the other. When the experiment was repeated and the records were sent to Rhine the scores dropped to average.
Another example is the experiment carried out by the author Harold Sherman with the explorer Hubert Wilkins who carried out their own experiment in telepathy for five and a half months starting in October 1937. This took place when Sherman was in New York and Wilkins was in the Arctic. The experiment consisted of Sherman and Wilkins at the end of each day to relax and visualise a mental image or "thought impression" of the events or thoughts they had experienced in the day and then to record those images and thoughts on paper in a diary. The results at the end when comparing Sherman's and Wilkins' diaries were claimed to be more than 60 percent.
The full results of the experiments were published in 1942 in a book by Sherman and Wilkins titled "Thoughts Through Space". In the book both Sherman and Wilkins had written they believed they had demonstrated that it was possible to send and receive thought impressions from the mind of one person to another. The magician John Booth wrote the experiment was not an example of telepathy as a high percentage of misses had occurred. Booth wrote it was more likely that the "hits" were the result of "coincidence, law of averages, subconscious expectancy, logical inference or a plain lucky guess". A review of their book in the "American Journal of Orthopsychiatry" cast doubt on their experiment noting "the study was published five years after it was conducted, arouses suspicion on the validity of the conclusions.
In 1948, on the BBC radio Maurice Fogel made the claim that he could demonstrate telepathy. This intrigued the journalist Arthur Helliwell who wanted to discover his methods. He found that Fogel's mind reading acts were all based on trickery as he relied on information about members of his audience before the show started. Helliwell exposed Fogel's methods in a newspaper article. Although Fogel managed to fool some people into believing he could perform genuine telepathy, the majority of his audience knew he was a showman.
In a series of experiments Samuel Soal and his assistant K. M. Goldney examined 160 subjects over 128,000 trials and obtained no evidence for the existence of telepathy. Soal tested Basil Shackleton and Gloria Stewart between 1941 and 1943 in over five hundred sittings and over twenty thousand guesses. Shackleton scored 2890 compared with a chance expectation of 2308 and Gloria scored 9410 compared with a chance level of 7420. It was later discovered the results had been tampered with. Gretl Albert who was present during many of the experiments said she had witnessed Soal altering the records during the sessions. Betty Marwick discovered Soal had not used the method of random selection of numbers as he had claimed. Marwick showed that there had been manipulation of the score sheets and all experiments reported by Soal had thereby become discredited.
In 1979 the physicists John G. Taylor and Eduardo Balanovski wrote the only scientifically feasible explanation for telepathy could be electromagnetism (EM) involving EM fields. In a series of experiments the EM levels were many orders of magnitude lower than calculated and no paranormal effects were observed. Both Taylor and Balanovski wrote their results were a strong argument against the validity of telepathy.
Research in anomalistic psychology has discovered that in some cases telepathy can be explained by a covariation bias. In an experiment (Schienle "et al". 1996) 22 believers and 20 skeptics were asked to judge the covariation between transmitted symbols and the corresponding feedback given by a receiver. According to the results the believers overestimated the number of successful transmissions whilst the skeptics made accurate hit judgments. The results from another telepathy experiment involving 48 undergraduate college students (Rudski, 2002) were explained by hindsight and confirmation biases.
In parapsychology.
Within parapsychology, telepathy, often along with precognition and clairvoyance, is described as an aspect of extrasensory perception (ESP) or "anomalous cognition" that parapsychologists believe is transferred through a hypothetical psychic mechanism they call "psi". Parapsychologists have reported experiments they use to test for telepathic abilities. Among the most well known are the use of Zener cards and the Ganzfeld experiment.
Types.
Several forms of telepathy have been suggested:
Zener Cards.
Zener cards are marked with five distinctive symbols. When using them, one individual is designated the "sender" and another the "receiver". The sender selects a random card and visualizes the symbol on it, while the receiver attempts to determine that symbol telepathically. Statistically, the receiver has a 20% chance of randomly guessing the correct symbol, so to demonstrate telepathy, they must repeatedly score a success rate that is significantly higher than 20%. If not conducted properly, this method is vulnerable to sensory leakage and card counting.
J. B. Rhine's experiments with Zener cards were discredited due to the discovery that sensory leakage or cheating could account for all his results such as the subject being able to read the symbols from the back of the cards and being able to see and hear the experimenter to note subtle clues. Once Rhine took precautions in response to criticisms of his methods, he was unable to find any high-scoring subjects. Due to the methodological problems, parapsychologists no longer utilize card-guessing studies.
Dream telepathy.
Parapsychological studies into dream telepathy were carried out at the Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York led by Stanley Krippner and Montague Ullman. They concluded the results from some of their experiments supported dream telepathy. However, the results have not been independently replicated. The psychologist James Alcock has written the dream telepathy experiments at Maimonides have failed to provide evidence for telepathy and "lack of replication is rampant."
The picture target experiments that were conducted by Krippner and Ullman were criticized by C. E. M. Hansel. According to Hansel there were weaknesses in the design of the experiments in the way in which the agent became aware of their target picture. Only the agent should have known the target and no other person until the judging of targets had been completed, however, an experimenter was with the agent when the target envelope was opened. Hansel also wrote there had been poor controls in the experiment as the main experimenter could communicate with the subject.
An attempt to replicate the experiments that used picture targets was carried out by Edward Belvedere and David Foulkes. The finding was that neither the subject nor the judges matched the targets with dreams above chance level. Results from other experiments by Belvedere and Foulkes were also negative.
Ganzfeld experiment.
When using the Ganzfeld experiment to test for telepathy, one individual is designated as the receiver and is placed inside a controlled environment where they are deprived of sensory input, and another person is designated as the sender and is placed in a separate location. The receiver is then required to receive information from the sender. The nature of the information may vary between experiments.
The Ganzfeld experiment studies that were examined by Ray Hyman and Charles Honorton had methodological problems that were well documented. Honorton reported only 36% of the studies used duplicate target sets of pictures to avoid handling cues. Hyman discovered flaws in all of the 42 Ganzfeld experiments and to access each experiment, he devised a set of 12 categories of flaws. Six of these concerned statistical defects, the other six covered procedural flaws such as inadequate documentation, randomization and security as well as possibilities of sensory leakage. Over half of the studies failed to safeguard against sensory leakage and all of the studies contained at least one of the 12 flaws. Because of the flaws, Honorton agreed with Hyman the 42 Ganzfeld studies could not support the claim for the existence of psi.
Possibilities of sensory leakage in the Ganzfeld experiments included the receivers hearing what was going on in the sender's room next door as the rooms were not soundproof and the sender's fingerprints to be visible on the target object for the receiver to see.
Hyman also reviewed the autoganzfeld experiments and discovered a pattern in the data that implied a visual cue may have taken place:
Hyman wrote the autoganzfeld experiments were flawed because they did not preclude the possibility of sensory leakage. In 2010, Lance Storm, Patrizio Tressoldi, and Lorenzo Di Risio analyzed 29 ganzfeld studies from 1997 to 2008. Of the 1,498 trials, 483 produced hits, corresponding to a hit rate of 32.2%. This hit rate is statistically significant with p < .001. Participants selected for personality traits and personal characteristics thought to be psi-conducive were found to perform significantly better than unselected participants in the ganzfeld condition. Hyman (2010) published a rebuttal to Storm "et al". According to Hyman "reliance on meta-analysis as the sole basis for justifying the claim that an anomaly exists and that the evidence for it is consistent and replicable is fallacious. It distorts what scientists mean by confirmatory evidence." Hyman wrote the ganzfeld studies have not been independently replicated and have failed to produce evidence for telepathy. Storm "et al". published a response to Hyman claiming the ganzfeld experimental design has proved to be consistent and reliable but parapsychology is a struggling discipline that has not received much attention so further research on the subject is necessary. Rouder "et al". 2013 wrote that critical evaluation of Storm "et al".'s meta-analysis reveals no evidence for telepathy, no plausible mechanism and omitted replication failures. A 2016 paper examined questionable research practices in the ganzfeld experiments.
Twin telepathy.
Twin telepathy is a belief that has been described as a myth in psychological literature. Psychologists Stephen Hupp and Jeremy Jewell have noted that all experiments on the subject have failed to provide any scientific evidence for telepathy between twins. According to Hupp and Jewell there are various behavioral and genetic factors that contribute to the twin telepathy myth "identical twins typically spend a lot of time together and are usually exposed to very similar environments. Thus, it's not at all surprising that they act in similar ways and are adept at anticipating and forecasting each other's reactions to events."
A 1993 study by Susan Blackmore investigated the claims of twin telepathy. In an experiment with six sets of twins one subject would act as the sender and the other the receiver. The sender was given selected objects, photographs or numbers and would attempt to psychically send the information to the receiver. The results from the experiment were negative, no evidence of telepathy was observed.
The skeptical investigator Benjamin Radford has noted that "Despite decades of research trying to prove telepathy, there is no credible scientific evidence that psychic powers exist, either in the general population or among twins specifically. The idea that two people who shared their mother's womb — or even who share the same DNA — have a mysterious mental connection is an intriguing one not borne out in science."
Scientific reception.
A variety of tests have been performed to demonstrate telepathy, but there is no scientific evidence that the power exists. A panel commissioned by the United States National Research Council to study paranormal claims concluded that "despite a 130-year record of scientific research on such matters, our committee could find no scientific justification for the existence of phenomena such as extrasensory perception, mental telepathy or 'mind over matter' exercises... Evaluation of a large body of the best available evidence simply does not support the contention that these phenomena exist." The scientific community considers parapsychology a pseudoscience. There is no known mechanism for telepathy. Philosopher and physicist Mario Bunge has written that telepathy would contradict laws of science and the claim that "signals can be transmitted across space without fading with distance is inconsistent with physics".
Physicist John Taylor has written that the experiments that have been claimed by parapsychologists to support evidence for the existence of telepathy are based on the use of shaky statistical analysis and poor design, and attempts to duplicate such experiments by the scientific community have failed. Taylor also wrote the arguments used by parapsychologists for the feasibility of such phenomena are based on distortions of theoretical physics as well as "complete ignorance" of relevant areas of physics.
Psychologist Stuart Sutherland wrote that cases of telepathy can be explained by people underestimating the probability of coincidences. According to Sutherland, "most stories about this phenomenon concern people who are close to one another - husband and wife or brother and sister. Since such people have much in common, it is highly probable that they will sometimes think the same thought at the same time." Graham Reed, a specialist in anomalistic psychology, noted that experiments into telepathy often involve the subject relaxing and reporting the 'messages' to consist of colored geometric shapes. Reed wrote that these are a common type of hypnagogic image and not evidence for telepathic communication.
Outside of parapsychology, telepathy is generally explained as the result of fraud, self-delusion and/or self-deception and not as a paranormal power. Psychological research has also revealed other explanations such as confirmation bias, expectancy bias, sensory leakage, subjective validation and wishful thinking. Virtually all of the instances of more popular psychic phenomena, such as mediumship, can be attributed to non-paranormal techniques such as cold reading. Magicians such as Ian Rowland and Derren Brown have demonstrated techniques and results similar to those of popular psychics, albeit without claiming paranormal skills. They have identified, described, and developed psychological techniques of cold reading and hot reading.
Psychiatry.
The notion of telepathy is not dissimilar to three clinical concepts: delusions of thought insertion/removal and thought broadcasting. This similarity might explain how an individual might come to the conclusion that he or she were experiencing telepathy. Thought insertion/removal is a symptom of psychosis, particularly of schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder or substance-induced psychosis. Psychiatric patients who experience this symptom falsely believe that some of their thoughts are not their own and that others (e.g., other people, aliens, demons or fallen angels, or conspiring intelligence agencies, or artificial intelligences) are putting thoughts into their minds (thought insertion). Some patients feel as if thoughts are being taken out of their minds or deleted (thought removal). Along with other symptoms of psychosis, delusions of thought insertion may be reduced by antipsychotic medication. Psychiatrists and clinical psychologists believe and empirical findings support the idea that people with schizotypy and schizotypal personality disorder are particularly likely to believe in telepathy.
Use in fiction.
Telepathy is a common theme in modern fiction and science fiction, with many extraterrestrials (such as the Protoss in the "StarCraft" franchise), superheroes, and supervillains having telepathic ability. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Space dock
A space dock is a hypothesised type of space station that is able to repair or build spacecraft similar to maritime shipyards on Earth. They remove the need for new spacecraft to perform a space launch to reach space and existing spacecraft to make an atmospheric entry and landing for repair work. They currently only exist in fiction, however concept work has been undertaken on real space dock facilities that could be built with current technology.
Real world.
Space docks, as part of a wider space logistics infrastructure, are considered a relevant part of a true space-faring society. Scientists of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics have proposed that future, near-term LEO space facilities should include "a large space dock making possible the on-orbit assembly and maintenance of large space facilities, space platforms, and spacecraft" (see image for design concept). A space dock / hangar could also allow enclosed (and possibly pressurized) maintenance of smaller spacecraft and space planes, though the construction of non-atmospheric spacecraft and other space facilities is envisaged as its main use. The structural strength of such a more advanced hangar would primarily be based on the internal atmospheric pressure that would have to be sustained for shirt-sleeve operations, thus enabling routine servicing and assembly in space.
The use for orbital maintenance could be especially critical for damaged atmospheric spacecraft, which are at great risk during reentry into the atmosphere, as was shown during the "Columbia" disaster. In the wake of the disaster, NASA improvised repairs to shuttles while in flight, a procedure which would have been much easier with a dedicated orbital facility. The use of a major space dock as a construction facility would also be required for the construction of an interstellar colonization starship built with current or near-term technology.
Future Ares V missions for example could serve to cost-effectively transport construction materials for future spacecraft and space exploration missions, delivering raw materials to a Moon-based space dock positioned as a counterweight to a Moon-based space elevator.
Science fiction.
Space docks in science fiction play an important role in the construction and maintenance of space vessels. They add a depth of realism to the fictional worlds they appear in and continue the nautical parallels that most space-based science fiction uses. Space docks serve the same purpose as their non-fictional terrestrial dry dock counterparts, being used for construction, repairs, refits and restorations of spacecraft. Some play significant plot roles, others hide in the background in many sci-fi media.
Such science fiction settings as "Star Wars", "Babylon 5", the "Honorverse" and the "Foundation" series mention or allude substantially to such facilities.
"Star Trek".
Space docks of varying styles and sizes have made a number of appearances in the "Star Trek" science fiction universe. Often they were shown as open, metal framed structures in which a vessel could be docked. The first such drydock was seen in ' with the refit USS "Enterprise" (NCC-1701) contained within such an "orbital dockyard" before being sent to intercept an alien vessel on course for Earth — "chronologically" speaking in the storyline, an earlier example (set in 2151) also housed the first "Enterprise" of Capt. Jonathan Archer at of the ' series.
A larger facility, known as Earth Spacedock was seen for the first time in ". These were huge orbital command installations incorporating internal space docks that could be completely enclosed – starships could enter through bay doors to receive supplies or maintenance.
A third type of space dock was seen occasionally in " and following series. This type of dock had a large command pod at the top, with arms underneath that could house a starship. The "Enterprise"-D was refitted and repaired in such a dock following in 2367.
"Babylon 5".
Dock facilities were occasionally seen on the "Babylon 5" television series and movies. In the "Babylon 5" universe, the space docks were structures deployed outside the station when larger ships were in need of repair. The "Babylon-station" itself effectively served as a Space dock with internal docking facilities for freighters, personal transport vessels and its own complement of fighter-craft designated to protect the station.
During the events of the movie "", the "Excalibur" and the "Victory" were shown in the dry dock facilities in which they were constructed. The dock was destroyed by the Drakh following their attack on Earth, which would halt the construction of further Victory class destroyers until the facilities could be rebuilt.
"Star Wars".
Large space dock facilities were common above major shipbuilding worlds, such as Sullust and Corellia. Most notably, the massive Kuat Drive Yards corporation owned many facilities in the extensive moon system in the Kuat system and even a massive ringworld dry dock around Kuat (the planet) itself. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Psionics
In American science fiction of the 1950s and '60s, psionics was a proposed discipline that applied principles of engineering (especially electronics) to the study (and employment) of paranormal or psychic phenomena, such as telepathy and psychokinesis. The term is a compound formed from "psi" (in the sense of "psychic phenomena") and the -"" from "electronics". The word "psionics" began as, and always remained, a term of art within the science fiction community and—despite the promotional efforts of editor John W. Campbell, Jr—it never achieved general currency, even among academic parapsychologists. In the years after the term was coined in 1951, it became increasingly evident that no scientific evidence supports the existence of "psionic" abilities.
Etymology.
In 1942, two authors—biologist Bertold Wiesner and psychologist Robert Thouless—had introduced the term "psi" (from ψ "psi," 23rd letter of the Greek alphabet) to parapsychology in an article published in the "British Journal of Psychology". (This Greek character was chosen as apropos since it is the initial letter of the Greek word ψυχή ["psyche"]—meaning "mind" or "soul".) The intent was that "psi" would represent the "unknown factor" in extrasensory perception and psychokinesis, experiences believed to be unexplained by any known physical or biological mechanisms. In a 1972 book, Thouless insisted that he and Wiesner had coined this usage of the term "psi" prior to its use in science fiction circles, explaining that their intent was to provide a more neutral term than "ESP" that would not suggest a pre-existing theory of mechanism.
The word "psionics" first appeared in print in a novella by science fiction writer Jack Williamson—"The Greatest Invention"—published in "Astounding Science Fiction" magazine in 1951. Williamson derived it from the "psion", a fictitious "unit of mental energy" described in the same story. (Only later was the term retroactively described in non-fiction articles in "Astounding" as a portmanteau of "psychic electronics", by editor John W. Campbell.) The new word was derived by analogy with the earlier term radionics. (“Radionics” combined "radio" with "electronics" and was itself devised in the 1940s to refer to the work of early 20th century physician and pseudoscientist Albert Abrams.) The same analogy was subsequently taken up in a number of science fiction-themed neologisms, notably bionics ("bio-" + "electronics"; coined 1960) and cryonics ("cryo-" + "electronics"; coined 1967).
Background.
In the 1930s, three men were crucial to inciting John W. Campbell's early enthusiasm for a "new science of the mind" construed as "engineering [principles] applied to the mind". The first was mathematician and philosopher Norbert Wiener—known as the "father of cybernetics"—who had befriended Campbell when he was an undergraduate (1928–31) at MIT. The second was parapsychologist Joseph Banks Rhine whose parapsychology laboratory at Duke University was already famous for its investigations of "ESP" when Campbell was an undergraduate there (1932–34) The third was a non-academic: Charles Fort, the author and paranormal popularizer whose 1932 book "Wild Talents" strongly encouraged credence in the testimony of people who had experienced telepathy and other "anomalous phenomena".
The idea that ordinary people only utilize a small fraction of the (potentially enormous) capabilities of the human brain had become a particular "pet idea" for Campbell by the time he first published his own science fiction writings as a college student. In a 1932 short story he asserted that "no man in all history ever used even half of the thinking part of his brain". He followed up on this notion in a note to another story published five years later:
The total capacity of the mind, even at present, is to all intents and purposes, infinite. Could the full equipment be hooked into a functioning unit, the resulting intelligence should be able to conquer a world without much difficulty.
In 1939, he wrote in an editorial in the magazine "Unknown", which he edited:
Is it so strange a thing that this unknown mass [the human brain] should have some unguessed power by which to feel and see beyond, directly, meeting mind to mind in telepathy, sensing direct the truth of things by clairvoyance?
Along with Charles Fort, Campbell believed that there were already many individuals with latent "psi powers" among us unwittingly and he took this belief a step further in considering development of such powers to be the "next step" in human evolution. Throughout his career, Campbell had sought grounds for a new "scientific psychology" and he was instrumental in formulating the brainchild of one of his more imaginative science fiction writers—the "Dianetics" of L. Ron Hubbard. Campbell's enthusiasm for Dianetics—which later morphed into the Church of Scientology—was red hot in 1949 and 1950, but had considerably cooled by 1951 when he saw Hubbard for the last time.
History.
With Campbell's encouragement, or at his direction, "psionic" abilities began to appear frequently in magazine science fiction stories in the mid-1950s, providing characters with supernormal or supernatural abilities. The first example was Murray Leinster's novella "The Psionic Mousetrap" published in early 1955. Examples of psychic abilities in fiction, whether attributed to supernatural agencies or otherwise, predated the "psionics" vogue. But the editors of "The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction" describe and define a post-war "psi-boom" in genre science fiction—"which he [Campbell] engineered"—dating it from the mid-1950s to the early 1960s. They cite James Blish's "Jack of Eagles" (1952), Theodore Sturgeon's "More Than Human" (1953), Wilson Tucker's "Wild Talent" (1954) and Frank M. Robinson's "The Power" (1956) as examples. Alfred Bester's "The Demolished Man" (1953) is a pioneering example of a work depicting a society in which people with "psi" abilities are fully integrated. Since the "psi-boom" years coincided with the darkest and most paranoid period of the Cold War, it is natural that many examples of the utility of telepathy in espionage (for example those of Randall Garrett) would be produced. In terms of literary continuity, the editors of "The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction" point out that:
All the psi powers, of course, used to be in the repertoire of powerful magicians, and most are featured in occult romances.
In 1956, Campbell began promoting a psionics device known as the Hieronymus machine. It faced skepticism from scientists who viewed it as pseudoscientific and even as an example of quackery.
Some of the wind was taken out of the sails of psionics in 1957 when Martin Gardner, in the updated edition of his book "Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science", wrote that the study of psionics is "even funnier than Dianetics or Ray Palmer's Shaver stories", and criticized the beliefs and assertions of Campbell as anti-scientific nonsense. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Domed city
A domed city is a hypothetical structure that encloses a large urban area under a single roof. In most descriptions, the dome is airtight and pressurized, creating a habitat that can be controlled for air temperature, composition and quality, typically due to an external atmosphere (or lack thereof) that is inimical to habitation for one or more reasons. Domed cities have been a fixture of science fiction and futurology since the early 20th century, and may be situated on Earth, a moon or other planet.
Origin.
It is not clear exactly when the concept of a domed city first appeared. The phrase "domed city" had come into use by the 19th century in a different sense, meaning a skyline with dome-topped buildings. One catalogue of early science fiction mentions the 1881 fantasy "Three Hundred Years Hence" by British author William Delisle Hay (not to be confused with an earlier novel of the same title, by Mary Griffith). Hay's book describes a future civilization where most of humanity lives in glass-domed cities beneath the sea, allowing the surface of the earth to be used primarily for agriculture. Several examples from the early 20th century are also listed.
In fiction.
Authors used domed cities in response to many problems, sometimes to the benefit of the people living in them and sometimes not. The problems of air pollution and other environmental destruction are a common motive, particularly in stories of the middle to late 20th century. As in the "Pure" trilogy of books by Julianna Baggott. In some works, the domed city represents the last stand of a human race that is either dead or dying. The 1976 film "Logan's Run" shows both of these themes. The characters have a comfortable life within a domed city, but the city also serves to control the populace and to ensure that humanity never again outgrows its means.
The domed city in fiction has been interpreted as a symbolic womb that both nourishes and protects humanity. Where other science fiction stories emphasize the vast expanse of the universe, the domed city places limits on its inhabitants, with the subtext that chaos will ensue if they interact with the world outside.
In some works cities are getting "domed" to quarantine its inhabitants.
Engineering proposals.
During the 1960s and 1970s, the domed city concept was widely discussed outside the confines of science fiction. In 1960, visionary engineer Buckminster Fuller described a 3 km geodesic dome spanning Midtown Manhattan that would regulate weather and reduce air pollution. A domed city was proposed in 1979 for Winooski, Vermont and in 2010 for Houston.
In order to test whether an artificial closed ecological system was feasible, Biosphere 2 (a complex of interconnected domes and glass pyramids) was constructed in the late 1980s. Its original experiment housed eight people and remains the largest such system attempted to date.
In 2010, a domed city known as Eco-city 2020 of 100,000 was proposed for the Mir mine in Siberia. In 2014, the ruler of Dubai announced plans for a climate-controlled domed city covering an area of 48 million square feet (4.5 square kilometers), but as of 2016, the project has been redesigned without the dome. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Xenoarchaeology
Xenoarchaeology, a branch of xenology dealing with extraterrestrial cultures, is a hypothetical form of archaeology that exists mainly in works of science fiction. The field is concerned with the study of material remains to reconstruct and interpret past life-ways of alien civilizations. Xenoarchaeology is not currently practiced by mainstream archaeologists due to the current lack of any material for the discipline to study.
Etymology.
The name derives from Greek "xenos" (ξένος) which means 'stranger, alien', and archaeology 'study of ancients'.
Xenoarchaeology is sometimes called "astroarchaeology" or "exoarchaeology", although some would argue that the prefix exo- would be more correctly applied to the study of human activities in a space environment.
Other names for xenoarchaeology, or specialised fields of interest, include Probe SETI (Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence), extraterrestrial archaeology, space archaeology, SETA (Search for Extra-Terrestrial Artifacts), Dysonian SETI, Planetary SETI, SETT (Search for Extra-Terrestrial Technology), SETV (Search for Extra-Terrestrial Visitation), extraterrestrial anthropology, areoarchaeology and selenoarchaeology.
Justification.
It is arguably the case that, due to the immense distances between stars, any evidence we discover of extraterrestrial intelligence, whether it be an artifact or an electromagnetic signal, may come from a long-vanished civilization. Thus the entire SETI project can be seen as a form of archaeology. Additionally, due to the extreme age of the universe, there may be a reasonable expectation for astrobiology research to produce evidence of extinct alien life prior to the discovery of alien life itself.
The study of alien cultures might offer us glimpses into our own species' past or future development.
Vicky Walsh argued for the existence of "exo-artifacts" using the principle of mediocrity and the Drake equation. She proposed that a theoretical and speculative field of archaeology be established in order to test outlandish claims, and to prepare for a time when undeniably extraterrestrial artifacts needed to be analysed. "If it is possible to construct an abstract archaeology that can be tested and refined on earth and then applied to areas beyond our planet, then the claims for ETI remains on the moon and Mars may really be evaluated in light of established archaeological theory and analysis".
Ben McGee similarly proposed the creation of a set of interdisciplinary, proactive xenoarchaeological guidelines, arguing that identifying suspected artifacts of astrobiology is all that is required to justify establishing a methodology for xenoarchaeology. He emphasized the necessity of proactive xenoarchaeological work in order to avoid future bias, mischaracterization, and information mismanagement, and he cites three scenarios under which such a methodology or set of guidelines would be useful, those being "remote sensing" of a potential xenoarchaeologial artifact, encountering an artifact during "human exploration," and "terrestrial interception" of an artifact.
Greg Fewer has argued that archaeological techniques should be used to evaluate alleged UFO landing or crash sites, such as Roswell.
History.
The origins of the field have been traced to theories about a hypothetical Martian civilization based on observations of what were perceived as canals on Mars. These theories, of which Percival Lowell was the most famous exponent, were apparently inspired by a mistranslation of a quote by Giovanni Schiaparelli.
The 1997 Theoretical Archaeology Group conference featured a session on "archaeology and science fiction".
The 2004 annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association featured a session "Anthropology, Archaeology and Interstellar Communication".
Planetary SETI.
Planetary SETI is concerned with the search for extraterrestrial structures on the surface of bodies in the Solar System. Claims for evidence of extraterrestrial artifacts can be divided into three groups, the Moon, Mars, and the other planets and their satellites.
Examples of sites of interest include the "bridge" sighted in the Mare Crisium in 1953, and the "Blair Cuspids", "an unusual arrangement of seven spirelike objects of varying heights" at the western edge of the "Mare Tranquillitatis", photographed by in Lunar Orbiter 2 on 20 November 1966. In 2006, Ian Crawford proposed that a search for alien artifacts be conducted on the Moon.
Percival Lowell's mistaken identification of Martian canals was an early attempt to detect and study an alien culture from its supposed physical remains. More recently, there was interest in the supposed Face on Mars, an example of the psychological phenomenon of pareidolia.
The Society for Planetary SETI Research is a loose organization of researchers interested in this field. The organization does not endorse any particular conclusions drawn by its members on particular sites.
Probe SETI, or SETA.
A great deal of research and writing has been done, and some searches conducted for extraterrestrial probes in the Solar System. This followed the work of Ronald N. Bracewell.
Robert Freitas, Christopher Rose and Gregory Wright have argued that interstellar probes can be a more energy-efficient means of communication than electromagnetic broadcasts.
If so, a solarcentric Search for Extraterrestrial Artifacts (SETA) would seem to be favored over the more traditional radio or optical searches.
Robert A. Freitas coined the Term SETA in the 1980s.
On the basis that the Earth-Moon or Sun-Earth libration orbits might constitute convenient parking places for automated extraterrestrial probes, unsuccessful searches were conducted by Freitas and Valdes.
Dysonian SETI.
In a 1960 paper, Freeman Dyson proposed the idea of a Dyson sphere, a type of extraterrestrial artifact able to be searched for and studied at interstellar distances. Following that paper, several searches have been conducted.
In a 2005 paper, Luc Arnold proposed a means of detecting smaller, though still mega-scale, artifacts from their distinctive transit light curve signature. "(see Astroengineering)".
Fringe theories.
A subculture of enthusiasts studies purported structures on the Moon or Mars. These controversial "structures" (such as the Face on Mars) are not accepted as more than natural features by most scientists, examples of the pareidolia phenomenon.
Palaeocontact or ancient astronaut theories, espoused by Erich von Däniken and others, are further examples of fringe theories. These claim that the Earth was visited in prehistoric times by extraterrestrial beings.
Science fiction.
Xenoarchaeological themes are common in science fiction. Works about the exploration of enigmatic extraterrestrial artifacts have been satirically categorized as Big Dumb Object stories.
Some of the more prominent examples of xenoarchaeological fiction include Arthur C. Clarke's novel "Rendezvous with Rama", H. Beam Piper's short story "Omnilingual", and Charles Sheffield's Heritage Universe series. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Shaggy God story
A shaggy God story is a story in a minor science fiction genre that attempts to explain Biblical concepts with science fiction tropes. The term was coined by writer and critic Brian W. Aldiss in a pseudonymous column in October 1965 issue of "New Worlds". The term is a pun on the phrase "shaggy dog story".
A typical shaggy God story might feature a pair of astronauts landing on a lush and virgin world and in the last line their names are revealed as Adam and Eve. The television show "The Twilight Zone" used several versions of this, the most notable being "Probe 7, Over and Out". Another classic example is Isaac Asimov's 1956 short story "The Last Question" which ends with the protagonist supercomputer exclaiming "Let there be light!"
The creation of the term is often misattributed to Michael Moorcock. Moorcock edited the issue of "New Worlds" where Aldiss coined the term in a pseudonymous column. It has been suggested that many assumed Moorcock to be the author of the column. The issue was cleared up in an August 2004 David Langford column in "SFX" magazine.
The genre as a cliché.
Brian Stableford noted in "The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction" that a frequently written, but rarely printed, story submitted to science-fiction magazines features a male and female astronaut marooned on a habitable planet and “reveal[s] (in the final line) that their names are Adam and Eve.” Among the "partial list of overworked ideas that should be strenuously avoided" that H. L. Gold of "Galaxy Science Fiction" in 1953 warned prospective writers of were "the characters we have been reading about are Adam and Eve or Jesus, the creation of a miniature universe in a laboratory by a scientist whose name turns out to be an anagram of Jehovah". "Dr. Peristyle" (Brian W. Aldiss) of "New Worlds" wrote in 1965 that "The shaggy god story is the bane of magazine editors, who get approximately one story a week set in a garden of Eden spelt Ee-Duhn". The genre is also listed as a cliché in the Science Fiction Writers of America's Turkey City Lexicon and David Langford's SFX magazine column on same. Will Ferguson references the cliché extensively in his novel "Generica" (2001).
Expansions of the term.
Shaggy God themes can be seen as an effort to harmonize religious accounts about the origin of human beings with science fiction tropes such as alien races, interstellar travel, genetic manipulation, the uplift of primitive races and man's place in the galactic life cycle.
David Brin's Uplift Universe is a series of science fiction works that deal with the idea of advanced intergalactic cultures who identify proto-sentient species and genetically manipulate them into star-faring cultures in their own right (often enslaving them for thousands of years as payment). In the novels, proponents of the view that humans were uplifted by a galactic culture (as opposed to evolving into sentience) are called “Dänikenites.”
"" was called this by film critic John Simon. One interpretation of David Bowman's entrance into the EVA pod before entering space (the new Eden) to become a Star Child suggests Adam and Eve and the dawn of new man. Some people interpreted David Bowman transforming into the Star Child as his turning into a god or godlike being. The plot also involves an alien intelligence "creating" modern man by improving upon mankind's hominid ancestors.
Douglas Adams's "The Restaurant at the End of the Universe", a sequel to "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy", parodies the Shaggy God story with a subplot where the planet Golgafrincham comes up with a scheme to rid itself of its useless workers, such as telephone sanitizers and insurance salesmen, by sending them off in a space ark that eventually lands on the prehistoric Earth. The marooned telephone sanitizers, insurance salesmen, and other blissfully ignorant societal rejects are thought to have driven the indigenous Neanderthal-like race to extinction to themselves become the ancestors of modern "Homo sapiens", until the sequel reveals otherwise. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Zombie apocalypse
Zombie apocalypse is a genre of fiction in which civilization collapses due to overwhelming swarms of zombies. Typically only a few individuals or small bands of survivors are left living.
In some versions, the reason the dead rise and attack is unknown, rendering the whole situation inexplicable. In others versions, a specific parasite or infection is known to be the cause, framing events much like a plague. Some stories have every corpse rise, regardless of the cause of death, whereas others require exposure to the vector of infection.
In either scenario, this causes the outbreak to become an exponentially growing crisis: the spreading "zombie plague" swamps law enforcement organizations, the military and health care services, leading to the panicked collapse of civil society until only isolated pockets of survivors remain. Basic services such as piped water supplies and electrical power shut down, mainstream mass media cease broadcasting, and the national government of affected countries collapses or goes into hiding. The survivors usually begin scavenging for food, weapons and other supplies in a world reduced to a mostly pre-industrial hostile wilderness. There is usually a 'safe zone' where the non-infected can seek refuge and begin a new era.
Genre.
Literature.
An early inspirational work of the genre was Richard Matheson's novel "I Am Legend" (1954), which featured a lone survivor named Robert Neville waging a war against a human population transformed into vampires. The novel has been adapted into several screenplays, including "The Last Man on Earth" (1964), starring Vincent Price, and "The Omega Man" (1971), starring Charlton Heston. A 2007 film version also titled "I Am Legend" starred Will Smith, in a more contemporary setting. George A. Romero began the idea with his apocalyptic feature "Night of the Living Dead" (1968) from Matheson, but for vampires he substituted shuffling ghouls, identified after its release as zombies.
Thematic subtext.
The narrative of a zombie apocalypse carries strong connections to the turbulent social landscape of the United States in the 1960s when the originator of this genre, the film "Night of the Living Dead", was first created. Many also feel that zombies allow people to deal with their own anxiety about the end of the world. Kim Paffenroth notes that "more than any other monster, zombies are fully and literally apocalyptic ... they signal the end of the world as we have known it."
Story elements.
There are several common themes and tropes that create a zombie apocalypse:
The stories usually follow a single group of survivors, caught up in the sudden rush of the crisis. The narrative generally progresses from the onset of the zombie plague, then initial attempts to seek the aid of authorities, the failure of those authorities, through to the sudden catastrophic collapse of all large-scale organization and the characters' subsequent attempts to survive on their own. Such stories are often squarely focused on the way their characters react to such an extreme catastrophe, and how their personalities are changed by the stress, often acting on more primal motivations (fear, self-preservation) than they would display in normal life.
Generally the zombies in these situations are the slow, lumbering and unintelligent kind first made popular in the 1968 film "Night of the Living Dead". Motion pictures created within the 2000s, however, have featured zombies that are more agile, vicious, intelligent, and stronger than the traditional zombie. In many cases of "fast" zombies, creators use living humans infected with a pathogen (as in "28 Days Later", "Zombieland" and "Left 4 Dead"), instead of re-animated corpses, to avoid the
"slow death walk" of Romero's variety of zombies. It is disputable whether cases featuring living humans suffering the effects of a disease should technically be considered zombies, since they have never died.
In addition, ‘special’ zombie types may also be included, depending on the genre, either as unexpected mutations or superior classes compared to standard zombies, boasting special abilities or heightened skills such as strength, speed or ferocity, as seen in video games such as "Half-Life 2" and "The Last of Us".
Reception.
Academic research.
According to a 2009 Carleton University and University of Ottawa epidemiological analysis, an outbreak of even "Living Dead"'s slow zombies "is likely to lead to the collapse of civilization, unless it is dealt with quickly." Based on their mathematical modelling, the authors concluded that offensive strategies were much more reliable than quarantine strategies, due to various risks that can compromise a quarantine. They also found that discovering a cure would merely leave a few humans alive, since this would do little to slow the infection rate.
It was additionally determined that the most likely long-term outcome of such an outbreak would be the essential extinction of humans with the global human population either succumbing to the epidemic, being killed by existing zombies, or experiencing other fatal events. This conclusion stems from the study's reasoning that the primary epidemiological risk of zombies, besides the difficulties of neutralization, is that their population is subject to near-constant growth: generations of surviving humans would likely maintain a tendency to feed zombie populations, resulting in gross outnumbering and largely continual growth of the infected population, a phenomenon which would only cease with the infection or death of all surviving humans. The researchers explain that their methods of modelling may be applicable to the spread of political views or diseases with dormant infection.
The Zombie Institute for Theoretical Studies (ZITS) is a program through the University of Glasgow. It is headed by Dr. Austin. Dr. Austin is a character that has been created by the university to be the face of ZITS. The ZITS team is dedicated to using real science to explain what could be expected in the event of an actual zombie apocalypse. Much of their research is used to disprove common beliefs about the zombie apocalypse as shown in popular media. They have published one book (Zombie Science 1Z) and give public "spoof" lectures on the subject.
Government.
On May 18, 2011, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) published an article, "Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse" providing tips on preparing to survive a zombie invasion. The article does not claim an outbreak is likely or imminent, but states: "That’s right, I said z-o-m-b-i-e a-p-o-c-a-l-y-p-s-e. You may laugh now, but when it happens you’ll be happy you read this..." The CDC goes on to summarize cultural references to a zombie apocalypse. It uses these to underscore the value of laying in water, food, medical supplies, and other necessities in preparation for any and all potential disasters, be they hurricanes, earthquakes, tornadoes, floods, or hordes of ravenous brain-devouring undead.
The CDC also published a graphic novel, "Zombie Pandemic", alongside a series of related articles.
In the unclassified document titled "CONOP 8888," officers from U.S. Strategic Command used a zombie apocalypse scenario as a training template for operations, emergencies and catastrophes, as a tool to teach cadets about the basic concepts of military plans and disaster preparation using its admittedly outlandish premise.
Weather.
On October 17, 2011, The Weather Channel published an article, "How To Weather the Zombie Apocalypse" that included a fictional interview with a Director of Research at the CDD, the "Center for Disease Development". Based on a seasonal attraction in the Atlanta area called "The Atlanta Zombie Apocalypse", Weather.com interviews "Dr. Dale Dixon" (subtle references to characters in AMC's "The Walking Dead") asking questions about how different weather conditions affect zombies abilities. Questions answered include "How does the temperature affect zombies' abilities? Do they run faster in warmer temperatures? Do they freeze if it gets too cold?" |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Interstellar ark
An interstellar ark is a conceptual space vehicle designed for interstellar travel. Interstellar arks may be the most economically feasible method of traveling such distances. The ark has also been proposed as a potential habitat to preserve civilization and knowledge in the event of a global catastrophe.
Such a ship would have to be large, requiring a large power plant. The Project Orion concept of propulsion by nuclear pulses has been proposed. The largest spacecraft design analyzed in Project Orion had a 400 m diameter and weighed approximately 8 million tons. It could be large enough to host a city of 100,000 or more people.
Thrust concepts.
Another concern is selection of power sources and mechanisms which would remain viable for the long time spans involved in interstellar travel through the desert of space. The longest lived space probes are the Voyager program probes, which use radioisotope thermoelectric generators having a useful lifespan of a mere 50 years.
One propulsion method for a crewed spacecraft could be a fusion microexplosion nuclear pulse propulsion system, like that proposed in Project Daedalus that may allow it to obtain an interstellar cruising velocity of up to 10% of the speed of light. However, if the ship is capable of transits requiring hundreds of thousands of years, chemical and gravitational slingshot propulsion may be sufficient.
Specific proposals and research projects.
The Enzmann starship proposed in 1964 is a large fusion-powered spacecraft that could function as an interstellar ark, supporting a crew of 200 with extra space for expansion, on multi-year journeys at subluminal speeds to nearby star systems.
In 1955 Project Orion considered nuclear propulsion for spacecraft, suitable for deep space voyages.
In 1973–1978 Project Daedalus was conducted by the British Interplanetary Society to study unmanned interstellar spacecraft. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Fictional language
Fictional languages are a subset of constructed languages, and are distinct from the former in that they have been created as part of a fictional setting (i.e. for use in a book, movie, television show, or video game). Typically they are the creation of one individual, while natural languages evolve out of a particular culture or people group. Fictional languages are also distinct from natural languages in that the former do not have native speakers.
Fictional languages are intended to be the languages of a fictional world and are often designed with the intent of giving more depth and an appearance of plausibility to the fictional worlds with which they are associated, and to have their characters communicate in a fashion which is both alien and dislocated. Within their fictional world, these languages do function as natural languages, helping to identify certain races or people groups and set these apart from others.
While some less-formed fictional languages are created as distorted versions or dialects of a pre-existing natural language, many are independently designed conlangs with their own lexicon (some more robust than others) and rules of grammar. Some of the latter are fully formed enough to be learned as a speak-able language, and many subcultures exist of those who are 'fluent' in one or more of these fictional languages. Often after the creator of a fictional language has accomplished their task, the fandom of that fictional universe will pick up where the creator left off and continue to flesh out the language, making it more like a natural language and therefore more usable.
Purpose.
Fictional languages are separated from artistic languages by both purpose and relative completion: a fictional language often has the least amount of grammar and vocabulary possible, and rarely extends beyond the absolutely necessary. At the same time, some others have developed languages in detail for their own sake, such as J. R. R. Tolkien's Quenya and Sindarin (two Elvish languages), "Star Trek"s Klingon language and "Avatar"'s Na'vi language which exist as functioning, usable languages.
By analogy with the word "conlang", the term "conworld" is used to describe these fictional worlds, inhabited by fictional constructed cultures. The conworld influences vocabulary (what words the language will have for flora and fauna, articles of clothing, objects of technology, religious concepts, names of places and tribes, etc.), as well as influencing other factors such as pronouns, or how their cultures view the break-off points between colors or the gender and age of family members. Sound is also a directing factor, as creators seek to show their audience through phonology the type of race or people group to whom the language belongs.
Commercial fictional languages.
Commercial fictional languages are those languages created for use in various commercial media, such as:
While some languages are created purely from the desire of the creator, language creation can be a profession. In 1974, Victoria Fromkin was the first person hired to create a language (Land of the Lost's Paku). Since then, notable professional language creators have included Marc Okrand (Klingon), David Peterson (Dothraki and others in Game of Thrones), and Paul Frommer (Na'vi).
Alien languages.
A notable subgenre of fictional languages are alien languages, the ones that are used or might be used by putative extraterrestrial life forms. Alien languages are subject of both science fiction and scientific research. Perhaps the most fully developed fictional alien language is the Klingon language of the Star Trek universe – a fully developed constructed language.
The problem of alien language has confronted generations of science fiction writers; some have created fictional languages for their characters to use, while others have circumvented the problem through translation devices or other fantastic technology. For example, the Star Trek universe makes use of a 'universal translator', which explains why such different races, often meeting for the first time, are able to communicate with each other. Another more humorous example would be the Babel fish from "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy", an aurally-inserted fish that instantaneously translates alien speech to the speaker's native language.
While in many cases an alien language is but an element of a fictional reality, in a number of science fiction works the core of the plot involves linguistic and psychological problems of communication between various alien species.
Visual alien languages.
A further subgenre of alien languages are those that are visual, rather than auditory. Notable examples of this type are Sherman's Circular Gallifreyan from BBC's Doctor Who series (though this language was entirely created and spread by fans, all appearances of Gallifreyan in the show are merely meaningless symbols), and the Heptapod language from the 2016 film "Arrival".
Internet-based fictional languages.
Internet-based fictional languages are hosted along with their "conworlds" on the internet, and based at these sites, becoming known to the world through the visitors to these sites. Verdurian, the language of Mark Rosenfelder's Verduria on the planet of Almea, is a flagship Internet-based fictional language. Rosenfelder's website includes resources for other aspiring language creators.
Many other fictional languages and their associated conworlds are created privately by their inventor, known only to the inventor and perhaps a few friends. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Astronomical engineering
Engineering on an astronomical scale, or astronomical engineering, "i.e.", engineering involving operations with whole astronomical objects (planets, stars, etc.), is a known theme in science fiction, as well as a matter of recent scientific research and exploratory engineering.
In Kardashev scale, Type II and Type III civilizations can harness energy on the required scale. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Simulated reality
Simulated reality is the hypothesis that reality could be simulated—for example by quantum computer simulation—to a degree indistinguishable from "true" reality. It could contain conscious minds that may or may not know that they live inside a simulation. This is quite different from the current, technologically achievable concept of virtual reality, which is easily distinguished from the experience of actuality. Simulated reality, by contrast, would be hard or impossible to separate from "true" reality. There has been much debate over this topic, ranging from philosophical discourse to practical applications in computing.
Arguments.
Simulation argument.
A version of the simulation hypothesis was first theorised as a part of a philosophical argument on the part of René Descartes, and later by Hans Moravec. The philosopher Nick Bostrom developed an expanded argument examining the probability of our reality being a simulation. His argument states that at least one of the following statements is very likely to be true:
Bostrom's argument rests on the premise that given sufficiently advanced technology, it is possible to represent the populated surface of the Earth without recourse to digital physics; that the qualia experienced by a simulated consciousness are comparable or equivalent to those of a naturally occurring human consciousness, and that one or more levels of simulation within simulations would be feasible given only a modest expenditure of computational resources in the real world.
If one assumes first that humans will not be destroyed nor destroy themselves before developing such a technology, and that human descendants will have no overriding legal restrictions or moral compunctions against simulating biospheres or their own historical biosphere, then, Bostrom argues, it would be unreasonable to count ourselves among the small minority of genuine organisms who, sooner or later, will be vastly outnumbered by artificial simulations.
Epistemologically, it is not impossible to tell whether we are living in a simulation. For example, Bostrom suggests that a window could "pop up" saying: "You are living in a simulation. Click here for more information." However, imperfections in a simulated environment might be difficult for the native inhabitants to identify and for purposes of authenticity, even the simulated memory of a blatant revelation might be purged programmatically. Nonetheless, should any evidence come to light, either for or against the skeptical hypothesis, it would radically alter the aforementioned probability.
Computationalism.
Computationalism is a philosophy of mind theory stating that cognition is a form of computation. It is relevant to the simulation hypothesis in that it illustrates how a simulation could contain conscious subjects, as required by a "virtual people" simulation. For example, it is well known that physical systems can be simulated to some degree of accuracy. If computationalism is correct and if there is no problem in generating artificial consciousness or cognition, it would establish the theoretical possibility of a simulated reality. Nevertheless, the relationship between cognition and phenomenal qualia of consciousness is disputed. It is possible that consciousness requires a vital substrate that a computer cannot provide and that simulated people, while behaving appropriately, would be philosophical zombies. This would undermine Nick Bostrom's simulation argument; we cannot be a simulated consciousness, if consciousness, as we know it, cannot be simulated. The skeptical hypothesis remains intact, however, and we could still be envatted brains, existing as conscious beings within a simulated environment, even if consciousness cannot be simulated. It has been suggested that whereas virtual reality would enable a participant to experience only three senses (sight, sound and optionally smell), simulated reality would enable all five (including taste and touch).
Some theorists have argued that if the "consciousness-is-computation" version of computationalism and mathematical realism (or radical mathematical Platonism) are true then consciousnesses is computation, which in principle is platform independent and thus admits of simulation. This argument states that a "Platonic realm" or ultimate ensemble would contain every algorithm, including those that implement consciousness. Hans Moravec has explored the simulation hypothesis and has argued for a kind of mathematical Platonism according to which every object (including, for example, a stone) can be regarded as implementing every possible computation.
Dreaming.
A dream could be considered a type of simulation capable of fooling someone who is asleep. As a result, the "dream hypothesis" cannot be ruled out, although it has been argued that common sense and considerations of simplicity rule against it. One of the first philosophers to question the distinction between reality and dreams was Zhuangzi, a Chinese philosopher from the 4th century BC. He phrased the problem as the well-known "Butterfly Dream," which went as follows:
Once Zhuangzi dreamt he was a butterfly, a butterfly flitting and fluttering around, happy with himself and doing as he pleased. He didn't know he was Zhuangzi. Suddenly he woke up and there he was, solid and unmistakable Zhuangzi. But he didn't know if he was Zhuangzi who had dreamt he was a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming he was Zhuangzi. Between Zhuangzi and a butterfly there must be "some" distinction! This is called the Transformation of Things. (2, tr. Burton Watson 1968:49)
The philosophical underpinnings of this argument are also brought up by Descartes, who was one of the first Western philosophers to do so. In "Meditations on First Philosophy", he states "... there are no certain indications by which we may clearly distinguish wakefulness from sleep", and goes on to conclude that "It is possible that I am dreaming right now and that all of my perceptions are false".
Chalmers (2003) discusses the dream hypothesis and notes that this comes in two distinct forms:
Both the dream argument and the simulation hypothesis can be regarded as skeptical hypotheses; however in raising these doubts, just as Descartes noted that his own thinking led him to be convinced of his own existence, the existence of the argument itself is testament to the possibility of its own truth. Another state of mind in which some argue an individual's perceptions have no physical basis in the real world is called psychosis though psychosis may have a physical basis in the real world and explanations vary.
The dream hypothesis is also used to develop other philosophical concepts, such as Valberg's personal horizon: what this world would be internal to if "this" were all a dream.
Existence of simulated reality unprovable in any concrete sense.
Known as the idea of Nested Simulations: the existence of simulated reality is seen to be unprovable in any concrete sense as there is an infinite regress problem with the argument: any evidence that is directly observed could be another simulation itself.
Even if we are a simulated reality, there is no way to be sure the beings running the simulation are not themselves a simulation and the operators of "that" simulation are not a simulation.
" involves a simulation or an entity in the simulation, creating another instance of the same simulation, running it and using its results" (Pooch and Sullivan 2000).
In August 2019, philosopher Preston Greene suggested that it may be best not to find out if we're living in a computer simulation since, if it were found to be true, such knowing may end the simulation.
Philosophical and religious implications.
Some philosophers and authors (Nick Bostrom's “Are You Living In a Computer Simulation?”, Jean Baudrillard's “Simulacra and Simulation”, Iurii Vovchenko's “Answers in Simulation”) tried to address the implications of the simulated reality on mankind's way of life and future. Simulated reality has significant implications to the philosophical questions such as the questions of existence of gods, meaning of life, etc. There are attempts to link religion to the simulated reality.
In fiction.
Simulated reality in fiction has been explored by many authors, game designers and film directors.
Most notably explored in the famous film The Matrix |
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The grandfather paradox is a paradox of time travel in which inconsistencies emerge through changing the past. The name comes from the paradox's description: a person travels to the past and kills their own grandfather before the conception of their father or mother, which prevents the time traveller's existence. Despite its title, the grandfather paradox does not exclusively regard the contradiction of killing one's own grandfather to prevent one's birth. Rather, the paradox regards any action that alters the past, since there is a contradiction whenever the past becomes different from the way it was.
Early examples.
The grandfather paradox was mentioned in written stories as early as 1929. In 1931, it was described as "the age-old argument of preventing your birth by killing your grandparents" in a letter to American science fiction magazine "Amazing Stories". Early science-fiction stories dealing with the paradox are the short story "Ancestral Voices" by Nathaniel Schachner, published in 1933, and the 1944 book "Future Times Three" by René Barjavel, although a number of other works from the 1930s and 1940s touched upon the topic in various degrees of detail.
Variants.
The grandfather paradox encompasses any change to the past, and it is presented in many variations. Physicist John Garrison et al. give a variation of the paradox of an electronic circuit that sends a signal through a time machine to shut itself off, and receives the signal before it sends it. An equivalent paradox is known in philosophy as the "retro-suicide paradox" or "autoinfanticide", going back in time and killing a younger version of oneself (such as a baby). Another variant of the grandfather paradox is the "Hitler paradox" or "Hitler's murder paradox", a fairly frequent trope in science fiction, in which the protagonist travels back in time to murder Adolf Hitler before he can instigate World War II and the Holocaust. Rather than necessarily physically preventing time travel, the action removes any "reason" for the travel, along with any knowledge that the reason ever existed. Additionally, the consequences of Hitler's existence are so monumental and all-encompassing that for anyone born after the war, it is likely that their birth was influenced in some way by its effects, and thus the lineage aspect of the paradox would directly apply in some way.
Some advocate a parallel universe approach to the grandfather paradox. When the time traveller kills their grandfather, the traveller is actually killing a parallel universe version of the grandfather, and the time traveller's original universe is unaltered; it has been argued that since the traveller arrives in a different universe's history and not their own history, this is not "genuine" time travel. In other variants, the actions of time travellers have no effects outside of their own personal experience, as depicted in Alfred Bester's short story "The Men Who Murdered Mohammed".
Philosophical analysis.
Even without knowing whether time travel to the past is physically possible, it is possible to show using modal logic that changing the past results in a logical contradiction. If it is necessarily true that the past happened in a certain way, then it is false and impossible for the past to have occurred in any other way. A time traveller would not be able to change the past from the way it "is;" they would only act in a way that is already consistent with what "necessarily" happened.
Consideration of the grandfather paradox has led some to the idea that time travel is by its very nature paradoxical and therefore logically impossible. For example, the philosopher Bradley Dowden made this sort of argument in the textbook "Logical Reasoning", arguing that the possibility of creating a contradiction rules out time travel to the past entirely. However, some philosophers and scientists believe that time travel into the past need not be logically impossible provided that there is no possibility of changing the past, as suggested, for example, by the Novikov self-consistency principle. This principle is illustrated in Ted Chiang's novelette The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate. Dowden revised his view after being convinced of this in an exchange with the philosopher Norman Swartz.
General relativity.
Consideration of the possibility of backward time travel in a hypothetical universe described by a Gödel metric led famed logician Kurt Gödel to assert that time might itself be a sort of illusion. He suggests something along the lines of the block time view, in which time is just another dimension like space, with all events at all times being fixed within this four-dimensional "block".
Causal loops.
Backward time travel that does not create a grandfather paradox creates a causal loop. The Novikov self-consistency principle expresses one view as to how backward time travel would be possible without the generation of paradoxes. According to this hypothesis, physics in or near closed timelike curves (time machines) can only be consistent with the universal laws of physics, and thus only self-consistent events can occur. Anything a time traveller does in the past must have been part of history all along, and the time traveller can never do anything to prevent the trip back in time from happening, since this would represent an inconsistency. Novikov et al. used the example given by physicist Joseph Polchinski for the grandfather paradox, that of a billiard ball heading toward a time machine. The ball's older self emerges from the time machine and strikes its younger self so that its younger self never enters the time machine. Novikov et al. showed how this system can be solved in a self-consistent way that avoids the grandfather paradox, though it creates a causal loop. Some physicists suggest that causal loops only exist in the quantum scale, in a fashion similar to that of the chronology protection conjecture proposed by Stephen Hawking, so histories over larger scales are not looped. Another conjecture, the cosmic censorship hypothesis, suggests that every closed timelike curve passes through an event horizon, which prevents such causal loops from being observed.
Seth Lloyd and other researchers at MIT have proposed an expanded version of the Novikov principle by which probability bends to prevent paradoxes from occurring. Outcomes would become stranger as one approaches a forbidden act, as the universe must favor improbable events to prevent impossible ones.
Quantum physics.
Some physicists, such as Daniel Greenberger, and David Deutsch, have proposed that quantum theory allows for time travel where the past must be self-consistent. Deutsch argues that quantum computation with a negative delay—backward time travel—produces only self-consistent solutions, and the chronology-violating region imposes constraints that are not apparent through classical reasoning. In 2014, researchers published a simulation validating Deutsch's model with photons. Deutsch uses the terminology of "multiple universes" in his paper in an effort to express the quantum phenomena, but notes that this terminology is unsatisfactory. Others have taken this to mean that "Deutschian" time travel involves the time traveller emerging in a different universe, which avoids the grandfather paradox.
The interacting-multiple-universes approach is a variation of Everett's many-worlds interpretation (MWI) of quantum mechanics. It involves time travellers arriving in a different universe than the one from which they came; it has been argued that, since travellers arrive in a different universe's history and not their own history, this is not "genuine" time travel. Stephen Hawking has argued that even if the MWI is correct, we should expect each time traveller to experience a single self-consistent history, so that time travellers remain within their own world rather than travelling to a different one. Allen Everett argued that Deutsch's approach "involves modifying fundamental principles of quantum mechanics; it certainly goes beyond simply adopting the MWI", and that even if Deutsch's approach is correct, it would imply that any macroscopic object composed of multiple particles would be split apart when traveling back in time, with different particles emerging in different worlds.
However, it was shown in an article by Tolksdorf and Verch that Deutsch's CTC self-consistency condition can be fulfilled to arbitrary precision in any quantum system described according to relativistic quantum field theory on spacetimes where CTCs are excluded, casting doubts on whether Deutsch's condition is really characteristic of quantum processes mimicking CTCs in the sense of general relativity. |
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Grok is a neologism coined by American writer Robert A. Heinlein for his 1961 science fiction novel "Stranger in a Strange Land". While the "Oxford English Dictionary" summarizes the meaning of "grok" as "to understand intuitively or by empathy, to establish rapport with" and "to empathize or communicate sympathetically (with); also, to experience enjoyment", Heinlein's concept is far more nuanced, with critic Istvan Csicsery-Ronay Jr. observing that "the book's major theme can be seen as an extended definition of the term." The concept of "grok" garnered significant critical scrutiny in the years after the book's initial publication. The term and aspects of the underlying concept have become part of communities such as computer science.
Descriptions of "grok" in "Stranger in a Strange Land".
Critic David E. Wright Sr. points out that in the 1991 "uncut" edition of "Stranger", the word "grok" "was used first "without any explicit definition" on page 22" and continued to be used without being explicitly defined until page 253 (emphasis in original). He notes that this first intensional definition is simply "to drink", but that this is only a metaphor "much as English 'I see' often means the same as 'I understand'". Critics have bridged this absence of explicit definition by citing passages from "Stranger" that illustrate the term. A selection of these passages follows:
Etymology.
Robert A. Heinlein originally coined the term "grok" in his 1961 novel "Stranger in a Strange Land" as a Martian word that could not be defined in Earthling terms, but can be associated with various literal meanings such as "water", "to drink", "life", or "to live", and had a much more profound figurative meaning that is hard for terrestrial culture to understand because of its assumption of a singular reality.
According to the book, drinking water is a central focus on Mars, where it is scarce. Martians use the merging of their bodies with water as a simple example or symbol of how two entities can combine to create a new reality greater than the sum of its parts. The water becomes part of the drinker, and the drinker part of the water. Both "grok" each other. Things that once had separate realities become entangled in the same experiences, goals, history, and purpose. Within the book, the statement of divine immanence verbalized among the main characters, "thou art God", is logically derived from the concept inherent in the term "grok".
Heinlein describes Martian words as "guttural" and "jarring". Martian speech is described as sounding "like a bullfrog fighting a cat". Accordingly, "grok" is generally pronounced as a guttural "gr" terminated by a sharp "k" with very little or no vowel sound (a narrow transcription might be ). William Tenn suggests Heinlein in creating the word might have been influenced by Tenn's very similar concept of "griggo", earlier introduced in Tenn's story "Venus and the Seven Sexes" (published in 1949). In his later afterword to the story, Tenn says Heinlein considered such influence "very possible".
Adoption and modern usage.
In computer programmer culture.
Uses of the word in the decades after the 1960s are more concentrated in computer culture, such as a 1984 appearance in "InfoWorld": "There isn't any software! Only different internal states of hardware. It's all hardware! It's a shame programmers don't grok that better."
The Jargon File, which describes itself as a "Hacker's Dictionary" and has been published under that name three times, puts "grok" in a programming context:
The entry existed in the very earliest forms of the Jargon File, dating from the early 1980s. A typical tech usage from the "Linux Bible, 2005" characterizes the Unix software development philosophy as "one that can make your life a lot simpler once you grok the idea".
The book "Perl Best Practices" defines "grok" as understanding a portion of computer code in a profound way. It goes on to suggest that to "re-grok" code is to reload the intricacies of that portion of code into one's memory after some time has passed and all the details of it are no longer remembered. In that sense, "to grok" means to load everything into memory for immediate use. It is analogous to the way a processor caches memory for short term use, but the only implication by this reference was that it was something a human (or perhaps a Martian) would do.
The main web page for cURL, an open source tool and programming library, describes the function of cURL as "cURL groks URLs".
The book "Cyberia" covers its use in this subculture extensively:
The keystroke logging software used by the NSA for its remote intelligence gathering operations is named GROK.
One of the most powerful parsing filters used in ElasticSearch software's logstash component is named "grok".
A reference book by Carey Bunks on the use of the GNU Image Manipulation Program is titled Grokking the GIMP
In counterculture.
Tom Wolfe, in his book "The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test" (1968), describes a character's thoughts during an acid trip: "He looks down, two bare legs, a torso rising up at him and like he is just noticing them for the first time... he has never seen any of this flesh before, this stranger. He groks over that..."
In his counterculture Volkswagen repair manual, "How to Keep Your Volkswagen Alive: A Manual of Step-by-Step Procedures for the Compleat Idiot" (1969), dropout aerospace engineer John Muir instructs prospective used VW buyers to "grok the car" before buying.
The word was used numerous times by Robert Anton Wilson in his works "The Illuminatus! Trilogy" and "Schrödinger's Cat Trilogy".
The term inspired actress Mayim Bialik's women's lifestyle site, Grok Nation. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Violence in science fiction
Science fiction violence is the display, mention and/or physical description of violent scenes and/or violent actions in any given science fiction setting or environment. It can also be a result of science fiction elements such as fictional aliens, science fiction robots, humans (usually with advanced abilities), science fiction weapons, apocalypse and/or other disasters found in the genre.
Examples in literature, film and television.
Film.
Examples of science fiction violence in stand-alone films is "Saturn 3" which tells the story of a powerful robot that goes out of control and causes damage and inflicts injury on living beings, resulting in the death of one dog and at least one human with the other dying while destroying the killing-machine.
"Unknown Origin" tells the story of an alien organism that falls on Earth and penetrates an underwater submarine. It then begins attacking the crew members, killing many of them and is mostly resistant to their firepower. The human crew members attempt to contain and destroy the organism and prevent it from reaching a dry surface and reproducing itself.
"Red Planet" starring Val Kilmer and Terence Stamp is about a crew of humans on a mission to Mars and also bring with them a robot "Amy" which goes out of control and frequently attacks them, violently.
Television.
Science fiction violence commonly occurs in television series of the genre such as Simon Says (The Outer Limits) which tells the story of a scientist who replicates the intelligence, memories and violent nature of his diseased son into a robot he constructs. The robot also unintentionally kills their pet cat, Tina, as a result of having sharp metallic hands, but also turns violent on instances he is denied what he wants by inheriting his predecessors sensitive emotions. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | List of fictional robots and androids
Robots and androids have frequently been depicted or described in works of fiction. The word "robot" itself comes from a work of fiction, Karel Čapek's play, "R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots)", written in 1920 and first performed in 1921.
This list of fictional robots and androids is chronological, and categorised by medium. It includes all depictions of robots, androids and gynoids in literature, television, and cinema; however, robots that have appeared in more than one form of media are not necessarily listed in each of those media. This list is intended for all fictional computers which are described as existing in a humanlike or mobile form. It shows how the concept has developed in the human imagination through history.
Static computers depicted in fiction are discussed in the separate list of fictional computers.
Television films and series.
2000s.
Animal Mechanicals(2007) |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Interstellar communication
Interstellar communication is the transmission of signals between planetary systems. Sending interstellar messages is potentially much easier than interstellar travel, being possible with technologies and equipment which are currently available. However, the distances from Earth to other potentially inhabited systems introduce prohibitive delays, assuming the limitations of the speed of light. Even an immediate reply to radio communications sent to stars tens of thousands of light-years away would take many human generations to arrive.
Radio.
The SETI project has for the past several decades been conducting a search for signals being transmitted by extraterrestrial life located outside the Solar System, primarily in the radio frequencies of the electromagnetic spectrum. Special attention has been given to the Water Hole, the frequency of one of neutral hydrogen's absorption lines, due to the low background noise at this frequency and its symbolic association with the basis for what is likely to be the most common system of biochemistry (see Alternative biochemistry).
The regular radio pulses emitted by pulsars were briefly thought to be potential intelligent signals; the first pulsar to be discovered was originally designated "LGM-1", for "Little Green Men." They were quickly determined to be of natural origin, however.
Several attempts have been made to transmit signals to other stars as well. (See "Realized projects" at Active SETI.) One of the earliest and most famous was the 1974 radio message sent from the largest radio telescope in the world, the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. An extremely simple message was aimed at a globular cluster of stars known as M13 in the Milky Way Galaxy and at a distance of 30,000 light years from the Solar System. These efforts have been more symbolic than anything else, however. Further, a possible answer needs double the travel time, i.e. tens of years (near stars) or 60,000 years (M13).
Other methods.
It has also been proposed that higher frequency signals, such as lasers operating at visible light frequencies, may prove to be a fruitful method of interstellar communication; at a given frequency it takes surprisingly small energy output for a laser emitter to outshine its local star from the perspective of its target.
Other more exotic methods of communication have been proposed, such as modulated neutrino or gravitational wave emissions. These would have the advantage of being essentially immune to interference by intervening matter.
Sending physical mail packets between stars may prove to be optimal for many applications. While mail packets would likely be limited to speeds far below that of electromagnetic or other light-speed signals (resulting in very high latency), the amount of information that could be encoded in only a few tons of physical matter could more than make up for it in terms of average bandwidth. The possibility of using interstellar messenger probes for interstellar communication — known as Bracewell probes — was first suggested by Ronald N. Bracewell in 1960, and the technical feasibility of this approach was demonstrated by the British Interplanetary Society's starship study Project Daedalus in 1978. Starting in 1979, Robert Freitas advanced arguments
for the proposition that physical space-probes provide a superior mode of interstellar communication to radio signals, then undertook telescopic searches for such probes in 1979 and 1982. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | World government in fiction
In both science fiction and utopia/dystopian fiction, authors have made frequent use of the age-old idea of a global state and, accordingly, of world government.
Overview.
In tune with Immanuel Kant's vision of a world state based on the voluntary political union of all countries of this planet in order to avoid colonialism and in particular any future war ("Idee zu einer allgemeinen Geschichte in weltbürgerlicher Absicht", 1784; "Zum ewigen Frieden", 1795), some of these scenarios depict an egalitarian and utopian world supervised (rather than controlled) by a benevolent (and usually democratic) world government. Others, however, describe the effects of a totalitarian regime which, after having seized power in one country, annexes the rest of the world in order to dominate and oppress all mankind.
One major influence was Edward Bellamy's "Looking Backward". The best-known advocate of world government was H. G. Wells. He describes such a system in "The Shape of Things to Come", "Men Like Gods" and "The World Set Free".
Some writers have also parodied the idea: E. M. Forster's "The Machine Stops" (1909) and Aldous Huxley's 1932 novel "Brave New World". Wells himself wrote "The Sleeper Awakes", an early vision of a dystopian world.
World government themes in science fiction are particularly prominent in the years following World War II, coincident with the involvement of many scientists in the actual political movement for world government in response to the perceived dangers of nuclear holocaust. Prominent examples from the Cold War era include "Childhood's End" (1953), "Starship Troopers" (1959), "" (from 1966), the "Doctor Who" story "The Enemy of the World" (1968) and Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons (1968) Later references to a unified world government also appear however in post-Cold War science fiction television series such as "Babylon 5".
The concept also appears frequently in science fiction anime, whether in the form of a strengthened United Nations or an entirely new organizations with world presidential election. Examples of anime with this premise are "Macross" (adapted in America as the first part of Robotech) and "Gundam".
President of Earth.
President of Earth (also known as President of the World) is a fictional concept or character who is the leader of Planet Earth. Examples include the following: |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Mundane science fiction
Mundane science fiction (MSF) is a niche literary movement that developed in the early 2000s (decade) which proposes "mundane science fiction" as its own subgenre of science fiction. MSF is typically characterized by its setting on Earth or within the Solar System; a lack of interstellar travel, intergalactic travel or human contact with extraterrestrials; and a believable use of technology and science as it exists at the time the story is written or a plausible extension of existing technology. The key tenets of the movement were set out in a 2004 manifesto written by Geoff Ryman and anonymous collaborators. There is debate over the boundaries of MSF and over which works can be considered canonical. Rudy Rucker has noted MSF's similarities to hard science fiction and Ritch Calvin has pointed out MSF's similarities to cyberpunk. Some commentators have identified science fiction films and television series which embody the MSF ethos of near-future realism.
MSF has garnered a mixed reception from the science fiction community. While some science fiction authors have defended the proposed subgenre, others have argued that MSF is contrary to the longstanding imaginative tradition of science fiction, or questioned the need for a new subgenre.
Background.
Precursor movements: 1950-1960s.
Describing the context for the emergence of MSF, Christopher Cokinos cites Chris Nakashima-Brown in noting that a considerable body of science fiction entails fantasies about escape from scientific reality: "the escape from the subtly nihilistic dominion of reason in the post-Enlightenment West, into a generically unbound Jungian Disneyland...”. He argues that in the Golden Age of Science Fiction, stodgy tales of space opera
using "bland prose" and "formulas of planetary romances, über-robots, and cold equations" dominated. He also points out that SF writer Thomas Disch has similarly opined that the preference for weak, implausible depictions of science in sci fi is an “American aspect of our 'lie-loving' culture” used by readers for escapism. Some Golden Age writers, however, such as Theodore Sturgeon, Philip José Farmer, and Ray Bradbury did transcend these formulas and developed nuanced characters and stories.
Cokinos goes on to state that in the 1960s, various authors launched science fiction's New Wave, when "stylistic experimentation" in the writing and new topics meant less formulas and clichés. The authors had a profound "skepticism about science and technology", and there was an examination of “inner space”
(Ballard), "feminist...critiques, and ecology (Frank Herbert’s "Dune"). Similarly, BBC TV critic Hugh Montgomery notes that J.G. Ballard believed that the Golden Age’s focus on advanced interstellar spaceships was “clichéd and unilluminating”, preferring to write stories about humans’ “next five minutes” and “near future”, which is “immediately recognisable to us, but invariably with a pretty unpleasant twist or three.”
2000s.
Ritch Calvin argues that the goals of MSF were predated by sociologist Wayne Brekhus in 2000, who published “A Mundane Manifesto”, calling for “analytically interesting studies of the socially uninteresting.” He argues for a focus on the “mundane” because the “extraordinary draws disproportionate theoretical attention from researchers”, which weakens the development of theory and creates a distorted image of reality. He stated that he hoped that the humanities would also focus on the mundane. Calvin noted that in 2001, the sci-fi website Futurismic came out against the traditional forms of SF, and instead called for an examination of the impact of scientific discoveries on human society. Futurismic is against all “fantasy, horror, and space opera, as well as off-world SF, distant futures, aliens, alternate histories, and time travel”. Futurismic accepts fiction that is mundane, “post-cyberpunk sf, satirical/gonzo futurism, and realistic near future hard sf.”
History and origins.
The MSF movement, inspired by an idea of computer programmer Julian Todd, was founded in 2004 during the Clarion workshop by novelist Geoff Ryman among others. The beliefs of the movement were later codified as the Mundane Manifesto.
The authors of the Manifesto stated that they were “pissed off and needing a tight girdle of discipline to restrain our sf imaginative silhouettes”. Ryman explained the MSF Manifesto in a speech to BORÉAL’s 2007 Science Fiction convention in Montreal. Ryman claims that the MSF Manifesto was “jokey” and that it was not intended to be a “serious” statement. The authors of the MSF Manifesto, apart from Ryman, are anonymous.
Style and ethos.
MSF is a postulated science fiction subgenre:60 that exists between science fiction and the mainstream. According to the Manifesto, MSF writers believe it is unlikely that alien intelligence will overcome the physical constraints on interstellar travel any better than we can. As such, the Manifesto imagines a future on Earth and within the Solar System. The Manifesto states that alternative universes, parallel worlds, magic and the supernatural (including telepathy and telekinesis), time travel and teleportation are similarly avoided. MSF rarely involves interstellar travel or communication with alien civilization. In the MSF ethos, unfounded speculation about interstellar travel can lead to an illusion of a universe abundant with planets as hospitable to life as Earth, which encourages wasteful attitude to the abundance on Earth. MSF thus focuses on stories set on or near the Earth, with a believable use of technology and science as it exists at the time the story is written or which is a plausible extension of existing technology. MSF works explore topics such as enhanced genomes, environmental degradation, nanotechnology, quantum mechanics, robotics, and virtual reality. MSF claims to describe change “already in effect” and claims “ideological significance”.
The boundaries between the proposed mundane subgenre and other genres, such as hard science fiction, dystopias, or cyberpunk are not defined. With MSF, the canonical works are vaguer than with cyberpunk. Science Fiction author, Aliette de Bodard, said in an interview with , "Science fiction has moved into the mainstream in step with the infusion of science into the everyday; thus, it can risk losing its outlandish feel, even as other fictional forms borrow its tropes.” In its issue on mundane science fiction, British science fiction magazine "Interzone" attempted a checklist of topic that cannot be included for a work to be considered "mundane": Faster-than-light travel, psionic powers, nanobots, aliens, computer consciousness, profitable space travel, immortality, mind uploading, teleportation, or time travel.
MSF proponents claims several notable science fiction authors have written in the style of the subgenre at least once.
Media.
Reception and controversy.
In 2007 science fiction writer Rudy Rucker, author of the 1983 Transrealist Manifesto, blogged a response to the Mundane Manifesto. Rucker stated that he "prefer[s] to continue searching for ways to be less and less Mundane". He pointed out that alternate universes are "quite popular in modern physics" and stated that perhaps other worlds exist in other dimensions. He noted that fiction writers outside of SF use stories about time travel, so while implausible, it was worth exploring. While Rucker also rejected SF's “escapist” tendencies, and called for transrealism, he argued that elements of SF which MSF advocates reject are “symbolic of archetypal modes of perception” that are needed in SF.
In the March 2008 issue of "Asimov's Science Fiction" magazine, in writer Jim Kelly's ongoing "On the Net" column he agreed with many elements of MSF. At the same time, he wondered, “how was Mundane SF all that different from what had up until then been called hard science fiction?”. Kelly states that too many of his favorite works fall outside the tenets of MSF. Both Kelly and Calvin mention the criticism by Ian McDonald, and his fundamental objection, that much good science fiction is being written without any awareness of or need for the manifesto. Niall Harrison argued that "Interzone" #216's collection of MSF stories does not develop “a convincing case for mundane sf.” Also in 2008, Chris Cokinos described The Mundane Manifesto as anthropocentric. He noted that the concern in MSF about wasting the abundance of Earth is influenced by the "...moral climate that permeates North American and British nature writing", adding that MSF is intended "more as compass than chimera".
In 2009, writer Kate McKinney Maddalena noted that the MSF blog was first used as a forum for debate about the new subgenre and that by 2009, bloggers were identifying MSF from the SF literature, and looking for newly published MSF (“mundane spotting”). Maddelena added that Ryman's naming of MSF "only marks (and encourages) a high point in SF’s social and ecological consciousness and conscience.” Also in 2009, SF writer Claire L. Evans called it a “controversial recent sub-genre”; while stating MSF was a “useful category for an already-existing genre of science fiction". Evans disagreed with MSF in that it was often "the wildest, least likely prognostications that come to pass”. She also criticized Ryman for disrespecting SF’s tradition of creating prophecies, thus influencing real life, which she stated means he “completely misses the point of [science fiction]”.
Commentary on MSF continued in the 2010s. In 2011 a "Fantastic Worlds" journal critic criticized the “very selective" use of science in MSF and its depressing nature. In 2012, Emmet Byrne and Susannah Schouweiler called MSF the Dogme 95 of science fiction, a reference to a realist Danish film manifesto. In 2013 Linda Nagata noted the relationship between hard science fiction and MSF, but stated, "the term 'mundane' has the 'implication of "boring'? To me, the term is another marketing disaster." Also in 2013, The New Museum's digital art arm Rhizome published Martine Syms' "The Mundane Afrofuturist Manifesto". In 2019, Roger Luckhurst, a professor in Modern and Contemporary Literature at Birkbeck, University of London, stated the MSF movement was developed because writers did not want “…to imagine shiny, hard futures [but [rather] give a] sense of sliding from one version of our present into something slightly alienated”.
Literature.
In 2007 the British sci fi magazine "Interzone" devoted an issue to the subgenre, The 2009 short story collection "When It Changed: Science Into Fiction", edited by Ryman, is a collection of mundane science fiction stories, each written by a science fiction author with advice from a scientist, and with an endnote by that scientist explaining the plausibility of the story. In 2015 a reviewer from ‘’Boing Boing’’ called Kim Stanley Robinson’s novel "Aurora", a generation ship novel, MSF's "most significant novel”. In 2019 Robert Harris' "The Second Sleep" was described as the best MSF novel of the year.
Films and television.
Christopher Cokinos in 2008 stated that films such as "Gattaca", about a society based on genetic testing and ranking, and "Moon", about a lonely mining operation on the Moon, "fit the Mundane Manifesto’s interest in near-future realism, even if they don’t directly deal with the beauties and heartbreaks of the Earth". Other examples Cokinos cited are French filmmaker Chris Marker’s "Sans Soleil" and the film version of "Children of Men", which shows a "heart-wrenching film of a grim, near-future Earth".
In 2019, UK television critic Hugh Montgomery identified MSF television series and films which are set in the near future and which use plausible technologies; his list includes "Black Mirror"; "The Handmaid’s Tale" (a dystopian drama set in a totalitarian, misogynist theocracy); "Osmosis" (about a dating app that requires a bodily implant for users); "Years and Years" (a family drama set over the next 15 years, in a world facing ecological disasters); and "Children of Men".
Related genres.
In Ritch Calvin's opinion, MSF shares “characteristics with cyberpunk, postcyberpunk, and near-future science fiction”. For instance, William Gibson’s novels show a “near future urban” world, while Bruce Sterling’s "Schismatrix" depicts the impacts of global capitalism.
See also.
Lab lit |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Encyclopedia Galactica
The Encyclopedia Galactica is a fictional or hypothetical encyclopedia containing all the knowledge accumulated by a galaxy-spanning civilization. The name evokes the exhaustive aspects of the real-life "Encyclopædia Britannica".
Asimov's "Encyclopedia Galactica".
"Encyclopedia Galactica" first appeared in Isaac Asimov's short story "Foundation" ("Astounding Science Fiction", May 1942), later republished as "The Encyclopedists" in the short-story collection "Foundation" (1951). Asimov's "Encyclopedia Galactica" was a compendium of all knowledge then available in the Galactic Empire, intended to preserve that knowledge in a remote region of the galaxy in the event of a foreseen galactic catastrophe. The "Encyclopedia" is later revealed to be an element in an act of misdirection, with its real purpose being to concentrate a group of knowledgeable scientists on a remote, resource-poor planet named Terminus, with the long-term aim of revitalizing the technologically stagnant and scientifically dormant empire. Originally published in a physical medium, it later becomes computerized and subject to continual change.
Asimov used the "Encyclopedia Galactica" as a literary device throughout his "Foundation" series, beginning many of the book sections or chapters with a short extract from the "Encyclopedia" discussing a key character or event in the story. This provides the reader with a hazy idea of what is to come.
The first citation, in the chronological order is present in Prelude to Foundation. It is about Emperor Cleon, First of the Name, and last of the Entun Dynasty.
CLEON I – ... The last Galactic Emperor of the Entun Dynasty. He was born in the year 11,988 of the Galactic Era, the same year in which Hari Seldon was born. (It is thought that Seldon’s birthdate, which some consider doubtful, may have been adjusted to match that of Cleon, whom Seldon, soon after his first arrival on Trantor, is supposed to have encountered.)
Having succeeded to the Imperial throne in 12,010 at the age of twenty-two,
Cleon I’s reign represented a curious interval of quiet in those troubled times. This is
undoubtedly due to the skills of his chief of staff, Eto Demerzel, who so carefully
obscured himself from public record that little is known about him.
Cleon himself . . .
ENCYCLOPEDIA GALACTICA
Theodore Wein considers the "Encyclopedia Galactica" as possibly inspired by a reference in H.G. Wells's "The Shape of Things to Come" (1933). The future world envisioned by Wells includes an "Encyclopaedic organization which centres upon Barcelona, with seventeen million active workers" and which is tasked with creating "the Fundamental Knowledge System which accumulates, sorts, keeps in order and renders available everything that is known". As pointed out by Wein, this Wells book was at its best-known and most influential in the late 1930s – coinciding with "the period of incubation" when the young Asimov became interested in science fiction, reading a lot of it and starting to formulate his own ideas.
Later instances in fiction.
Various authors have invoked the "Encyclopædia Galactica" in both science and science fiction. The first may have been author Frank Holby's short story "The Strange Case of the Missing Hero" in the July 1942 issue of "Astounding Science Fiction" which featured Sebastian Lelong, editor of the "Encyclopedia". It was also a common fixture in previous incarnations of the Legion of Super-Heroes comic books, and has appeared in the "Star Wars" expanded universe and Superman comics set in the future. The "Encyclopedia Galactica" was also mentioned as being a collection of all the knowledge of a galactic Empire in the science fiction short story called "The Originist", which was written by American novelist Orson Scott Card in 1989, and took place in Isaac Asimov's fictional "Foundation" Universe.
In the comic science fiction series by Douglas Adams, the "Galactica" is frequently contrasted with the apparently more popular "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy":
Robert A. Heinlein mentioned the Encyclopedia in chapter three of "To Sail Beyond the Sunset" (1987): "... the computer that led the Lunar Revolution on time line three, code 'Neil Armstrong.' Let's skip the details; it's all in "Encyclopedia Galacta" (sic) and other books."
In Arthur C. Clarke's and Gentry Lee's novel "Rama II" (1989), Nicole des Jardins says to Richard Wakefield, "Just think, the sum of everything all human beings know or have ever known might be nothing more than an infinitesimal fraction of the "Encyclopedia Galactica"."
"Encyclopedia Galactica" is mentioned by Charlie Sheen's character in The Arrival (1996 film), and by Jody Foster's character in Contact (1997 American film).
Other uses.
There was a series of five video documentaries in 1993, collectively called "Encyclopædia Galactica", with the episode titles “The Inner Solar System”, “The Outer Solar System”, “Star Trekking”, “Discovery”, and “Astronomy and the Stars”. The videos were produced by York Films of England and distributed by Encyclopædia Britannica (Australia). Other entities associated with the production of the video series were Encyclopædia Britannica Educational Corporation, The Learning Channel, The Discovery Channel Europe, S4C Wales, System TV France and Yleisradio Finland.
There was an "Encyclopedia Galactica: from the Fleet Library aboard the Battlestar Galactica" published in 1978. Aimed at a juvenile audience, this was a tie in to the "Battlestar Galactica" television series being broadcast at the time.
In reality.
The term has been used in non-fictional contexts as well. One example is its use by Carl Sagan (1934–1996) in his 1980 book "Cosmos", and his documentary , to refer to a text where hypothetical extraterrestrial civilizations could store all of their information and knowledge. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Space burial
Space burial is the launching of remains into space. Missions may go into orbit around the Earth or to extraterrestrial bodies such as the Moon, or farther into space.
Remains are generally not scattered in space so as not to contribute to space debris. Remains are sealed until the spacecraft burns up upon re-entry into the Earth's atmosphere or they reach their extraterrestrial destinations. Suborbital flights briefly transport them into space then return to Earth where they can be recovered. Small samples of remains are usually launched to minimize the cost of launching mass into space, thereby making such services more affordable.
History and typology.
The concept of launching remains into space using conventional rockets was proposed by the science fiction author Neil R. Jones in the novella "The Jameson Satellite", which was published in the pulp magazine "Amazing Stories" in 1931. It was later proposed as a commercial service in the 1965 movie, "The Loved One", and by Richard DeGroot in a "Seattle Times" newspaper article on April 3, 1977. Since 1997, the private company Celestis has conducted numerous space burials flying as secondary payloads.
Maiden flights.
The first space burial occurred in 1992 when the NASA (mission STS-52) carried a sample of Gene Roddenberry's cremated remains into space and returned them to Earth.
The first private space burial, Celestis' "Earthview 01: The Founders Flight", was launched on April 21, 1997. An aircraft departing from the Canary Islands carried a Pegasus rocket containing samples of the remains of 24 people to an altitude of above the Atlantic Ocean. The rocket then carried the remains into an elliptical orbit with an apogee of and a perigee of , orbiting the Earth once every 96 minutes until re-entry on May 20, 2002, northeast of Australia. Famous people on this flight included Gene Roddenberry and Timothy Leary.
Suborbital flights.
Short flights that cross the boundary of space without attempting to reach orbital velocity are a cost-effective method of space burial. The remains do not burn up and are either recovered or lost.
Moon burial.
The first moon burial was that of Dr. Eugene Shoemaker, a portion of whose cremated remains were flown to the Moon by NASA. Shoemaker's former colleague Carolyn Porco, a University of Arizona professor, proposed and produced the tribute of having Shoemaker's ashes launched aboard the NASA's Lunar Prospector spacecraft. Ten days after Shoemaker's passing, Porco had the go-ahead from NASA administrators and delivered the ashes to the Lunar Prospector Mission Director Scott Hubbard at the NASA Ames Research Center. The ashes were accompanied by a piece of brass foil inscribed with an image of Comet Hale-Bopp, an image of a Meteor Crater in northern Arizona, and a passage from William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. The Lunar Prospector spacecraft was launched on January 6, 1998, and impacted the south polar region of the moon on July 31, 1999.
Missions are proposed by both Elysium Space and Celestis as part of a mission by Astrobotic Technology of Pittsburgh.
Pet burial.
In 2014, Celestis launched Celestis Pets, a pet memorial spaceflight service for animal cremated remains. Prior to then, a Monroe, Washington police dog may have flown on a 2012 memorial spaceflight. When this news broke, Celestis' President said that if dog ashes were on the rocket, the person who supplied the cremated remains likely violated the contract they signed with Celestis.
Dedicated spacecraft.
On May 17, 2017, Elysium Space announced the world's first memorial flight involving a dedicated spacecraft. The cubesat was placed as a secondary payload on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket as part of a dedicated rideshare mission called SSO-A planned by Spaceflight. The launch took place from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California on December 3rd, 2018. The launch was successful, however, industry sources have noted that the ElysiumStar spacecraft remained attached to the deployer due to a failure to procure proper licensing. |
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Science fiction (sometimes shortened to sci-fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction that typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel universes, and extraterrestrial life. It has been called the "literature of ideas", and often explores the potential consequences of scientific, social, and technological innovations.
Non-fiction whose roots go back to ancient times, is related to fantasy, horror, and superhero fiction, and contains many subgenres. Its exact definition has long been disputed among authors, critics, scholars, and readers.
Science fiction literature, film, television, and other media have become popular and influential over much of the world. Besides providing entertainment, it can also criticize present-day society, and is often said to inspire a "sense of wonder".
Definitions.
American science fiction author and editor Lester del Rey wrote, "Even the devoted aficionado or fan—has a hard time trying to explain what science fiction is," and the lack of a "full satisfactory definition" is because "there are no easily delineated limits to science fiction." According to Isaac Asimov, "Science fiction can be defined as that branch of literature which deals with the reaction of human beings to changes in science and technology." Robert A. Heinlein wrote that "A handy short definition of almost all science fiction might read: realistic speculation about possible future events, based solidly on adequate knowledge of the real world, past and present, and on a thorough understanding of the nature and significance of the scientific method." Damon Knight summed up the difficulty, saying "science fiction is what we point to when we say it."
Alternative terms.
Forrest J Ackerman is credited with first using the term "sci-fi" (analogous to the then-trendy "hi-fi") in 1954. As science fiction entered popular culture, writers and fans active in the field came to associate the term with low-budget, low-tech "B-movies," and with low-quality pulp science fiction. By the 1970s, critics within the field, such as Damon Knight and Terry Carr, were using "sci fi" to distinguish hack-work from serious science fiction. Peter Nicholls writes that "SF" (or "sf") is "the preferred abbreviation within the community of sf writers and readers." Robert Heinlein found even "science fiction" insufficient for certain types of works in this genre, and suggested the term speculative fiction to be used instead for those that are more "serious" or "thoughtful."
History.
Science fiction had its beginnings in ancient times, when the line between myth and fact was blurred. Written in the 2nd century CE by the satirist Lucian, "A True Story" contains many themes and tropes characteristic of modern science fiction, including travel to other worlds, extraterrestrial lifeforms, interplanetary warfare, and artificial life. Some consider it the first science-fiction novel. Some of the stories from "The Arabian Nights", along with the 10th-century "The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter" and Ibn al-Nafis's 13th-century "Theologus Autodidactus," also contain elements of science fiction.
Written during the Scientific Revolution and the Age of Enlightenment, Johannes Kepler's "Somnium" (1634), Francis Bacon's "New Atlantis" (1627), Athanasius Kircher's "Itinerarium extaticum" (1656), Cyrano de Bergerac's "Comical History of the States and Empires of the Moon" (1657) and "The States and Empires of the Sun" (1662), Margaret Cavendish's "The Blazing World" (1666), Jonathan Swift's "Gulliver's Travels" (1726), Ludvig Holberg's "Nicolai Klimii Iter Subterraneum" (1741) and Voltaire's "Micromégas" (1752) are regarded as some of the first true science-fantasy works. Isaac Asimov and Carl Sagan considered "Somnium" the first science-fiction story; it depicts a journey to the Moon and how the Earth's motion is seen from there.
Following the 17th-century development of the novel as a literary form, Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" (1818) and "The Last Man" (1826) helped define the form of the science-fiction novel. Brian Aldiss has argued that "Frankenstein" was the first work of science fiction. Edgar Allan Poe wrote several stories considered to be science fiction, including "The Unparalleled Adventure of One Hans Pfaall" (1835) which featured a trip to the Moon. Jules Verne was noted for his attention to detail and scientific accuracy, especially in "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea" (1870). In 1887, the novel "El anacronópete" by Spanish author Enrique Gaspar y Rimbau introduced the first time machine.
Many critics consider H. G. Wells one of science fiction's most important authors, or even "the Shakespeare of science fiction." His notable science-fiction works include "The Time Machine" (1895), "The Island of Doctor Moreau" (1896), "The Invisible Man" (1897), and "The War of the Worlds" (1898). His science fiction imagined alien invasion, biological engineering, invisibility, and time travel. In his non-fiction futurologist works he predicted the advent of airplanes, military tanks, nuclear weapons, satellite television, space travel, and something resembling the World Wide Web.
Edgar Rice Burroughs' "A Princess of Mars", published in 1912, was the first of his three-decade-long planetary romance series of Barsoom novels which were set on Mars and featured John Carter as the hero. In 1926, Hugo Gernsback published the first American science-fiction magazine, "Amazing Stories". In its first issue he wrote:
In 1928, E. E. "Doc" Smith's first published work, "The Skylark of Space," written in collaboration with Lee Hawkins Garby, appeared in "Amazing Stories". It is often called the first great space opera. The same year, Philip Francis Nowlan's original Buck Rogers story, "Armageddon 2419", also appeared in "Amazing Stories". This was followed by a Buck Rogers comic strip, the first serious science-fiction comic.
In 1937, John W. Campbell became editor of "Astounding Science Fiction", an event which is sometimes considered the beginning of the Golden Age of Science Fiction, which is characterized by stories celebrating scientific achievement and progress. In 1942, Isaac Asimov started his Foundation series, which chronicles the rise and fall of galactic empires and introduced psychohistory. The series was later awarded a one-time Hugo Award for "Best All-Time Series." The "Golden Age" is often said to have ended in 1946, but sometimes the late 1940s and the 1950s are included.
Theodore Sturgeon's "More Than Human" (1953) explored possible future human evolution. In 1957, "" by the Russian writer and paleontologist Ivan Yefremov presented a view of a future interstellar communist civilization and is considered one of the most important Soviet science fiction novels. In 1959, Robert A. Heinlein's "Starship Troopers" marked a departure from his earlier juvenile stories and novels. It is one of the first and most influential examples of military science fiction, and introduced the concept of powered armor exoskeletons. The German space opera series "Perry Rhodan", written by various authors, started in 1961 with an account of the first Moon landing and has since expanded in space to multiple universes, and in time by billions of years. It has become the most popular science fiction book series of all time.
In the 1960s and 1970s, New Wave science fiction was known for its embrace of a high degree of experimentation, both in form and in content, and a highbrow and self-consciously "literary" or "artistic" sensibility. In 1961, "Solaris" by Stanisław Lem was published in Poland. The novel dealt with the theme of human limitations as its characters attempted to study a seemingly intelligent ocean on a newly discovered planet. 1965's "Dune" by Frank Herbert featured a much more complex and detailed imagined future society than had previous science fiction.
In 1967 Anne McCaffrey began her "Dragonriders of Pern" science fantasy series. Two of the novellas included in the first novel, "Dragonflight", made McCaffrey the first woman to win a Hugo or Nebula Award. In 1968, Philip K. Dick's "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?," was published. It is the literary source of the "Blade Runner" movie franchise. 1969's "The Left Hand of Darkness" by Ursula K. Le Guin was set on a planet in which the inhabitants have no fixed gender. It is one of the most influential examples of social science fiction, feminist science fiction, and anthropological science fiction.
In 1979, "Science Fiction World" began publication in the People's Republic of China. It dominates the Chinese science fiction magazine market, at one time claiming a circulation of 300,000 copies per issue and an estimated 3-5 readers per copy (giving it a total estimated readership of at least 1 million), making it the world's most popular science fiction periodical. In 1984, William Gibson's first novel, "Neuromancer," helped popularize cyberpunk and the word "cyberspace," a term he originally coined in his 1982 short story "Burning Chrome". In 1986, "Shards of Honor" by Lois McMaster Bujold began her Vorkosigan Saga. 1992's "Snow Crash" by Neal Stephenson predicted immense social upheaval due to the information revolution.
In 2007, Liu Cixin's novel, "The Three-Body Problem", was published in China. It was translated into English by Ken Liu and published by Tor Books in 2014, and won the 2015 Hugo Award for Best Novel, making Liu the first Asian writer to win the award.
Emerging themes in late 20th and early 21st century science fiction include environmental issues, the implications of the Internet and the expanding information universe, questions about biotechnology, nanotechnology, and post-scarcity societies. Recent trends and subgenres include steampunk, biopunk, and mundane science fiction.
Film.
The first, or at least one of the first, recorded science fiction film is 1902's "A Trip to the Moon", directed by French filmmaker Georges Méliès. It was profoundly influential on later filmmakers, bringing a different kind of creativity and fantasy to the cinematic medium. In addition, Méliès's innovative editing and special effects techniques were widely imitated and became important elements of the medium.
1927's "Metropolis", directed by Fritz Lang, is the first feature-length science fiction film. Though not well received in its time, it is now considered a great and influential film. In 1954, "Godzilla", directed by Ishirō Honda, began the kaiju subgenre of science fiction film, which feature large creatures of any form, usually attacking a major city or engaging other monsters in battle.
1968's "", directed by Stanley Kubrick and based on the work of Arthur C. Clarke, rose above the mostly B-movie offerings up to that time both in scope and quality, and greatly influenced later science fiction films. That same year, "Planet of the Apes" (the original), directed by Franklin J. Schaffner and based on the 1963 French novel "La Planète des Singes" by Pierre Boulle, was released to popular and critical acclaim, due in large part to its vivid depiction of a post-apocalyptic world in which intelligent apes dominate humans.
In 1977, George Lucas began the "Star Wars" film series with the film now identified as "Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope." The series, often called a space opera, went on to become a worldwide popular culture phenomenon, and the second-highest-grossing film series of all time.
Since the 1980s, science fiction films, along with fantasy, horror, and superhero films, have dominated Hollywood's big-budget productions. Science fiction films often "cross-over" with other genres, including animation "(WALL-E" - 2008, "Big Hero 6" - 2014), gangster ("Sky Racket" - 1937), Western ("Serenity" - 2005), comedy ("Spaceballs" -1987, "Galaxy Quest" - 1999), war ("Enemy Mine" - 1985), action ("Edge of Tomorrow" - 2014, "The Matrix" - 1999), adventure ("Jupiter Ascending" - 2015, "Interstellar" - 2014), sports ("Rollerball" - 1975), mystery ("Minority Report" - 2002), thriller ("Ex Machina" - 2014), horror ("Alien" - 1979), film noir ("Blade Runner" - 1982), superhero ("Marvel Cinematic Universe" - 2008-), drama ("Melancholia" - 2011, "Predestination" - 2014), and romance ("Her (film)" - 2013).
Television.
Science fiction and television have consistently been in a close relationship. Television or television-like technologies frequently appeared in science fiction long before television itself became widely available in the late 1940s and early 1950s.
The first known science fiction television program was a thirty-five-minute adapted excerpt of the play "RUR", written by the Czech playwright Karel Čapek, broadcast live from the BBC's Alexandra Palace studios on 11 February 1938. The first popular science fiction program on American television was the children's adventure serial "Captain Video and His Video Rangers", which ran from June 1949 to April 1955.
"The Twilight Zone" (the original series), produced and narrated by Rod Serling, who also wrote or co-wrote most of the episodes, ran from 1959 to 1964. It featured fantasy, suspense, and horror as well as science fiction, with each episode being a complete story. Critics have ranked it as one of the best TV programs of any genre.
The animated series "The Jetsons", while intended as comedy and only running for one season (1962–1963), predicted many inventions now in common use: flat-screen televisions, newspapers on a computer-like screen, computer viruses, video chat, tanning beds, home treadmills, and more. In 1963, the time travel-themed "Doctor Who" premiered on BBC Television. The original series ran until 1989 and was revived in 2005. It has been extremely popular worldwide and has greatly influenced later TV science fiction. Other programs in the 1960s included "The Outer Limits" (1963-1965), "Lost in Space" (1965-1968), and "The Prisoner" (1967).
' (the original series), created by Gene Roddenberry, premiered in 1966 on NBC Television and ran for three seasons. It combined elements of space opera and Space Western. Only mildly successful at first, the series gained popularity through syndication and extraordinary fan interest. It became a very popular and influential franchise with many films and television shows, novels, and other works and products. ' (1987-1994) led to four additional "Star Trek" shows (' (1993-1999), ' (1995-2001)"," ' (2001-2005), and ' (2017–present))--with more in some form of development.
The miniseries "V" premiered in 1983 on NBC. It depicted an attempted takeover of Earth by reptilian aliens. "Red Dwarf", a comic science fiction series aired on BBC Two between 1988 and 1999, and on Dave since 2009. "The X-Files", which featured UFOs and conspiracy theories, was created by Chris Carter and broadcast by Fox Broadcasting Company from 1993 to 2002, and again from 2016 to 2018. "Stargate", a film about ancient astronauts and interstellar teleportation, was released in 1994. "Stargate SG-1" premiered in 1997 and ran for 10 seasons (1997-2007). Spin-off series included "Stargate Infinity" (2002-2003), "Stargate Atlantis" (2004-2009), and "Stargate Universe" (2009-2011). Other 1990s series included "Quantum Leap" (1989-1993) and "Babylon 5" (1994-1999).
SyFy, launched in 1992 as The Sci-Fi Channel, specializes in science fiction, supernatural horror, and fantasy.
Social influence.
Science fiction's great rise in popularity during the first half of the 20th century was closely tied to the popular respect paid to science at that time, as well as the rapid pace of technological innovation and new inventions. Science fiction has often predicted scientific and technological progress. Some works predict that new inventions and progress will tend to improve life and society, for instance the stories of Arthur C. Clarke and "Star Trek". Others, such as H.G. Wells's "The Time Machine" and Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World", warn about possible negative consequences.
In 2001 the National Science Foundation conducted a survey on "Public Attitudes and Public Understanding: Science Fiction and Pseudoscience." It found that people who read or prefer science fiction may think about or relate to science differently than other people. They also tend to support the space program and the idea of contacting extraterrestrial civilizations. Carl Sagan wrote: "Many scientists deeply involved in the exploration of the solar system (myself among them) were first turned in that direction by science fiction."
Brian Aldiss described science fiction as "cultural wallpaper." Evidence for this widespread influence can be found in trends for writers to employ science fiction as a tool for advocacy and generating cultural insights, as well as for educators when teaching across a range of academic disciplines not limited to the natural sciences. Scholar and science fiction critic George Edgar Slusser said that science fiction "is the one real international literary form we have today, and as such has branched out to visual media, interactive media and on to whatever new media the world will invent in the 21st century. Crossover issues between the sciences and the humanities are crucial for the century to come."
As protest literature.
Science fiction has sometimes been used as a means of social protest. George Orwell's "Nineteen Eighty-Four" (1949) is an important work of dystopian science fiction. It is often invoked in protests against governments and leaders who are seen as totalitarian. James Cameron's 2009 film "Avatar" was intended as a protest against imperialism, and specifically the European colonization of the Americas. Its images have been used by, among others, Palestinians in their protests against the State of Israel.
Robots, artificial humans, human clones, intelligent computers, and their possible conflicts with human society have all been major themes of science fiction since, at least, the publication of Shelly's "Frankenstein". Some critics have seen this as reflecting authors’ concerns over the social alienation seen in modern society.
Feminist science fiction poses questions about social issues such as how society constructs gender roles, the role reproduction plays in defining gender, and the inequitable political or personal power of one gender over others. Some works have illustrated these themes using utopias to explore a society in which gender differences or gender power imbalances do not exist, or dystopias to explore worlds in which gender inequalities are intensified, thus asserting a need for feminist work to continue.
Climate fiction, or "cli-fi," deals with issues concerning climate change and global warming. University courses on literature and environmental issues may include climate change fiction in their syllabi, and it is often discussed by other media outside of science fiction fandom.
Libertarian science fiction focuses on the politics and social order implied by right libertarian philosophies with an emphasis on individualism and private property, and in some cases anti-statism.
Science fiction comedy often satirizes and criticizes present-day society, and sometimes makes fun of the conventions and clichés of more serious science fiction.
Sense of wonder.
Science fiction is often said to inspire a "sense of wonder." Science fiction editor and critic David Hartwell wrote: "Science fiction’s appeal lies in combination of the rational, the believable, with the miraculous. It is an appeal to the sense of wonder." Carl Sagan said: "One of the great benefits of science fiction is that it can convey bits and pieces, hints and phrases, of knowledge unknown or inaccessible to the reader . . . works you ponder over as the water is running out of the bathtub or as you walk through the woods in an early winter snowfall."
In 1967, Isaac Asimov commented on the changes then occurring in the science fiction community: "And because today’s real life so resembles day-before-yesterday’s fantasy, the old-time fans are restless. Deep within, whether they admit it or not, is a feeling of disappointment and even outrage that the outer world has invaded their private domain. They feel the loss of a 'sense of wonder' because what was once truly confined to 'wonder' has now become prosaic and mundane."
Science fiction studies.
The study of science fiction, or science fiction studies, is the critical assessment, interpretation, and discussion of science fiction literature, film, TV shows, new media, fandom, and fan fiction. Science fiction scholars study science fiction to better understand it and its relationship to science, technology, politics, other genres, and culture-at-large. Science fiction studies began around the turn of the 20th century, but it was not until later that science fiction studies solidified as a discipline with the publication of the academic journals "Extrapolation" (1959), "" (1972), and "Science Fiction Studies" (1973), and the establishment of the oldest organizations devoted to the study of science fiction in 1970, the Science Fiction Research Association and the Science Fiction Foundation. The field has grown considerably since the 1970s with the establishment of more journals, organizations, and conferences, as well as science fiction degree-granting programs such as those offered by the University of Liverpool and the University of Kansas.
Classification.
Science fiction has historically been sub-divided between hard science fiction and soft science fiction–with the division centering on the feasibility of the science central to the story. However, this distinction has come under increasing scrutiny in the 21st century. Some authors, such as Tade Thompson and Jeff VanderMeer, have pointed out that stories that focus explicitly on physics, astronomy, mathematics, and engineering tend to be considered "hard" science fiction, while stories that focus on botany, mycology, zoology, and the social sciences tend to be categorized as "soft," regardless of the relative rigor of the science.
Max Gladstone defined "hard" science fiction as stories "where the math works," but pointed out that this ends up with stories that often seem "weirdly dated," as scientific paradigms shift over time. Michael Swanwick dismissed the traditional definition of "hard" SF altogether, instead saying that it was defined by characters striving to solve problems "in the right way–with determination, a touch of stoicism, and the consciousness that the universe is not on his or her side."
Ursula K. Le Guin also criticized the more traditional view on the difference between "hard" and "soft" SF: "The 'hard' science fiction writers dismiss everything except, well, physics, astronomy, and maybe chemistry. Biology, sociology, anthropology—that's not science to them, that's soft stuff. They're not that interested in what human beings do, really. But I am. I draw on the social sciences a great deal."
As serious literature.
Respected authors of mainstream literature have written science fiction. Mary Shelley wrote a number of science fiction novels including "Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus" (1818), and is considered a major writer of the Romantic Age. Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World" (1932) is often listed as one of England's most important novels, both for its criticism of modern culture and its prediction of future trends including reproductive technology and social engineering. Kurt Vonnegut was a highly respected American author whose works contain science fiction premises or themes. Other science fiction authors whose works are widely considered to be "serious" literature include Ray Bradbury (including, especially, "Fahrenheit 451" (1953) and "The Martian Chronicles" (1951)), Arthur C. Clarke (especially for "Childhood's End"), and Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger, writing under the name Cordwainer Smith. In his book "The Western Canon", literary critic Harold Bloom includes "Brave New World", "Solaris", "Cat's Cradle" (1963) by Vonnegut, and "The Left Hand of Darkness" as culturally and aesthetically significant works of western literature.
David Barnett has pointed out that there are books such as "The Road" (2006) by Cormac McCarthy, "Cloud Atlas" (2004) by David Mitchell, "The Gone-Away World" (2008) by Nick Harkaway, "The Stone Gods" (2007) by Jeanette Winterson, and "Oryx and Crake" (2003) by Margaret Atwood, which use recognizable science fiction tropes, but whose authors and publishers do not market them as science fiction. Doris Lessing, who was later awarded the Nobel Prize in literature, wrote a series of five SF novels, "Canopus in Argos: Archives" (1979-1983), which depict the efforts of more advanced species and civilizations to influence those less advanced, including humans on Earth.
In her much reprinted 1976 essay "Science Fiction and Mrs Brown," Ursula K. Le Guin was asked: "Can a science fiction writer write a novel?" She answered: "I believe that all novels, . . . deal with character, and that it is to express character–not to preach doctrines [or] sing songs... that the form of the novel, so clumsy, verbose, and undramatic, so rich, elastic, and alive, has been evolved. . . . The great novelists have brought us to see whatever they wish us to see through some character. Otherwise they would not be novelists, but poets, historians, or pamphleteers." Orson Scott Card, best known for his 1985 science fiction novel "Ender's Game", has postulated that in science fiction the message and intellectual significance of the work is contained within the story itself and, therefore, does not need stylistic gimmicks or literary games.
Jonathan Lethem, in a 1998 essay in the "Village Voice" entitled "Close Encounters: The Squandered Promise of Science Fiction," suggested that the point in 1973 when Thomas Pynchon's "Gravity's Rainbow" was nominated for the Nebula Award and was passed over in favor of Clarke's "Rendezvous with Rama," stands as "a hidden tombstone marking the death of the hope that SF was about to merge with the mainstream." In the same year science fiction author and physicist Gregory Benford wrote: "SF is perhaps the defining genre of the twentieth century, although its conquering armies are still camped outside the Rome of the literary citadels."
Community.
Authors.
Science fiction is being written, and has been written, by diverse authors from around the world. According to 2013 statistics by the science fiction publisher Tor Books, men outnumber women by 78% to 22% among submissions to the publisher. A controversy about voting slates in the 2015 Hugo Awards highlighted tensions in the science fiction community between a trend of increasingly diverse works and authors being honored by awards, and reaction by groups of authors and fans who preferred what they considered more "traditional" science fiction.
Awards.
Among the most respected and well-known awards for science fiction are the Hugo Award for literature, presented by the World Science Fiction Society at Worldcon, and voted on by fans; the Nebula Award for literature, presented by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, and voted on by the community of authors; the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel, presented by a jury of writers; and the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for short fiction, presented by a jury. One notable award for science fiction films and TV programs is the Saturn Award, which is presented annually by The Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror Films.
There are other national awards, like Canada's Prix Aurora Awards, regional awards, like the Endeavour Award presented at Orycon for works from the U.S. Pacific Northwest, and special interest or subgenre awards such as the Chesley Award for art, presented by the Association of Science Fiction & Fantasy Artists, or the World Fantasy Award for fantasy. Magazines may organize reader polls, notably the Locus Award.
Conventions, clubs, and organizations.
Conventions (in fandom, often shortened as "cons," such as "comic-con") are held in cities around the world, catering to a local, regional, national, or international membership. General-interest conventions cover all aspects of science fiction, while others focus on a particular interest like media fandom, filking, and so on. Most science fiction conventions are organized by volunteers in non-profit groups, though most media-oriented events are organized by commercial promoters. The convention's activities are called "the program", which may include panel discussions, readings, autograph sessions, costume masquerades, and other events. Additional activities occur throughout the convention that are not part of the program. These commonly include a dealer's room, art show, and hospitality lounge (or "con suites").
Conventions may host award ceremonies. For instance, Worldcon presents the Hugo Awards each year. SF societies, referred to as "clubs" except in formal contexts, form a year-round base of activities for science fiction fans. They may be associated with an ongoing science fiction convention, or have regular club meetings, or both. Long-established groups like the New England Science Fiction Association and the Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society have clubhouses for meetings and storage of convention supplies and research materials. The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) was founded by Damon Knight in 1965 as a non-profit organization to serve the community of professional science fiction authors.
Fandom and fanzines.
Science fiction fandom is the "community of the literature of ideas[,] . . . the culture in which new ideas emerge and grow before being released into society at large." Members of this community ("fans"), as discussed above, are often in contact with each other at conventions or clubs, through print or online fanzines, or on the Internet using websites, mailing lists, and other resources. SF fandom emerged from the letters column in "Amazing Stories" magazine: soon fans began writing letters to each other, and then grouping their comments together in informal publications that became known as fanzines. Once they were in regular contact, fans wanted to meet each other, and they organized local clubs. In the 1930s, the first science fiction conventions gathered fans from a wider area.
The earliest organized online fandom was the SF Lovers Community, originally a mailing list in the late 1970s with a text archive file that was updated regularly. In the 1980s, Usenet groups greatly expanded the circle of fans online. In the 1990s, the development of the World-Wide Web exploded the community of online fandom by orders of magnitude, with thousands and then millions of websites devoted to science fiction and related genres for all media. Most such sites are relatively small, ephemeral, and/or narrowly focused, though sites like SF Site and SFcrowsnest offer a broad range of references and reviews.
The first science fiction fanzine, "The Comet", was published in 1930 by the Science Correspondence Club in Chicago, Illinois. Fanzine printing methods have changed over the decades, from the hectograph, the mimeograph, and the ditto machine, to modern photocopying. Distribution volumes rarely justify the cost of commercial printing. Contemporary fanzines are largely printed on computer printers or at local copy shops, or they may only be sent as email (termed "Ezines") or otherwise made available online (termed "webzines"). One of the best known fanzines today is "Ansible", edited by David Langford, winner of numerous Hugo awards. Other notable fanzines to win one or more Hugo awards include "File 770", "Mimosa", and "Plokta". Artists working for fanzines have frequently risen to prominence in the field, including Brad W. Foster, Teddy Harvia, and Joe Mayhew; the Hugos include a category for Best Fan Artists.
Elements.
Science fiction elements can include, among others: |
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The hypothetical colonization of Mars has received interest from public space agencies and private corporations, and has received extensive treatment in science fiction writing, film, and art.
Organizations have proposed plans for a human mission to Mars, the first step towards any colonization effort, but no person has set foot on the planet. However, landers and rovers have successfully explored the planetary surface and delivered information about conditions on the ground. Virtual visits to Mars, using haptic technologies, have been proposed, and may precede humans visiting the planet.
Reasons for colonizing Mars include curiosity, the potential for humans to provide more in-depth observational research than unmanned rovers, economic interest in its resources, and the possibility that the settlement of other planets could decrease the likelihood of human extinction. Difficulties and hazards include radiation exposure during a trip to Mars and on its surface, toxic soil, low gravity, the isolation that accompanies Mars' distance from Earth, a lack of water, and cold temperatures.
The most recent commitments to researching permanent settlement include those by public space agencies—NASA, ESA, Roscosmos, ISRO and the CNSA—and private organizations—SpaceX, Lockheed Martin, and Boeing.
Mission concepts and timelines.
Since the 20th century, there have been several proposed human missions to Mars both by government agencies and private companies.
All of the human mission concepts as currently conceived by national governmental space programs would not be direct precursors to colonization. Programs such as those being tentatively planned by NASA, Roscosmos, and ESA are intended solely as exploration missions, with the establishment of a permanent base possible but not yet the main goal.
Colonization requires the establishment of permanent habitats that have the potential for self-expansion and self-sustenance. Two early proposals for building habitats on Mars are the Mars Direct and the Semi-Direct concepts, advocated by Robert Zubrin, an advocate of the colonization of Mars.
SpaceX has proposed the development of Mars transportation infrastructure in order to facilitate the eventual colonization of Mars. The mission architecture includes fully reusable launch vehicles, human-rated spacecraft, on-orbit propellant tankers, rapid-turnaround launch/landing mounts, and local production of rocket fuel on Mars via in situ resource utilization (ISRU). SpaceX's aspirational goal is to land their cargo starships on Mars by 2024 and the first 2 crewed starships by 2026.
Relative similarity to Earth.
Earth is similar to Venus in bulk composition, size and surface gravity, but Mars' similarities to Earth are more compelling when considering colonization. These include:
Differences between Earth and Mars.
Gravity and magnetosphere.
The surface gravity of Mars is just 38% that of Earth. Although microgravity is known to cause health problems such as muscle loss and bone demineralization, it is not known if Martian gravity would have a similar effect. The Mars Gravity Biosatellite was a proposed project designed to learn more about what effect Mars' lower surface gravity would have on humans, but it was cancelled due to a lack of funding.
Due to the lack of a magnetosphere, solar particle events and cosmic rays can easily reach the Martian surface.
The atmosphere.
Atmospheric pressure on Mars is far below the Armstrong limit at which people can survive without pressure suits. Since terraforming cannot be expected as a near-term solution, habitable structures on Mars would need to be constructed with pressure vessels similar to spacecraft, capable of containing a pressure between 30 and 100 kPa. The atmosphere is also toxic as most of it consists of carbon dioxide (95% carbon dioxide, 3% nitrogen, 1.6% argon, and traces totaling less than 0.4% of other gases including oxygen).
This thin atmosphere does not filter out ultraviolet sunlight, which causes instability in the molecular bonds between atoms. For example, ammonia (NH3) is not stable in the Martian atmosphere and breaks down after a few hours.
Also due to the thinness of the atmosphere, the temperature difference between day and night is much larger than on Earth, typically around 70 °C (125 °F). However, the day/night temperature variation is much lower during dust storms when very little light gets through to the surface even during the day, and instead warms the middle atmosphere.
Water and climate.
Water on Mars is scarce, with rovers "Spirit" and "Opportunity" finding less than there is in Earth's driest desert.
The climate is much colder than Earth, with mean surface temperatures between (depending on the season and latitude). The lowest temperature ever recorded on Earth was 184 K (−89.2 °C, −128.6 °F) in Antarctica.
Because Mars is about 52% farther from the Sun, the amount of solar energy entering its upper atmosphere per unit area (the solar constant) is only around 43.3% of what reaches the Earth's upper atmosphere. However, due to the much thinner atmosphere, a higher fraction of the solar energy reaches the surface. The maximum solar irradiance on Mars is about 590 W/m2 compared to about 1000 W/m2 at the Earth's surface; optimal conditions on the Martian equator can be compared to those on Devon Island in the Canadian Arctic in June.
Global dust storms are common throughout the year and can cover the entire planet for weeks, blocking sunlight from reaching the surface. This has been observed to cause temperature drops of 4 °C (7 °F) for several months after the storm. In contrast, the only comparable events on Earth are infrequent large volcanic eruptions such as Krakatoa which threw large amounts of ash into the atmosphere in 1883, causing a global temperature drop of around 1 °C (2 °F). Perhaps more importantly, these storms affect electricity production from solar panels for long periods, as well interfering with communications with Earth.
Mars has no rain and virtually no clouds, so although cold, it is permanently sunny (apart from during dust storms). This means solar panels can always operate at maximum efficiency on dust-free days. And Mars' orbit is more eccentric than Earth's, increasing temperature and solar constant variations over the course of the Martian year.
Soil.
The Martian soil is toxic due to relatively high concentrations of chlorine and associated compounds which are hazardous to all known forms of life.
Survivability.
Although there are some extremophile organisms that survive in hostile conditions on Earth, including simulations that approximate Mars, plants and animals generally cannot survive the ambient conditions present on the surface of Mars.
Conditions for human habitation.
Conditions on the surface of Mars are closer to the conditions on Earth in terms of temperature and sunlight than on any other planet or moon, except for the cloud tops of Venus. However, the surface is not hospitable to humans or most known life forms due to the radiation, greatly reduced air pressure, and an atmosphere with only 0.16% oxygen.
In 2012, it was reported that some lichen and cyanobacteria survived and showed remarkable adaptation capacity for photosynthesis after 34 days in simulated Martian conditions in the Mars Simulation Laboratory (MSL) maintained by the German Aerospace Center (DLR). Some scientists think that cyanobacteria could play a role in the development of self-sustainable crewed outposts on Mars. They propose that cyanobacteria could be used directly for various applications, including the production of food, fuel and oxygen, but also indirectly: products from their culture could support the growth of other organisms, opening the way to a wide range of life-support biological processes based on Martian resources.
Humans have explored parts of Earth that match some conditions on Mars. Based on NASA rover data, temperatures on Mars (at low latitudes) are similar to those in Antarctica. The atmospheric pressure at the highest altitudes reached by piloted balloon ascents (35 km (114,000 feet) in 1961, 38 km in 2012) is similar to that on the surface of Mars. However, the pilots were not exposed to the extremely low pressure, as it would have killed them, but seated in a pressurized capsule.
Human survival on Mars would require living in artificial Mars habitats with complex life-support systems. One key aspect of this would be water processing systems. Being made mainly of water, a human being would die in a matter of days without it. Even a 5–8% decrease in total body water causes fatigue and dizziness and a 10% decrease physical and mental impairment (See Dehydration). A person in the UK uses 70–140 litres of water per day on average. Through experience and training, astronauts on the ISS have shown it is possible to use far less, and that around 70% of what is used can be recycled using the ISS water recovery systems. Half of all water is used during showers. Similar systems would be needed on Mars, but would need to be much more efficient, since regular robotic deliveries of water to Mars would be prohibitively expensive (the ISS is supplied with water four times per year). Potential access to in-situ water (frozen or otherwise) via drilling has been investigated by NASA.
Effects on human health.
Mars presents a hostile environment for human habitation. Different technologies have been developed to assist long-term space exploration and may be adapted for habitation on Mars. The existing record for the longest consecutive space flight is 438 days by cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov, and the most accrued time in space is 878 days by Gennady Padalka. The longest time spent outside the protection of the Earth's Van Allen radiation belt is about 12 days for the Apollo 17 moon landing. This is minor in comparison to the 1100-day journey planned by NASA as soon as the year 2028. Scientists have also hypothesized that many different biological functions can be negatively affected by the environment of Mars colonies. Due to higher levels of radiation, there are a multitude of physical side-effects that must be mitigated. In addition, Martian soil contains high levels of toxins which are hazardous to human health.
Physical effects.
The difference in gravity would negatively affect human health by weakening bones and muscles. There is also risk of osteoporosis and cardiovascular problems. Current rotations on the International Space Station put astronauts in zero gravity for six months, a comparable length of time to a one-way trip to Mars. This gives researchers the ability to better understand the physical state that astronauts going to Mars would arrive in. Once on Mars, surface gravity is only 38% of that on Earth. Microgravity affects the cardiovascular, musculoskeletal and neurovestibular (central nervous) systems. The cardiovascular effects are complex. On earth, blood within the body stays 70% below the heart, and in microgravity this is not case due to nothing pulling the blood down. This can have several negative effects. Once entering into microgravity, the blood pressure in the lower body and legs is significantly reduced. This causes legs to become weak through loss of muscle and bone mass. Astronauts show signs of a puffy face and chicken legs syndrome. After the first day of reentry back to earth, blood samples showed a 17% loss of blood plasma, which contributed to a decline of erythropoietin secretion. On the skeletal system which is important to support our body's posture, long space flight and exposure to microgravity cause demineralization and atrophy of muscles. During re-acclimation, astronauts were observed to have a myriad of symptoms including cold sweats, nausea, vomiting and motion sickness. Returning astronauts also felt disorientated. Journeys to and from Mars being six months is the average time spent at the ISS. Once on Mars with its lesser surface gravity (38% percent of Earth's), these health effects would be a serious concern. Upon return to Earth, recovery from bone loss and atrophy is a long process and the effects of microgravity may never fully reverse.
Radiation.
Mars has a weaker global magnetosphere than Earth does as it has lost its inner dynamo, which significantly weakened the magnetosphere—the cause of so much radiation reaching the surface, despite its far distance from the Sun compared to Earth. Combined with a thin atmosphere, this permits a significant amount of ionizing radiation to reach the Martian surface.
There are two main types of radiation risks to traveling outside the protection of Earth's atmosphere and magnetosphere: galactic cosmic rays (GCR) and solar energetic particles (SEP). Earth's magnetosphere protects from charged particles from the Sun, and the atmosphere protects against uncharged and highly energetic GCRs. There are ways to mitigate against solar radiation, but without much of an atmosphere, the only solution to the GCR flux is heavy shielding amounting to roughly 15 centimeters of steel, 1 meter of rock, or 3 meters of water, limiting human colonists to living underground most of the time.
The Mars Odyssey spacecraft carries an instrument, the Mars Radiation Environment Experiment (MARIE), to measure the radiation. MARIE found that radiation levels in orbit above Mars are 2.5 times higher than at the International Space Station. The average daily dose was about —equivalent to 0.08 Gy per year. A three-year exposure to such levels would exceed the safety limits currently adopted by NASA, and the risk of developing cancer due to radiation exposure after a Mars mission could be two times greater than what scientists previously thought. Occasional solar proton events (SPEs) produce much higher doses, as observed in September 2017, when NASA reported radiation levels on the surface of Mars were temporarily doubled, and were associated with an aurora 25-times brighter than any observed earlier, due to a massive, and unexpected, solar storm. Building living quarters underground (possibly in Martian lava tubes) would significantly lower the colonists' exposure to radiation.
Much remains to be learned about space radiation. In 2003, NASA's Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center opened a facility, the NASA Space Radiation Laboratory, at Brookhaven National Laboratory, that employs particle accelerators to simulate space radiation. The facility studies its effects on living organisms, as well as experimenting with shielding techniques. Initially, there was some evidence that this kind of low level, chronic radiation is not quite as dangerous as once thought; and that radiation hormesis occurs. However, results from a 2006 study indicated that protons from cosmic radiation may cause twice as much serious damage to DNA as previously estimated, exposing astronauts to greater risk of cancer and other diseases. As a result of the higher radiation in the Martian environment, the summary report of the Review of U.S. Human Space Flight Plans Committee released in 2009 reported that "Mars is not an easy place to visit with existing technology and without a substantial investment of resources." NASA is exploring a variety of alternative techniques and technologies such as deflector shields of plasma to protect astronauts and spacecraft from radiation.
Psychological effects.
Due to the communication delays, new protocols need to be developed in order to assess crew members' psychological health. Researchers have developed a Martian simulation called HI-SEAS (Hawaii Space Exploration Analog and Simulation) that places scientists in a simulated Martian laboratory to study the psychological effects of isolation, repetitive tasks, and living in close-quarters with other scientists for up to a year at a time. Computer programs are being developed to assist crews with personal and interpersonal issues in absence of direct communication with professionals on Earth. Current suggestions for Mars exploration and colonization are to select individuals who have passed psychological screenings. Psychosocial sessions for the return home are also suggested in order to reorient people to society.
Terraforming.
Various works of fiction put forward the idea of terraforming Mars to allow a wide variety of life forms, including humans, to survive unaided on Mars' surface. Some ideas of possible technologies that may be able to contribute to the terraforming of Mars have been conjectured, but none would be able to bring the entire planet into the Earth-like habitat pictured in science fiction.
Transportation.
Interplanetary spaceflight.
Mars requires less energy per unit mass (delta V) to reach from Earth than any planet except Venus. Using a Hohmann transfer orbit, a trip to Mars requires approximately nine months in space. Modified transfer trajectories that cut the travel time down to four to seven months in space are possible with incrementally higher amounts of energy and fuel compared to a Hohmann transfer orbit, and are in standard use for robotic Mars missions. Shortening the travel time below about six months requires higher delta-v and an increasing amount of fuel, and is difficult with chemical rockets. It could be feasible with advanced spacecraft propulsion technologies, some of which have already been tested to varying levels, such as Variable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket, and nuclear rockets. In the former case, a trip time of forty days could be attainable, and in the latter, a trip time down to about two weeks. In 2016, a University of California, Santa Barbara scientist said they could further reduce travel time for a small robotic probe to Mars down to "as little as 72 hours" with the use of a laser propelled sail (directed photonic propulsion) system instead of the fuel-based rocket propulsion system.
During the journey the astronauts would be subject to radiation, which would require a means to protect them. Cosmic radiation and solar wind cause DNA damage, which increases the risk of cancer significantly. The effect of long-term travel in interplanetary space is unknown, but scientists estimate an "added" risk of between 1% and 19% (one estimate is 3.4%) for males to die of cancer because of the radiation during the journey to Mars and back to Earth. For females the probability is higher due to generally larger glandular tissues.
Landing on Mars.
Mars has a surface gravity 0.38 times that of Earth, and the density of its atmosphere is about 0.6% of that on Earth. The relatively strong gravity and the presence of aerodynamic effects make it difficult to land heavy, crewed spacecraft with thrusters only, as was done with the Apollo Moon landings, yet the atmosphere is too thin for aerodynamic effects to be of much help in aerobraking and landing a large vehicle. Landing piloted missions on Mars would require braking and landing systems different from anything used to land crewed spacecraft on the Moon or robotic missions on Mars.
If one assumes carbon nanotube construction material will be available with a strength of then a space elevator could be built to land people and material on Mars.
A space elevator on Phobos (a Martian moon) has also been proposed.
Equipment needed for colonization.
Colonization of Mars would require a wide variety of equipment—both equipment to directly provide services to humans and production equipment used to produce food, propellant, water, energy and breathable oxygen—in order to support human colonization efforts. Required equipment will include:
Basic utilities.
In order to function at all the colony would need the basic utilities to support human civilization. These would need to be designed to handle the harsh Martian environment and would either have to be serviceable whilst wearing an EVA suit or housed inside a human habitable environment. For example, if electricity generation systems rely on solar power, large energy storage facilities will also be needed to cover the periods when dust storms block out the sun, and automatic dust removal systems may be needed to avoid human exposure to conditions on the surface. If the colony is to scale beyond a few people, systems will also need to maximise use of local resources to reduce the need for resupply from Earth, for example by recycling water and oxygen and being adapted to be able to use any water found on Mars, whatever form it is in.
Communication with Earth.
Communications with Earth are relatively straightforward during the half-sol when Earth is above the Martian horizon. NASA and ESA included communications relay equipment in several of the Mars orbiters, so Mars already has communications satellites. While these will eventually wear out, additional orbiters with communication relay capability are likely to be launched before any colonization expeditions are mounted.
The one-way communication delay due to the speed of light ranges from about 3 minutes at closest approach (approximated by perihelion of Mars minus aphelion of Earth) to 22 minutes at the largest possible superior conjunction (approximated by aphelion of Mars plus aphelion of Earth). Real-time communication, such as telephone conversations or Internet Relay Chat, between Earth and Mars would be highly impractical due to the long time lags involved. NASA has found that direct communication can be blocked for about two weeks every synodic period, around the time of superior conjunction when the Sun is directly between Mars and Earth, although the actual duration of the communications blackout varies from mission to mission depending on various factors—such as the amount of link margin designed into the communications system, and the minimum data rate that is acceptable from a mission standpoint. In reality most missions at Mars have had communications blackout periods of the order of a month.
A satellite at the or Earth–Sun Lagrangian point could serve as a relay during this period to solve the problem; even a constellation of communications satellites would be a minor expense in the context of a full colonization program. However, the size and power of the equipment needed for these distances make the L4 and L5 locations unrealistic for relay stations, and the inherent stability of these regions, although beneficial in terms of station-keeping, also attracts dust and asteroids, which could pose a risk. Despite that concern, the STEREO probes passed through the L4 and L5 regions without damage in late 2009.
Recent work by the University of Strathclyde's Advanced Space Concepts Laboratory, in collaboration with the European Space Agency, has suggested an alternative relay architecture based on highly non-Keplerian orbits. These are a special kind of orbit produced when continuous low-thrust propulsion, such as that produced from an ion engine or solar sail, modifies the natural trajectory of a spacecraft. Such an orbit would enable continuous communications during solar conjunction by allowing a relay spacecraft to "hover" above Mars, out of the orbital plane of the two planets. Such a relay avoids the problems of satellites stationed at either L4 or L5 by being significantly closer to the surface of Mars while still maintaining continuous communication between the two planets.
Robotic precursors.
The path to a human colony could be prepared by robotic systems such as the Mars Exploration Rovers "Spirit", "Opportunity", "Curiosity" and "Perseverance". These systems could help locate resources, such as ground water or ice, that would help a colony grow and thrive. The lifetimes of these systems would be years and even decades, and as recent developments in commercial spaceflight have shown, it may be that these systems will involve private as well as government ownership. These robotic systems also have a reduced cost compared with early crewed operations, and have less political risk.
Wired systems might lay the groundwork for early crewed landings and bases, by producing various consumables including fuel, oxidizers, water, and construction materials. Establishing power, communications, shelter, heating, and manufacturing basics can begin with robotic systems, if only as a prelude to crewed operations.
Mars Surveyor 2001 Lander MIP (Mars ISPP Precursor) was to demonstrate manufacture of oxygen from the atmosphere of Mars, and test solar cell technologies and methods of mitigating the effect of Martian dust on the power systems.
Before any people are transported to Mars on the notional 2020s Mars transportation infrastructure envisioned by SpaceX, a number of robotic cargo missions would be undertaken first in order to transport the requisite equipment, habitats and supplies.
Equipment that would be necessary would include "machines to produce fertilizer, methane and oxygen from Mars' atmospheric nitrogen and carbon dioxide and the planet's subsurface water ice" as well as construction materials to build transparent domes for initial agricultural areas.
Economics.
As with early colonies in the New World, economics would be a crucial aspect to a colony's success. The reduced gravity well of Mars and its position in the Solar System may facilitate Mars–Earth trade and may provide an economic rationale for continued settlement of the planet. Given its size and resources, this might eventually be a place to grow food and produce equipment to mine the asteroid belt.
Some early Mars colonies might specialize in developing local resources for Martian consumption, such as water and/or ice. Local resources can also be used in infrastructure construction. One source of Martian ore currently known to be available is metallic iron in the form of nickel–iron meteorites. Iron in this form is more easily extracted than from the iron oxides that cover the planet.
Another main inter-Martian trade good during early colonization could be manure. Assuming that life doesn't exist on Mars, the soil is going to be very poor for growing plants, so manure and other fertilizers will be valued highly in any Martian civilization until the planet changes enough chemically to support growing vegetation on its own.
Solar power is a candidate for power for a Martian colony. Solar insolation (the amount of solar radiation that reaches Mars) is about 42% of that on Earth, since Mars is about 52% farther from the Sun and insolation falls off as the square of distance. But the thin atmosphere would allow almost all of that energy to reach the surface as compared to Earth, where the atmosphere absorbs roughly a quarter of the solar radiation. Sunlight on the surface of Mars would be much like a moderately cloudy day on Earth.
Economic drivers.
Space colonization on Mars can roughly be said to be possible when the necessary methods of space colonization become cheap enough (such as space access by cheaper launch systems) to meet the cumulative funds that have been gathered for the purpose.
Although there are no immediate prospects for the large amounts of money required for any space colonization to be available given traditional launch costs, there is some prospect of a radical reduction to launch costs in the 2020s, which would consequently lessen the cost of any efforts in that direction. With a published price of per launch of up to payload to low Earth orbit or to Mars, SpaceX Falcon 9 rockets are already the "cheapest in the industry". SpaceX's reusable plans include Falcon Heavy and future methane-based launch vehicles including the Starship. If SpaceX is successful in developing the reusable technology, it would be expected to "have a major impact on the cost of access to space", and change the increasingly competitive market in space launch services.
Alternative funding approaches might include the creation of inducement prizes. For example, the 2004 President's Commission on Implementation of United States Space Exploration Policy suggested that an inducement prize contest should be established, perhaps by government, for the achievement of space colonization. One example provided was offering a prize to the first organization to place humans on the Moon and sustain them for a fixed period before they return to Earth.
Possible locations for settlements.
Equatorial regions.
Mars Odyssey found what appear to be natural caves near the volcano Arsia Mons. It has been speculated that settlers could benefit from the shelter that these or similar structures could provide from radiation and micrometeoroids. Geothermal energy is also suspected in the equatorial regions.
Lava tubes.
Several possible Martian lava tube skylights have been located on the flanks of Arsia Mons. Earth based examples indicate that some should have lengthy passages offering complete protection from radiation and be relatively easy to seal using on-site materials, especially in small subsections.
Hellas Planitia.
Hellas Planitia is the lowest lying plain below the Martian geodetic datum. The air pressure is relatively higher in this place when compared to the rest of Mars.
Planetary protection.
Robotic spacecraft to Mars are required to be sterilized, to have at most 300,000 spores on the exterior of the craft—and more thoroughly sterilized if they contact "special regions" containing water, otherwise there is a risk of contaminating not only the life-detection experiments but possibly the planet itself.
It is impossible to sterilize human missions to this level, as humans are host to typically a hundred trillion microorganisms of thousands of species of the human microbiome, and these cannot be removed while preserving the life of the human. Containment seems the only option, but it is a major challenge in the event of a hard landing (i.e. crash). There have been several planetary workshops on this issue, but with no final guidelines for a way forward yet. Human explorers would also be vulnerable to back contamination to Earth if they become carriers of microorganisms should Mars have life.
Ethical, political and legal challenges.
It is unforeseen how the first human landing on Mars will change the current policies regarding the exploration of space and occupancy of celestial bodies. In the 1967 United Nations Outer Space Treaty, it was determined that no country may take claim to space or its inhabitants. Since the planet Mars offers a challenging environment and dangerous obstacles for humans to overcome, the laws and culture on the planet will most likely be very different from those on Earth. With Elon Musk announcing his plans for travel to Mars, it is uncertain how the dynamic of a private company possibly being the first to put a human on Mars will play out on a national and global scale. NASA had to deal with several cuts in funding. During the presidency of Barack Obama, the objective for NASA to reach Mars was pushed to the background. In 2017, president Donald Trump promised to return humans to the Moon and eventually Mars, effectively taking action by increasing NASA budget with $1.1 billion, and mostly focus on the development of the new Space Launch System.
Colonialism.
Space colonization in general has been discussed as continuation of imperialism and colonialism, especially regarding Mars colonial decision making and reasons for colonial labor and land exploitation have been questioned with postcolonial critique. Seeing the need for inclusive and democratic participation and implementation of any space and Mars exploration, infrastructure, or colonialization, many have called for dramatic sociological reforms and guarantees to prevent racism, sexism, and other forms of prejudice and bigotry.
The narrative of space exploration as a "New Frontier" has been criticized as unreflected continuation of settler colonialism and manifest destiny, continuing the narrative of colonial exploration as fundamental to the assumed human nature.
The predominant perspective of territorial colonization in space has been called "surfacism", especially comparing advocacy for colonization of Mars opposed to Venus.
Dangers to pregnancy.
One possible ethical challenge that space travelers might face is that of pregnancy during the trip. According to NASA's policies, it is forbidden for members of the crew to engage in sex in space. NASA wants its crewmembers to treat each other like coworkers would in a professional environment. A pregnant member on a spacecraft is dangerous to all those aboard. The pregnant woman and child would need additional nutrition from the rations aboard, as well as special treatment and care. The pregnancy would impede on the pregnant crew member's duties and abilities. It is still not fully known how the environment in a spacecraft would affect the development of a child aboard. It is known however that an unborn child in space would be more susceptible to solar radiation, which would likely have a negative effect on its cells and genetics. During a long trip to Mars, it is likely that members of craft may engage in sex due to their stressful and isolated environment.
Advocacy.
Mars colonization is advocated by several non-governmental groups for a range of reasons and with varied proposals. One of the oldest groups is the Mars Society who promote a NASA program to accomplish human exploration of Mars and have set up Mars analog research stations in Canada and the United States. Mars to Stay advocates recycling emergency return vehicles into permanent settlements as soon as initial explorers determine permanent habitation is possible.
Elon Musk founded SpaceX with the long-term goal of developing the technologies that will enable a self-sustaining human colony on Mars. Richard Branson, in his lifetime, is "determined to be a part of starting a population on Mars. I think it is absolutely realistic. It will happen... I think over the next 20 years," [from 2012] "we will take literally hundreds of thousands of people to space and that will give us the financial resources to do even bigger things".
In June 2013, Buzz Aldrin, American engineer and former astronaut, and the second person to walk on the Moon, wrote an opinion, published in "The New York Times", supporting a human mission to Mars and viewing the Moon "not as a destination but more a point of departure, one that places humankind on a trajectory to homestead Mars and become a two-planet species". In August 2015, Aldrin, in association with the Florida Institute of Technology, presented a "master plan", for NASA consideration, for astronauts, with a "tour of duty of ten years", to colonize Mars before the year 2040.
In fiction.
A few instances in fiction provide detailed descriptions of Mars colonization. They include: |
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"The Martians" was a term used to refer to a group of prominent Jewish Hungarian scientists (mostly, but not exclusively, physicists and mathematicians) who emigrated to the United States in the early half of the 20th century.
Leó Szilárd, who jokingly suggested that Hungary was a front for aliens from Mars, used this term. In an answer to the question of why there is no evidence of intelligent life beyond Earth despite the high probability of it existing, Szilárd responded: "They are already here among us they just call themselves Hungarians." This account is featured in György Marx's book "The Voice of the Martians."
Paul Erdős, Paul Halmos, Theodore von Kármán, John G. Kemeny, John von Neumann, George Pólya, Leó Szilárd, Edward Teller, and Eugene Wigner are included in this group.
Dennis Gabor, Ervin Bauer, Róbert Bárány, George de Hevesy, Nicholas Kurti, George Klein, Eva Klein, Michael Polanyi and Marcel Riesz are also sometimes named, though they did not emigrate to the United States.
Loránd Eötvös, Kálmán Tihanyi, Zoltán Lajos Bay, Victor Szebehely, Albert Szent-Györgyi, Georg von Békésy and Maria Telkes are often mentioned in connection.
Elizabeth Róna, a Hungarian nuclear chemist who emigrated to the US in 1941 to work on the Manhattan Project and discovered Uranium-Y, is a colleague, but not usually included.
Origin of the name.
Since they all spoke English with a strong accent (made famous by horror actor Bela Lugosi), they were considered outsiders in American society. The Hungarian scientists were seemingly superhuman in intellect, spoke an incomprehensible native language, and came from a small obscure country. This led to them being called Martians, a name they jocularly adopted.
The joke was that Hungarian scientists are actually descendants of a Martian scout force which landed in Budapest around the year 1900, and later departed after the planet was found unsuitable, but leaving behind children by several Earth women, children who all became the famous scientists. John von Neumann cited as mock evidence to support this claim the close geographic proximity of the Martians' birthplaces and the well-traceable career path, which started with an interest in chemistry and led the individual in question to German universities where he moved towards physics, at which point the Martian left Europe for the US.
The original story from György Marx's book "The Voice of the Martians":
When the question was put to Edward Teller who was particularly proud of his monogram, "E.T." (abbreviation of "extraterrestrial") he looked worried, and said: "Von Kármán must have been talking."
According to György Marx, the extraterrestrial origin of the Hungarian scientists is proved by the fact that the names of Leó Szilárd, John von Neumann and Theodore von Kármán cannot be found on the map of Budapest, but on the Moon are craters bearing their names:
There is also a crater on Mars named after Von Kármán.
Central European scientists who emigrated to the United States.
During and after World War II many Central European scientists immigrated to the United States, mostly Jewish refugees fleeing from Nazism or Communism. Several were from Budapest, and were instrumental in American scientific progress (e.g., developing the atomic bomb).
List of "The Martians".
According to György Marx, "The Martians" are as follows: |
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} | m2d2_wiki | History of science fiction
The literary genre of science fiction is diverse, and its exact definition remains a contested question among both scholars and devotees. This lack of consensus is reflected in debates about the genre's history, particularly over determining its exact origins. There are two broad camps of thought, one that identifies the genre's roots in early fantastical works such as the Sumerian "Epic of Gilgamesh" (earliest Sumerian text versions c. 2150–2000 BCE). A second approach argues that science fiction only became possible sometime between the 17th and early 19th centuries, following the scientific revolution and major discoveries in astronomy, physics, and mathematics.
Question of deeper origins aside, science fiction developed and boomed in the 20th century, as the deep integration of science and inventions into daily life encouraged a greater interest in literature that explores the relationship between technology, society, and the individual. Scholar Robert Scholes calls the history of science fiction "the history of humanity's changing attitudes toward space and time ... the history of our growing understanding of the universe and the position of our species in that universe." In recent decades, the genre has diversified and become firmly established as a major influence on global culture and thought.
Early science fiction.
Ancient and early modern precursors.
There are a number of ancient or early modern texts including a great many epics and poems that contain fantastical or "science-fictional" elements, yet were written before the emergence of science fiction as a distinct genre. These texts often include elements such as a fantastical voyage to the moon or the use of imagined advanced technology. Although fantastical and science fiction-like elements and imagery exist in stories such as Ovid's "Metamorphoses" (8 AD), the Old English epic heroic poem "Beowulf" (8th-11th centuries AD), and the Middle German epic poem "Nibelungenlied" (c. 1230), their relative lack of references to science or technology puts them closer to fantasy rather than science fiction.
One of the earliest and most commonly-cited texts for those looking for early precursors to science fiction is the ancient Mesopotamian "Epic of Gilgamesh", with the earliest text versions identified as being from about 2000 BC. American science fiction author Lester del Rey was one such supporter of using Gilgamesh as an origin point, arguing that "science fiction is precisely as old as the first recorded fiction. That is the Epic of Gilgamesh." French science fiction writer Pierre Versins also argued that "Gilgamesh" was the first science fiction work due to its treatment of human reason and the quest for immortality. In addition, "Gilgamesh" features a flood scene that in some ways resembles work of apocalyptic science fiction. However, the lack of explicit science or technology in the work has led some to argue that it is better categorized as fantastic literature.
Ancient Indian poetry such as the Hindu epic "Ramayana" (5th to 4th century BC) includes Vimana flying machines able to travel into space or under water, and destroy entire cities using advanced weapons. In the first book of the "Rigveda" collection of Sanskrit hymns (1700–1100 BC), there is a description of "mechanical birds" that are seen "jumping into space speedily with a craft using fire and water... containing twelve stamghas (pillars), one wheel, three machines, 300 pivots, and 60 instruments."
The ancient Hindu mythological epic, the "Mahabharata" (8th and 9th centuries BC) includes the story of King Kakudmi, who travels to heaven to meet the creator Brahma and is shocked to learn that many ages have passed when he returns to Earth, anticipating the concept of time travel.
Ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes has several works that include elements often associated with the "fantastic voyage", including air travel to another world. Examples include his "The Clouds" (423 BC), "The Birds" (414 BC) and "The Peace".
One frequently cited text is the Syrian-Greek writer Lucian's 2nd-century satire "True History", which uses a voyage to outer space and conversations with alien life forms to comment on the use of exaggeration within travel literature and debates. Typical science fiction themes and topoi in "True History" include travel to outer space, encounter with alien life-forms (including the experience of a first encounter event), interplanetary warfare and planetary imperialism, motif of giganticism, creatures as products of human technology, worlds working by a set of alternative physical laws, and an explicit desire of the protagonist for exploration and adventure. In witnessing one interplanetary battle between the People of the Moon and the People of the Sun as the fight for the right to colonize the Morning Star, Lucian describes giant space spiders who were "appointed to spin a web in the air between the Moon and the Morning Star, which was done in an instant, and made a plain campaign upon which the foot forces were planted..." L. Sprague de Camp and a number of other authors argue this to be one of the earliest if not the earliest example of science fiction or proto-science fiction.
However, since the text was intended to be explicitly satirical and hyperbolic, other critics are ambivalent about its rightful place as a science fiction precursor. For example, English critic Kingsley Amis wrote that "It is hardly science-fiction, since it deliberately piles extravagance upon extravagance for comic effect" yet he implicitly acknowledged its SF character by comparing its plot to early 20th-century space operas: "I will merely remark that the sprightliness and sophistication of "True History" make it read like a joke at the expense of nearly all early-modern science fiction, that written between, say, 1910 and 1940." Lucian translator Bryan Reardon is more explicit, describing the work as "an account of a fantastic journey - to the moon, the underworld, the belly of a whale, and so forth. It is not really science fiction, although it has sometimes been called that; there is no 'science' in it."
The early Japanese tale of "Urashima Tarō" involves traveling forwards in time to a distant future, and was first described in the "Nihongi" (720). It was about a young fisherman named Urashima Taro who visits an undersea palace and stays there for three days. After returning home to his village, he finds himself three hundred years in the future, where he is long forgotten, his house in ruins, and his family long dead. The 10th-century Japanese narrative "The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter" may also be considered proto-science fiction. The protagonist of the story, Kaguya-hime, is a princess from the Moon who is sent to Earth for safety during a celestial war, and is found and raised by a bamboo cutter in Japan. She is later taken back to the Moon by her real extraterrestrial family. A manuscript illustration depicts a round flying machine similar to a flying saucer.
"One Thousand and One Nights".
Several stories within the "One Thousand and One Nights" ("Arabian Nights", 8th-10th century CE) also feature science fiction elements. One example is "The Adventures of Bulukiya", where the protagonist Bulukiya's quest for the herb of immortality leads him to explore the seas, journey to the Garden of Eden and to Jahannam, and travel across the cosmos to different worlds much larger than his own world, anticipating elements of galactic science fiction; along the way, he encounters societies of jinn, mermaids, talking serpents, talking trees, and other forms of life.
In "Abdullah the Fisherman and Abdullah the Merman", the protagonist gains the ability to breathe underwater and discovers an underwater submarine society that is portrayed as an inverted reflection of society on land, in that the underwater society follows a form of primitive communism where concepts like money and clothing do not exist.
Other "Arabian Nights" tales deal with lost ancient technologies, advanced ancient civilizations that went astray, and catastrophes which overwhelmed them. "The City of Brass" features a group of travellers on an archaeological expedition across the Sahara to find an ancient lost city and attempt to recover a brass vessel that Solomon once used to trap a jinn, and, along the way, encounter a mummified queen, petrified inhabitants, lifelike humanoid robots and automata, seductive marionettes dancing without strings, and a brass robot horseman who directs the party towards the ancient city.
"The Ebony Horse" features a robot in the form of a flying mechanical horse controlled using keys that could fly into outer space and towards the Sun, while the "Third Qalandar's Tale" also features a robot in the form of an uncanny sailor. "The City of Brass" and "The Ebony Horse" can be considered early examples of proto-science fiction. Other examples of early Arabic proto-science fiction include al-Farabi's "Opinions of the residents of a splendid city" about a utopian society, and certain "Arabian Nights" elements such as the flying carpet.
Other medieval literature.
According to Roubi, the final two chapters of the Arabic theological novel "Fādil ibn Nātiq" (c. 1270), also known as "Theologus Autodidactus", by the Arabian polymath writer Ibn al-Nafis (1213–1288) can be described as science fiction. The theological novel deals with various science fiction elements such as spontaneous generation, futurology, apocalyptic themes, eschatology, resurrection and the afterlife, but rather than giving supernatural or mythological explanations for these events, Ibn al-Nafis attempted to explain these plot elements using his own extensive scientific knowledge in anatomy, biology, physiology, astronomy, cosmology and geology. For example, it was through this novel that Ibn al-Nafis introduces his scientific theory of metabolism, and he makes references to his own scientific discovery of the pulmonary circulation in order to explain bodily resurrection. The novel was later translated into English as "Theologus Autodidactus" in the early 20th century.
During the European Middle Ages, science fictional themes appeared within many chivalric romance and legends. Robots and automata featured in romances starting in the twelfth century, with "Le Pèlerinage de Charlemagne" and "Eneas" among the first. The Roman de Troie, another twelfth-century work, features the famous Chambre de Beautes, which contained four automata, one of which held a magic mirror, one of which performed somersaults, one of which played musical instruments, and one which showed people what they most needed. Automata in these works were often ambivalently associated with necromancy, and frequently guarded entrances or provided warning of intruders. This association with necromancy often leads to the appearance of automata guarding tombs, as they do in "Eneas", "Floris and Blancheflour", and "Le Roman d’Alexandre", while in Lancelot they appear in an underground palace. Automata did not have to be human, however. A brass horse is among the marvelous gifts given to the Cambyuskan in Geoffrey Chaucer's "The Squire's Tale". This metal horse is reminiscent of similar metal horses in middle eastern literature, and could take its rider anywhere in the world at extraordinary speed by turning a peg in its ear and whispering certain words in its ear. The brass horse is only one of the technological marvels which appears in The Squire's Tale: the Cambyuskan, or Khan also receives a mirror which reveals distant places, which the witnessing crowd explains as operating by the manipulation of angles and optics, and a sword which deals and heals deadly wounds, which the crowd explains as being possible using advanced smithing techniques.
Technological inventions are also rife in the Alexander romances. In John Gower's "Confessio Amantis", for example, Alexander the Great constructs a flying machine by tying two griffins to a platform and dangling meat above them on a pole. This adventure is ended only by the direct intervention of God, who destroys the device and throws Alexander back to the ground. This does not, however, stop the legendary Alexander, who proceeds to have constructed a gigantic orb of glass which he uses to travel beneath the water. There he sees extraordinary marvels which eventually exceed his comprehension.
States similar to suspended animation also appear in medieval romances, such as the Histora Destructionis Troiae and the Roman d’Eneas. In the former, king Priam has the body of the hero Hector entombed in a network of golden tubes that run through his body. Through these tubes ran the semi-legendary fluid balsam which was then reputed to have the power to preserve life. This fluid kept the corpse of Hector preserved as if he was still alive, maintaining him in a persistent vegetative state during which autonomic processes such as the growth of facial hair continued.
The boundaries between medieval fiction with scientific elements and medieval science can be fuzzy at best. In works such as Geoffrey Chaucer "The House of Fame", it is proposed that the titular House of Fame is the natural home of sound, described as a ripping in the air, towards which all sound is eventually attracted, in the same way that the earth was believed to be the natural home of earth to which it was all eventually attracted. Likewise, medieval travel narratives often contained science-fictional themes and elements. Works such as Mandeville's Travels included automata, alternate species and sub-species of humans, including Cynoencephali and Giants, and information about the sexual reproduction of diamonds. However, Mandeville's Travels and other travel narratives in its genre mix real geographical knowledge with knowledge now known to be fictional, and it is therefore difficult to distinguish which portions should be considered science fictional or would have been seen as such in the Middle Ages.
Proto-science fiction in the Enlightenment and Age of Reason.
In the wake of scientific discoveries that characterized the Enlightenment, several new types of literature began to take shape in 16th-century Europe. The humanist thinker Thomas More's 1516 work of fiction and political philosophy entitled "Utopia" describes a fictional island whose inhabitants have perfected every aspect of their society. The name of the society stuck, giving rise to the Utopia motif that would become so widespread in later science fiction to describe a world that is seemingly perfect but either ultimately unattainable or perversely flawed. The Faust legend (1587) contains an early prototype for the "mad scientist story".
In the 17th and 18th centuries, the so-called "Age of Reason" and widespread interest in scientific discovery fueled the creation of speculative fiction that anticipated many of the tropes of more recent science fiction. Several works expanded on imaginary voyages to the moon, first in Johannes Kepler's "Somnium" (The Dream, 1634), which both Carl Sagan and Isaac Asimov have referred to as the first work of science fiction. Similarly, some identify Francis Godwin's "The Man in the Moone" (1638) as the first work of science fiction in English, and Cyrano de Bergerac's "Comical History of the States and Empires of the Moon" (1656). Space travel also figures prominently in Voltaire's "Micromégas" (1752), which is also notable for the suggestion that people of other worlds may be in some ways more advanced than those of earth.
Other works containing proto-science-fiction elements from the Age of Reason of the 17th and 18th centuries include (in chronological order):
19th-century transitions.
Shelley and Europe in the early 19th century.
The 19th century saw a major acceleration of these trends and features, most clearly seen in the groundbreaking publication of Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" in 1818. The short novel features the archetypal "mad scientist" experimenting with advanced technology. In his book "Billion Year Spree", Brian Aldiss claims "Frankenstein" represents "the first seminal work to which the label SF can be logically attached". It is also the first of the "mad scientist" subgenre. Although normally associated with the gothic horror genre, the novel introduces science fiction themes such as the use of technology for achievements beyond the scope of science at the time, and the alien as antagonist, furnishing a view of the human condition from an outside perspective. Aldiss argues that science fiction in general derives its conventions from the gothic novel. Mary Shelley's short story "Roger Dodsworth: The Reanimated Englishman" (1826) sees a man frozen in ice revived in the present day, incorporating the now common science fiction theme of cryonics whilst also exemplifying Shelley's use of science as a conceit to drive her stories. Another futuristic Shelley novel, "The Last Man", is also often cited as the first true science fiction novel.
In 1836 Alexander Veltman published "Predki Kalimerosa: Aleksandr Filippovich Makedonskii" (The forebears of Kalimeros: Alexander, son of Philip of Macedon), which has been called the first original Russian science fiction novel and the first novel to use time travel. In it the narrator rides to ancient Greece on a hippogriff, meets Aristotle, and goes on a voyage with Alexander the Great before returning to the 19th century.
Somehow influenced by the scientific theories of the 19th century, but most certainly by the idea of human progress, Victor Hugo wrote in "The Legend of the Centuries" (1859) a long poem in two parts that can be viewed like a dystopia/utopia fiction, called "20th century". It shows in a first scene the body of a broken huge ship, the greatest product of the prideful and foolish mankind that called it "Leviathan", wandering in a desert world where the winds blow and the anger of the wounded Nature is; humanity, finally reunited and pacified, has gone toward the stars in a starship, to look for and to bring liberty into the light.
Other notable proto-science fiction authors and works of the early 19th century include:
Verne and Wells.
The European brand of science fiction proper began later in the 19th century with the scientific romances of Jules Verne and the science-oriented, socially critical novels of H. G. Wells. Verne's adventure stories, notably "Journey to the Center of the Earth" (1864), "From the Earth to the Moon" (1865), and "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea" (1869) mixed daring romantic adventure with technology that was either up to the minute or logically extrapolated into the future. They were tremendous commercial successes and established that an author could make a career out of such whimsical material. L. Sprague de Camp calls Verne "the world's first full-time science fiction novelist."
Wells's stories, on the other hand, use science fiction devices to make didactic points about his society. In "The Time Machine" (1895), for example, the technical details of the machine are glossed over quickly so that the Time Traveller can tell a story that criticizes the stratification of English society. The story also uses Darwinian evolution (as would be expected in a former student of Darwin's champion, Huxley), and shows an awareness of Marxism. In "The War of the Worlds" (1898), the Martians' technology is not explained as it would have been in a Verne story, and the story is resolved by a deus ex machina, albeit a scientifically explained one.
The differences between Verne and Wells highlight a tension that would exist in science fiction throughout its history. The question of whether to present realistic technology or to focus on characters and ideas has been ever-present, as has the question of whether to tell an exciting story or make a didactic point.
Late 19th-century expansion.
Wells and Verne had quite a few rivals in early science fiction. Short stories and novelettes with themes of fantastic imagining appeared in journals throughout the late 19th century and many of these employed scientific ideas as the springboard to the imagination. "Erewhon" is a novel by Samuel Butler published in 1872 and dealing with the concept that machines could one day become sentient and supplant the human race. In 1886 the novel The Future Eve by French author Auguste Villiers de l'Isle-Adam was published, where Thomas Edison builds an artificial woman. Although better known for Sherlock Holmes, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle also wrote early science fiction, particularly using the character of Professor Challenger. Rudyard Kipling's contributions to the genre in the early 1900s made Campbell describe him as "the first modern science fiction writer". Other writers in the field were Bengali science fiction authors such as Sukumar Ray and Begum Roquia Sakhawat Hussain, who wrote the earliest known feminist science fiction work, "Sultana's Dream". Another early feminist science fiction work at the time was Charlotte Perkins Gilman' "Herland".
Wells and Verne both had an international readership and influenced writers in America, especially. Soon a home-grown American science fiction was thriving. European writers found more readers by selling to the American market and writing in an Americanised style.
American proto-science fiction in the late 19th century.
In the last decades of the 19th century, works of science fiction for adults and children were numerous in America, though it was not yet given the name "science fiction."
There were science-fiction elements in the stories of Nathaniel Hawthorne and Fitz-James O'Brien. Edgar Allan Poe is often mentioned with Verne and Wells as the founders of science fiction. A number of his short stories, and the novel "The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket" are science fictional. Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus is published. The book, by 20-year-old Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, is frequently called the world's first science fiction novel.
In 1835 Edgar Allan Poe published a short story, "The Unparalleled Adventure of One Hans Pfaall" in which a flight to the moon in a balloon is described. It has an account of the launch, the construction of the cabin, descriptions of strata and many more science-like aspects. In addition to Poe's account the story written in 1813 by the Dutch Willem Bilderdijk is remarkable. In his novel "Kort verhaal van eene aanmerkelijke luchtreis en nieuwe planeetontdekking" (Short account of a remarkable journey into the skies and discovery of a new planet) Bilderdijk tells of a European somewhat stranded in an Arabic country where he boasts he is able to build a balloon that can lift people and let them fly through the air. The gasses used turn out to be far more powerful than expected and after a while he lands on a planet positioned between earth and moon. The writer uses the story to portray an overview of scientific knowledge concerning the moon in all sorts of aspects the traveller to that place would encounter. Quite a few similarities can be found in the story Poe published some twenty years later.
John Leonard Riddell, a Professor of Chemistry in New Orleans, published the short story "Orrin Lindsay's plan of aerial navigation, with a narrative of his explorations in the higher regions of the atmosphere, and his wonderful voyage round the moon!" in 1847 on a pamphlet. It tells the story of the student Orrin Lindsay who invents an alloy that prevents gravitational attraction, and in a spherical craft leaves earth and travel to the moon. The story contains algebra and scientific footnotes, which makes it an early example of hard science fiction.
William Henry Rhodes published in 1871 the tale "The Case of Summerfield" in the Sacramento Union newspaper, and introduced weapon of mass destruction. A mad scientist and villain called Black Bart makes an attempt to blackmail the world with a powder made of potassium, able to destroy the planet by turning its waters into fire.
Charles Curtis Dail, a Kentucky lawyer, published in 1890 the novel "Willmoth the Wanderer, or The Man from Saturn", had his protagonist travel through the solar system by covering his body with an anti-gravity ointment.
The newspaper man Edward Page Mitchell would publish his innovative science fiction short stories in "The Sun" for more than a decade, except for his first story which was published in "Scribner's Monthly" in 1874. His stories included invisibility, faster than light travels, teleportation, time travel, cryogenics, mind transfer, mutants, cyborgs and mechanical brains.
One of the most successful works of early American science fiction was the second-best selling novel in the U.S. in the 19th century: Edward Bellamy's "Looking Backward" (1888), its effects extending far beyond the field of literature. "Looking Backward" extrapolates a future society based on observation of the current society.
In 1894, Will Harben published "Land of the Changing Sun," a dystopian fantasy set at the center of the earth. In Harben's tale, the earth's core is populated by a scientifically advanced civilization, living beneath the glow of a mechanical sun.
Mark Twain explored themes of science in his novel "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court". By means of ""transmigration of souls", "transposition of epochs – and bodies"" Twain's Yankee is transported back in time and his knowledge of 19th-century technology with him. Written in 1889, "A Connecticut Yankee" seems to predict the events of World War I, when Europe's old ideas of chivalry in warfare were shattered by new weapons and tactics.
American author L. Frank Baum's series of 14 books (1900–1920) based in his outlandish Land of Oz setting, contained depictions of strange weapons (Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz, Glinda of Oz), mechanical men (Tik-Tok of Oz) and a bevy of not-yet-realized technological inventions and devices including perhaps the first literary appearance of handheld wireless communicators (Tik-Tok of Oz).
Jack London wrote several science fiction stories, including "The Red One" (a story involving extraterrestrials), "The Iron Heel" (set in the future from London's point of view) and "The Unparalleled Invasion" (a story involving future germ warfare and ethnic cleansing). He also wrote a story about invisibility and a story about an irresistible energy weapon. These stories began to change the features of science fiction.
Edward Everett Hale wrote "The Brick Moon", a Verne-inspired novel notable as the first work to describe an artificial satellite. Written in much the same style as his other work, it employs pseudojournalistic realism to tell an adventure story with little basis in reality.
Edgar Rice Burroughs (1875–1950) began writing science fiction for pulp magazines just before World War I, getting his first story "Under the Moons of Mars" published in 1912. He continued to publish adventure stories, many of them science fiction, throughout the rest of his life. The pulps published adventure stories of all kinds. Science fiction stories had to fit in alongside murder mysteries, horror, fantasy and Edgar Rice Burroughs' own Tarzan.
Early 20th century.
The next great science fiction writers after H. G. Wells were Olaf Stapledon (1886–1950), whose four major works "Last and First Men" (1930), "Odd John" (1935), "Star Maker" (1937), and "Sirius" (1944), introduced a myriad of ideas that writers have since adopted, and J.-H. Rosny aîné, born in Belgium, the father of "modern" French science fiction, a writer also comparable to H. G. Wells, who wrote the classic "Les Xipehuz" (1887) and "La Mort de la Terre" (1910). However, the Twenties and Thirties would see the genre represented in a new format. Robert Hugh Benson wrote one of the first modern dystopias, Lord of the World (1907).
Rudyard Kipling's contributions to science fiction go beyond their direct impact at the start of the 20th century. The Aerial Board of Control stories and his critique of the British military, The Army of a Dream, were not only very modern in style, but strongly influenced authors like John W. Campbell and Robert Anson Heinlein, the latter of whom wrote a novel, Starship Troopers, that contains all of the elements of The Army of a Dream, and whose Stranger in a Strange Land can be compared to The Jungle Book, with the human child raised by Martians instead of wolves. Heinlein's technique of indirect exposition first appears in Kiplings' writing. Heinlein, the central influence of all science fiction from the 1930s forward, has also described himself as influenced by George Bernard Shaw, whose longest work Back to Methuselah (1921) was itself science fiction.
Birth of the pulps.
The development of American science fiction as a self-conscious genre dates in part from 1926, when Hugo Gernsback founded "Amazing Stories" magazine, which was devoted exclusively to science fiction stories. Though science fiction magazines had been published in Sweden and Germany before, "Amazing Stories" was the first English language magazine to solely publish science fiction. Since he is notable for having chosen the variant term "scientifiction" to describe this incipient genre, the stage in the genre's development, his name and the term "scientifiction" are often thought to be inextricably linked. Though Gernsback encouraged stories featuring scientific realism to educate his readers about scientific principles, such stories shared the pages with exciting stories with little basis in reality. Much of what Gernsback published was referred to as "gadget fiction", about what happens when someone makes a technological invention. Published in this and other pulp magazines with great and growing success, such scientifiction stories were not viewed as serious literature but as sensationalism. Nevertheless, a magazine devoted entirely to science fiction was a great boost to the public awareness of the scientific speculation story. "Amazing Stories" competed with several other pulp magazines, including "Weird Tales" (which primarily published fantasy stories), "Astounding Stories", and "Wonder Stories", throughout the 1930s. It was in the Gernsback era that science fiction fandom arose through the medium of the "Letters to the Editor" columns of "Amazing" and its competitors. In August 1928, Amazing Stories published Skylark of Space and Armageddon 2419 A.D., while Weird Tales published Edmond Hamilton's "Crashing Suns", all of which represented the birth of space opera.
Fritz Lang's movie "Metropolis" (1927), in which the first cinematic humanoid robot was seen, and the Italian Futurists' love of machines are indicative of both the hopes and fears of the world between the world wars.
"Metropolis" was an extremely successful film and its art-deco inspired aesthetic became the guiding aesthetic of the science fiction pulps for some time.
Modernist writing.
Writers attempted to respond to the new world in the post-World War I era. In the 1920s and 30s writers entirely unconnected with science fiction were exploring new ways of telling a story and new ways of treating time, space and experience in the narrative form. The posthumously published works of Franz Kafka (who died in 1924) and the works of modernist writers such as James Joyce, T. S. Eliot, Virginia Woolf and others featured stories in which time and individual identity could be expanded, contracted, looped and otherwise distorted. While this work was unconnected to science fiction as a genre, it did deal with the impact of modernity (technology, science, and change) upon people's lives, and decades later, during the New Wave movement, some modernist literary techniques entered science fiction.
Czech playwright Karel Čapek's plays "The Makropulos Affair", "R.U.R.", "The Life of the Insects", and the novel "War with the Newts" were modernist literature which invented important science fiction motifs. "R.U.R." in particular is noted for introducing the word robot to the world's vocabulary.
A strong theme in modernist writing was "alienation", the making strange of familiar surroundings so that settings and behaviour usually regarded as "normal" are seen as though they were the seemingly bizarre practices of an alien culture. The audience of modernist plays or the readership of modern novels is often led to question everything.
At the same time, a tradition of more literary science fiction novels, treating with a dissonance between perceived Utopian conditions and the full expression of human desires, began to develop: the dystopian novel. For some time, the science fictional elements of these works were ignored by mainstream literary critics, though they owe a much greater debt to the science fiction genre than the modernists do. Sincerely Utopian writing, including much of Wells, has also deeply influenced science fiction, beginning with Hugo Gernsback's "Ralph 124C 41+".
Yevgeny Zamyatin's 1920 novel "We" depicts a totalitarian attempt to create a utopia that results in a dystopic state where free will is lost. Aldous Huxley bridged the gap between the literary establishment and the world of science fiction with "Brave New World" (1932), an ironic portrait of a stable and ostensibly happy society built by human mastery of genetic manipulation.
In the late 1930s, John W. Campbell became editor of Astounding Science Fiction, and a critical mass of new writers emerged in New York City in a group of science fiction fans (many of whom soon became professional writers) called the Futurians, which included Isaac Asimov, Damon Knight, Donald A. Wollheim, Frederik Pohl, James Blish, Judith Merril, and others. Other important writers during this period included Robert A. Heinlein, Arthur C. Clarke, and A. E. van Vogt. Campbell's tenure at Astounding is considered to be the beginning of the Golden Age of science fiction, characterized by hard science fiction stories celebrating scientific achievement and progress. This lasted until postwar technological advances, new magazines like Galaxy under H.L. Gold and later Pohl as editor, and a new generation of writers began writing stories outside the Campbell mode.
George Orwell wrote perhaps the most highly regarded of these literary dystopias, "Nineteen Eighty-Four", in 1948. He envisions a technologically governed totalitarian regime that dominates society through total information control. Zamyatin's "We" is recognized as an influence on both Huxley and Orwell; Orwell published a book review of "We" shortly after it was first published in English, several years before writing "1984".
Ray Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451", Ursula K. Le Guin's "The Dispossessed:An Ambiguous Utopia", much of Kurt Vonnegut's writing, and many other works of later science fiction continue this dialogue between utopia and dystopia.
Science fiction's impact on the public.
Orson Welles's "The Mercury Theatre on the Air" produced a radio version of "The War of the Worlds" which, according to urban myth, panicked large numbers of people who believed the program to be a real newscast. However, there is doubt as to how much anecdotes of mass panic had any reflection in reality, and the myth may have originated among newspapers, jealous of the upstart new medium of radio. Inarguably, though, the idea of visitors or invaders from outer space became embedded in the consciousness of everyday people.
During World War II, American military planners studied science fiction for ideas. The British did the same, and also asked authors to submit outlandish ideas which the government leaked to the Axis as real plans. Pilots speculated as to the origins of the "Foo fighters" they saw around them in the air. Meanwhile, the Germans had developed flying bombs known as V1s and V2s reminiscent of the "rocket ships" ever-present in pulp science fiction, presaging space flight. Jet planes and the atom bomb were developed. "Deadline", a Cleve Cartmill short story about a fictional atomic bomb project prompted the FBI to visit the offices of "Astounding Science Fiction".
Asimov said that "The dropping of the atom bomb in 1945 made science fiction respectable. Once the horror at Hiroshima took place, anyone could see that science fiction writers were not merely dreamers and crackpots after all, and that many of the motifs of that class of literature were now permanently part of the newspaper headlines". With the story of a flying saucer crash in Roswell, New Mexico in 1947, science fiction had become modern folklore.
The Golden Age.
The period of the 1940s and 1950s is often referred to as the Golden Age of Science Fiction.
"Astounding" Magazine.
With the emergence in 1937 of a demanding editor, John W. Campbell, Jr., at "Astounding Science Fiction", and with the publication of stories and novels by such writers as Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, and Robert A. Heinlein, science fiction began to gain status as serious fiction.
Campbell exercised an extraordinary influence over the work of his stable of writers, thus shaping the direction of science fiction. Asimov wrote, "We were extensions of himself; we were his literary clones." Under Campbell's direction, the years from 1938–1950 would become known as the "Golden Age of science fiction", though Asimov points out that the term Golden Age has been used more loosely to refer to other periods in science fiction's history.
Campbell's guidance to his writers included his famous dictum, "Write me a creature that thinks as well as a man, or better than a man, but not like a man." He emphasized a higher quality of writing than editors before him, giving special attention to developing the group of young writers who attached themselves to him.
Ventures into the genre by writers who were not devoted exclusively to science fiction also added respectability. Magazine covers of bug-eyed monsters and scantily clad women, however, preserved the image of a sensational genre appealing only to adolescents. There was a public desire for sensation, a desire of people to be taken out of their dull lives to the worlds of space travel and adventure.
An interesting footnote to Campbell's regime is his contribution to the rise of L. Ron Hubbard's religion Scientology. Hubbard was considered a promising science fiction writer and a protégé of Campbell, who published Hubbard's first articles about Dianetics and his new religion. As Campbell's reign as editor of "Astounding" progressed, Campbell gave more attention to ideas like Hubbard's, writing editorials in support of Dianetics. Though "Astounding" continued to have a loyal fanbase, readers started turning to other magazines to find science fiction stories.
The Golden Age in other media.
With the new source material provided by the Golden Age writers, advances in special effects, and a public desire for material that treated with the advances in technology of the time, all the elements were in place to create significant works of science fiction film.
As a result, science fiction film came into its own in the 1950s, producing films like "Destination Moon", "Them!", "Invasion of the Body Snatchers", "Forbidden Planet", and many others. Many of these movies were based on stories by Campbell's writers. "The Thing from Another World" was adapted from a Campbell story, "Them" and "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" were based on Jack Finney novels, "Destination Moon" on a Heinlein novel, and "The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms" was derived from a Ray Bradbury short story. John Wyndham's cosy catastrophes, including "The Day of the Triffids" and "The Kraken Wakes", provided important source material as well.
Science fiction had also been appearing in American comic books such as Planet Comics, but an important step forward came with the anthology series Weird Science (comic) and Weird Fantasy, published by E.C. Comics, which would include some adaptations from authors like Ray Bradbury, along with many original stories. Classics Illustrated had already published adaptations of Wells and Verne stories.
At the same time, science fiction began to appear on a new medium – television. In 1953 "The Quatermass Experiment" was shown on British television, the first significant science fiction show, though it could also be described as horror. In the United States, science fiction heroes like "Captain Video", "Flash Gordon" and "Buck Rogers" were shown, programs that more closely resembled pre-Campbellian science fiction. These shows also saw comic book spin-off products.
End of the Golden Age.
Seeking greater freedom of expression, writers started to publish their articles in other magazines, including "The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction", "If magazine", a resurrected "Amazing Stories", and most notably, "Galaxy".
Under editors H.L. Gold and then Frederik Pohl, "Galaxy" stressed a more literary form of science fiction that took cues from more mainstream literature. It was less insistent on scientific plausibility than Campbell's "Astounding". The rise of "Galaxy" signaled the end of Golden Age science fiction, though most of the Golden Age writers were able to adapt to the changes in the genre and keep writing. Some, however, moved to other fields. Isaac Asimov and several others began to write scientific fact almost exclusively.
The New Wave and its aftermath.
Mainstream publishers.
Until about 1950, magazines were the only way authors could publish new stories. Only small specialty presses like Arkham House and Gnome Press published science fiction hardcover books, all reprints of magazine stories. With rare exceptions like the collections "Adventures in Time and Space" and "A Treasury of Science Fiction", large mainstream publishers only printed Verne and Wells. Most genre books were sold by mail from small magazine advertisements, because bookstores rarely carried science fiction.
By 1951, the small presses proved that demand existed for science fiction books, enough to cause magazines to print regular review columns. Large, mainstream companies published hardboiled crime fiction during World War II; Doubleday in 1950, then Simon & Schuster, Scribner's, Putnam, and others now entered the science fiction market. They issued fixups such as "The Martian Chronicles", novel versions of serialized stories, and original fiction. Demand for content grew as the specialty presses had depleted the supply of easily reprinted, high-quality stories; new genre magazines appeared (38 different science fiction publications existed in the US and UK in 1953); and large-circulation magazines like "Playboy", "Collier's", and "Esquire" published stories. Genre stories like Walter M. Miller Jr.'s "A Canticle for Leibowitz" became mainstream bestsellers as books. For the first time, an author could write science fiction full-time; Barry N. Malzberg calculated that producing 1,000 words a day would earn twice the national median income, and Asimov stopped teaching at Boston University School of Medicine after making more money as a writer.
The mainstream book companies' large print runs and distribution networks lowered prices and increased availability, but displaced the small publishers; Algis Budrys later said that "they themselves would draw little but disaster" from the science fiction boom of the 1950s they helped to begin. While book sales continued to grow, the magazine industry almost collapsed from the glut of new titles, shrinking from 23 in mid-1957 to six by the end of 1960, while authors like Heinlein, Clarke, Vonnegut, and Bradbury published through non-genre publications that paid at much higher rates. Top writers like Budrys, Miller, Theodore Sturgeon, and Robert Silverberg left the industry.
Precursors to the New Wave.
Samuel Beckett's "The Unnamable" and "Waiting for Godot" were influential upon writing in the 1950s. In the former all sense of place and time are dispensed with; all that remains is a voice poised between the urge to continue existing and the urge to find silence and oblivion. (The only other major writer to use "The Unnamable" as a title was H. P. Lovecraft.) In the latter, time and the paradoxes of cause and effect become thematic. Beckett's influence on the intelligentsia—as well as the general influence of existentialism and the legal battles to publish books then classified as obscene—made science fiction more sophisticated, especially in Britain.
William S. Burroughs (1914–1997) was the writer who finally brought science fiction together with the trends of postmodern literature. With the help of Jack Kerouac, Burroughs published "Naked Lunch", the first of a series of novels employing a semi-dadaistic technique called the Cut-up and postmodern deconstructions of conventional society, pulling away the mask of normality to reveal nothingness beneath. Burroughs showed visions of society as a conspiracy of aliens, monsters, police states, drug dealers and alternate levels of reality. The linguistics of science fiction merged with the experiments of postmodernism in a beat generation gestalt.
The New Wave.
In 1960, British novelist Kingsley Amis published "New Maps of Hell", a literary history and examination of the field of science fiction. This serious attention from a mainstream, acceptable writer did a great deal of good, eventually, for the reputation of science fiction.
Another milestone was the publication, in 1965, of Frank Herbert's "Dune", a complex work of fiction featuring political intrigue in a future galaxy, mystical religious beliefs, and the ecosystem of the desert planet Arrakis. Another was the emergence of the work of Roger Zelazny, whose novels such as Lord of Light and his famous The Chronicles of Amber showed that the lines between science-fiction, fantasy, religion, and social commentary could be very fine.
Also in 1965 French director Jean-Luc Godard's film Alphaville used the medium of dystopian and apocalyptic science fiction to explore language and society.
In Britain, the 1960s generation of writers, dubbed "The New Wave", were experimenting with different forms of science fiction, stretching the genre towards surrealism, psychological drama and mainstream currents. The 60s New Wave was centred around the writing in the magazine "New Worlds" after Michael Moorcock assumed editorial control in 1963. William Burroughs was a big influence. The writers of the New Wave also believed themselves to be building on the legacy of the French New Wave artistic movement. Though the New Wave was largely a British movement, there were parallel developments taking place in American science fiction at the same time. The relation of the British New Wave to American science fiction was made clear by Harlan Ellison's original anthology "Dangerous Visions", which presented science fiction writers, both American and British, writing stories that pushed the boundaries of what was acceptable in a science fiction magazine. Isaac Asimov, writing an introduction to the anthology, labeled it the "Second Revolution", after the first revolution that produced the Golden Age.
The New Wave and their contemporaries placed a greater emphasis on style and a more highbrow form of storytelling. They also sought controversy in subjects older science fiction writers had avoided. For the first time sexuality, which Kingsley Amis had complained was nearly ignored in science fiction, was given serious consideration by writers like Samuel R. Delany, Ursula K. Le Guin, Norman Spinrad, and Theodore Sturgeon. Contemporary political issues were also given voice, as John Brunner and J.G. Ballard wrote cautionary tales about, respectively, overpopulation and apocalypse.
Asimov noted that the Second Revolution was far less clear cut than the first, attributing this to the development of the anthology, which made older stories more prominent. But a number of Golden Age writers changed their style as the New Wave hit. Robert A. Heinlein switched from his Campbellian Future History stories to stylistically adventuresome, sexually open works of fiction, notably "Stranger in a Strange Land" and "The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress". Isaac Asimov wrote the New Wave-ish "The Gods Themselves". Many others also continued successfully as styles changed.
Science fiction films took inspiration from the changes in the genre. Stanley Kubrick's "" and "A Clockwork Orange" gave visual form to the genre's new style. A myriad of other films, including THX 1138 and Soylent Green, depicted a dystopian future.
Ursula K. Le Guin extrapolated social and biological changes that were anthropological in nature. Philip K. Dick explored the metaphysics of the mind in a series of novels and stories that rarely seemed dependent on their science fictional content. Le Guin, Dick, and others like them became associated with the concept of soft science fiction more than with the New Wave.
Soft science fiction was contrasted to the notion of hard science fiction. Though scientific plausibility had been a central tenet of the genre since Gernsback, writers like Larry Niven and Poul Anderson gave hard science fiction new life, crafting stories with a more sophisticated writing style and more deeply characterized protagonists, while preserving a high level of scientific sophistication.
Science fiction in the 1980s.
Cyberpunk.
By the early 1980s the fantasy market was much larger than that of almost all science fiction authors. The New Wave had faded out as an important presence in the science fiction landscape. As new personal computing technologies became an integral part of society, science fiction writers felt the urge to make statements about its influence on the cultural and political landscape. Drawing on the work of the New Wave, the Cyberpunk movement developed in the early 80s. Though it placed the same influence on style that the New Wave did, it developed its own unique style, typically focusing on the 'punks' of their imagined future underworld. Cyberpunk authors like William Gibson turned away from the traditional optimism and support for progress of traditional science fiction.
William Gibson's "Neuromancer", published in 1984, announced the cyberpunk movement to the larger literary world and was a tremendous commercial success. Other key writers in the movement included Bruce Sterling, John Shirley, and later Neal Stephenson. Though Cyberpunk would later be cross-pollinated with other styles of science fiction, there seemed to be some notion of ideological purity in the beginning. John Shirley compared the Cyberpunk movement to a tribe.
During the 1980s, a large number of cyberpunk manga and anime works were produced in Japan, the most notable being the 1982 manga "Akira" and its 1988 anime film adaptation, the 1985 anime "Megazone 23", and the 1989 manga "Ghost in the Shell" which was also adapted into an anime film in 1995.
Contemporary science fiction and its future.
Contemporary science fiction has been marked by the spread of cyberpunk to other parts of the marketplace of ideas. No longer is cyberpunk a ghettoized tribe within science fiction, but an integral part of the field whose interactions with other parts have been the primary theme of science fiction around the start of the 21st century.
Notably, cyberpunk has influenced film, in works such as "Johnny Mnemonic" and "The Matrix" series, in anime such as "Akira" and "Ghost in the Shell", and the emerging medium of video games, with the critically acclaimed "Deus Ex" and "Metal Gear" series. This entrance of cyberpunk into mainstream culture has led to the introduction of cyberpunk's stylistic motifs to the masses, particularly the cyberpunk fashion style. It has also led to other developments including Steampunk (a subgenre of science fiction and fantasy that incorporates technology and aesthetic designs inspired by 19th-century industrial steam-powered machinery) and Dieselpunk (which combines the aesthetics of the diesel-based technology of the interwar period through to the 1950s with retro-futuristic technology and postmodern sensibilities).
Emerging themes in the 1990s included environmental issues, the implications of the global Internet and the expanding information universe, questions about biotechnology and nanotechnology, as well as a post-Cold War interest in post-scarcity societies; Neal Stephenson's "The Diamond Age" comprehensively explores these themes. Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan novels brought the character-driven story back into prominence.
The cyberpunk reliance on near-future science fiction has deepened. In William Gibson's 2003 novel, "Pattern Recognition", the story is a cyberpunk story told in the present, the ultimate limit of the near-future extrapolation.
Cyberpunk's ideas have spread in other directions, though. Space opera writers have written work featuring cyberpunk motifs, including David Brin's "Kiln People" and Ken MacLeod's Fall Revolution series. This merging of the two disparate threads of science fiction in the 1980s has produced an extrapolational literature in contrast to those technological stories told in the present.
John Clute writes that science fiction around the start of the 21st century can be understood in two ways: "a vision of the triumph of science fiction as a genre and as a series of outstanding texts which figured to our gaze the significant futures that, during those years, came to pass ... [or]... indecipherable from the world during those years ... fatally indistinguishable from the world it attempted to adumbrate, to signify." |
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Federation Trading Post was a Star Trek and science fiction specialty retail store with two locations, one in Berkeley, California (opened May 11, 1975) and a second in New York City (opened October 11, 1976). Both stores were founded and owned by self-described Trekkers Chuck Weiss and Sandy Sarris.
Described as the "first of its kind", and very likely the first independent retail store solely devoted to a television series, the Federation Trading Post was seen as contributing to the rise of Star Trek fan culture in the Bay Area and in New York City in the years between the cancellation of the original series in 1969, and the release of in 1979. During this time, the show had entered syndication and gained new fans, many of whom took to letter-writing campaigns to bring the show back on the air. Official merchandise for the growing fan base had been sparse, so many unlicensed fan creations were shared and/or sold at early science fiction conventions.
The “Red Hour” Festival.
Star Trek-specific fan club events had begun before the show's cancellation in 1969, although guests were not included in any organized convention setting until January, 1972. Star Trek Lives details the first series of Star Trek conventions, growing steadily in New York, as well as a nationwide campaign by fans to see a series revival.
Weiss, Sarris and other San Francisco fans of the series would meet to watch reruns and exchange trivia. Their organization efforts led to The "Red Hour" Festival (referencing the episode "The Return of the Archons"), the first Star Trek convention held in Northern California.
The twelve-hour event was held at Lincoln High School in San Francisco on February 22, 1975, and served as a fundraising effort for the local fan club, Star Trek Archives. Actors James Doohan, George Takei, Walter Koenig and Arlene Martel appeared, along with others. Reportedly, 1,000 fans were turned away for lack of space. The event garnered attention in the local press, including a mention by Herb Caen in his column in the San Francisco Chronicle, and its success helped convince Weiss and Sarris to open the Federation Trading Post.
Federation Trading Post (West).
The Federation Trading Post opened on May 11, 1975 at 2556 Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley, California, selling toys and memorabilia of the original Star Trek television series. 1,500 people lined up the small store on its opening day, with a line down Telegraph Avenue. Within days of the Berkeley store opening, local news reported that the Federation Trading Post was receiving hundreds of letters of mail a day, many inquiring about a potential catalog. Eight months later, People Magazine's first national edition (it had previously been a West Coast publication) included an article about The Federation Trading Post.
The store acted primarily as a meeting place for like-minded fans, without pressure to purchase. To add to the atmosphere, audio recordings of episode music and sound effects would play continuously on an 8-track loop. Weiss described the Federation Trading Post as a place where fans "can come and let their hair down and be among friends."
Mail Order Catalog.
Almost all of the items sold at the Federation Trading Post were featured in a mail order catalog that shipped to all fifty states, and seven foreign countries. The store and its catalog boasted over three hundred items, including tribbles, real looking phasers, Vulcan ear appliances made by professional make-up artist Doug Jones, posters, records, photos of the cast, model kits, key chains, buttons, bumper stickers, blueprints of the Starship Enterprise, games, t-shirts, iron-on patches, Starfleet uniforms for men and women, uniform insignia, and Spock-shaped candy. Most of the items were fan-produced, as licensed merchandise was sparsely available at the time. The store also stocked a variety of Fanzines, which were themselves instrumental in building fan-based communities, long before online social media.
Arcade Cabinet.
In 1977, computer engineer Dave Needle, Bob Ewell and software designer Stan Shepherd were interested in creating a Star Trek video game arcade cabinet, and approached Chuck Weiss at the Federation Trading Post about placing it in the store. This had not been the first attempt or offer, but after four months the team had finished the game, using two Intel 8080 8-bit microprocessors.
When the game was over , from the episode of the same name, would appear and eat the ship of the losing player.
Federation Trading Post (East).
In October 1976, The Federation Trading Post East opened in Manhattan at 210 East 53rd Street. The store duplicated the one in Berkeley, with the addition of a Star Trek Museum, featuring realistic looking fan-produced reproductions of Star Trek models and props.
Isaac Asimov and his wife, Janet Jeppson (famously a Star Trek fan), attended the opening night party.
Ron Barlow and Doug Drexler (who would later move to Hollywood and win two Emmys and an Academy Award for his work on Dick Tracy), managed the New York location. Just as in Berkeley, the New York City store was an instant hit its first year, with a line of people often waiting to get in. The local fans were so enthused that they raised funds to air a 30-second TV commercial for the store during syndicated Star Trek reruns.
The success of the Federation Trading Post inspired imitators on both coasts, including the Intergalactic Trading Company in New York City, and the Interstellar Trading Post in San Diego, California.
Star Trek Museum.
The New York location designated a room as the "World's First Star Trek Museum", customized with Matt Jeffries-inspired doorway arches and painted backdrops with lights and electronics to resemble the Starship Enterprise. Displayed in the museum were authentic props and uniforms from the collection of Alan Asherman, author of the "" The museum also hosted a six-foot model of a Klingon Battlecruiser crafted by two fans, along with other replicas of ships and weapons.
Sued by Paramount Studios.
After the Federation Trading Post opened in New York City, the store was sued by Gulf and Western, parent company of Paramount Studios at the time, alleging infringement of their common law trademark, “Star Trek.” The owners were able to acquire representation by the prestigious San Francisco law firm of Philips, Moore, Weissenberger, Lempio & Majestic. Eventually the suit was settled out of court without admission of wrongdoing by the defendants, and the store was given a sales and manufacturing license, which allowed it to continue conducting business as before.
The Effect of Star Wars.
The unprecedented success of "Star Wars" in 1977 suddenly brought science fiction into the mainstream. Whereas before, toys and memorabilia from science fiction movies and TV shows were hard to find, after "the release of Star Wars" the Federation Trading Post was soon competing with the larger, nationwide retail outlets. To keep up, the store’s inventory expanded to include not only Star Wars merchandise, but also futuristic items such as 3D holographic pendants. An enlarged “21st Century” edition of the mail order catalog was created to include the store’s new offerings.
Guest Appearances.
Most of the original cast signed autographs at the Federation Trading Post. William Shatner (Capt. James Kirk) promoted his new album “William Shatner Live” at the Berkeley store, signing his name to every copy sold that day. James Doohan (Chief Engineer, Montgomery Scott), George Takei (Helmsman, Hikaru Sulu), Nichelle Nichols (Communications Officer, Nota Uhura), Grace Lee Whitney (Yeoman, Janice Randy), Bruce Hyde (Transporter Technician, Kevin Riley), and guest star Arlene Martel (Spock's fiancée, T’Pring), along with Franz Joseph Schnaubelt (creator of the Enterprise Blueprints and author of the "Starfleet Technical Manual") also made appearances in Berkeley. David Prowse (Darth Vader of Star Wars) later appeared at the Berkeley location].
At the New York store, Nichelle Nichols (Communications Officer, Nyota Uhura) signed autographs]. Leonard Nimoy appeared in costume while touring with the Royal Shakespeare Company in the title role of "Sherlock Homes". Other notable visitors included comics legend Stan Lee, and , author of "The Making of Star Trek", and Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry himself.
Federation Trading Post was mentioned in Robert Anton Wilson's "," and "Neuropolitics" by Timothy Leary, Robert Anton Wilson, George A. Koopman.
In 1976 the store advertised in some of the earliest Starlog magazine issues, and contributed a newsletter to TV Sci-Fi Monthly.
The Berkeley location, as well as The "Red Hour" Festival before it, were vocally supported in their early days by Bob Wilkins, host of "Creature Features" on KTVU in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Reunion.
In May 2018, the owners and two of the original staff, David Bellard (stock boy) and Rita Fattaruso (cashier), held a reunion event in the original retail space, after hearing that the building would soon be torn down. The event featured photos of the original store, screening of episodes, costume contest, refreshments, and a sales room for collectables. |
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World SF is a loose term for international, or global, speculative fiction, predominantly from the non-Anglophone world. An early use of the term came with the establishment of "World SF", an association of SF professionals in 1976. According to the third edition of the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, the term was partly revived by the author Lavie Tidhar, leading to the establishment of the "World SF Blog", which ran 2009-2013. Early on, the Filipino blogger Charles A. Tan became involved with the blog, contributing much of the original material - including interviews with authors, reviews and the occasional editorial, including the important "World SF: Our Possible Future" in 2012. Tan was himself twice nominated for the World Fantasy Award, for his own blog, "Bibliophile Stalker", and has edited several anthologies of Filipino speculative fiction.
For his work on the promotion of global speculative fiction, Tidhar was nominated for a World Fantasy Award in 2011, and won a 2012 BSFA Award for Non-Fiction in 2012. The Polish SF scholar Konrad Walewski argued that "Tidhar deliberately utilized the term World SF as a specific act of disagreement and dissatisfaction with what he considered to be the gradual ossification of the original organization".
In parallel, Tidhar edited three anthologies of World SF, "The Apex Book of World SF" series, between 2009-2014. Significant authors featured in the series included Lauren Beukes (South Africa), Zoran Živković (Serbia), Aliette de Bodard (France), Hannu Rajaniemi (Finland), Xia Jia (China), Karin Tidbeck (Sweden), Guy Hasson (Israel), Tunku Halim (Malaysia), Samit Basu (India), Ekaterina Sedia (Russia) and many others. The series was continued in 2015 with a fourth volume edited by Mahvesh Murad, with Tidhar remaining as series editor.
World SF should not be confused with WorldCon which, despite its name, is a predominantly (though not exclusively) American institution. |
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All Our Yesterdays by Harry Warner, Jr., is a history of science fiction fandom of the 1940s, an essential reference work in the field.
It was originally published by Advent in 1969; the members of the World Science Fiction Society voted its author the Hugo Award for Best Fan Writer that year. NESFA Press produced a new edition () with additional photographs, in 2004, after Warner's death.
Warner also wrote a related series of historical columns called "All Our Yesterdays." He later published a sequel, "A Wealth of Fable," covering the 1950s, originally produced in a three-volume mimeographed edition, the first volume issued in 1976, and later expanded into hardcover form () by SCIFI Press in 1992.
Reception.
Algis Budrys praised Warner's work as "that calm, reasoned, and, I suppose, sometimes slightly prejudiced 'fan history' that the microcosm needs as a counterweight" to Sam Moskowitz's earlier "The Immortal Storm".
Science fiction fan and author Mike Resnick called the book "a fabulous, informal history, covering all the high points, reporting on (for example) the initial meeting after the war between DAW (Wollheim) and SaM (the man who barred him from the first Worldcon), filled with well over 100 photos, even indexed. It's a true treasure of fannish history and anecdotes." |
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} | m2d2_wiki | To Write Like a Woman
To Write Like a Woman: Essays in Feminism and Science Fiction is a collection of essays by Joanna Russ, published in 1995. Many of the essays previously appeared as letters, in anthologies, or in journals like "Science Fiction Studies", "Extrapolation", and Chrysalis. Topics range from the work of specific authors to major trends in feminism and science fiction. Through all of these different topics, Russ underlines the importance of celebrating the work of female authors and turning a critical eye on the commentaries and work produced by men.
The collection is split up into two sections. Part One focuses on the critique of masculinist writing and male authorship, while Part Two focuses on the work of female authors and their relationship to writing.
Reception.
This collection of essays has been praised for its accessibility, even to readers unfamiliar with complex feminist or science fiction critique theory. Criticism has mostly been centered on the contradictions in subject matter for the essays, since the source material ranges from Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley to "Star Trek". In addition, critics have claimed that Russ' cautions against psychoanalytic readings of an author's work are naïve and overly simplistic. |
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Reading Science Fiction is a collection of 22 short essays edited by James Gunn, Marleen S. Barr & Matthew Candelaria. The collection explores a wide range of theoretical approaches to studying science fiction, such as gender studies, post colonialism and structuralism. The authors reference the various mediums through which science fiction has appeared including literature, film, television, as well as video games to define science fiction as a genre, trace its origins, as well as its parallels with contemporary society.
Reception.
Several of the collection's essays were praised, however, the collection as a whole received criticism for not being entirely accessible to students new to science fiction. |
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The Geek Feminist Revolution is a collection of essays by the American science fiction writer Kameron Hurley, published by Tor Books on 31 May 2016.
Contents.
The book collects several of Hurley's previously published blog posts, including "We Have Always Fought", which won the 2014 Hugo Award for Best Related Work. It also contains nine new essays written for the collection.
The scope of the writing ranges from "autobiographical reflection to literary criticism to world history and to commentary on the state of the geek world". It particularly examines the circumstances under which women participate in genre fiction in the face of a "cacophony of digital misogyny", as for example made public in the Gamergate controversy, and the cultural reasons for this misogyny.
Reception.
Andrew Liptak of "io9" described the "rightfully angry" collection as a "powerful and thoughtful examination of the professional world that helps construct the worlds we take part in". He noted that while Hurley's argument that patriarchal conditions in society allow for the behavior she examines was not new, but that it remained necessary because of the slow rate of change. In "The Guardian", Damien Walter summarized the book as a "loving call to arms for geek culture's deconstruction and rebuilding in a new image", written in a combative style reflecting its outsider perspective and its origins in the often hostile atmosphere of Internet fora.
In a starred review, "Publishers Weekly" highlighted the collection's "exquisitely crafted yet deceptively casual, profanity-laced style", noting that, while Hurley was not the first to point out the "deep misogyny in 21st-century popular culture", she did so in a convincing and inspiring manner. "Kirkus Reviews" also emphasized the passion and commitment of Hurley's writing, but noted repetition in the book's contents and commented that readers occasionally felt like getting only half the experience from blog posts disconnected from their online context. |
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Jar Jar Binks Must Die (subtitled ...and Other Observations about Science Fiction Movies) is a 2011 collection of 42 essays by film critic Daniel M. Kimmel, published in a trade paperback edition by Fantastic Books in March 2011, with a second printing following five months later.
Binks in the title is an aside to the Star Wars CGI character who was poorly received, the title gives voice to the extent of the lack of warmth his negative critics had over the controversy raised by Binks' characterization and what it was felt to engender.
The collection was a finalist for the Hugo Award for Best Related Work in 2012. Although it tied for first in nominations for eligible works, it placed fifth in the final voting. The essays originally appeared in such publications as "Artemis Magazine", "The Internet Review of Science Fiction", "Clarkesworld" and "Space & Time".
Reception.
Elizabeth Hand wrote in "F&SF" that "Kimmel's a terrific guide to classic though underappreciated works such as Things to Come, and is especially sharp on 1950s sf movies, David Cronenberg, and the art (or lack of same) of movie remakes. ... [H]is brief essays are addictively readable and yes, a lot more fun than watching ""."
"Analog" reviewer Don Sakers also praised the collection, saying, "Whether [Kimmel]'s explaining why "Metropolis" is such an important film, or joining in with the obligatory George Lucas bashing, his writing is intelligent and entertaining. You may disagree with him (in fact, you almost certainly will on something), but you can't say he doesn't give reasoned arguments in support of his positions. And his knowledge of SF movies is encyclopedic as hell." |
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} | m2d2_wiki | List of concepts in Artemis Fowl
This is a list of fictional concepts in "Artemis Fowl", a novel series by Eoin Colfer.
Fairy concepts.
Bio-bomb.
A high-tech, fairy-manufactured guided missile, also known as a "bio-bomb" or a "blue-rinse" because of its blue colour. Once detonated, it employs the radioactive energy source Solinium 2 (an element not yet discovered by humans), destroying all living tissue in the area while leaving landscape and buildings untouched. It was used on Fowl Manor in "Artemis Fowl", and, later, in "Artemis Fowl and the Opal Deception", Opal Koboi manufactures a larger missile-guided bio-bomb and a compact bio-bomb with a plasma screen that can only be blocked by the rigid polymer used in the manufacturing of LEP helmets.
Book of the People.
The Book of the People is the Fairy bible, known by the fairies themselves simply as the Book. It is written in Gnommish, the fairy language. As it contains the history of the People and their life teachings, Artemis Fowl manages to secure a copy from an alcoholic fairy in Ho Chi Minh City and use it to kidnap Holly Short, and to decode Gnommish. The first few lines are included in the first book.
Some of the first lines are:
It also states the proper Ritual in which one buries an acorn to regain his or her powers. Apart from Artemis and his bodyguard, no humans are said to have seen the Book. If a human touches the Book without the fairy's permission it will combust.
Originally, the book was printed in spirals, which is how ancient fairy texts were read. However, reading in circles gave fairies migraines, so normally printed version have been made (ordinary Gnommish), this is in the typical western version of reading, left-to-right, top-to-bottom.
Buzz baton.
A fairy weapon, primarily used by the LEP to incapacitate any foes they may face. They are designed as bludgeoning weapons, and once powered, they will send a 1000 volt shock (10,000 volts in Artemis Fowl and the Atlantis Complex when used by Turnball) into the target- presumably enough to incapacitate a fairy, but insufficient when used against a human. An LEPretrieval squad attempted to use them against Butler in the Fowl Manor siege, but to no avail.
Centaurian.
A script only known by centaurs. The cipher is slightly easier to translate than Gnommish because many of the symbols look similar to their English counterparts. It can be read fluently once familiar, and is more like a recognisable font than a language.
Camfoil.
A thin sheet of foil that is wrapped around the body to imitate invisibility and to blend in with the surrounding environment. The foil is dotted with a series of micro-cameras, which enable the sheet to make an image of the wearer's background. Unfortunately, the entire surface uses circuits, which means that the invisibility can fail in rain or if the sheet is flattened by an object.
In "Artemis Fowl and the Lost Colony", however, Eoin Colfer states that the cam-foils are made of fairy-made diamonds that reflect light regardless of the direction and angle of viewing. Crushing the beads causes the sheet to fail.
DNA cannons.
A specialized cannon designed to incapacitate any creature whose DNA is coded into the cannon with a laser. Most notably, the Koboi Laboratories is protected with DNA stun cannons.
Iris-cam.
A tiny LEP-issue camera within a contact lens; once attached to the user's eye, it is virtually invisible. However, to lower visibility, fairies tend to use one that matches their eye color. In "The Eternity Code", Artemis uses a hazel-colored lens, causing Jon Spiro to realize that something is "wrong with [his] eyes". It is used as a remote camera, which also has several filters, including thermal and x-ray. Whenever one changes filters, a small shock passes through the iris-cam, which may cause discomfort. The invention of the iris cam won Foaly a school science project, Opal Koboi being runner up with her wing designs.
LEP Helmet.
Part of the official LEP uniform, the LEP Helmet was developed by Foaly. The helmet includes a motion-sensor filter which flags moving objects "with an orange corona". The casing of the LEP helmet is made of impregnable polymer. An LEP helmet contains a visor, a camera, two 400-watt lamps, and a pollution mask, as well as a microphone, and loudspeaker. All LEP helmets have a self-destruct system which can be activated remotely. When activated, the self-destruct system releases acid, which dissolves the helmet and anyone who was wearing it. Section Eight helmets, which are more sophisticated than normal LEP helmets, have more advanced functions, such as a visor with digital display, plus all of a normal LEP helmet's capabilities. Section Eight helmets can also be controlled from Haven and be moved around independently using microbead bags and the officers Section 8 helmet also have flying thrusters as demonstrated by Foaly in the fifth book.
Magnastrips.
Magnastrips power the automobiles in Haven City. LEP automobiles have the ability to push other vehicles out of the way in case of emergency During the lockdown in "Artemis Fowl and the Eternity Code", all non-emergency vehicles lost power.
Medi-Pac.
Invented by Foaly, the medi-pac is an ice pack infused with magic healing crystals. Activated by crumpling the crystals together, it is applied to the wounded area. It is not as effective as magic, but it can be useful in a tight spot.
Mesmer.
A magical power, similar to hypnosis, that most of the fairy families are able to use, since only a small amount of magic is needed to "mesmerize" someone. It is even said that some humans have the power to do it. Someone who is under the "mesmer" has no control over their actions, and becomes entranced with the voice of the one mesmerizing. It requires direct eye contact, as well as a voice laced with suggestion; thus, the "mesmer" is useless against mirrored surfaces such as mirrored sunglasses or mirrored contact lenses, it is shown that a person of high intelligence can resist the mesmer, such as at the beginning of "Artemis Fowl, the Arctic Incident" when Holly was using the mesmer against Butler to command him to put down his weapon. Butler had been able to resist the mesmer although he gave in in the end. It is also notable that the Book forbids fairies from "mesmerizing" other fairies. It is also said that if someone resists the mesmer too much, his or her brain cells might be fried. If a someone is constantly mesmerized their pupils become increasingly ragged until they eventually go blind. In Book 6, "The Time Paradox", Butler had a heart attack when he tried to resist Opal Koboi's mesmer. It is also stated in Book 7, "Artemis Fowl and the Atlantis Complex", that when a person was mesmerized, "A large part of their brains were switched off and the parts left awake were not going to be winning any Nobel prizes".
Mind-wipe.
The mind-wipe is a technology designed to erase parts of sentient memory, usually human. Any sighting of the People by a human being is erased from the memory of any humans involved. The mind-wipe has two forms; the block wipe, which obliterates the memory of a set period of time from the targeted mind, and the fine-tuned wipe, designed to remove only specific memories from the targeted mind. It was also mentioned that a block mind-wipe can cause a drop in IQ. A part of the process not fully understood by the People is that human minds usually invent new memories to fill in the gaps. However, if a human (or fairy for that matter) sees something related to what was mind wiped from them, the brain recalls the lost information. Example: You have been mind wiped to forget that a fairy shot you with a Neutrino 3000. If you later see a Neutrino 3000, "residual memories" may be sparked, and you will start to remember what happened.
Artemis Fowl II, Domovoi Butler and Juliet all submitted to a fine-tune mind-wipe at the end of "The Eternity Code", but Artemis and Butler managed to initiate a total recall through a disk containing specific knowledge to trigger recall. Artemis' was an in-depth description of his escapades, as was Butler's, but Butler was able to recall all the memories totally after hearing merely his first name, Domovoi. There was nothing on the disk for Juliet, although Juliet herself achieves total recall in "The Atlantis Complex", by listening to Turnball mesmerizing people.
Mood blanket.
The mood blanket is a multi-sensor massage and homeopathic garment meant for centaurs, created by Foaly.
Mud People.
The terms 'Mud People', 'Mud Men', 'Mud Woman', 'Mud Maid', 'Mud Boy', 'Mud Girl', 'Mud Kid,' and 'Mud Whelp' are generalizations used by fairies to address humans. This term comes from the age of the Battle of Taillte, when the People were battling the "Mud People" to stay above ground, they gave up due to overwhelming numbers. Apparently, the human race once lived in mud, hence the term “Mud People”. This term also conveys fairies' dislike and even contempt towards the human race because of their pollution and the fact that humans forced fairies underground (partly because fairies can only have a child every twenty years).
Neutrino 500.
This is the most basic model of the Neutrino in the Artemis Fowl books. It is used in the short story "LEPrecon". It is only mentioned in this story and is currently outdated.
Neutrino 2000.
The latest, lightweight model of fairy handguns, with three settings: "Scorched, well done, and crisped to a cinder." The Neutrinos are nuclear powered, so they have almost unlimited ammunition. Neutrinos can only knock out people, they can't kill. The gun shoots an orange beam of heat at the target.
Neutrino 3000.
The new version of the Neutrino 2000 that Foaly designed after the B'wa Kell rebellion. The guns are registered to only respond to one person, and every shot loosed by the Neutrino 3000 is recorded on a computer log. There are no metal parts, and, as Foaly describes, it is "powered by kinetics, the motion of your body, with a backup mini-nuke cell... The casing is virtually impregnable".
Omnitool.
A device that is capable of picking most human locks. Seen in "Artemis Fowl and the Eternity Code" and "Artemis Fowl and the Time Paradox".
Holly's mother had one, which she passed down to Holly upon the former’s death. However, Mulch Diggums stole it during the Hamburg Incident as mentioned in "The Time Paradox' and "Artemis Fowl" (first book)
Pressure Elevators.
Powered by "gaseous columns vented from the earth's core", fairies can ride in titanium eggs or more leisurely shuttles to the surface to perform the Ritual or for other business. The elevators are natural vents which allow magma streams to shoot toward the surface; these irregular pressure releases are watched by the LEP technicians, and "flare-prediction teams" are accurate to about a tenth of a second with a 99.8% accuracy rating.
Retimager.
A piece of fairy technology developed by Foaly that infallibly tells whether or not a person has seen a specific image before. Based on the premise that every image that a person sees leaves an infinitesimal etching on the retina that never disappears and therefore cannot be fooled by a mind-wipe, two suction cups resembling plungers are used to read the etchings on the subject's retinas. The seals on the suction cups are implanted with micro needles, which inject sedative through the subject's pores.
The Ritual.
The Ritual is explained in the Book (the "Fairy Bible"). It consists of picking an acorn from an ancient oak tree at a bend in a river during a full moon and planting it far from the ancient oak. When a fairy does this, his or her magic is replenished. In "Artemis Fowl and the Time Paradox", it is shown that magic may be replenished with the help of a warlock, demonstrated by No1. In "Artemis Fowl", Artemis and Butler captured Holly Short while she was attempting to complete the Ritual.
An extract from the Fairy Bible describing the Ritual reads,
"From the earth thine power flows,
Given through courtesy, so thanks are owed.
Pluck thou the magick seed,
Where full moon, ancient oak and twisted water meet.
And bury it far from where it was found,
So return your gift into the ground."
Sentinel.
A computer system invented by Foaly that monitors all human telecommunications and reviews phone calls with fairy-related "buzzwords". Because of the sheer amount of fairy-related culture, this method was somewhat unreliable for detecting breaches of security.
Shielding.
A shield is a form of magic which allows the user to stay invisible to most observers. Fairies shield by increasing their heart rate, causing their bodies to vibrate so quickly that they are never in one place long enough to be seen by the naked eye. Usually, when using the shield, the fairy encounters resistance from non-vibrating clothing, equipment, etc., which causes a slight shimmer in the air. A shielded fairy would cause any object they were sitting upon to shatter under the high vibrations. Fairies have difficulty shielding in areas with high levels of radiation, like northern Russia.
A shielded fairy can also be seen by if an anti-shield filter or by a high-speed camera, but requires viewers to look at the video frame by frame. In "The Atlantis Complex", Butler and Juliet see a shielded fairy using a type of sunglasses that Artemis had created which enable the wearer to see through fairy shields. However, rats and two species of monkey can naturally see through the shield.
Softnose laser.
The softnose laser is an illegal type of laser weapon with a lifetime of less than ten years. They were originally powered with solar cells, but were adapted to be powered by simple AA alkaline batteries in "The Arctic Incident". The softnose fires a laser at a slower speed, penetrating the target (instead of incapacitating), causing greater damage than a normal laser. The B'wa Kell goblin triad was armed with these weapons by Opal Koboi in the failed storming of Police Plaza.
Solinium 2.
A radioactive element, still not in the human periodic table. It has a half-life of 14 seconds and is the main energy source of a bio-bomb.
Solinium.
The "bio bomb" used by the LEP utilizes Solinium in order to kill only living tissue. It is standard procedure to spray any LEP property with solinium-based tracker, as shown in "The Arctic Incident". Foaly was able to find Mulch Diggums by tracking the gold he stole from the "Fowl Manor Siege". Artemis Fowl also used a Solinium-based device, concealed in a button on his bodyguard Butler's jacket, to prevent electronic devices spying on him in Spain, as seen in "The Lost Colony" – it is noted by Butler that they "may have ruined a few honeymoon videos", showing the Solinium wipes digital visual recordings as well as preventing them.
Time-stop.
A tool used by the Fairies in the "Artemis Fowl" series. It stops time in a selected area using magic. Historically, time-stop fields were created by five warlocks who created a pentagram around the intended area. However, the process was mechanized by Foaly; the warlocks send their magic into lithium batteries, in which it can be stored until needed. Time-stops cut off an area entirely from the outside world; communications to the "outside world" are rendered useless, as nothing is able to penetrate the field. Once in a time-stop, it is impossible to change one's state of consciousness. If, upon entering the field, one is conscious, then it will be impossible to fall asleep, and vice versa. However, if one's state of consciousness is artificially changed (using sleeping pills, for example), the person in question will have dropped out of the time-stopped area into the outside world. The person will later wake up after the time-stop has disappeared, while to anyone still in the time-stop, the person will have disappeared.
Warlock.
A fairy with strong magic skills who is highly trained in the magical arts. In the past warlocks have been used to stop time and wipe minds. In modern times, since Foaly "had them do their thing into lithium batteries," Warlocks are still trained in the magical arts, but their training leans more towards the medical sides, such as emergency medicine. Most warlocks have a strong pacifist creed.
Demon Warlock<br>
Demon Warlocks are the most powerful warlocks by far, and risked being shunned by other demons owing to the fact normal demons are bloodthirsty and non-magical. Their powers extend to time-travel and firing bolts of magic. In the 21st century, only three Demon Warlocks are still alive: Qwan was the only survivor of the petrification following Leon Abbot's interference in the time-spell; his apprentice Qweffor was melded with Abbot and eventually suppressed in the Leader's mind, and No 1 was the first Warlock born since the time-spell. Following the return of the Demon island Hybras to Earth, No 1 releases Qweffor from Abbot's control, and begins training under Qwan.
Other concepts.
C Cube.
A device made by Artemis Fowl II from stolen fairy technology in "Artemis Fowl and the Eternity Code". It can read any medium, electronic or organic, because it contains an "omnisensor", a piece of fairy technology that can sense anything. It was stolen by Jon Spiro, and had to be retrieved because it has the potential to compromise the People's security. It is encoded with an Eternity Code (see below).
Eternity Code.
Created by Artemis Fowl II, it is a code like any other code, except that it uses a completely new language as a base language, making it next to impossible to translate. As noted by one of Jon Spiro's staff members, Dr. Pearson, and Artemis Fowl II himself, theoretically it would take an eternity to get through the code. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Fictional world of The Hunger Games
"The Hunger Games" universe is the fictional world which serves as the setting for "The Hunger Games", a trilogy of young-adult dystopian novels written by American author Suzanne Collins, and the movie series that has been adapted from the novels. The series takes place in the fictional nation of Panem, which was created at an unspecified time in the future after a series of ecological disasters and a devastating war. Panem's government is based in the Capitol, which rules over its thirteen districts.
Panem.
The word is the accusative singular form of Latin word for 'bread' and was derived from the Latin saying , meaning 'bread and circuses'. The phrase is attributed to the Roman poet Juvenal, and refers to the use of entertainment and plentiful food to make citizens give up their freedoms and political power. Panem consists of a capital city, called 'the Capitol', located in the Rocky Mountains. The Capitol is surrounded by twelve outlying numbered Districts. There is also a thirteenth District that was allegedly destroyed before the series's beginning. The country of Panem is smaller geographically than North America today, and characters in the Hunger Games story state that large areas of land across the world were lost due to rising sea levels.
Panem is a totalitarian society and a police state modeled somewhat on ancient Rome. Districts 1-12 are subservient to the Capitol. The Districts provide resources to the Capitol in exchange for protection by and from the Capitol's army of "Peacekeepers". The Peacekeepers brutally control all riots and protect the dictatorial President Coriolanus Snow. They also attend the "reapings", where participants are selected for the Hunger Games. At the start of the series, Panem has been ruled for more than 25 years by President Snow.
Seventy-four years before the series's beginning, a civil war was waged against the Capitol. The uprising was led by District 13, which was a center of military–industrial production. The Capitol put down the rebellion and supposedly destroyed District 13 and its residents. To further punish the rebellious districts and discourage future rebellion, the government instituted an annual violent pageant known as the Hunger Games, for which each district is compelled to provide two 'tributes': one male and one female, aged between 12 and 18, who are chosen by lottery. The tributes are sent to an arena and forced to fight to the death until a single victor remains.
In the final novel of the series, "Mockingjay", it is revealed that District 13's population had not been wiped out, but had instead gone underground. There, District 13's president, Alma Coin heads a faction of rebels planning a further assault against the Capitol.
The Capitol.
The Capitol is populated by citizens who have surrendered their civic responsibility and capacity for self-governance in return for "bread and circuses". Removed from the deprivation and oppression of the districts, the pampered and hedonistic civilians are generally preoccupied with flamboyant and extravagant fashion, parties, sex, and mass entertainment. The Capitol is a lot wealthier than the districts, and it derives most of the benefits of advanced technologies such as computers, hover planes and high-speed trains. Visiting tributes, who have grown up with the constant threat of starvation and poverty, are shocked by the wasteful decadence in the Capitol. For example, at parties, it is common to serve many more dishes than one person could normally consume and to provide emetic beverages so that guests can continue eating.
Citizens of the Capitol are described as culturally distinct from those of the districts. They speak with characteristic accents and choose first names of ancient Greco-Roman derivation. The Capitol's architecture is a modernized version of ancient Roman architecture: in the Hunger Games novels, The Capitol's buildings are described as "candy-colored." The fashions of the Capitol are depicted as exotic and ostentatious, and its citizens dye their skin and hair with vivid colors, have many tattoos, and undergo extensive surgical alteration. The Capitol accent is said to sound "silly" and effete to people from the districts; it is described as "high-pitched with clipped tones and odd vowels". The letter "s" is a hiss and the tone rises at the end of every sentence, as if the speaker is asking a question.
Residents of the Capitol cannot be chosen as tributes for the Hunger Games because the Games were instituted as a punishment for the twelve remaining districts of Panem for their failed rebellion. The Games are an annual cause for celebration in the Capitol; citizens gamble on the tributes and sponsor their favorites in the arena, providing water, food, weapons and other necessary provisions. Past victors often become celebrities in the Capitol and in their districts. Despite the bloodthirsty nature of the Games, the people of the Capitol are vulnerable to sentimentality and melodrama and becoming emotionally invested in the tributes. This tendency is exploited and manipulated by Katniss and Peeta, important characters in Hunger Games.
Avox.
An Avox is a person who has been punished for being a rebel against the Capitol, a traitor or a deserter. Most Avoxes were likely hunted and caught by the Peacekeepers of their respective districts. Avoxes have their tongues removed, rendering them mute. They are often used as domestic servants and waiters upon tributes and Capitol citizens. It is also suggested that Avoxes are charged with the day-to-day maintenance of the Capitol and work shifts in the Transfer network under the city. They are generally not spoken to unless being given orders and spend their lives serving the Capitol.
Peacekeepers.
Peacekeepers are the military, internal security and law enforcement organization in Panem. They wear black-trimmed white uniforms consisting of a "police helmet" (which resembles a police motorcycle helmet in the first film and full-face motorcycle helmets in later films), a standing collar, a waist-length tunic, and trousers tucked into high black boots. In the Capitol, they wear similar but more formal and ceremonial attire. This uniform is of the same basic design, with a black sash and beret with the gold Capitol seal. In "The Hunger Games: Catching Fire", their appearance is different from the first film; they wear a full helmet, darker visor, and heavier-looking armor, and carry automatic rifles. Peacekeepers are most often born in District 2 or the Capitol itself, and they must serve for 20 years before getting married or having children. Due to Capitol citizens' extravagant lifestyle, they typically join only to avoid punishment for a crime.
Peacekeepers maintain order and suppress dissidence through coercion and brutality. The force in each region is led by an appointed Head Peacekeeper of the district. The Peacekeepers ensure that the laws of the Capitol are obeyed and publicly punish those who break them. Flogging is the most frequent punishment, but the pillory and hanging are imposed for more serious crimes. Peacekeepers are usually equipped with sub-machine guns to discourage disobedience in the districts. Since the Capitol considers District 12 a minimal threat, the Peacekeepers stationed there are less brutal and easily bribed with sex and black market goods such as poached animals. But in "Catching Fire", after Katniss Everdeen's and Peeta Mellark's defiance of the Capitol in the 74th Hunger Games, the Head Peacekeeper is replaced by a more brutal peacekeeper, Romulus Thread. In "Catching Fire", Thread destroys the Hob, where black market trades take place. Thread also whipped Gale Hawthorne in the District 12 square as a punishment.
Throughout the book series, Peacekeepers use the train and hovercraft for transportation. The films show the Peacekeepers using armored trucks, submachine guns, pistols, and armed hovercraft. In "Mockingjay Part II", during the battle for the Capitol, they use machine guns and rocket launchers, weapons previously unseen in the films. They also have access to an air defense network (seen in both "Mockingjay Part I" and "II") and use a fortified bunker in District 2 (nicknamed "The Nut" by the rebels) as a command and control center.
Throughout the series, the government of Panem uses genetic engineering to create animals that are used in Hunger Games or that serve Panem's political purposes. All of those listed below, excluding grooslings, are examples of these so-called "".
Jabberjay.
Jabberjays are small, crested black birds created by the Capitol during the Dark Days. They were originally used to spy on rebels, because they possess the capability to remember and precisely mimic human speech. The rebels eventually realized this and gave the birds disinformation. When the Capitol discovered this, the birds were abandoned in the wilderness, expected to die because they were exclusively male. However, they bred with female mockingbirds and created a new hybrid species, called a mockingjay.
During the third Quarter Quell in "Catching Fire", the Capitol uses jabberjays in the arena to demoralize the tributes by repeating faked screams of their loved ones. Finnick hears his lover Annie, Katniss hears her sister Prim, and her mother, and Gale and Gale's family. Katniss attempts to shoot the screaming birds but eventually gives up.
Mockingjay.
Mockingjays are black and white birds that resulted from the mating of engineered jabberjays with female mockingbirds. After the emergence of mockingjays, their jabberjay progenitors became, as Katniss states in "Catching Fire", "as rare and tough as rocks". The Mockingjay does not have the ability to enunciate words, but it can perfectly copy a melody in a whistling tone. District 11 has an especially large mockingjay population, and they are used there to signal the end of the workday.
The mockingjay is a source of embarrassment to the Capitol because of its accidental creation. Because of this, it becomes a symbol of anti-Capitol resistance and the rebellion. At the beginning of "The Hunger Games", Katniss wears a mockingjay pin given to her by Madge Undersee. In "Catching Fire", Plutarch Heavensbee shows Katniss that his pocket watch displays a holographic mockingjay. In "Mockingjay", Katniss is given the identity of "the Mockingjay" as an inspirational figure for the rebels, wearing a mockingjay-inspired costume.
Tracker jackers.
Tracker jackers are wasps engineered to be extremely aggressive, tracking their victims and stinging them with extremely painful, hallucinogenic and potentially fatal venom. Katniss drops a tracker jacker nest on several tributes during her first Hunger Games (the 74th Hunger Games), killing two of them, including Glimmer of District 1. Katniss and several other tributes hallucinate when they are stung. The Capitol uses tracker jacker venom in a process of torture and brainwashing known as "hijacking". "Hijacking targets the part of the brain that controls fear and confusion in order to distort the victim's memories. The technique is used on Peeta in "Mockingjay", in an attempt to turn him into an assassin to kill Katniss.
Grooslings.
The groosling is an edible wild bird the size of a wild turkey. Katniss hunts it in the first book of the series. Rue states that it is commonly found in District 11. They are spotted and hunted frequently in the 74th Hunger Games. They are, according to Katniss, fatty and delicious, like turkey.
Wolf.
Wolf "" or "mutts" are engineered wolf-like creatures that appear at the end of the 74th Hunger Games to draw Katniss, Peeta, and Cato into a final fight. These creatures are hybrids created by mixing wolf DNA with the DNA of deceased tributes in order to cause them to resemble those tributes. The resemblance is expressed in fur and eye color, and the mutts' collars match the tributes' district numbers. Katniss identifies one wolf as Rue and others as Glimmer, Foxface, the boy from District 9 and Thresh. When he is shot in the hand with an arrow, Cato falls off the Cornucopia; in the book, Cato's fight for survival against the mutts goes on for several hours before Katniss shoots him in the skull with an arrow out of pity. He would not have survived for so long without his suit of body armor and a hidden knife. In the film adaptation, the mutts resemble Rottweiler dogs, and Cato dies more quickly.
Lizard Muttations
These creatures are seen in "Mockingjay" in the tunnels of the Capitol, supposedly created to hunt down Katniss. They are human-sized, with tight, white skin, a long reptilian tail, long wolflike claws, and sharp teeth. They are engineered to smell like the roses from President Snow's garden, reminding Katniss that he is after her and has many
ways to capture her. Finnick Odair is killed by one.
Monkey Mutts.
The 75th Games included "" monkeys, with razor-sharp claws, wickedly sharp teeth, and orange fur that would attack during the 4th hour of the "clock". They attacked the tributes in packs when Peeta glanced up at them, but the woman victor from 6, or 'female morphling' as Katniss calls her, jumps in front of Peeta to save his life, because she was part of the alliance formed to defend Katniss and Peeta with their lives.
Candy-pink birds.
During the 50th Games, Haymitch struck a temporary alliance with a female tribute from his district named Maysilee Donner. After they break off this alliance, Haymitch hears her screams and runs to her. He sees a flock of candy-pink birds attacking Maysilee and spearing her throat with their razor-sharp beaks. He stays with her as she dies, just as Katniss stays with Rue.
Snake Mutts.
A type of highly venomous snake , with pink, blue or yellow skins, are introduced in "The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes". They instinctively attack people with unfamiliar smells. The head Gamemaker, Dr. Gaul, uses them on one of the mentors, Clemensia Dovecote, as punishment. Clemensia survives, as she promptly receives the antidote, but the venom makes her grow scales over her torso and discolors her skin and eyes. They are deployed in the 10th Hunger Games. Coriolanus Snow suspects this beforehand, so places a handkerchief he had previously lent to the tribute he was mentoring, Lucy Gray Baird, to familiarise them with her smell. Once delivered to the arena, they kill three of the seven remaining tributes, but they do not attack Lucy Gray, and allow her to collect them in her skirt.
Nightlock.
Nightlock is a wild bush with extremely toxic berries. The berries will kill almost as soon as they are ingested, and they serve as a major plot device in "The Hunger Games". They are first gathered by Peeta, who thinks that they are edible. Katniss identifies them before Peeta has eaten any. Foxface, one of the remaining tributes steals them and eats them. When Katniss and Peeta are the last two survivors, the improvised rule allowing two winners from the same district is revoked. Katniss suggests that they kill themselves by eating the berries, accurately assuming that the Gamemakers would rather relent than have a Game with no victor.
"Nightlock" is likely a portmanteau of the names of the real plants "nightshade" and "hemlock", both of which are toxic to humans. It has been suggested the names may go with Collins' allusions to "Romeo and Juliet" in the use of the phrase "star-crossed lovers" and the suicidal nature of Romeo and Juliet's death.
In "Mockingjay", District 13 makes a suicide pill out of the nightlock toxin and gives one to Katniss and each member of the "Star Squad" in the final Capitol attack in case they are captured. The word "nightlock" repeated three times is used as the self-destruct code for the Holo, a holographic map device used by the rebels in "Mockingjay" to display the location of the Capitol's defense pods.
Tracker jacker antidote leaves.
In "The Hunger Games", Rue uses the leaves of an unidentified plant to treat Katniss's tracker jacker stings. Katniss recognizes the leaves as something that her mother used. Rue chews the leaves into a pulp and applies them directly to the tracker jacker stings, while Katniss recalls that her mother stewed them to make an infusion for her patients to drink. Later in the book, Katniss applies the leaves of the same plant to Peeta's leg wound (inflicted by Cato) in the hope of warding off infection. The application makes pus run out of his leg and temporarily decreases the swelling.
Technology.
Lunar glasses.
Rue, from District 11, mentions that Katniss had these in her pack in the 74th Hunger Games. They are used in District 11 to help farmers work during night shifts. The glasses obstruct vision in daylight, but at night and in very dark areas, they function as night-vision devices.
Television.
The Capitol controls all TV broadcasts within Panem. Sometimes there are emergency announcements that make the TV start itself, like the Hunger Games, news bulletins or warnings. In The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1 and Part 2, the televisions are used to air District 13 propaganda.
High-speed rail.
High-speed maglev trains run throughout Panem, carrying tributes and others on official Capitol business; otherwise, travel between districts is prohibited. The trains are known for their speed and comfort; they can travel at and contain sleeping and dining quarters as luxurious as those found in the Capitol.
Freight trains are the primary means of transporting goods from the districts to the Capitol.
Electromagnetic force fields.
Electromagnetic force fields are used by the Capitol as barriers, mainly in the arenas, where the fields are actively camouflaged to match the arena's terrain. In the Second Quarter Quell, Haymitch uses the force field as a weapon against a District 1 tribute by bouncing an axe off it. In the Third Quarter Quell, Peeta accidentally hits the force field while walking through the tropical arena, stopping his heart and almost killing him. Blight, the male District 7 tribute, is killed when stumbling upon the force field during the blood rain. Katniss shoots an arrow at the force field to destroy it during the Third Quarter Quell.
Clothing.
In Panem, Districts 1–12 inhabitants wear generic clothing that is like modern-day fashions, but citizens of the Capitol typically wear extravagant designer clothes that are very colorful and peculiar. In District 13, all the citizens wear simple grey jumpsuits. In the Games, special uniforms are designed to help the tributes fend against harsh conditions. In "Catching Fire", the uniforms were designed to help survive in tropical temperatures. Technological advances also influence Panem fashions. During both tribute parades and interviews in the Hunger Games trilogy, Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark wear outfits that seem to catch fire, just like the coal from their District (District 12).
Hovercraft.
VTOL aircraft, or hovercraft, are used by the Capitol to transport Peacekeepers and secure district borders. They are implied to be extremely fast and silent, and some may have active camouflage that makes them seem to appear out of thin air. In "Mockingjay", it is revealed that District 13 has a fleet of hovercraft, but they never used them out of fear that the Capitol would retaliate. Hovercraft are also used in The Hunger Games to transport the tributes to the arena. In "Mockingjay" the Capitol uses them as bombers to attack Districts 8 and 12. The rebels also use them in this manner while attacking the Nut in District 2 and bombing the Capitol.
To counter the aircraft, both the Capitol and District 13 operate air defense networks to intercept and shoot them down.
In the movies, their appearances change between "The Hunger Games", "Catching Fire" and "Mockingjay". They all lack the active camouflage mentioned in the novels. However, they are still used for close air support, strategic bombing missions, and transporting cargo and personnel. District 13 appears to operate different versions, including some models similar to those used by the Capitol. However, in District 2, the rebellion appears to have used combat hovercraft while bombing the Nut.
Holo Map.
A Holo Map, more commonly referred to as a Holo, is a piece of technology with the purpose of projecting a holographic map of a location. In "", it is used by the Star Squad as both an interactive, three-dimensional map of the Capitol and as a tool to locate dangerous defense pods hidden in the streets of the city. It also functions as an explosive device that detonates if a squad member flicks a switch and repeats the word 'nightlock' three times. If set off, it blasts everything within a five-yard radius. It caused the death of the Mutts in "Mockingjay".
Nuclear weapons.
Both the Capitol and District 13 have nuclear weapons. Before the Dark Days, District 13 was responsible for the Capitol's nuclear weapons program, although the public was told that its purpose was graphite mining (a material needed in the enrichment process). It is implied that the weapons are only delivered via missiles. Little information is given about the origin of the weapons' development, though it is possible that they originated from the remains of the United States Military's nuclear arsenal.
The novels do not state the amount of weaponry that District 13 or the government of Panem possess. However, it is implied that each group holds enough that mutually assured destruction is the assumed outcome of another war.
In the films, there is little mention of nuclear weapons.
The Districts of Panem.
District 1 (Luxury).
District 1 specializes in producing luxury items like jewelry. Children living there take pride in representing District 1 in the Games and are often among the group of tributes nicknamed "Careers" who illegally train for the Games from a young age. Along with District 2, District 1 is heavily favored by the Capitol and is wealthier than the rest of the districts. People from this district name their children after expensive materials, such as Cashmere, or the characteristics of the things they make, such as Glimmer.
In "The Hunger Games", during the 74th Hunger Games, both tributes from District 1 (Marvel and Glimmer) join the "Career" pack. Glimmer is eventually killed by the tracker jackers (wasp muttations) that were dropped on the Careers by Katniss. Katniss kills Marvel after he kills Rue. In "Catching Fire", the tributes from District 1 are siblings Cashmere and Gloss, who are killed by Johanna Mason and Katniss, respectively. In "The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes", both tributes from District 1 (Facet and Velvereen) are shot by Peacekeepers trying to escape from the arena after it is bombed.
During the Second Rebellion, it is noted that District 1 was one of the first to rebel against the Capitol.
District 2 (Masonry and defense).
District 2 is in charge of stone cutting, supplying Peacekeepers, and weapons manufacturing. It is also a center of training for the Capitol's army of Peacekeepers. District 2 is a large district in the mountains, not far from the Capitol itself. Its citizens have better living conditions than most other districts, and support for Capitol control is stronger there than in any other district. Some citizens of District 2 name their children in Ancient Roman or Greek style, like those common in the Capitol. District 2 tributes often volunteer for the Games even when not selected in the drawing, which makes reapings very difficult. As such, their tributes often train for the games and are among those referred to as "careers." Though this practice is illegal, the Capitol ignores it because of District 2's support for its rule. The number of victors is heavily skewed towards District 2 due to their eagerness to compete in the Games.
During the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games, Cato and Clove, the tributes from District 2, are formidable opponents. Clove comes the closest to killing Katniss, but she is interrupted and killed by Thresh. Cato is the final tribute killed. In the Seventy-fifth Hunger Games, District 2's tributes are Brutus and Enobaria. Brutus is killed by Peeta in the arena; Enobaria survives the Games and the rebellion. Another victor, Commander Lyme, is the leader of the rebellion's District 2 forces during the takeover of The Nut. The District 2 tributes in the Tenth Hunger Games both try to escape after the arena is bombed. The female tribute, Sabyn, falls to her death when attempting to escape the Pre-Games arena bombing, while the male tribute, Marcus, successfully escapes and hides in the Capitol sewers, only to be recaptured, beaten, and placed back into the arena, hanging by his wrists from between two tall poles. Lamina kills him with an axe.
District 2 is made up of many villages, each based around a mine. In the midst of District 2 is a central mountain (referred to as "The Nut" by Katniss) which contains the command and control center for the Capitol's defenses. During the Dark Days, District 2 was the Capitol's staunchest ally, and it received preferential treatment from the Capitol after the rebellion, along with District 1. Katniss states that many of the other Districts loathe District 2, referring to them as "the Capitol's lap dogs." In the third book, during the second rebellion, District 2 is the last to fall to the rebels.
District 3 (Technology).
District 3 specializes in the production of technology and electronics. Most of its inhabitants work in factories and are good at engineering, which helps its tributes in the Games. In the Seventy-Fourth Hunger Games, the male tribute from District 3 manages to reactivate the land mines surrounding the Cornucopia to protect the supplies of the Careers. One of the previous victors from District 3, Beetee Latier, won his Games by setting a trap that electrocuted six tributes at once. He uses his skills after being chosen to compete in the Seventy-fifth Hunger Games in "Catching Fire". The other victor who competes in the Seventy-fifth Hunger Games is a woman named Wiress, who discovers that the arena operates like a clock and tells Katniss how to detect force fields, after she points out the force field between the Gamemakers and the victors. Wiress dies during the Seventy-fifth Hunger Games, while Beetee joins the technological division for the Second Rebellion's war effort and becomes the only surviving Victor from District 3. In the 10th Hunger Games, the District 3 tributes hack the drones which deliver supplies. Circ, the male tribute, is killed by snake mutts before he has a chance to use them, but Teslee, the female tribute, uses them to kill Mizzen, only to be killed by Treech.
During the Second Rebellion, Beetee makes a special bow and arrows for Katniss. The arrows include explosive arrows and regular arrows. He also designed a specialized trident for Finnick.
Although District 3 seems to have technological advantages over other districts, it is the poorest of the wealthy districts and typically does not do well in the Games.
District 4 (Fishing).
District 4 is a coastal district that specializes in aquaculture and wild fisheries. It is another wealthy district in which children often train for the Hunger Games. It is said that District 4 has the most "decent-looking" people. The most popular bread baked in this District is a salty, fish-shaped loaf tinted green by seaweed. The most common tools in District 4 are fishing nets, tridents and fishing rods.
In the first book, the male tribute from District 4 is one of the eleven to die in the initial bloodbath at the Cornucopia; in the film he has his throat slit by Cato after an attempt to flee. In the book, the female tribute is killed by the tracker jackers alongside Glimmer; however, in the film she barely makes an appearance. She is seen picking up one of the backpacks at the cornucopia bloodbath and running away. In "Catching Fire", Katniss finds important allies in Mags and Finnick Odair, the victors from District 4 chosen for the Quarter Quell. Mags is an elderly victor who mentored Finnick in his first Games and could make a fishing hook "out of anything". She volunteers for the Quarter Quell, taking the place of Annie Cresta, an unstable past victor who won her games by being able to swim the longest after the arena was flooded. During the third Quarter Quell, Mags is killed by a mysterious blister agent in the form of a fog. Katniss says that Finnick is "beautiful" and “a tool.” He won his Games at the young age of fourteen by using an expensive trident. In "Mockingjay", Katniss and Finnick become friends and eventually Finnick is killed by part-lizard saving Katniss's life. Thus, Annie, now Finnick's wife, becomes the only surviving Victor from District 4 after the war.
In the 10th Hunger Games, the male and female tributes are Mizzen and Coral, respectively. Coral is killed by snake mutts, and Mizzen is killed by Teslee with hacked drones.
District 5 (Power).
District 5 specializes in electrical power, Caesar Flickerman refers to them as the "Power Plant Workers" in the first film. The district is dotted by dams that provide the Capitol with electricity; this fact is exploited by the rebels, who destroy the dams, briefly cutting off electricity within the Capitol and allowing District 13 to rescue the captured Victors.
Even though District 12 mines coal, it is implied throughout the series that the coal is used to heat buildings and homes in the Capitol, not to generate electricity. It is not known if there are any other sources of power generation. From the attack on the hydroelectric dam during the second rebellion, it is implied that there are only a handful of power facilities, given the Capitol's limited ability to supply power.
In the first movie, Katniss nicknames the female tribute from District 5 "Foxface" because she looked like a fox, with a slim face and sleek red hair. She is one of the last to die, due to her cleverness, avoiding any form of contact with other tributes. She steals a small portion of food from the Careers' supplies, dodging the bombs set up by the Careers, shortly before her death. She dies by eating poisonous berries known as "nightlock" after watching Peeta harvest them, assuming that they are safe. No name or description is given to the male tribute from District 5, except that he is one of the eleven who die in the bloodbath on the first day. In the 75th Hunger Games, Finnick kills the male tribute with his trident at the Cornucopia on the first day. In the film, the female tribute is killed by the 10 o'clock wave that propels itself through the jungle. In the tenth Hunger Games, the male tribute, Hy, dies due to complications from asthma before the Games begin, and the female tribute, Sol, is killed by Coral on the second day.
District 6 (Transportation).
District 6 specializes in transportation, serving as a hub for Panem's transport network. During the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games, both tributes are killed in the bloodbath on the first day. In the film, the male is targeted by Cato, who accuses him of taking his knife during a pre-Games training exercise (that was stolen by Rue). During the 75th Hunger Games, both tributes are nicknamed the "Morphlings" due to their addiction to morphling, a psychoactive drug like morphine. During training, they often go to the camouflage station and paint. The male tribute is killed in the bloodbath, while the female tribute dies blocking a monkey from Peeta. Peeta comforts her and allows her to paint flowers on his face with her blood and describes the many colors in the sky and sunset to her, particularly his favourite color orange, as she dies. The tributes for the 10th Hunger Games, Otto and Ginnee, are killed in a bombing attack before the games begin.
District 7 (Lumber).
District 7 specializes in forestry, lumber and paper. Its two tributes in the 74th Hunger Games die in the initial bloodbath. In the 75th Hunger Games, the tributes selected are Blight, who protests his inclusion, and Johanna Mason, a strong-willed yet somewhat abrasive woman who has no qualms with killing with her axe, a signature weapon from her district. In the film, Johanna also protests her inclusion in an expletive-ridden tirade with Caesar Flickerman. The winner of the 71st Hunger Games, she is the closest mentioned victor to Katniss and Peeta in age. Despite her intense and stand-offish attitude, she defends Katniss and takes her out of the 75th Hunger Games at the beginning of the Second Rebellion. In the 10th Hunger Games, the female tribute Lamina shelters up on a crossbar for two days, only to be killed by the District 4 tributes after they climb it. Lucy Gray kills the male tribute, Treech, with a snake mutt.
District 8 (Textiles).
District 8 specializes in textiles, including at least one factory in which Peacekeeper uniforms are made. Along with Districts 7 and 11, it one of the first districts to rebel. Two people from District 8, Bonnie and Twill, escape during one of the uprisings and inform Katniss of the theory that District 13 still exists. It is implied that security is strict in District 8 following the uprising and the citizens are desperate for hope. In "Mockingjay", Katniss visits a hospital in District 8, which is later bombed by the Capitol. It is thus the second-most targeted district during the Second Rebellion, after District 12. A leader of the District 8 rebels, Paylor, commands fierce loyalty from her soldiers who follow her orders in preference to those of Alma Coin, the president of District 13. Paylor later becomes President of Panem after Katniss assassinates Coin.
In the 74th Hunger Games, the male tribute from District 8 dies at the Cornucopia at the hands of Marvel. The female tribute is attacked by the Careers on the first night and "finished off" by Peeta when she does not die immediately, as indicated by cannon blast. In the 75th Hunger Games, both tributes from District 8, Woof and Cecelia, die in the initial battle at the Cornucopia. Woof is an elderly, senile tribute in his 70s. Cecelia is about thirty years old and has three children. It is later revealed that Cecelia was to be an original member of the arranged alliance to save Katniss and Peeta from the second Arena, but she does not survive the initial bloodbath. Woof also had knowledge of the plot. In the 10th Hunger Games, the male tribute, Bobbin, is killed by Coriolanus Snow, after he attacks him. The female tribute, Wovey, dies from being poisoned by Lucy Gray Baird.
District 9 (Grain).
District 9 specializes in producing grain and salts. It is the least mentioned district in the series; no named character from the district has appeared in the series. It is the only district to lose both of its tributes in the bloodbath of both the 74th and 75th Hunger Games and the only one to have no named characters in the trilogy.
In the 10th Hunger Games, both District 9 tributes, Panlo (male) and Sheaf (female), are killed in the Arena bombing prior to the beginning of the Games.
District 10 (Livestock).
District 10 specializes in livestock. Katniss does not note any major tributes from District 10, except one boy with a crippled leg who is mentioned several times. In "Mockingjay", Katniss meets Dalton, a District 10 refugee who tells her about District 13's history. At the 75th Hunger Games, Katniss notes that the District 10 tributes, who are dressed as cows, wear flaming belts that make them look like they are broiling themselves, a poor imitation of Cinna and Portia's techniques in the 74th Hunger Games. In the 10th Hunger Games, the female tribute, Brandy, is shot dead after killing her mentor, Arachne Crane. The male tribute, Tanner, forms an alliance with the District 4 tributes, but he is later betrayed by them.
District 11 (Agriculture).
District 11 specializes in agriculture. It is located somewhere in the South and is very large, possibly occupying nearly all the Deep South. The people live in small shacks, and there is a harsh force of Peacekeepers. Common traits are dark skin and brown eyes. According to Rue, many tracker jacker nests were left there, so the workers keep medicinal leaves on hand. In the orchards, small children are sent into the branches to pick the highest fruit. Sometimes, during the height of the harvest they are given night-vision goggles so that they can work after dark. The district also contains fields of vegetables. The District's electric fences are active 24 hours a day, unlike District 12's. The inhabitants apparently have extensive knowledge of herbs. Overall, the conditions in the district are worse than in District 12. Harsh measures, including summary execution, are implemented to keep people from stealing anything meant for the Capitol.
In the 74th Hunger Games, the tributes from District 11 are Thresh, the tallest and most imposing of all tributes whom the others try to avoid as much as possible, and Rue, a 12-year-old petite girl who can climb and jump between trees and becomes Katniss' steadfast ally until her death. In the 75th Hunger Games, the victors selected as tributes are Chaff, Haymitch's drinking comrade who refused a prosthetic arm, and Seeder, an elderly but healthy tribute who reminds Katniss of Rue. District 11 is one of the first Districts to rebel. In the film, its rebellion erupts during the events of the 74th Hunger Games in response to the way in which Rue was killed and Katniss' tribute to her. Districts 7 and 8 rebel shortly after. In the 10th Hunger Games, the female tribute, Dill, dies of natural causes on the first day. The male tribute, Reaper, exhibits a number of unusual behaviours, such as dragging the corpses of the tributes into a row, and cutting out a piece of the flag of Panem to use as a cape. Reaper is killed by deliriously drinking a puddle of water poisoned by Lucy Gray; he is the last tribute to die in the Games.
District 12 (Coal).
District 12 specializes in coal mining, replaced by medicine after the Second Rebellion, and is the farthest from the Capitol. Katniss, Peeta and other major characters come from District 12. It is located in the coal-mining region of the Appalachian Mountains and the district itself is split into two distinct housing areas and social classes. "The Seam" is a slum where those who work in the coal mines live, while the mercantile class lives in the town, centered around the "Square". Both classes are easy to distinguish physically and generally socialize amongst themselves. Those from the Seam generally have dark hair, grey eyes and olive skin, and those from merchant families typically have blond hair, blue eyes and fair skin. Katniss and Gale are from The Seam, and Peeta is a baker's son from town. Although she comes from the Seam, Katniss' sister, Prim, has characteristics typical of the town residents because she resembles her mother, who was one of the few town residents willing to move to the Seam to marry Katniss' and Prim's father. It is unclear if this class divide exists in other Districts or is unique to District 12. On the victory tour in "Catching Fire" Katniss mentions that she cannot see where the well-to-do live in District 11, as it surely is not the square where their speech is being held. She also notes that many members of the crowd during the Victory Tour seem even poorer than the Seam inhabitants in District 12.
District 12 is the poorest district, and starvation is a major issue for the citizens. Due to the lack of food, the local Capitol authority figures – the Mayor and Peacekeepers – often bend the extremely strict Panem laws. The electric fence surrounding the district to prevent access to the woods is usually turned off, and Katniss and her friend Gale often hunt there. The black market, located at an old coal warehouse named the Hob, is where many of the citizens make their money. The Hob is destroyed by the local Peacekeepers after their commander is replaced in "Catching Fire". This is followed by the bombing of the entire district after the escape of the tributes during the 75th Hunger Games. However, Gale managed to evacuate about 10% of the population—"a little under 900 people"—to District 13.
District 12's geography is dominated by forests and meadows. The meadow, which is located just outside the community, ends at a long electric fence built to keep wild animals from escaping the forest outside. It has many holes and is usually turned off, giving Katniss and Gale the chance to hunt; however, the fence is fully electrified after Romulus Thread replaces Cray as Head Peacekeeper. The vast forest has a lake and contains enough wildlife to support more than 800 residents of the District stranded after the bombings in "Catching Fire". Many do not know where it leads; as revealed in "Catching Fire", the forest eventually ends at District 13, located a week away from District 12 on foot. Another feature of the District is a small hill, which is where Victors' Village is located. It contains twelve large villas facing each other in two rows. It is very quiet there since District 12 has few victors, though more people begin to settle there after the war. After the Capitol bombs District 12 at the end of "Catching Fire", most of the residency is destroyed, and the meadow is turned into a mass grave of the residents unable to escape. Only Victors' Village is left unharmed. After the Second Rebellion, though, the District 12 refugees begin to return to their home, including Katniss, who states in the epilogue that the mass grave is becoming a meadow again.
District 12 is notorious for having only two Victors in the history of the Hunger Games before the 74th, Lucy Gray Baird (10th Hunger Games), who is dead by the time of "The Hunger Games", and Haymitch Abernathy (50th Hunger Games and 2nd Quarter Quell). Because of this, it is the laughingstock of the other districts; volunteering for the Hunger Games in District 12 is seen as suicide since the tributes of the district often perish early in the game.
In the 10th Hunger Games, the two tributes from District 12, Lucy Gray and Jessup, initially form an alliance, but Jessup develops rabies on the second day and dies from a fall while chasing Lucy Gray.
District 13 (Nuclear Weaponry).
Before the Dark Days war, District 13 specialized in nuclear technology and the development of emerging technologies for use by Panem's military. It was also the Capitol's primary military–industrial complex and weapon manufacturer until the rebellion. During the Dark Days, District 13 was one of the major forces of the rebellion. Near the end of the Dark Days, they managed to take control of the nuclear arsenal. District 13 was supposedly bombed and destroyed before the first annual Hunger Games at the end of the Dark Days war, but it was hinted in "Catching Fire" that it had survived. In "Mockingjay", it is confirmed that District 13 became an underground district when the population retreated to bunkers. After the Capitol and District 13 agreed to cease hostilities towards one another under the doctrine of mutually assured destruction, the Capitol spread the story that District 13 had been destroyed. District 13 controlled the primary nuclear weapons stockpile and the Capitol did not want a nuclear war. This underground district maintains concealed livestock and vegetable farms in order to survive, so as not to arouse the suspicion of the other districts. District 13 is a week away from District 12 on foot.
In "Mockingjay", District 13 is the center of the new rebellion. It is led by President Alma Coin, who aspires to succeed Snow as President of Panem and has orchestrated the events in books two and three to circumvent District 13's truce with the Capitol. The lifestyle in District 13 is very strict because of the circumstances. When a citizen wakes up, they are given a temporary tattoo of their personalized schedule for the day, though Katniss usually ignores it, wandering around and sleeping. They are very thrifty and ration food carefully. Everyone wears the same grey uniform and sleeps in identical living quarters. Everyone over the age of 14 is addressed as "Soldier" because almost everyone in District 13 is being trained for a military rebellion against the Capitol. Free education is provided, and all refugees can become citizens. This is due to the eagerness of the district to add more genetic diversity to the population after an infection made many of its citizens infertile. Weddings are usually not celebrated, though the wedding of Finnick Odair and Annie Cresta in "Mockingjay" deviates from this.
The Hunger Games.
Every year since the Dark Days, which occurred 75 years before the events of "Mockingjay", the Capitol hosts an event called the Hunger Games. The Games consist of a gladiatorial-style battle royal combat fought by twenty-four teenagers ("tributes") aged 12–18. One boy and one girl are chosen by lottery from each district (except for District 13). This is known as the Reaping. The Hunger Games are held to remind the citizens of the districts of their failed rebellion and the absolute power of the Capitol while providing entertainment for the Capitol citizens. They are discontinued after the second rebellion, the fall of President Snow and the ascendancy of Commander Paylor. Thus, a total of 1,800 district citizens were reaped as tributes from the start to the end of the games (the 50th Hunger Games had double the number, while the 75th reaped the victors from the previous games). Every 25 years, a special Games is held with a unique alteration of the rules. For example, in the 50th Hunger Games, twice the number of tributes competed, with 4 from each district (two boys and two girls). This is known as a Quarter Quell.
Reapings and preliminaries.
All citizens from each district between the ages of 12 and 18 are entered into the "reaping", a lottery system that chooses the tributes. On the day of the reaping, spokespersons from the Capitol, known as "escorts", visit their respective districts (District 12's is Effie Trinket, and Katniss states that she has been the escort for several years before the events of "The Hunger Games") and choose one male and one female name at random, selecting the two tributes who will compete. However, any other citizen of the same sex aged 12 to 18 can volunteer to become a tribute, taking the place of the child originally reaped (as Katniss did for Primrose Everdeen in "The Hunger Games"). In Districts 1 and 2 (and 4 in the book), most children spend years training specifically for the Games and then volunteer to compete, even though this is technically against the rules.
All 12-year-old candidates are entered once in the reaping by default, and older candidates are an additional time each year. The names are written on slips of paper and placed in glass bowls ("reaping balls"), one each for males and females. Since many families live in poverty, a candidate may request one or more additional "tesserae" (a year's meager ration of grain and oil for one person) in exchange for additional entries in the reaping. One such entry is issued for every "tessera" that a candidate has requested since turning 12. Thus, a candidate who requests three "tesserae" every year would be entered four times at age 12, eight times at age 13, and so on, up to 28 times at age 18.
Following the reaping, the tributes are taken immediately to the Capitol, where they are given a makeover by a team of stylists to look appealing for a TV audience. Female tributes are usually waxed to remove all their body hair. One of the stylists on the team designs a costume for them to wear in the tribute parade, which reflects their district's industry. Each District's tributes are then put in horse-drawn chariots and attempt to impress Capitol citizens while they ride down the Avenue of the Tributes. Afterward, they learn strategy with mentors drawn from their District's pool of past victors (Katniss and Peeta's mentor is Haymitch, who is the only living victor from District 12) and are provided basic SERE-training in combat and survival skills with the other tributes. On the last day of training, they demonstrate their skills before a team of judges, including the Gamemakers, who then score them on a scale of 1 to 12. These scores are made public to show who has the best chances of surviving, which can attract Sponsors and influence betting; tributes awarded the highest scores are often targeted first in the arena because they are the largest threats. On the eve of the Games, each tribute dresses formally and appears on television for an interview with the charming Caeser Flickerman, where they attempt to attract Sponsors by being charismatic. In the book and film, Peeta confesses his love for Katniss during his interviews.
Interviews, mentoring, sponsoring and gambling are all introduced for the tenth Hunger Games, the last two on the suggestion of Coriolanus Snow. Initially, final-year students from the Academy, an elite Capitol high school, serve as mentors, but this is discontinued after several students are killed in the lead-up to the games.
Games.
On the morning of the Games, the tributes have a tracker chip inserted in their skin so the Gamemakers can track them. The tributes are then flown to a dedicated outdoor location called the Arena. A new Arena is built every year. Past Arenas become popular tourist attractions for Capitol citizens. Each tribute is given special clothing to wear, depending on the environment, and then confined to an underground room, referred to as the "Launch Room" by the Capitol and the "Stockyard" by the Districts, until game time. The tributes are lifted into the arena by glass tubes, emerging in a circle surrounding a giant, supply-filled horn made of solid gold called the Cornucopia. A sixty-second countdown to the start of the Games begins, during which any tribute who steps off the plate will be killed immediately by land mines planted in the ground around the plates. The power of the landmines is immense, according to Katniss, who mentions that one year, a girl dropped her token, a little wooden ball, and "they literally had to scrape bits of her off the ground".
The Games begin with the sound of a loud gong. Most tributes run for the Cornucopia to find food, water, weapons, tools, backpacks or other useful items; the most valuable and useful items, including weapons, are often placed closest to the Cornucopia itself. The initial competition is called the "Bloodbath" and the scramble for supplies usually results in intense fighting, with a significant number of tributes killed in the first few minutes or hours of the Games. In most Games, a well-stocked, often well-trained group of tributes band together to hunt down other individuals, until they are the only ones left to fight each other. The alliance is generally agreed upon before the Games begin. These tributes are dubbed "Careers" because they are often trained for an extensive portion of their childhood in combat and other survival skills. The "Careers" usually come from Districts 1, 2 and 4 (only 1 and 2 in the films). They are generally disliked and considered brutally aggressive by many of the tributes from the other Districts.
If one or more tributes does not move fast enough, avoids conflict for too long, or is too close to the edge of the Arena, the Gamemakers will sometimes create hazards, such as mutts or a natural threat, to create more entertaining programming or to steer the remaining tributes toward each other. Another common occurrence is a "feast", where a boon of extra supplies or food is granted to the tributes at a particular place and time (usually the Cornucopia). In the first novel, the Gamemakers told the tributes that the feast would provide them with something they direly needed.
It is implied that there are no official rules for the Games except for not stepping off the plate until the conclusion of the sixty-second countdown. In the first novel, Katniss mentions that there is an unspoken rule against cannibalism in the Games. This rule came to be after the 71st Hunger Games, when a District 6 tribute named Titus resorted to cannibalism in the arena, attempting to eat the tributes that he had killed. The Capitol, disgusted and horrified by his actions, had the Gamemakers trigger an avalanche which killed Titus. There is some speculation that it was created to ensure that the victor was not a mad cannibal. During the 74th Hunger Games, the rules are altered during the Games to allow two tributes from the same district to win. However, when Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark, both tributes from District 12, are the only two tributes remaining, the rule is revoked to have them fight one another to the death. This fails when they attempt to commit a double suicide by nightlock, a poisonous berry that had killed another tribute nicknamed "Foxface". At the last moment, the rule is reinstated, allowing both to become victors. Though described as an act of love for one another in the publicity after the Games, the establishment in the Capitol sees it as an act of defiance. They believe that the District 12 tributes manipulated and outwitted the Capitol when they refused to follow the rules.
Quarter Quell.
The "Quarter Quell" is an especially brutal edition of the Hunger Games that occurs every 25 years. Each Quarter Quell includes a different twist to the rules, to remind the districts about some aspect of the rebellion. Officially, many Quells were prescribed by the original creators of the Hunger Games at the end of the Dark Days. Each quarter, the current President selects the rule change from a box of numbered, sealed envelopes and reads it aloud on live television.
In the first Quell (year 25), the Districts were forced to choose their tributes by election instead of the usual random lottery, to remind them that they chose to rebel.
In the second Quell (year 50), twice the usual number of tributes were reaped from each District, to remind them that two rebels died for each Capitol citizen during the rebellion. Coriolanus Snow was President that year. The victor was Haymitch Abernathy, who won by discovering the properties of the force field surrounding the arena and using them to his advantage during the final battle with a girl from District 1, causing his attacker's thrown axe to fly back and hit her in the head. Humiliated by Haymitch's actions, Snow retaliated by ordering Haymitch's family and girlfriend killed shortly after.
In the third Quell (year 75), portrayed in "Catching Fire", the rule change requires the tributes to be chosen from the surviving victors, as a reminder that not even the strongest can hope to defy the Capitol. Currently, 59 victors are still alive, including the only living female victor from District 12, Katniss Everdeen. In the book, Katniss suspects President Snow made up the rule for this Quell, which conveniently serves his vendetta against her. In the film, it is implied that Snow makes the rule under counsel of his new Head Gamemaker Plutarch Heavensbee, in order to exterminate the living victors. This Quell has no winner and is the last Hunger Games. Katniss destroys the force field surrounding the arena and becomes one of six survivors. Heavensbee is revealed as the leader of an underground Capitol rebel group, working for Alma Coin, who presides over District 13 and uses the collapse of the Quell to launch a second civil war.
Arenas.
In the later years of the Hunger Games, the location of the arena varies for each Game. Past arenas have included volcanoes, avalanche zones, and dams; the terrain has included woods, meadows, scrubland, deserts, and frozen tundra. In the "Hunger Games" movies, they briefly show one of the previous Games taking place in the ruins of an abandoned city. Upon the conclusion of the Games, the arena is preserved as a tourist attraction for Capitol citizens.
The arena for the 74th Hunger Games is a forested area with a central meadow where the Cornucopia is located, a lake, and a wheat field. Katniss notes that it resembles the forests of District 12, which gives her a slight survival advantage.
The arenas devised for the Quarter Quells appear to be especially spectacular. The second Quarter Quell took place in a beautiful meadow with flowers and a fruit-bearing forest and mountains. However, everything was designed by the Gamemakers to be either dangerous or poisonous, including the food, water, wildlife, and vegetation. The tributes realized that one of the mountains in the arena is a volcano.
In the third Quarter Quell, the Cornucopia is placed on an island in a saltwater lake, with the surrounding shore divided into twelve segments that resembled a clock. Every hour features its own deadly attack, limited only to that slice of the arena during that time of day. For example, at noon and midnight, an hour-long electrical storm takes place in the first segment. Other dangers encountered by the tributes included blood rain, carnivorous monkeys, insects, a tidal wave, a fog-like gas that causes chemical burns to the skin and nerve damage, and a section of the jungle in which tributes are trapped with jabberjays that imitated the screams of their loved ones. The center of the island can also rotate, disorienting those attempting to master the clock strategy.
The Gamemakers have complete control of the arena environment and can create any hazard they wish. In "The Hunger Games", they set the forest on fire and switch between day and night at will. In the 75th Hunger Games, the Gamemakers divide the arena into twelve segments, each containing a different terror that only activated at a certain hour.
After the rebellion, the arenas are destroyed and replaced by memorials.
The early Hunger Games take place in an arena on the outskirts of the Capitol that was formerly used for sporting events. For the first nine games, this means that the fighting is confined to the field and the stands. Shortly before the tenth games, the arena is bombed, giving tributes access to tunnels surrounding the arena to use as hiding places. The transition to purpose-built arenas occurs some time after the tenth Hunger Games.
Victors.
The last living tribute of the Hunger Games is the victor. After the Games, the victor receives extreme medical treatment in the Capitol to recover from all the injuries during the Games, followed by a final celebration during which they are interviewed and crowned victor by the President of Panem. Once the festivities are over, the victor returns to live in his or her District in an area called the "Victor's Village", where houses are well-furnished and equipped with luxuries such as hot water and telephones. All families in the victor's District receive additional parcels of food and other goods for a year. In "The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes", it is revealed that the existence of the Victor's Village and the rewarding of the victor's District are developed by Corionalus Snow during his internship as a Gamemaker between the 10th and 11th Hunger Games, in order to encourage Districts to have a greater stake in their tributes. About six months after the Games, the victor participates in the Victory Tour. In every District, the victor is given a celebration and ceremony, usually accompanied by a victory rally and dinner with senior district officials. In the Victory Tour, the victor speaks publicly in each district, even if they are disliked or hated if the victor was responsible for their tribute's death.
However, the victors' involvement with the games and the Capitol does not end after the Tour. Their lives are under constant surveillance by the Capitol to prevent them from organizing an insurgency or rebellion within the Districts. If they do not behave "properly" within the Games or outside, the Capitol punishes them. To prevent the victors from becoming "martyrs" when they are killed by the Capitol, they punish the victor's loved ones instead. This is exemplified by Haymitch, who loses his family and girlfriend due to his unorthodox way of winning his Game, while it is implied that Johanna lost her family due to her disobedience. This practice seems to have begun later in the games' history, as Lucy Gray Baird, the victor of the tenth Hunger Games, lives with minimal interference from the Capitol afterwards, and is not punished for smuggling in rat poison to kill the other tributes.
Victors who are particularly attractive are sold by the Capitol as prostitutes to the highest bidder. One example of this is Finnick, who serves as prostitute to the Capitol's citizens, both men and women, under the threat of having his girlfriend, the fellow victor Annie, tortured. Johanna's family was killed because she refused to be a subject of such cruelty. The victors also have to mentor the incoming tributes for the next games. This is particularly cruel to Haymitch; since he is the only living victor of District 12 prior to the 74th Hunger Games, he has to personally mentor all the following District 12 tributes and watch them die in the games. Furthermore, although the victors are exempt from further Games (not including the 3rd Quarter Quell) the victors' children can be reaped to serve the interests of the Capitol. Katniss thinks that the reapings are sometimes rigged because victors' children are selected too often for it to be a coincidence. As Haymitch puts it, "Nobody ever wins the games. There are survivors. There's no winners." After participating in the games and mentoring tributes who will ultimately die, most of the victors resort to substance abuse as a coping mechanism.
The victors of the Hunger Games usually form friendships with each other because they share the experiences of brutality. In Finnick and Annie's case, their attraction turns into love. While this leads to the increased pressure on the tributes in the 75th Hunger Games, it also means that the victors can relay information about rebel planning. In the book, it is revealed that half of the tributes are part of a conspiracy to break Katniss from the arena and transport her to District 13 to become the face of the rebellion.
Before the start of the 75th Hunger Games, fifty-nine of the seventy-five victors are still alive. Eighteen of the twenty-four victors die during the events of "Catching Fire". "Mockingjay" reveals that the Capitol conducted the "Victor's Purge" to capture, torture, and execute all remaining victors. At the end of the series, there are only 7 victors remaining: Enobaria from District 2, Beetee from District 3, Annie from District 4, Johanna from District 7, and Katniss, Peeta, and Haymitch from District 12. It is unknown if Lyme from District 2 survived the assault on The Nut, or if she participated in or died in the assault on the Capitol.
Victory Tour.
The Victory Tour is a trip across all the Districts of Panem to honor the victor of that Hunger Games. The Tour is usually held six months after the Games to keep the horror of the Games fresh in the minds of those living in the Districts. The Victory Tour usually starts at District 12 and then goes in descending order, ending at District 1. The victor's district is skipped and saved for last. In "Catching Fire", the tour starts in District 11 because the victors live in District 12. After attending celebrations in the Capitol, the victors return to their home district for celebrations paid for by the Capitol. In "Catching Fire", Katniss looks forward to the feast in District 12 during which everyone could eat their fill. Before the tour, the victor's prep team and stylist prepare the victor to just as they did when they appeared in the Capitol before the games.
The Rebellions.
First Rebellion.
74 years before the events of the Second Rebellion, Panem fell into the First Rebellion, commonly known as the Dark Days. All thirteen districts rebelled against the Capitol and Panem's government. The rebellion was led by District 13, which controlled Panem's nuclear weapons. Near the end of the war, the Capitol dropped chemical bombs on District 13, and the remaining twelve districts surrendered to the Capitol. Although the other districts thought that District 13 had been destroyed, after the rebellion, the leader of District 13 and the President of Panem agreed to never attack each other ever again due to District 13's control of the country's nuclear weapons. District 13 was allowed to secede from Panem and to not participate in the annual Hunger Games.
After the end of the war, the Capitol established the Treaty of Treason that would ensure peace between the Districts and the Capitol. This was the treaty that established the Hunger Games.
Second Rebellion.
The Second Rebellion takes place after the 3rd Quarter Quell (the 75th Hunger Games). At the end of "Catching Fire", the Head Gamemaker of the 3rd Quarter Quell tells Katniss that they are on their way to District 13. Katniss is one of the leaders of the rebellion: she is the "Mockingjay", tasked with convincing the Districts to fight against Capitol. At the end of the war, the rebels capture the Capitol, and Alma Coin, the President of District 13 and acting President of Panem, announces that President Snow will be executed. Katniss is to be the executioner. When Katniss is about to kill President Snow, she fires instead at President Coin and killing her, because she was responsible for Katniss's sister's death. The crowd then charges at President Snow and kills him.
After Katniss executes President Coin, Panem's government announces its first free election. All District and Capitol citizens can vote on who should be the first President of the free Democratic Republic of Panem. When the results come in, Commander Paylor, the leader of the rebellion in District 8, becomes the next President of Panem. At the end of the fourth movie, "Mockingjay Part 2", there is a scene where Commander Paylor is sworn in as the 1st President of the Democratic Republic of Panem. While she was in office, she gets rid of the totalitarian government and police state, and turned it into a democratic republic. Commander Paylor also ends the Hunger Games, destroys the arenas, turning them into memorials for all who were killed in the Hunger Games. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Fictional universe of Avatar
In the 2009 science fiction film "Avatar", director James Cameron conceived a fictional universe in which humans seek to mine unobtanium on the fictional exoplanetary moon, Pandora. The Earth-like moon is inhabited by a sapient indigenous humanoid species called the Na'vi, and varied fauna and flora. Resources Development Administration (RDA) scientists, administrators, recruits, support, and security personnel travel to Pandora in the 22nd century to discover this beautiful, lush world, which is inhabited by many lifeforms including the human-like Na'vi. The clan with which the humans have contact in the film "[lives] in a giant tree that sits on a vast store of a mineral called unobtainium, which humans want as an energy supply."
Na'vi.
The Na'vi are humanoid creatures that inhabit Pandora along with other creatures. They use animals ranging from direhorses to even viperwolves
The world of Pandora.
The Pandora biosphere teems with a biodiversity of bioluminescent species ranging from six-legged animals to other types of exotic fauna and flora. The Pandoran ecology forms a vast neural network spanning the entire lunar surface into which the Na'vi and other creatures can connect. The strength of this collective consciousness is powerfully illustrated when the human invaders are defeated in battle by the Pandora ecology, after the resolute Na'vi were nearly defeated. Cameron used a team of expert advisors in order to make the various examples of fauna and flora as scientifically feasible as possible.
Astronomy and geology.
In the film, Pandora is depicted as being located in the Alpha Centauri A system, about from Earth. It is one of the many natural satellites orbiting the gas giant Polyphemus, named for the Polyphemus of Greek mythology. Pandora's atmosphere is a mix of nitrogen, oxygen, carbon dioxide, xenon, methane, ammonia and hydrogen sulfide, the latter two of which are unbreathable for humans, who wear Exo-Packs when outside their buildings or vehicles. The atmosphere of Pandora does have enough oxygen for humans (21%-22%), but too much carbon dioxide (16%-18%). The Na'vi have special organs (similar to kidneys) called Wichow that take advantage of this atmosphere to extract greater amounts of oxygen for their bloodstream. These organs use carbon dioxide and water in their bodies and convert them into methane and oxygen. The methane is exhaled back into the atmosphere. The extra oxygen is added to the Na'vi blood stream to help power their extra large bodies and powerful muscles. This process accounts for the small amount of methane in the Pandoran atmosphere. At rest or when the Na'vi are dormant, those same organs can convert some small amounts of methane back into carbon dioxide and water to replenish their water supply if needed. This is why humans can survive with just a filtration system (Exo-Packs), but the Navi need the higher amounts of carbon dioxide to function. The high level of carbon dioxide and other gases such as hydrogen sulfide also help keep the Na'vi bloodstream a slightly acidic PH around 5.25-5.75 (humans 7.35-7.45).
Leri Greer, a designer at Weta Workshop, explained the unusual day/night cycle experienced by the Na'vi, who inhabit a moon orbiting a planet, that in turn orbits around a star.
Pandora has tropical rainforests that cover much of its continents. Pandora also possesses a weaker gravitational force than Earth. The geology of Pandora is strongly affected by the presence of unobtanium, a mineral whose superconductive properties allow it to float in magnetic fields (flux pinning). This property makes it highly valued by humans, who mine it for transport back to Earth. Pandora's levitating Hallelujah Mountains contain significant quantities of unobtanium, which allows them to ride the strong magnetic fields in their region.
Cameron hopes to explore the other moons in future sequels, books, and spin-offs.
Pandoran biosphere.
The Pandoran biosphere teems with a biodiversity of bioluminescent species ranging from hexapodal animals to other types of exotic fauna and flora. The Pandoran ecology forms a vast neural network spanning the entire lunar surface into which the Na'vi and other creatures can connect. The strength of this collective consciousness is powerfully illustrated when the human invaders are defeated in battle by the Pandoran ecology, after the Na'vi were nearly defeated. Cameron hired a team of expert advisors to make the various examples of fauna and flora as scientifically feasible as possible.
Human interest.
In the "Avatar" universe (set in the year 2154), humans have achieved a very technologically advanced, post-industrial society ruled/dominated by powerful corporations and industries. One of Earth's most powerful corporations is the globally integrated Resources Development Administration (RDA), a quasi-governmental organization that owns all resources off Earth. The Interplanetary Commerce Administration granted these sole rights to the RDA under the stipulation that the use of weapons of mass destruction is prohibited. Known RDA personnel on Pandora include head administrator Parker Selfridge, Colonel Miles Quaritch, Private Sean Fike, Corporal Lyle Wainfleet, Dr. Max Patel, Dr. Grace Augustine, Dr. Norm Spellman, and Samson 16 pilot Trudy Chacon.
Although Earth is never seen in the film, other than in the extended collectors edition, Cameron developed the future Earth of "Avatar" as a dystopian, overpopulated, overpolluted, global urban slum wrecked by corrupt, nature-destroying industrialism; the movie's background cyberpunk theme is a regular feature of his work. According to Jake, one of the main characters, the Earth is a "dying world" where humans have "killed their mother", suggesting that there is very little, if any, functioning natural ecosystem left. By the film's 22nd century timeframe, Earth faces a worldwide economic/energy crisis due to the depletion of natural resources. Earth is also apparently so politically unstable that the services of private security contractors and the militaries of Earth's nations are in high demand; Colonel Quaritch boasts about serving three combat tours of duty in Nigeria before coming to Pandora and notes that Jake is a veteran of a military operation in Venezuela. The planet has also suffered serious natural and man-made disasters, such as an intra-continental conflict and tsunamis hitting the east and west coasts of the United States.
Technology.
Technologically, humans have achieved monumental advancements by 2154: interplanetary and interstellar space travel and colonization; virtual 3D printing and holography mapping; and advanced methods of cryonics and psionics (via synthetic telepathy interface) are employed. Using their capability of advanced genetic engineering, humans develop "Avatar" hybrid bodies from genetically distinct modified-human DNA and Na'vi alien genetic material. Through psionics, genetically matched humans are then mind-linked to these "Avatars" for remote control operation. In the area of medicine, humans have developed advanced stem cell neuroregeneration technology that can cure Jake's paralysis. However, in 2154, it is still extremely expensive and is not covered by Veterans Affairs benefits. Thus, RDA is initially able to use Jake's desire to regain the use of his legs as leverage against him.
As with many science fiction films, many space vehicles, aircraft, ground vehicles, weapons and technologies were created to fit the story. Many were patterned after historical or contemporary technologies to give the film a sense of futuristic realism. Concept artist Ryan Church based many drawings on aerodynamic research from previously classified NASA and DARPA technical papers. Unlike the movie "Aliens" which employed one drop ship from de-orbit to ground combat, several vehicles cover specific roles of utility transport, gunship, and base resupply. This is similar to the specialization of aircraft and helicopters in the United States military since the Vietnam war.
The huge glowing radiators mounted to the engines dissipate their heat, and the enormously long central truss, with its own protective coolers and reflectors, protects the cargo and crew modules from the engines' heat and radiation using the simple rule of r-squared attenuation rather than heavy shielding. (Yes, [James Cameron] really thinks about this kind of stuff and explains it very clearly in text and in person.) The ship has a pair of centrifugal-gravity-gen modules for the crew who remain awake for the duration, which has become a pretty typical feature of quasi-realistic ship designs in movies. But one unique feature it has which directly relates to the sub-light realistic travel is a cascade-style shield stack to protect the speeding craft from interstellar debris. Jim's [brief] completely explains this technology, apparently based on current NASA research, and how it obliterates potentially catastrophic particles by letting them slam through a series of thin, light shield surfaces.
Reception.
Owen Gleiberman of "Entertainment Weekly" writes, "Cameron turns Pandora into a vertiginously suspended forest landscape...Jake and the sexy tribal princess Neytiri (Zoë Saldana) wow us with their fluid, prancing movements, but there's no subtext to their smoothly virtual faces." Carol Kaesuk Yoon of the "New York Times" wrote that "Avatar" "has recreated what is the heart of biology: the naked, heart-stopping wonder of really seeing the living world".
"CNN" reported that the film's universe has had a profound effect on the audience over their perception of Earth, and life on it, in reality. Avatar Forums posted a topic thread entitled "Ways to cope with the depression of the dream of Pandora being intangible" which received "1,000 posts from people experiencing depression and fans trying to help them cope" (a second thread was posted for more room). Philippe Baghdassarian, the site administrator, commented that, "I wasn't depressed myself. In fact the movie made me happy, but I can understand why it made people depressed. The movie was so beautiful and it showed something we don't have here on Earth. I think people saw we could be living in a completely different world and that caused them to be depressed." Many have confessed to falling to depression and harbouring suicidal thoughts, while others have expressed disgust towards humanity and "disengagement with reality." Psychiatrist Dr. Stephan Quentzel added that "Virtual life is not real life and it never will be, but this is the pinnacle of what we can build in a virtual presentation so far."
In February 2010, "CNN" published an article exploring the "Avatar science" (the technology linking the human mind to a remotely controlled body). Elizabeth Landau wrote, "Scientists say we are many decades, even centuries, away from making this kind of sophisticated interaction possible, if it can be done at all." A neuroscientist at the University of Pittsburgh, Andrew Schwartz, further commented that it "shouldn't be taken as anything but fantasy." |
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} | m2d2_wiki | The Enchanted Duplicator
The Enchanted Duplicator is science fiction fan fiction written by Walt Willis and Bob Shaw. It was originally published in February 1954, in an edition of 200 numbered copies, and has been reprinted many times, notably in an edition illustrated by Eddie Jones in 1962; in "Amazing Stories" in 1972/3; and in "Warhoon" 28, a hardcover fanzine collection of Willis's writing, in 1980.
It is an allegory of the journey of a science fiction fan, loosely based on John Bunyan's "The Pilgrim's Progress" (though Shaw and Willis denied having read it beforehand ).
The Tower of Trufandom, the eventual location of the Enchanted Duplicator in the story, was based on Scrabo Tower in Newtownards, near Walt Willis' home in Northern Ireland
A sequel, "Beyond the Enchanted Duplicator... To the Enchanted Convention", by Walt Willis and James White, was published in 1991 by Geri Sullivan, and illustrated by Stu Shiffman. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Terraforming of Mars
The terraforming of Mars or the terraformation of Mars is a hypothetical procedure that would consist of a planetary engineering project or concurrent projects, with the goal of transforming the planet from one hostile to terrestrial life to one that can sustainably host humans and other lifeforms free of protection or mediation. The process would presumably involve the rehabilitation of the planet's extant climate, atmosphere, and surface through a variety of resource-intensive initiatives, and the installation of a novel ecological system or systems.
Justifications for choosing Mars over other potential terraforming targets include the presence of water and a geological history that suggests it once harbored a dense atmosphere similar to Earth’s. Hazards and difficulties include low gravity, low light levels relative to Earth’s, and the lack of a magnetic field.
Disagreement exists about whether current technology could render the planet habitable. Other objections include ethical concerns about terraforming and the considerable cost that such an undertaking would involve. Reasons for terraforming the planet include allaying concerns about resource use and depletion on Earth and arguments that the altering and subsequent or concurrent settlement of other planets decreases the odds of humanity's extinction.
Motivation and side effects.
Future population growth, demand for resources, and an alternate solution to the Doomsday argument may require human colonization of bodies other than Earth, such as Mars, the Moon, and other objects. Space colonization would facilitate harvesting the Solar System's energy and material resources.
In many aspects, Mars is the most Earth-like of all the other planets in the Solar System. It is thought that Mars had a more Earth-like environment early in its geological history, with a thicker atmosphere and abundant water that was lost over the course of hundreds of millions of years through atmospheric escape. Given the foundations of similarity and proximity, Mars would make one of the most plausible terraforming targets in the Solar System.
Side effects of terraforming include the potential displacement or destruction of indigenous life, even if microbial, if such life exists.
Challenges and limitations.
The Martian environment presents several terraforming challenges to overcome and the extent of terraforming may be limited by certain key environmental factors. Here is a list of some of the ways in which Mars differs from Earth, which terraforming seeks to address:
Countering the effects of space weather.
Mars doesn't have an intrinsic global magnetic field, but the solar wind directly interacts with the atmosphere of Mars, leading to the formation of a magnetosphere from magnetic field tubes. This poses challenges for mitigating solar radiation and retaining an atmosphere.
The lack of a magnetic field, its relatively small mass, and its atmospheric photochemistry, all would have contributed to the evaporation and loss of its surface liquid water over time. Solar wind–induced ejection of Martian atmospheric atoms has been detected by Mars-orbiting probes, indicating that the solar wind has stripped the Martian atmosphere over time. For comparison, while Venus has a dense atmosphere, it has only traces of water vapor (20 ppm) as it lacks a large, dipole induced, magnetic field.
Earth's ozone layer provides additional protection. Ultraviolet light is blocked before it can dissociate water into hydrogen and oxygen.
Low gravity and pressure.
The surface gravity on Mars is 38% of that on Earth. It is not known if this is enough to prevent the health problems associated with weightlessness.
Mars's atmosphere has about 1% the pressure of the Earth's at sea level. It is estimated that there is sufficient ice in the regolith and the south polar cap to form a atmosphere if it is released by planetary warming." The reappearance of liquid water on the Martian surface would add to the warming effects and atmospheric density, but the lower gravity of Mars requires 2.6 times Earth's column airmass to obtain the optimum pressure at the surface. Additional volatiles to increase the atmosphere's density must be supplied from an external source, such as redirecting several massive asteroids (40-400 billion tonnes total) containing ammonia () as a source of nitrogen.
Breathing on Mars.
Current conditions in the Martian atmosphere, at less than of atmospheric pressure, are significantly below the Armstrong limit of where very low pressure causes exposed bodily liquids such as saliva, tears, and the liquids wetting the alveoli within the lungs to boil away. Without a pressure suit, no amount of breathable oxygen delivered by any means will sustain oxygen-breathing life for more than a few minutes. In the NASA technical report "Rapid (Explosive) Decompression Emergencies in Pressure-Suited Subjects", after exposure to pressure below the Armstrong limit, a survivor reported that his "last conscious memory was of the water on his tongue beginning to boil". In these conditions humans die within minutes unless a pressure suit provides life support.
If Mars' atmospheric pressure could rise above , then a pressure suit would not be required. Visitors would only need to wear a mask that supplied 100% oxygen under positive pressure. A further increase to of atmospheric pressure would allow a simple mask supplying pure oxygen. This might look similar to mountain climbers who venture into pressures below , also called the death zone, where an insufficient amount of bottled oxygen has often resulted in hypoxia with fatalities. However, if the increase in atmospheric pressure was achieved by increasing CO2 (or other toxic gas) the mask would have to ensure the external atmosphere did not enter the breathing apparatus. CO2 concentrations as low as 1% cause drowsiness in humans. Concentrations of 7% to 10% may cause suffocation, even in the presence of sufficient oxygen. (See Carbon dioxide toxicity.)
Advantages.
According to scientists, Mars exists on the outer edge of the habitable zone, a region of the Solar System where liquid water on the surface may be supported if concentrated greenhouse gases could increase the atmospheric pressure. The lack of both a magnetic field and geologic activity on Mars may be a result of its relatively small size, which allowed the interior to cool more quickly than Earth's, although the details of such a process are still not well understood.
There are strong indications that Mars once had an atmosphere as thick as Earth's during an earlier stage in its development, and that its pressure supported abundant liquid water at the surface. Although water appears to have once been present on the Martian surface, ground ice currently exists from mid-latitudes to the poles. The soil and atmosphere of Mars contain many of the main elements crucial to life, including sulfur, nitrogen, hydrogen, oxygen, phosphorus and carbon.
Any climate change induced in the near term is likely to be driven by greenhouse warming produced by an increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide () and a consequent increase in atmospheric water vapor. These two gases are the only likely sources of greenhouse warming that are available in large quantities in Mars' environment. Large amounts of water ice exist below the Martian surface, as well as on the surface at the poles, where it is mixed with dry ice, frozen . Significant amounts of water are located at the south pole of Mars, which, if melted, would correspond to a planetwide ocean 5–11 meters deep. Frozen carbon dioxide () at the poles sublimes into the atmosphere during the Martian summers, and small amounts of water residue are left behind, which fast winds sweep off the poles at speeds approaching . This seasonal occurrence transports large amounts of dust and water ice into the atmosphere, forming Earth-like ice clouds.
Most of the oxygen in the Martian atmosphere is present as carbon dioxide (), the main atmospheric component. Molecular oxygen (O2) only exists in trace amounts. Large amounts of oxygen can be also found in metal oxides on the Martian surface, and in the soil, in the form of per-nitrates. An analysis of soil samples taken by the Phoenix lander indicated the presence of perchlorate, which has been used to liberate oxygen in chemical oxygen generators. Electrolysis could be employed to separate water on Mars into oxygen and hydrogen if sufficient liquid water and electricity were available. However, if vented into the atmosphere it would escape into space.
Proposed methods and strategies.
Terraforming Mars would entail three major interlaced changes: building up the magnetosphere, building up the atmosphere, and raising the temperature. The atmosphere of Mars is relatively thin and has a very low surface pressure. Because its atmosphere consists mainly of , a known greenhouse gas, once Mars begins to heat, the may help to keep thermal energy near the surface. Moreover, as it heats, more should enter the atmosphere from the frozen reserves on the poles, enhancing the greenhouse effect. This means that the two processes of building the atmosphere and heating it would augment each other, favoring terraforming. However, it would be difficult to keep the atmosphere together because of the lack of a protective global magnetic field against erosion by the solar wind.
Importing ammonia.
One method of augmenting the Martian atmosphere is to introduce ammonia (NH3). Large amounts of ammonia are likely to exist in frozen form on minor planets orbiting in the outer Solar System. It might be possible to redirect the orbits of these or smaller ammonia-rich objects so that they collide with Mars, thereby transferring the ammonia into the Martian atmosphere. Ammonia is not stable in the Martian atmosphere, however. It breaks down into (diatomic) nitrogen and hydrogen after a few hours. Thus, though ammonia is a powerful greenhouse gas, it is unlikely to generate much planetary warming. Presumably, the nitrogen gas would eventually be depleted by the same processes that stripped Mars of much of its original atmosphere, but these processes are thought to have required hundreds of millions of years. Being much lighter, the hydrogen would be removed much more quickly. Carbon dioxide is 2.5 times the density of ammonia, and nitrogen gas, which Mars barely holds on to, is more than 1.5 times the density, so any imported ammonia that did not break down would also be lost quickly into space.
Importing hydrocarbons.
Another way to create a Martian atmosphere would be to import methane (CH4) or other hydrocarbons, which are common in Titan's atmosphere and on its surface; the methane could be vented into the atmosphere where it would act to compound the greenhouse effect. However, like ammonia (NH3), methane (CH4) is a relatively light gas. It is in fact even less dense than ammonia and so would similarly be lost into space if it was introduced, and at a faster rate than ammonia. Even if a method could be found to prevent it escaping into space, methane can exist in the Martian atmosphere for only a limited period before it is destroyed. Estimates of its lifetime range from 0.6–4 years.
Use of fluorine compounds.
Especially powerful greenhouse gases, such as sulfur hexafluoride, chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), or perfluorocarbons (PFCs), have been suggested both as a means of initially warming Mars and of maintaining long-term climate stability. These gases are proposed for introduction because they generate a greenhouse effect thousands of times stronger than that of . Fluorine-based compounds such as sulphur hexafluoride and perfluorocarbons are preferable to chlorine-based ones as the latter destroys ozone. It has been estimated that approximately 0.3 microbars of CFCs would need to be introduced into Mars' atmosphere in order to sublimate the south polar glaciers. This is equivalent to a mass of approximately 39 million tonnes, that is, about three times the amount of CFCs manufactured on Earth from 1972 to 1992 (when CFC production was banned by international treaty). Maintaining the temperature would require continual production of such compounds as they are destroyed due to photolysis. It has been estimated that introducing 170 kilotons of optimal greenhouse compounds (CF3CF2CF3, CF3SCF2CF3, SF6, SF5CF3, SF4(CF3)2) annually would be sufficient to maintain a 70-K greenhouse effect given a terraformed atmosphere with earth-like pressure and composition.
Typical proposals envision producing the gases on Mars using locally extracted materials, nuclear power, and a significant industrial effort. The potential for mining fluorine-containing minerals to obtain the raw material necessary for the production of CFCs and PFCs is supported by mineralogical surveys of Mars that estimate the elemental presence of fluorine in the bulk composition of Mars at 32 ppm by mass (as compared to 19.4 ppm for the Earth).
Alternatively, CFCs might be introduced by sending rockets with payloads of compressed CFCs on collision courses with Mars. When the rockets crashed into the surface they would release their payloads into the atmosphere. A steady barrage of these "CFC rockets" would need to be sustained for a little over a decade while Mars changed chemically and became warmer.
Use of orbital mirrors.
Mirrors made of thin aluminized PET film could be placed in orbit around Mars to increase the total insolation it receives. This would direct the sunlight onto the surface and could increase Mars's surface temperature directly. The 125 km radius mirror could be positioned as a statite, using its effectiveness as a solar sail to orbit in a stationary position relative to Mars, near the poles, to sublimate the ice sheet and contribute to the warming greenhouse effect.
Albedo reduction.
Reducing the albedo of the Martian surface would also make more efficient use of incoming sunlight in terms of heat absorption. This could be done by spreading dark dust from Mars's moons, Phobos and Deimos, which are among the blackest bodies in the Solar System; or by introducing dark extremophile microbial life forms such as lichens, algae and bacteria. The ground would then absorb more sunlight, warming the atmosphere. However, Mars is already the second darkest planet in the solar system, absorbing over 70% of incoming sunlight so the scope for darkening it further is small.
If algae or other green life were established, it would also contribute a small amount of oxygen to the atmosphere, though not enough to allow humans to breathe. The conversion process to produce oxygen is highly reliant upon water, without which the is mostly converted to carbohydrates. In addition, because on Mars atmospheric oxygen is lost into space (unlike Earth where there is an Oxygen cycle), this would represent a permanent loss from the planet. For both of these reasons it would be necessary to cultivate such life inside a closed system. This would decrease the albedo of the closed system (assuming the growth had a lower albedo than the Martian soil), but would not affect the albedo of the planet as a whole.
On April 26, 2012, scientists reported that lichen survived and showed remarkable results on the adaptation capacity of photosynthetic activity within the simulation time of 34 days under Martian conditions in the Mars Simulation Laboratory (MSL) maintained by the German Aerospace Center (DLR).
One final issue with albedo reduction is the common Martian dust storms. These cover the entire planet for weeks, and not only increase the albedo, but block sunlight from reaching the surface. This has been observed to cause a surface temperature drop which the planet takes months to recover from. Once the dust settles it then covers whatever it lands on, effectively erasing the albedo reduction material from the view of the Sun.
Funded research: ecopoiesis.
Since 2014, the NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program and Techshot Inc are working together to develop sealed biodomes that would employ colonies of oxygen-producing cyanobacteria and algae for the production of molecular oxygen (O2) on Martian soil. But first they need to test if it works on a small scale on Mars. The proposal is called Mars Ecopoiesis Test Bed. Eugene Boland is the Chief Scientist at Techshot, a company located in Greenville, Indiana. They intend to send small canisters of extremophile photosynthetic algae and cyanobacteria aboard a future rover mission. The rover would cork-screw the canisters into selected sites likely to experience transients of liquid water, drawing some Martian soil and then release oxygen-producing microorganisms to grow within the sealed soil. The hardware would use Martian subsurface ice as its phase changes into liquid water. The system would then look for oxygen given off as metabolic byproduct and report results to a Mars-orbiting relay satellite.
If this experiment works on Mars, they will propose to build several large and sealed structures called biodomes, to produce and harvest oxygen for a future human mission to Mars life support systems. Being able to create oxygen there would provide considerable cost-savings to NASA and allow for longer human visits to Mars than would be possible if astronauts have to transport their own heavy oxygen tanks. This biological process, called "ecopoiesis", would be isolated, in contained areas, and is not meant as a type of global planetary engineering for terraforming of Mars's atmosphere, but NASA states that "This will be the first major leap from laboratory studies into the implementation of experimental (as opposed to analytical) planetary "in situ" research of greatest interest to planetary biology, ecopoiesis, and terraforming."
Research at the University of Arkansas presented in June 2015 suggested that some methanogens could survive in Mars's low pressure. Rebecca Mickol found that in her laboratory, four species of methanogens survived low-pressure conditions that were similar to a subsurface liquid aquifer on Mars. The four species that she tested were "Methanothermobacter wolfeii", "Methanosarcina barkeri", "Methanobacterium formicicum", and "Methanococcus maripaludis". Methanogens do not require oxygen or organic nutrients, are non-photosynthetic, use hydrogen as their energy source and carbon dioxide (CO2) as their carbon source, so they could exist in subsurface environments on Mars.
Protecting the atmosphere.
One key aspect of terraforming Mars is to protect the atmosphere (both present and future-built) from being lost into space. Some scientists hypothesize that creating a planet-wide artificial magnetosphere would be helpful in resolving this issue. According to two NIFS Japanese scientists, it is feasible to do that with current technology by building a system of refrigerated latitudinal superconducting rings, each carrying a sufficient amount of direct current.
In the same report, it is claimed that the economic impact of the system can be minimized by using it also as a planetary energy transfer and storage system (SMES).
Magnetic shield at L1 orbit.
During the Planetary Science Vision 2050 Workshop in late February 2017, NASA scientist Jim Green proposed a concept of placing a magnetic dipole field between the planet and the Sun to protect it from high-energy solar particles. It would be located at the Mars Lagrange orbit L1 at about 320 R♂, creating a partial and distant artificial magnetosphere. The field would need to be "Earth comparable" and sustain as measured at 1 Earth-radius. The paper abstract cites that this could be achieved by a magnet with a strength of . If constructed, the shield may allow the planet to restore its atmosphere. Simulations indicate that within years, the planet would be able to achieve half the atmospheric pressure of Earth. Without solar winds stripping away at the planet, frozen carbon dioxide at the ice caps on either pole would begin to sublimate (change from a solid into a gas) and warm the equator. Ice caps would begin to melt to form an ocean. The researcher further argues that volcanic outgassing, which to some degree balances the current atmospheric loss on Earth, would replenish the atmosphere over time, enough to melt the ice caps and fill of Mars' prehistoric oceans.
Thermodynamics of terraforming.
The overall energy required to sublimate the from the south polar ice cap was modeled by Zubrin and McKay in 1993. If using orbital mirrors, an estimated 120 MW-years of electrical energy would be required in order to produce mirrors large enough to vaporize the ice caps. This is considered the most effective method, though the least practical. If using powerful halocarbon greenhouse gases, an order of 1,000 MW-years of electrical energy would be required to accomplish this heating. However, if all of this were put into the atmosphere,
it would only double the current atmospheric pressure from 6 mbar to 12 mbar, amounting to about 1.2% of Earth's mean sea level pressure. The amount of warming that could be produced today by putting even 100 mbar of into the atmosphere is small, roughly of order . Additionally, once in the atmosphere, it likely would be removed quickly, either by diffusion into the subsurface and adsorption or by re-condensing onto the polar caps.
The surface or atmospheric temperature required to allow liquid water to exist has not been determined, and liquid water
conceivably could exist when atmospheric temperatures are as low as . However, a warming of is much less than thought necessary in order to produce liquid water. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Alarums and Excursions
Alarums and Excursions (A&E) is an amateur press association (APA) started in June 1975 by Lee Gold; publication continues to the present day. It was one of the first publications to focus solely on role-playing games.
History.
In 1964, Bruce Pelz of the Los Angeles Science Fiction Society (LASFS) began a monthly amateur press association known as "APA-L". In 1974, with the publication of "Dungeons & Dragons" by TSR, Inc., articles and comments about the new roleplaying game began to fill the pages of "APA-L". Pelz felt the discussion was taking up too much space, and he asked Lee Gold to start a new APA that would take this material and focus entirely on roleplaying games. The first issue of "Alarums and Excursions" appeared in June 1975, the title taken from an Elizabethan drama stage direction that moved soldiers across a stage.
In addition to removing roleplaying games discussion out of "APA-L", the initial aim of the publication was to prevent roleplaying games from becoming so divergent that people from different cities couldn't participate in games together.
The June 2017 collation of "Alarums and Excursions" was #500, with a color cover drawn by Lee Moyer and printed by Rob Heinsoo.
Contents.
Each issue is a collection of contributions from different authors, often featuring game design discussions, rules variants, write-ups of game sessions, reviews, and comments on others contributions.
Although game reports and social reactions are common parts of many "A&E" contributions, it has also, over the years, become a testing ground for new ideas on the development of the RPG as a genre and an art form. The idea that role-playing games "are" an art form took strong root in this zine, and left a lasting impression on many of the RPG professionals who contributed. The 1992 role-playing game "Over the Edge" was inspired by discussions in "A&E".
Over the years, contributors have included:
Reception.
In the February 1976 issue of "Strategic Review" (Issue 6), Gary Gygax complimented the new APA, calling it "an excellent source of ideas, inspirations and fun." Although Gygax felt some of the contributors were "woefully lacking in background", and the quality of printing varied dramatically from issue to issue, he concluded, "For all of its faults, it is far and away the best "D&D" 'zine, and well worth reading. See for yourself why it rates a Major Triumph."
In the June 1981 edition of "Dragon" (Issue #50), Dave Nalle reviewed "Alarums and Excursions" after its 63rd issue (November 1980), and although he found the writing style "a bit stuffy", with a "tendency for the writers to pat each other on the back", he still called it "the top APA publication... This is a very well run APA and features many of the leading thinkers in fantasy gaming."
Awards.
To date, "Alarums and Excursions" has been a winner of the Charles Roberts/Origins Award four times:
External links.
[[Category:Fanzines]]
[[Category:Magazines established in 1975]]
[[Category:Organizations established in 1975]]
[[Category:Origins Award winners]]
[[Category:Role-playing game magazines]]
[[Category:Science fiction organizations]]
[[Category:Magazines published in Los Angeles]] |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Philadelphia Science Fiction Society
Philadelphia Science Fiction Society (PSFS) is a science fiction club in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Established in 1936, PSFS is the second oldest extant group in science fiction fandom, and hosted what is considered by some to be the first science fiction convention. Anyone living in the greater Philadelphia area and interested in science fiction, fantasy, horror, whether written or on TV or in the movies; SF, fantasy, and horror art; gaming, board games or video games; comic books/graphic novels; and related arts is welcome.
The PSFS Constitution requires that a person must have attended three meetings before being voted into membership. The traditional club greeting for a person voted in is, "Pay your dues!" shouted in unison.
History.
PSFS was formed in October 1935 as a merger of the 11th chapter of the Science Fiction League (chartered the previous January by Milton A. Rothman), and the Boy's Science Fiction Club, founded at about the same time. It adopted its present name in early 1936. According to John Baltadonis (one of its founders), the new name was inspired by an illuminated sign saying "PSFS" on the Philadelphia Savings Fund Society's building. The idea was that the science fiction group could then claim that the building was its clubhouse. In 1944, it merged with another Philadelphia SF club, the Philadelphia Futurians, and retained the PSFS name.
PSFS meets monthly, usually on the second Friday of the month. Meeting usually have a guest speaker. The Annual meeting is held in January and sees the seven members of the PSFS Board (President, Vice President, Secretary, Treasurer, and three at-large members) report on their activities for the past year, and elections for new officers are held.
Panel.
Since 1981, the July meeting of the Society has featured the Hugo Panel. This panel is made up of five members and a varying number of alternates. Panel members and alternates read all the nominees for the Hugo Awards in the categories of Short Story, Novella, Novelette, Novel, and the long form and short form Dramatic Presentations. One panel member summarizes all the nominees in a category, with the other panelists commented after the summaries. All panelists then vote their preference for each nominee, ranking them and the traditional "No Award." Votes are averaged to get the rankings. The panel is usually held several days before the deadline for voting on the Hugos, and helps those PSFS members who are voting.
Each panel member and alternate also makes a recommendation for Best and Worst of all of the nominees. It is not uncommon for the same work to be nominated for both.
Convention.
PSFS hosts an annual science fiction convention, Philcon, in or near Philadelphia, usually in November. In 2006, the 70th anniversary Philcon was held at the Sheraton Philadelphia City Center Hotel. The first Philcon was held in 1936, making the convention the oldest science fiction convention in the world.
Sponsorship.
Since 1982, PSFS has sponsored the Philip K. Dick Award for "Best Original SF Paperback", which is awarded every year at Norwescon.
PSFS is incorporated as a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | MISFITS
MiSFiTS was the acronym for the "Minnesota Society for Interest in Science Fiction and Fantasy". This organization has now changed its name to GPS, an acronym for Geek Partnership Society. It was founded in 1999 and was the parent non-profit organization for the CONvergence speculative fiction convention. Geek Partnership Society (formerly MISFITS) and CONvergence separated their organizations effective January 1, 2010. GPS sponsors events and clubs year round including the Team Trivia Challenge, a Writing Contest, Read-the-Book/See-the-Movie, and various other social clubs for the Minneapolis/St. Paul fandom community.
In 2010 GPS will be opening the first geek community center with event and meeting space for events related to science-fiction, fantasy and other "geeky" topics. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | National Association for Science Fiction
The National Association for Science Fiction (NASF), New Zealand's first national science fiction club, was formed in 1976 by Wellington resident Frank Macskasy. The club expanded over several years and by the early 1980s had branches in Wellington, Auckland, Christchurch and Dunedin, and was for nearly 15 years New Zealand's only nationwide science fiction fan organisation.
History.
Members in Auckland, Wellington and Dunedin were involved in running national conventions, although none were officially run by NASF, and in many of the fanzines that sprouted up in the late '70s and early '80s, as well as amateur press association Aotearapa. NASF was also a motivating force behind the inauguration of a New Zealand Science Fiction fan awards in the late 1980s (these later reappeared as the Sir Julius Vogel Awards), and was also the umbrella organisation responsible for the appointing of host sites for national conventions.
At its height in the mid-1980s, NASF had a membership of about 150 and a bimonthly club magazine called "Warp". By the mid-1990s, the Auckland and Christchurch branches had folded, although there were still club members in those areas. The Dunedin branch and the Wellington branch continued until the late 1990s.
Debate continues on why NASF died, as well as whether it was officially wound up, but it was largely inactive by the mid 1990s and went into indefinite recess in late 1997. The rise of science fiction as a popular genre in the cinema and television, coupled with easier accessibility to science fiction books, magazines, movie and television series on video and later DVD likely contributed to NASF's demise. Considerable infighting within the Wellington and Christchurch branches may also have contributed, along with an unwieldy National Committee. The Phoenix Science Fiction Society was founded in Wellington specifically as an alternative to what was seen as a moribund branch of NASF, draining many active fans away from NASF. Other factors included the growth of the internet, which made an organised club less relevant. In contrast to when Macskasy formed NASF in 1976, by the late 1990s, New Zealanders could soak themselves in science fiction without any need to meet other people with the same interest.
Many of the national functions of NASF were later taken up by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Association of New Zealand (SFFANZ), which was founded in 2002.
Branches.
Dunedin branch.
The Dunedin branch of the National Association for Science Fiction (NASF) existed from 1978 until the late 1990s. The branch was the first science fiction club formed in Dunedin and for many years was the southernmost science fiction club in the world. It held fortnightly meetings (later monthly), initially at the children's library in Stuart Street, then at various other venues, the last of which was the W.E.A. building in Crawford Street. The branch organised social events and outings and ran a small lending library. About a dozen people attended the first meetings, but it took till the middle of the year for the official formation of the branch. Membership began to increase as a side effect of Dunedin winning the rights to hold the New Zealand National Science Fiction Convention, Octacon, in 1982. There was also a jump in social gatherings with members meeting every weekend and on some week days.
By 1983, the Dunedin branch was the most socially active within NASF and second in size only to the Wellington branch. Branch members were instrumental in staging other national conventions in Dunedin in 1986, 1989 and 1994. Dunedin branch members contributed to the NASF club fanzine "Warp" which was edited from Dunedin for several years, but the branch itself did not have a regular branch fanzine or newsletter other than the short-lived "Larque's Lament", which ran for five issues in the late 1980s, and a one-off fanzine called "Can’t Think of a Name So We Called it This!" in 1982. Several branch members were also members of "Aotearapa", or published their own fanzines, notably Tom Cardy's "Worlds Beyond", which ran for 11 issues. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Speculative Fiction Group
Speculative Fiction Group (Persian: گروه ادبیات گمانهزن) formerly known as Fantasy Academy (Persian:آکادمی فانتزی) is a Persian literature group whose main representation media is the website Fantasy Academy (www.fantasy.ir). Speculative Fiction Group (SFG) is composed of a group of writers, researchers, translators and fans of science-fiction, fantasy, horror fiction, and detective literary genres. The group is the governing body of the Persian Speculative Fiction Art and Literature Award, Shegetzar online magazine, Persian Speculative Encyclopedia, and "Persian SF&F Fanzine".
The group has an English portal for its main site and has established a MediaWiki-based encyclopedia of science fiction and fantasy.
History.
SFG started as a fanzine club named Zirabious in early 2004, and in 2005, after renaming itself to Fantasy Academy, changed its approach to a more academic path and became the sole reference for Persian speculative fiction, specially science fiction, since there was no group or organization working in this area. In 2010, the group reformed again to separate the fan base from academic activities, and all fan activities moved to a new website called Fanzine (Persian: فنزین).
Officially established in 2004, the group was founded on an earlier local private group called Seventh Dimension. Fantasy Academy has developed in several aspects. Primarily, the main focus of the group was to introduce and localize the two main subgenres of speculative fiction: fantasy and science fiction. However, other subgenres, including horror fiction, have since been added.
Group structure.
SFG is a combination of several subgroups, each of them devoted to specific activities. All groups work independently in their area.
Main aim.
The official aim of the group is to maintain effective support to the speculative genre developed and published in the Persian language. The group also tries to introduce and support all new Persian writers and intellectuals in this genre.
Head and coordinator.
Each group of the body has its own coordinating members. However, the person who represents the group holds the title of "chief editor", an official member of the group who is chosen by the members casually for an indefinite term. The current chief editor is Mehdi Bonvari.
Persian Speculative Fiction Short Story Contest.
This is an annual award presented by the Persian Fantasy Academy. The award is given to the best short story of the year in the field of science fiction, horror fiction, or fantasy. The winner is selected from all participants of the yearly contest. The contest starts in winter every year and ends in the spring, and the results are announced during the summer. All submitted stories must be written in Persian but the authors may be of any nationality.
The first award was given in 2004, and the jury members all belonged to the Persian Fantasy Academy Group.
The following year, the group invited well-known and notable authors, critics, and translators of Persian literature to join the committee. Among these were: Média Kashigar, Reza Alizade, Mitra Eliati, Arash Hejazi, Peyman Ghasemkhani, Shahram Eghbal Zadeh, Vida Eslamie, and Mehdi Yazdani Khoram.
Persian Speculative Fiction Art and Literature Award.
This is a yearly event which takes place in July. Awards granted for the best science fiction or fantasy works and achievements of the previous year.
The award is accompanied with a great convention of all speculative fiction proponents and is the main event of its field in Iran. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Bay Area Science Fiction Association
Bay Area Science Fiction Association (BASFA) is a science fiction fandom social club. The organization was founded after a committee meeting for the SiliCon science fiction convention in 1991 by several Bay Area convention organizers (SMOFs) looking for a reason to meet other than at committee meetings. The club has met weekly since 1991, at various locations in the southern portion of the San Francisco Bay Area.
Organization.
BASFA has an elected president, vice-president, treasurer, and secretary, who serve until a new election is called or until that official has missed thirteen consecutive meetings. Terms of service often last several years uninterrupted.
The club's activities revolve mainly around social meetings held at a restaurant in the San Francisco Bay Area (Silicon Valley). Meetings themselves involve recreational parliamentary procedure, including official reports, announcements of upcoming events, reviews of books and movies of genre interest, and a meeting-ending "rumor of the week". These, along with the designation of the previous meeting's minutes, tend to be hotly contested battles involving members buying votes. The minutes of BASFA are published in the online magazine "Science Fiction/San Francisco".
BASFA contributes yearly lists of recommendations for the Hugo Awards and has hosted appearances by authors such as Tad Williams. The association also regularly runs parties at local and international science fiction conventions. BASFA has been listed in the "Locus Magazine" online portal since 2002.
BASFA's main sources of income are auctions of donated material and taxation of puns. The club has a "Numismatic Responsibility Act" that taxes members for the making of puns and for erratic marksmanship when paying said taxes. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Ottawa Science Fiction Society
The Ottawa Science Fiction Society, Inc., or OSFS (pron:"Oss-Fuss") is a membership fan club in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It
is the oldest continuously operating science fiction club in Ontario.
Current activities.
OSFS switched from formal monthly meetings in 2012 to informal dinner meetings. Other gatherings and outings are held on an irregular basis.
It publishes an amateur magazine called "The OSFS Statement".
History.
OSFS was founded in 1977 by Marc "StarWolf" Gerin-LaJoie who was President for the first two years. Initial membership was around 150, and remained
around a hundred for most of the first 15 years.
"Stardock".
"Stardock" - Edited by Charles R. Saunders was a science fiction fanzine that published fiction and articles by OSFS members, as well as local writers and artists. Some notable contributors besides Saunders were Galad Elflandsson and Charles de Lint all of whom went on to be professionally published writers.
Maplecon.
Maplecon was Ottawa's first fullfledged science fiction convention, initially held at the Skyline Hotel blocks from Ottawa's Parliament Hill in October 1978. Started by StarWolf to give 'direction' to OSFS. It was co-chaired by Jocelyn "Bink" Tait and her husband Frank. In its second year, it merged with an event run by the local comics club, called the International Comic Collectors Club (aka I.C. Cubed), and comics joined the mix. This led to a rapid expansion of the convention. Maplecon grew to a membership of around a thousand attendees, with many notable guests from both science fiction and comics. This rapid growth caused concern about liability, and the "Committee for Change" was formed by a group of concerned members. Its aim was to convince OSFS to spawn off Maplecon as a separate organization so that if Maplecon failed catastrophically, it would not also sink OSFS. This also freed Maplecon from OSFS's control, which had a mixed outcome. An oversight corporation was formed called Ottawa Fandom Inc (aka "OFI"), and ownership of Maplecon was sold to OFI for one dollar. Eventually, without oversight by OSFS, the comics aspect overwhelmed the science fiction and fantasy written word aspect, and that spawned conventions to meet the wants and needs of the literary fans. First was Pinekone and later, CAN-CON. Another ramification of Maplecon's rapid growth was that it moved to Carleton University. Although this dramatically lowered the cost of the accommodations, it also dramatically lowered the quality of the accommodations. This became a frequent complaint, and is one of the reasons cited as why Maplecon lost attendance. The last Maplecon was number 13, held in 1992. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Orange County Science Fiction Club
The Orange County Science Fiction Club (OCSFC), founded in 1982, is a public club which meets in Orange County, California, and is one of the oldest continuing science fiction and fantasy organizations in Orange County. Membership is open to anyone in the community and includes published authors and actors. The club has also helped organize book signing events of well-known authors and has assisted in organizing local science fiction conventions.
Meetings.
Meeting topics include general news and information by members about science or science fiction/fantasy conventions, lectures, films and other genre related event. Generally a guest speaker associated with science or science fiction, including prominent authors, artist, actors and professionals from many fields will give a talk or presentation. However, being a social interest organization, guest speakers need not be limited to Science or Science Fiction. The meetings end with a question and answer session with the guest speaker, book signings, and one on one discussions with the guest.
Past guest speakers include Gregory Benford (astrophysicist and prolific author whose works include the Nebula Award winning "Timescape"), James Blaylock (Philip K. Dick Award winner, author of "Homunculus" and "The Last Coin"), Octavia E. Butler (Hugo Award and Nebula Award winner, author of "Parable of the Sower"}, Don Dixon (space and astronomical artist), Richard Hatch (Actor primarily known for his role as Apollo in "Battlestar Galactica" (original 1978-1979 TV series)), George Clayton Johnson (co-author of "Logan's Run" and writer of several episodes of "The Twilight Zone" (original 1959-1964 TV series)), Dean Koontz (bestselling author), Tim Powers (Philip K. Dick Award winner, Nebula Award nominee, author of "The Anubis Gates" and "Declare"), Shauna S. Roberts (author of "Like Mayflies in the Stream" and OCSFC member), Harry Turtledove (historian and author of the Hugo Award-winning "The Guns of the South" as well as other alternate history works),
History.
Established in 1982 by science fiction and fantasy book collectors Greg Funke and Graham Volker, the OCSFC had its first meeting in January 1983, and has been holding regular meetings continuously since. Originally a club for book collectors, it soon expanded its membership to include anyone interested in science fiction, fantasy, or science in general. As it grew, the club found itself with members who had connections to authors, actors and other professionals in the fields of science, art, and entertainment. Soon, the regular monthly meetings began to feature prominent guest speakers giving talks, lectures, or programs with audio/visual presentation. Over time, the club became increasingly active in arranging field trips, participation in conventions, and the organizing of book signing events.
Activities.
For several years, OCSFC has had a visible presence at the annual Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society (LASFS) convention, LosCon, in Los Angeles, California. Members often participate as panel members of group discussions during the convention. OCSFC members—in conjunction with local book stores—have organized book signings for prominent authors, including Dean Koontz, Steven Barnes, and Sherwood Smith. In 2006, OCSFC participated in and assisted with the 64th World Science Fiction Convention (aka Worldcon) held in Anaheim, California.
Over the years the club has expanded its activities to include a reading and a writers group:
OCSFC members stay connected via an Internet E-mail group, where a broad range of lively topics and events are discussed. The web address can be found on their official website.
Many members regularly meet to attend films or lectures. |
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Turku Science Fiction Society (), or TSFS, is the oldest science fiction society in Finland. It was founded in 1976. The society publishes its own semiprozine, called "Spin", also the oldest in Finland. It maintains a club room at the University of Turku with several related societies.
the TSFS has been the main organiser of Finncon three times, in 1999, 2003 and 2011. The 2003 event was also Eurocon and Baltcon.
Since 1983, the TSFS awards the annual Atorox Award for the best Finnish science fiction short story. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Dallas Future Society |
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New Zealand Doctor Who Fan Club |
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Fantasy Amateur Press Association
The Fantasy Amateur Press Association or FAPA ("FAP-uh") is science fiction fandom's longest-established amateur press association ("apa"). It was founded in 1937 by Donald A. Wollheim and John B. Michel. They were inspired to create FAPA by their memberships in some of the non-science fiction amateur press associations, which they learned about from H. P. Lovecraft. (It is also fandom's longest-running organization of any kind, preceding the founding of the runner-up, the National Fantasy Fan Federation, by nearly four years.)
Like other APAs, FAPA is primarily an agency for distributing to its members publications published by its members at their own expense. FAPA has "mailings" every three months. Members are required to be active in some way — writing or publishing — and produce at least eight pages of activity a year. When needed, there are elections (in August) of a secretary-treasurer and official editor. Other officials have included Official Critics, a Laureate Committee, President, Vice-President, and ballot counters. The first two positions were abandoned by the mid-1940s, and in 2009 the positions of President and Vice-President were also eliminated. The President Emeritus is the author Robert Silverberg, who was the last serving President and who has been an active member of FAPA longer than any other current member. When necessary, a teller for the annual officer elections was appointed by the secretary-treasurer.
FAPA's original constitutional limit was 50 members to accommodate publishers using hectographs. There were 21 members listed on the roster of the first mailing in August 1937; it took until the November 1938 mailing to fill the 50-member roster. The membership limit was raised to 65 in 1943 and has remained at that level ever since.
The early years of FAPA were stormy with party politics and sociological feuds (as recounted in the late Jack Speer's pioneering fan history, "Up to Now"). In 1947, Speer reformed the constitution, and the Insurgents quashed the last inactive OE, Elmer Perdue. Since then official troubles have mostly not disturbed FAPA, and red tape has been held to a minimum. The constitution was again revised in 1958 (also by Speer) to incorporate amendments, bylaws, and practices adopted since 1947. Another major revision occurred in 2001 under the oversight of Robert Lichtman (Secretary-Treasurer since 1986 and still holding that office), clarifying and conforming constitutional requirements with actual practice.
During the 1950s and 1960s FAPA was so popular and membership so sought after that the waiting list grew to monumental proportions, for a period of time exceeding the number of membership slots on the FAPA roster. A waiting list fee was instituted to cover the cost of sending the "Fantasy Amateur" to so many fans awaiting membership, and a requirement that waiting listers periodically acknowledge receipt of the "Fantasy Amateur" was begun in order to weed out those who lost interest during the long wait. By the '70s the waiting list became much smaller, and in more recent years (since the mid 1990s) has disappeared altogether. Additionally, the number of members has also shrunk as existing members died or otherwise dropped off the roster. As of August 2019, there were 17 active participants.
Members.
Notable members over the years have included: |
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The Dracula Society is a London-based literature and travel group with an interest in supernatural and macabre works of fiction, as exemplified by Bram Stoker's "Dracula".
The Society.
The society was founded in October 1973 by two actors, Bernard Davies (1924–2010) and Bruce Wightman (1923-2005) to organize Dracula-themed tours of Transylvania and Czechoslovakia. Despite the name, its field of interest encompasses all Gothic literature, as well as stage and screen adaptations, and their sources in myth and folklore. The society meets regularly five times a year, but also organises occasional one-off events, and trips to locations in the UK and Europe.
Awards.
The Society presents two awards at its annual dinner, which is held in early November to mark Bram Stoker's birthday.
A third award, the Bernard Davies Award, was inaugurated in 2012, and is presented only occasionally, for achievement in scholarship. The first recipient was Dr. Elizabeth Miller, Professor (Emerita) of English of the Memorial University of Newfoundland, and president of the Canadian Chapter of the Transylvanian Society of Dracula.
Journal.
The society also publishes a quarterly journal "Voices from the Vaults" which contains reviews and articles of direct or related interest to members.
Membership.
As well as its regular membership the society also presents Honorary Life Memberships; current holders include Richard Dalby, Christopher Frayling, Jonathan Rigby, Janina Faye and Caroline Munro, and former holders include Michael Carreras, Radu Florescu, Raymond T. McNally and Vincent Price. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Aotearapa
Aotearapa is a New Zealand-based amateur press association, run in association with New Zealand science fiction fandom. It caters primarily - but not exclusively - to science fiction fans. Founded by Greg Hills in 1979, it is New Zealand's only apa, and that country's longest-running science fiction-related publication. Members have mostly been from New Zealand, although there have been members in the United States, Australia, and the United Kingdom.
Published bi-monthly, "Aotearapa" had its heyday in the early 1990s, at which time it would often exceed 180 pages. In decline in recent years, Aotearapa ran for 167 issues before going into hiatus in July 2007.
In January 2008 "Aotearapa" mailing 168 re-emerged in different format, with bi-monthly electronic mailings of pdf and text files replacing the traditional paper and postage format. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Association of Science Fiction and Fantasy Artists
The Association of Science Fiction and Fantasy Artists, ASFA, is a non-profit, educational association, whose membership is made up of amateur and professional artists, art directors, art show managers, publishers and collectors involved in the visual arts of science fiction, fantasy, mythology and related topics. It is currently based in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
ASFA's purpose is to encourage and develop amateur artistic talent, educate the public, publishers, patrons of the arts and anyone interested in works of these particularly types of art and craftsmanship in the rights, needs and problems of the people involved in the creation of this material.
Each year ASFA gives out the Chesley Awards, named for the astronomical artist, Chesley Bonestell. The Chesleys were started in 1985 as a means for the SF and Fantasy art community to recognize individual works and achievements during the previous year. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Io9
io9 is a blog launched in 2008 by Gawker Media, which focuses on the subjects of science fiction, fantasy, futurism, science, technology and related areas. It was founded by Annalee Newitz, a former policy analyst for the Electronic Frontier Foundation and contributor to "Popular Science", "Wired", and "New Scientist". Other contributors included co-founding editors Charlie Jane Anders and Kevin Kelly, in addition to Geoff Manaugh (BLDGBLOG), Graeme McMillan (Newsarama), Meredith Woerner, Alasdair Wilkins, Cyriaque Lamar, Tim Barribeau, Esther Inglis-Arkell, Lauren Davis, Robbie Gonzalez, Keith Veronese, George Dvorsky, and Lynn Peril. Between October 2010 and January 2012 "io9" hosted the Geek's Guide to the Galaxy podcast, produced by John Joseph Adams and David Barr Kirtley.
History.
Annalee Newitz (2008–2015).
In 2008, shortly after Newitz's project, "other magazine", ceased print publication, Gawker media asked her to start a science and sci-fi blog. In an interview, Newitz explained the significance of the name "io9": "Well, io9s are input-output devices that let you see into the future. They're brain implants that were outlawed because they drove anyone who used one insane. We totally made that (device) up to name the blog. The blog is about looking into the future and science fiction, so we wanted to come up with a fictional name, something that was science fiction." "io9"'s "Explanations" page gives further details on the fictional backstory of these devices.
The blog is indexed by Google News. In February 2010, it was named one of the top 30 science blogs by Michael Moran of "The Times" Eureka Zone blog, who wrote, "Ostensibly a blog for science fiction enthusiasts, "io9" finds space for pieces on cutting-edge technology, the wilder fringes of astronomy and the more worrying implications of grey goo."
In 2012, "io9" created a video series called "io9: We Come From The Future". It had 32 shows from April 13, 2012 through November 16, 2012. It was hosted by Annalee Newitz and Esther Inglis-Arkell. It was shown on the Internet television network Revision3 and on YouTube. The show discussed the latest news in science and science fiction.
Io9 was referenced in the American television series "Dollhouse".
Charlie Jane Anders (2015–2016) — Gizmodo merger.
After seven years as head editor, in January 2014 Newitz became the new editor at Gizmodo, while co-founder Anders remained as editor at "io9", as part of a plan by Gawker to integrate "io9" with "Gizmodo". "io9"'s 11 member staff joined "Gizmodo"'s 22 person staff, under Newitz's overall supervision. One of the reasons for the merger was to better coordinate content: "io9" is a science and science fiction blog, while "Gizmodo "is a technology blog, which resulted in what Gawker assessed as roughly a 12% rate of overlapping content.
Newitz remained as a contributor at "io9" in 2014, however she later stated that she grew to dislike managing both sites at once, because it took so much time away from her main passion of writing articles. Therefore, after a nearly eight-year run, Newitz retired from both "io9" and Gizmodo on November 30, 2015, to take a position as tech culture editor at Ars Technica. Anders remained as head editor of "io9".
The resulting combined news site technically uses the domain name "io9.gizmodo.com", though in practice "io9" and "Gizmodo" are still separate subsections, using their old logos on their own specific content. The old "io9.com" URL automatically links to the main "io9" subpage of "io9.gizmodo.com".
Besides Newitz, several other longtime core staff members left their positions at "io9" during this transitional time period in 2015. Meredith Woerner departed "io9" in May 2015, to write for the "Los Angeles Times" "Hero Complex" column. Lauren Davis and Robbie Gonzalez left in August 2015: Davis went back to school to complete her MFA, and Gonzalez left for a position at "Wired". By May 2016 none of the original 2008 contributors were left on the site and neither were any of the staff in the 2010–2012 era. Before Newitz's departure, however, many new contributors were added to "io9", including Rob Bricken, Cheryl Eddy, George Dvorsky, Andrew Liptak, Germain Lussier, Ria Misra, James Whitbrook, and Katharine Trendacosta.
Rob Bricken (2016–2018).
On 26 April 2016 Charlie Jane Anders confirmed that she was leaving the site to focus her attention on her then untitled second novel and that Rob Bricken would take over as editor.
Jill Pantozzi (2018-2019).
On July 31, 2018, Rob Bricken announced that he was stepping down as editor of "io9", saying that managing the site was taking up too much time and he would rather spend writing articles for it. He announced that his place as editor would be filled by Jill Pantozzi, former editor-in-chief of "The Mary Sue", who had originally joined "io9" as a managing editor and took up the deputy editor position after Bricken's departure.
James Whitbrook (2019-present).
James Whitbrook, who had been an io9 staff writer since 2014, was promoted to news editor in July 2019. Jill Pantozzi remained on the staff as deputy editor. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Washington Science Fiction Association
The Washington Science Fiction Association (WSFA) is the oldest science fiction club in the Washington, D.C. area. It is also one of the oldest science fiction clubs, founded in 1947 by seven fans who met at that year's Worldcon in Philadelphia, the fifth Worldcon held.
Since 1960 it has met on the evenings of the first and third Fridays of each month in the homes of members. All meetings are open (and along the way have included a Polish student, a Cuban author, and a Chilean physician writer). There are often informal meetings on fifth Fridays. Because there was a 5th Friday in February 1980—a 5th Friday in February occurs only every 28 years—it was decided to hold a relaxacon called DatClave. The second DatClave was held in 2008.
On January 5, 1963, club members from Baltimore were trapped on a Trailways bus when returning to Baltimore after a WSFA meeting. The Baltimore Science Fiction Society was formed on the backseat of the bus.
It hosted the annual Disclave science fiction convention in or near Washington, D.C. from 1950 through 1997. After a four-year hiatus WSFA began a new convention, Capclave. WSFA has also hosted Worldcons, SMOFcons, World Fantasy Conventions, and many other events both casual and otherwise.
Since 1965 WSFA has published the monthly "WSFA Journal". WSFA Press has published the books: "The Father of Stones" by Lucius Shepard in 1989, "Through Darkest Resnick With Gun and Camera" by Mike Resnick in 1990, "The Edges of Things" by Lewis Shiner in 1991, "Home By The Sea" by Pat Cadigan in 1992, and "Future Washington", an anthology edited by Ernest Lilley, in 2005, "Reincarnations" by Harry Turtledove in 2009. In 2010 WSFA Press published two books in conjunction with Capclave, "The Three Quests of the Wizard Sarnod", by Jeff VanderMeer, and "Fire Watch" by Connie Willis. In 2013 WSFA Press published George R. R. Martins award-winning novella "The Skin Trade" as a stand-alone 1st Edition hardcover in conjunction with Martin being Capclaves Guest of Honor that year.
Not issued as a WSFA Press book, but published by WSFA, was a promotional giveaway to the membership of the 2005 Capclave, and issued without an isbn, was a chapbook by Guest of Honor Howard Waldrop. The chapbook was published in the format of an Ace Double cover art by Carol Emshwiller, wife of the late artist Ed Emshwiller who did many covers for the Ace science fiction books (signing his art as Emsh. The two stories were "The Horse of a Different Color (That You Rode in On)" and "The King of Where-I-Go". "The King of Where-I-Go" was a finalist for the Hugo Award and the Locus Award.
In 2007, the WSFA inaugurated the WSFA Small Press Award.
WSFA is incorporated as a 501(c)(4) non-profit organization.
Disclave.
Disclave was a science fiction convention run by WSFA in or near Washington D.C. in the springtime of nearly every year from 1950 through 1997. By most counts it was the fourth-oldest science fiction convention. "The Washington Post" had an article about that first Disclave, which began: "The Washington Science Fiction Association held its first disclave at the Hotel Wardman Park yesterday, with visitors from as far away as Pennsylvania and New York, and rocket expert, Willy Ley, among the speakers."
In 1997, after the final Disclave, WSFA took time off to discuss and plan the structure and focus of their next convention. The first Capclave was held in 2001.
Capclave.
Capclave is a science fiction convention that has been run by the Washington Science Fiction Association (WSFA) near Washington, D.C., in the autumn of every year starting in 2001. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Southern Fandom Confederation
The Southern Fandom Confederation is an association of science fiction fans who reside in or who have other associations with the Southern United States This unincorporated not-for-profit organization is often associated with the DeepSouthCon, and indeed holds their annual business meeting there. There is, however, no direct link from the SFC to the DSC—that is, neither organization in any way controls the other.
The SFC was founded in 1970 and Meade H. Frierson, III served as the first president. The current and tenth president is Jennifer Liang, who succeeded Warren Buff at DeepSouthCon 51. The SFC serves as a clearing house of information regarding southeastern fan clubs, conventions, mailing lists, and other items of regional interest.
SFC honors winners of the "Phoenix" (which is awarded to a science fiction professional editor, author, or artist with connections to the South) and the "Rebel Award" (which is awarded to a like-placed fan) with lifetime SFC memberships. The winners of those awards are selected by the convention committee of that year's DeepSouthCon. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | 501st Legion
The 501st Legion is an international fan-based organization dedicated to the construction and wearing of screen-accurate replicas of Imperial Stormtrooper armor, Sith Lords, Clone Troopers, bounty hunters, and other villains from the "Star Wars" universe. The 501st Legion, called by its nickname Vader's Fist, is made up entirely of volunteers.
Formed in South Carolina by residents Albin Johnson and Tom Crews in August 1997, the Legion now has over 14,000 active members worldwide, with over 26,000 approved costumes. The Legion is active on 6 continents, with local units known as "Garrisons" and "Outposts" in over 60 countries.
Legion members make appearances at casual, promotional, and charitable events, often at the request of Lucasfilm's Fan Events department. Although not officially affiliated with the Walt Disney Company or Lucasfilm LLC., the 501st Legion is Lucasfilm's preferred Imperial costuming organization, and its members were featured as extras in the official series "The Mandalorian".
Origins.
In 1997, Albin Johnson set up a GeoCities website called "Detention Block 2551" as a place to post photos of himself and his friend Tom Crews in their homemade Stormtrooper costumes. Arnie DeHerrera started "Stormtrooperland" at the same time in 1997 and started email conversation with Johnson and Crews. Shortly after that, Scott McArthur of Canada became involved and developed the original logo with the words, "The Fighting 501st!" as its catch phrase with a stormtrooper helmet with red eyes in front of a purple Imperial logo. This evolved quickly into the current red, black, and white logo with the phrase, "Vader's Fist" to express the force with which the 501st led. Within weeks of launching the sites, Albin was fielding email requests from people across the country and around the world looking to be featured on his website in their own homemade Stormtrooper armor. The Legion ranks swelled, and regional subdivisions called Garrisons, Squads, and Outposts were created to facilitate the organization of events and appearances on a local level.
While the Legion was initially based only on the white-armored stormtroopers stationed aboard the Death Star, as the group expanded, it grew to encompass every other canon trooper variation, and other villains from the Star Wars saga, such as Sith Lords and bounty hunters. Custom creations are generally not eligible for membership, and all applicants are reviewed by their local units and Legion Membership Officers prior to approval into the member database.
Early events attended (or "trooped") by the Legion were mostly science-fiction and comic book conventions or related to the release of the Star Wars movies in theaters and on video. But members were looking for more frequent reasons to meet up with their new-found Legion friends and show off their costumes together. The Legion expanded into a charitable organization.
A decade after Johnson and Crews founded the Legion, on January 1, 2007, two hundred members of the Legion marched in the annual Tournament of Roses Parade in Pasadena, California, with George Lucas himself as the grand marshal. At this watershed moment for the club, Lucas and Johnson discussed the future of the rapidly growing Legion, and an unofficial partnership was born. Lucasfilm would grant the Legion a limited use of their copyrighted characters, as long as members of the 501st promised never to use their costumes for personal profit and that they represent the franchise in a positive and respectful manner.
The 501st Legion name.
Johnson and Tom chose the club's name in 1997 to represent a fictional unit of Imperial stormtroopers. He wanted to ground the group in a “realistic” world and to pay homage to the fighting units of true military heroes, like his World War II airman father.
In 2004, author Timothy Zahn, with Lucasfilm's approval, honored the costuming group by incorporating the 501st Legion Elite Stormtrooper Unit into his "Star Wars" novel "Survivor's Quest". Several other authors have since followed suit and solidified the Legion's name in the official "Star Wars" universe. In 2005, the 501st Legion finally hit “mainstream” "Star Wars" canon with its inclusion in the novelization of '. The blue clone troopers led into the Jedi Temple by Darth Vader in are officially designated as the 501st Legion, with the nickname "Vader's Fist" because of his exclusive use of the unit. Although not mentioned in the film itself, all of the licensed support material and merchandising for the film make this reference, including Hasbro's 501st Legion action figures, the DK Publishing "Star Wars Visual Dictionary" books, and the ' game. The story-driven campaign mode of "Battlefront II" even expanded the role of the 501st Legion to the main fighting force in almost every battle in the "Clone Wars" and "Galactic Civil War" eras of "Star Wars", from the to the Battle of Hoth.
When the "Star Wars: The Clone Wars" and were released in 2008, the 501st Legion was given the charismatic clone Captain Rex, a popular character, to lead them into battle.
The 501st name continued to appear in various "Star Wars" expanded universe media until its suspension and rebranding to "Star Wars Legends" in 2014.
Mission statement.
The 501st Legion is an all-volunteer organization formed for the purpose of bringing together costume enthusiasts from around the world under a collective identity. The 501st Legion seeks to promote interest in Star Wars through the building and wearing of high quality costumes, to facilitate the use of these costumes for Star Wars-related events, and to contribute to the local community through costumed charity and volunteer work.
Membership.
Membership requirements for applicants include being at least 18 years of age and have a documented ownership of at least one qualifying high-quality costume of a Star Wars villain. To maintain membership they must troop at least one local unit or Legion-level event per year and abide by the 501st Legion Code of Conduct.
The Legion's costuming standards are listed online in the 501st Legion Costume Reference Library (CRL). All costumes must meet the base requirements listed there in order to be considered for approval.
Legion identification numbers.
Members of the 501st Legion refer to themselves by a letter-number combination, such as TK-899, TR-3774, or DZ-40201. This tradition originates from a line in Star Wars, "TK-421, why aren't you at your post?". The founder of the 501st Legion, Albin Johnson, decided that "Desert Troopers would be labeled “TD” and came from specialized training schools for their missions, Snowtroopers would be “TS”, Biker Scouts would [become] “TB.”" as each group of costumes carries a specific letter designation.
Members of the Legion are issued with individual identification numbers upon joining. It becomes their number for life, and will never be given to anyone else, even after they die. Because of that, many members pick a number that has a significant meaning to them.
Combining a costume code with a member's identification number creates a unique in-universe designation for each Legion member and each one of their costumes. Member 8968 might be known as TK-8968, IG-8968, or TB-8968, depending on whether they are wearing a Stormtrooper, Imperial Gunner, or Biker Scout costume at the time.
The Galactic Academy.
For Star Wars costumers who are under 18 years of age, the 501st Legion has partnered with its sister club, the Rebel Legion, to form a joint group for children called the Galactic Academy. The Galactic Academy deals with both "bad guy" and "good guy" costumes, has no member age requirement, and has no strict costume standards. It provides a safe environment for children of different age groups who share a love of Star Wars and costuming to connect with one another online.
Organization.
The Legion helps members to connect with fellow Star Wars costumers through two organizational networks: one based on geographical location and one based on costume types.
Local units.
As a worldwide organization that fields dozens of appearance requests daily, the Legion has set up local units to better handle tasks like event coordination, promotion, recruitment, and discipline.
There are three kinds of local units.
Detachments.
While Garrisons, Squads, and Outposts contain members with all varieties of Legion costumes, bound by a common geographic region, Legion Detachments contain members who are tied together by a common costume, but who live all over the world.
There are sixteen Legion costume Detachments. Each is dedicated to researching, constructing, and promoting a distinct group of costumes in the 501st. The Legion's costume references are stored on the Detachment websites, and their message boards contain tutorials on how to build the costumes that they have domain over.
Command structure.
To supervise the Legion at the worldwide and local levels, the membership elects leaders every year, who in turn appoint command staffs to administrate day-to-day operations for the Legion as a whole, Garrisons, Squads, Outposts, and Detachments.
Legion officers.
The following officers are collectively called "Legion Command".
Legion Commanding Officer (LCO): The LCO is the top administrator and president of the club. The LCO appoints an administrative staff to assist with club operations, which may include but are not limited to formulating policies, moderating the Legion Council, and organizing partnerships with outside parties.
Legion Executive Officer (LXO): The LXO assists the LCO in club operations as vice-president. The LXO may perform duties as assigned by the LCO, and will act as club president in the absence of the LCO.
Legion Captain of the Guard (LCotG): The office of the LCotG interprets and enforces club rules. This officer serves as an impartial mediator for disputes among members or officers, oversees disciplinary hearings, moderates Legion elections, and maintains the Legion map of units.
Legion Membership Officer (LMO): The office of the LMO is responsible for reviewing and processing applications for membership and maintaining member information in the Legion database. The LMO drives costume policies, including acceptable costume types for membership and quality control of costume submissions. The LMO is the final arbiter of member costume issues and approvals. The LMO supervises and advises Detachments, Garrison Membership Liaisons, and Garrison Web Liaisons.
Legion Webmaster (LWM): The office of the LWM manages all Legion Web resources and advises unit Webmasters.
Legion Merchandising and Branding Officer (LMBO): The office of the LMBO oversees all Legion merchandise operations, including those of local units. The LMBO ensures that all merchandise projects adhere to rules and guidelines that govern the use of images, pricing, and distribution.
Legion Public Relations Officer (LPRO): The office of the LPRO serves as the Legion's advocate and primary point of contact with the public and outside parties. The LPRO serves as the executive editor of all Legion publications and multimedia productions. The office of the LPRO also serves as the primary point of contact for celebrities and VIPs.
Legion Charity Representative (LCR): The office of the LCR serves as the Legion's primary point of contact with outside charitable organizations. The LCR manages documentation of Legion charitable activities and may publish and promote the Legion's charity efforts to the membership and the public.
Unit officers.
Garrison officers.
Garrison Commanding Officer (CO or GCO): The CO is elected by the Garrison membership. The CO is the chief administrator of the Garrison and is responsible for the operations of the Garrison and the coordination of events that occur within the Garrison's boundaries. The CO is responsible for maintaining communications with the Legion Council and Legion Command. The CO also appoints the Garrison officers and staff, and administers local forum rules. The CO is the principal representative of the Garrison membership on the Legion Council, and is responsible for assigning additional required Council representatives from the Garrison.
Garrison Executive Officer (XO or GXO): The XO is appointed by the CO. The XO may perform duties as assigned by the CO, and will assume leadership of the Garrison in the absence of the CO.
Garrison Membership Liaison (GML): The GML is appointed by the CO. The GML is responsible for reviewing and processing applications for membership and maintaining Garrison member information in the Legion database. The GML reports to the CO and the LMO.
Garrison Public Relations Officer (GPRO): The GPRO is appointed by the Garrison Commanding Officer. The GPRO assists the CO in promoting the Unit to the public and also may be called upon by the Legion PRO to assist in the public promotion of the Legion.
Garrison Web Liaison (GWL): The GWL is appointed by the Garrison Commanding Officer. The GWL assists the GML in the preparation and management of the Garrison Membership Profiles and is directly responsible for the processing and management of the Garrison Members' profile images.
Squad officers.
Squad Leader (SL): The SL is elected by the Squad's membership. The SL is the event coordinator for the local area in which the Squad operates. The SL reports directly to the parent Garrison's leadership.
Outpost officers.
Outpost Leader (OL): The OL of an Outpost is elected by the Outpost membership. The OL is the chief administrator of the Outpost and is responsible for the operations of the Outpost and the coordination of events that occur within the Outpost's boundaries. The OL is responsible for maintaining communications with the Legion Council and Legion Command. The OL also appoints any necessary Outpost officers and staff, and administers local forum rules. The OL is the principal representative of the Outpost membership on the Legion Council.
Detachment officers.
Detachment Leader (DL): The DL is elected by the Detachment membership. The DL is the chief administrator of the Detachment and is responsible for the operations of the Detachment and managing research and information about costume creation and construction. The DL also appoints any necessary Detachment officers and staff. DLs are supervised and represented on the Council by the LMO. A DL has the following responsibilities: Verify membership status in the Legion with the approved costume, and grant the appropriate access for active Legion members in good standing to detachments areas; monitor and moderate the Detachment forums, appointing additional moderators as needed; ensure that the Detachment Web site is properly maintained and the content therein is accurate and up to date; participate on the Legion forums and advise other DLs and GMLs as needed; maintain contact with the LMO and report any issue or controversy related to costuming.
Appearances.
The 501st Legion appears at several different venues for myriad reasons.
Community events.
Members of the 501st Legion participate in parades, school fairs, and community festivals.
Libraries.
The 501st Legion has been called in frequently to support many Star Wars events at public libraries, aimed at encouraging literacy among younger fans of the franchise. Library “Star Wars days” (including events for the official "Star Wars Reads Day") are routinely among the most popular events on a library's calendar. Activities like Stormtrooper Story Time, Jedi training games, trivia contests, coloring and drawing activity stations, and appearances by the 501st Legion help make these events successful.
Hospitals.
Members of the 501st Legion get frequently invited to appear at pediatric wards. When the 501st Legion appears in a hospital, they brighten the lives of children going through difficult trials and serious medical treatment.
Over the years, the 501st Legion has also been instrumental in granting the wishes of several Make-A-Wish children. Occasions such as these can make a difference for patients by providing them with some joy and comfort to them and their families during their treatments.
Scott Loxley of the 501st Legion was raising money for Monash Children's Hospital when he claims he was saved by stormtrooper armor from a bite on the shin by a deadly King Brown serpent near Yalboroo, Australia on January 14, 2015 as he walked down a road while walking entirely around the Australian continent.
Promotions.
Although the 501st Legion is not sponsored by Disney or Lucasfilm, they often call, together with their partners, upon members of the Legion to help promote the commercial release of new Star Wars products and tie-ins.
Legion members have become an established attraction at Disney World's annual Star Wars Weekends, the Star Wars: Where Science Meets Imagination museum exhibit, and Free Comic Book Day events across the United States.
Professional sports.
The 501st Legion has also partnered with various minor and major league sports franchises such as the National Hockey League, Major League Baseball, and National Basketball Association in recent years for special “Star Wars Nights.” These events have brought record attendance numbers to games. Members of the 501st Legion have participated in games at the minor league hockey and baseball levels, college sports, the Arena Football League, and the National Football League.
Conventions.
At formal events, members typically appear to have walked off the screen when portraying characters. At informal events (such as local science fiction conventions), members often display their creativity with genre mash-ups of their costumes.
Members of the 501st Legion frequently attend fandom's larger conventions including Dragon Con, San Diego Comic-Con, MCM London Comic Con, the Wizard World Comic Cons, and Megacon (among scores of other Sci-Fi conventions) where they often host a fan table or booth where the public can learn more about the Legion, see costumes and props on display, and speak directly with members. At HeroesCon, their table is generally set up near the similarly-themed, "Star Trek"-based Klingon Assault Group, and the two have a friendly rivalry to see who can solicit the most donations for charity.
Some larger units of the Legion also sometimes conduct activities like the Droid Hunt and Blast-a-Trooper at conventions.
The Droid Hunt is a give-away game where convention attendees become “the droids we’re looking for.” After the “droids” are "captured" by Legion members, the game concludes with a drawing for dozens of prizes from sponsors like Sideshow Collectibles, DK Publishing, Hasbro, Del Rey Publishers, Hallmark, Kotobukiya, and many other Star Wars merchandise partners.
In the Blast-a-Trooper game, fans fire foam darts at Imperial characters in exchange for a donation to charity. Blast-a-Trooper ranges have raised thousands of dollars for worthy causes around the world.
Concerts.
Legion units are often invited to appear on stage with symphonies and school bands who perform the music of John Williams.
Musician and comedian "Weird Al" Yankovic has invited members of the 501st Legion on stage during performances of his "Star Wars"-themed songs "Yoda" and "The Saga Begins", recruiting members of local garrisons while on tour. In appreciation, the 501st inducted Yankovic as a "Friend of the Legion", in September 2007.
Rock band No Doubt and country music band Sugarland have also invited 501st members up on stage during their performances in the past.
Television.
For the "MythBusters" "Star Wars" special, entitled "Revenge of the Myth" and the 2014 season premiere, the Legion's Golden Gate Garrison joined Adam Savage, who is an honorary Legion member after working with ILM during the prequel trilogy, on the show. They featured in the tests of the myths of Luke's swing while carrying Leia across the Death Star chasm in "" as they shot at Luke and Leia - played by Jamie Hyneman (inducted into the New England chapter of the 501st in 2014) and Sophia Bush - as they attempted the swing. They also chased after Jamie, Adam (as Han) and Sophia as the myth concluded for cinematic effect. A couple of them also featured in the background in a redwood forest similar to one on the Endor moon during tests of the Ewok log swing from "Return of the Jedi" alongside another ILM alumnus and honorary 501st member, Grant Imahara, as Han and Kari Byron as Leia.
Members were also featured on the Christmas 2012 episode of "".
The Legion was called in to play stormtrooper extras for the official "Star Wars" series "The Mandalorian" after the pilot's directors realized that they did not have enough stormtrooper armor to complete a shot.
Charitable works.
Giving back to the community is one of the 501st Legion's highest priorities. Because of this, the 501st Legion proudly refers to themselves as the "Bad Guys Doing Good." Members regularly participate in events to raise awareness for charitable causes, from walk-a-thons to blood drives, and provide opportunities for fundraising through events such as their "Blast-A-Trooper" game, where donations are collected from the public to target armored characters with Nerf blasters.
In September 2016, the 501st Legion announced their commitment to a first-of-its kind international endowment in a unique partnership with Make-A-Wish. The 501st Legion Make-A-Wish Endowment Fund will allow Make-A-Wish America and Make-A-Wish International to grant more Star Wars-related wishes to children diagnosed with life-threatening medical conditions. The endowment fund allows Make-A-Wish to grant wishes, alternating between the United States and international locations every other year – a first for an endowment of this kind. The Endowment relies on contributions from its members, as well as the public. With a goal of $150,000 in the fund by 2021, the Endowment fund will grant wishes from the interest accrued; as the fund continues to grow, so will the number of wishes granted by the endowment.
The 501st Legion never charges a fee for an appearance, but they do welcome donations to a charity in honor of the Legion or the local Legion unit. If an event host does not have a charity of choice, Legion members frequently direct the donations to the Endowment Fund. In cases where the event host is itself a charitable organization, a donation is usually not accepted by the 501st Legion as they volunteer their time for that charitable organization.
In 2016, the members of the 501st donated over 182,000 hours of community service, raising over $889,000 USD in direct donations, and participated in events that helped raise over $46 million for charities worldwide. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | List of Clarion Writers Workshop Instructors
This is a list of past instructors in the Clarion Workshop, an annual writers' workshop for science fiction, fantasy, and speculative literature writers.
Instructors marked with an asterisk are also graduates of the Clarion or Clarion West workshops.
2015 Instructors.
Clarion 2015 writers in residence: |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Odyssey Writing Workshop
Founded in 1996 by World Fantasy Award winning editor Jeanne Cavelos, the Odyssey Writing Workshop is held annually on the campus of Saint Anselm College in Goffstown, New Hampshire. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Science Fiction Poetry Association
The Science Fiction & Fantasy Poetry Association (SFPA) is an American society that brings together poets and readers interested in this specialist poetic genre. SFPA administers the annual Rhysling Awards for the best science fiction, fantasy, or horror poem of the year, and the Elgin Awards for the best full-length speculative poetry collection and best speculative chapbook.
History.
SFPA was established as the Science Fiction Poetry Association in 1978 by Suzette Haden Elgin to bring together poets and readers interested in science fiction poetry. In 2015 the president of the SFPA was Bryan D. Dietrich, with Bryan Thao Worra starting as president in September 2016, with Vice-President Sandra J. Lindow and Secretary Shannon Connor Winward. In 2017, members of the Science Fiction Poetry Association voted to change the name of the organization to the Science Fiction & Fantasy Poetry Association, while keeping the acronym "SFPA", similar to the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America.
Awards.
Since its inception in 1978, the organization has administered the Rhysling Award for best science fiction poetry of the year. The award is given in two categories: "Best Long Poem", for works of 50 or more lines, and "Best Short Poem", for works of 49 or fewer lines. It also bestows the Dwarf Stars Award for short poem (up to ten lines). Since the 1980s the Rhysling-winning poems are included in the Nebula Awards anthology published by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, along with (since 2008) the Dwarf Stars winning poems. The two awards involve the publication of annual anthologies of nominated works.
In 2013, SFPA inaugurated the Elgin Awards for poetry collections, named after SFPA founder Suzette Haden Elgin. Two awards are given annually, for best speculative chapbook and best full-length speculative poetry collection.
The SFPA awards "Grand Master" status to poets who have been actively publishing genre poetry of high caliber, given “to an individual living at the time of selection whose body of work shall reflect the highest artistic goals of the SFPA, who shall have been actively publishing within the target genres of Science Fiction and Fantasy for a period of no fewer than 20 years, and whose poetry has been noted to be exceptional in merit, scope, vision and innovation.”
Publications.
Magazines.
The organization has published the journal "Star*Line" since 1978. "Star*Line" publishes poetry as well as providing market listings and industry news to members. The current editor of "Star*Line" is Vince Gotera.
It has published the online magazine "Eye to the Telescope" since 2011. "Eye to the Telescope" has a rotating editorship, in order to broaden the scope of the organization's literary footprint. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Melbourne Science Fiction Club
The Melbourne Science Fiction Club Inc. (Also known as the M.S.F.C. or colloquially "the club") was founded in May 1952 by Race Mathews and others. It is the second oldest continuously active science fiction club in the world, after the Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society. It meets once a month in Melbourne.
Members of the MSFC were instrumental in organising and running three World Science Fiction Conventions in Australia: Aussiecon in 1975; Aussiecon Two in 1985; and Aussiecon 3 in 1999. Current members were involved in the Aussiecon 4 Worldcon in 2010. Members have also been involved in running many of the annual versions of the Australian National Science Fiction Conventions and other regional conventions in and around Melbourne, Australia.
Many members of Australian Science fiction fandom have been members of the MSFC. Notable members/past-members of the MSFC include Merv Binns (SF fan, editor, fanzine publisher and proprietor of Australia's first specialist SF bookshop, Space Age Books) Ian Gunn, (Past president and club fanzine editor) winner of the Hugo Award for Best Fan Artist 1999, Lee Harding, Damien Broderick, Alan Stewart (secretary for 16 years and Ditmar Award winner), Cheryl Morgan (editor of the Hugo Award for Best Fanzine winning fanzine, "Emerald City"), Phil Wlodarczyk, Martin James Ditmar ("Dick") Jenssen (after whom the Ditmar Award is named), Bruce Gillespie (Fan Guest of Honour at the 1999 World Science Fiction Convention Aussiecon 3), John Bangsund and Race Mathews who later became a Minister in the Victorian Legislative Assembly.
The MSFC has a library of over 8,000 volumes and a huge collection of fanzines, which is currently in storage. It is listed as a special library for researchers and has a computer catalogue of approximately 5,500 titles. Work continues on the catalogue.
There have been several club fanzines: In the 1950s, the club newszine was called "Etherline", which was followed later in the sixties by the "Somerset Gazette". There were no formal club zines in the 1970s. Since 1985 the MSFC has published a newszine called "Ethel the Aardvark", which has won the Ditmar Award several times, under different editors, including Alan Stewart, Ian Gunn and Paul Ewins, and the Chronos Award. It is up to issue #204 and continuing. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Trap Door Spiders
The Trap Door Spiders are a literary male-only eating, drinking, and arguing society in New York City, with a membership historically composed of notable science fiction personalities. The name is a reference to the reclusive habits of the trapdoor spider, which when it enters its burrow pulls the hatch shut behind it.
History and practices.
The Trap Door Spiders were established by author Fletcher Pratt in 1944, in response to the June 7, 1943 marriage of his friend Dr. John D. Clark to operatic soprano Mildred Baldwin. The new Mrs. Clark was unpopular with her husband's friends, despite their participation in the ceremony (Pratt's own wife Inga Stephens Pratt was matron of honor, and L. Sprague de Camp served as Clark's best man). Pratt reasoned that the club would give them an excuse to spend time with him without her. The presidency of the club rotated among the members, the president for a given evening being the member who had volunteered to host the meeting by giving the dinner and supplying a guest. Over the course of its existence the Trap Door Spiders has counted among its members numerous professional men, many of them writers and editors active in the science fiction genre, along with some prominent fans such as Dr. Clark.
The get-togethers of the Trap Door Spiders followed a set format, which remained consistent through the years; a dinner, given by the host for the evening, to which he would invite a guest who would be grilled by the others and form the focus of conversation for the evening. The grilling was traditionally begun by the host for the evening enquiring of the guest "How do you justify your existence?" or some variation, such as "Why do you exist?" Jack Coggins remembers that an editor for "Reader's Digest" went home from a meeting in tears after a brutally personal grilling. Coggins once invited Worthen Paxton, art director of "Life Magazine", to a meeting. As of 1976, the club met roughly one Friday a month, eight or nine times a year, and maintained a membership of thirteen, among whom the privilege of hosting the meetings rotated. The host of a given meeting selected the restaurant, wine, and menu for the evening, and had the option of inviting one or two guests he believed might prove interesting to the other members.
The group remained active through at least January 16, 1990, when its members attended a party given by Doubleday for Isaac Asimov at Tavern on the Green in New York City. The event commemorated Asimov's seventieth birthday and the fortieth anniversary of the publication of his first book. According to L. Sprague de Camp, the club was "still thriving" as of 1996.
Membership.
Membership of the club was by invitation, and varied as some Trap Door Spiders died or moved away (or in at least one instance was dropped by the consensus of the other members) and as others were admitted on the nomination of existing members. People known to have been members of the club include:
According to magician and skeptic James Randi, other prominent figures attending Trap Door Spiders meetings included authors Frederik Pohl and L. Ron Hubbard, as well as Randi himself. All three appear to have attended as guests rather than members (Pohl in particular has written he was never a member), though Randi did consider himself an "honorary" member.
Owing to the writings of Isaac Asimov (see below), those most closely associated with the group are Bensen, Cant, Carter, Clark, de Camp, del Rey, and Asimov himself.
The Trap Door Spiders in fiction.
The Trap Door Spiders are fictionalized in L. Sprague de Camp's historical novel "The Bronze God of Rhodes" (1960), as "The Seven Strangers," a social club holding symposia in the ancient Greek city-state of Rhodes. Such Spider elements as the rotating presidency and the question put to guests are faithfully represented in the practices of the Strangers.
The club was also the inspiration for Isaac Asimov's fictional group of puzzle solvers the Black Widowers, protagonists of a long-running series of mystery short stories beginning in 1971. Asimov, a Boston resident who was often an invited guest of the Trap Door Spiders when in New York, became a permanent member of the club when he moved to the area in 1970.
Asimov loosely modeled his fictional "Black Widowers" on six of the real-life Trap Door Spiders. He gave his characters professions somewhat more varied than those of their models, while retaining aspects of their personalities and appearances. Asimov's characters and their real-life counterparts are:
Other real people, including members of the Spiders and others, also occasionally appeared in the series in fictional guise. These included Fletcher Pratt (albeit deceased and offstage) as Widowers founder Ralph Ottur in the story "To the Barest," and (as guests) Asimov himself (in a humorously unflattering portrayal) as arrogant author Mortimer Stellar in "When No Man Pursueth", James Randi as stage magician The Amazing Larri in "The Cross of Lorraine", and Harlan Ellison as writer Darius Just (a character who first appeared as protagonist of Asimov's 1976 mystery novel "Murder at the ABA") in "The Woman in the Bar."
The remaining member of the Widowers, the group's waiter and unfailing sleuth Henry Jackson, was completely fictional, though Asimov did liken the character to that of P.G. Wodehouse's Jeeves from the Bertie Wooster novels. |
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Clarion is a six-week workshop for aspiring science fiction and fantasy writers. Originally an outgrowth of Damon Knight and Kate Wilhelm's Milford Writers' Conference, held at their home in Milford, Pennsylvania, United States, it was founded in 1968 by Robin Scott Wilson at Clarion State College in Pennsylvania. Knight and Wilhelm were among the first teachers at the workshop.
In 1972, the workshop moved to Michigan State University. It moved again, in 2006, to the University of California, San Diego.
Other Clarion Workshops.
Independently operated workshops which share the Clarion name and follow its founding principles include: |
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This is a partial list of alumni of the Clarion Workshop, an annual writers' workshop for science fiction, fantasy, and speculative literature writers. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | National Fantasy Fan Federation
The National Fantasy Fan Federation (N3F or NFFF) is one of the world's oldest science fiction fandom organizations. The organization was founded in April 1941 when all science fiction, horror, and fantasy literature was lumped into one category called "fantasy." The group actively encourages the development of writers, editors, and artists.
History.
The group was founded by a loose cadre of members of Boston, Massachusetts-based Stranger Club who were inspired by the Damon Knight article "Unite - or Fie!" published in that month's "Fanfare". Knight said the withering of "New Fandom" should be counteracted by the creation of a general-purpose organization to link avid readers of all forms of speculative fiction. The club still exists today and continues to reach many of its members by regular mail, though it now has a growing online presence with its Web site and related mailing lists via the Internet.
Organization and Services.
The N3F has a president, treasurer, secretary and directorate which handles the day-to-day operation of the club's business. The president and directorate are elected by the membership.
The club's activities revolve mainly around its bureaus, which are headed by club members who volunteer for the positions and are appointed by the president. Bureaus can consist of one to more than one person, depending on the level of participation by club members. Current bureaus include art, computer gaming, correspondence, welcommittee, Mangaverse, teaching SF, Future Fandom, Writer's Exchange and an amateur press alliance.
Perhaps the heart of the N3F's bureau activities are the round robins (RRs), which are conducted by both regular mail and e-mail. RRs, as they are called, are groups of members with interest in a specific topic (a particular writer, or a subject such as comics, cats in SF, dragons, horror, Star Trek, time travel, etc.). Each RR has a Robin Master, who starts the group with sending a letter or e-mail to one of the other members; that person adds their contribution and sends both items on to the next person in the group. Each time the packet returns to a member, they remove their previous contribution and insert a new one, often containing responses to what other RR members have written. This is one of the club's oldest and longest-lasting activities, because it allows members to comment on topics of their interest without requiring them to travel or meet others in person. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | Trans-Atlantic Fan Fund
The Trans-Atlantic Fan Fund, often known as TAFF, is a crowdfunding project created in 1953 for the purpose of providing funds to bring well-known and popular members of science fiction fandom familiar to fans on both sides of the ocean, across the Atlantic.
History.
The first international fan fund, the "Big Pond Fund", was established to get Ted Carnell to the 1947 Worldcon, though it was the 1949 Worldcon he eventually attended. TAFF's roots lie in the successful effort to bring Walt Willis to the 1952 Worldcon in Chicago. Willis published the founding document for TAFF in "Hyphen" 4 (October 1953) following a discussion with "the available leaders of British fandom" at that year's Coroncon. Since that time TAFF has regularly brought North American fans to European conventions and European fans to North American conventions. The success of TAFF has inspired other regular fan funds between North America and Australia, Europe and Australia, and even Eastern and Western Canada.
Funding.
TAFF is funded through the support of fandom. Candidates are voted on by interested fans all over the world, and each vote is accompanied by a donation of not less than $4 or £3 or €4. These donations, and the continued generosity of fandom, are what make TAFF possible.
In addition to donations, fans hold auctions at science fiction conventions to raise money for TAFF. Frequently art, books, T-shirts, and other ephemera of fandom are auctioned off for this purpose.
Procedure.
Each candidate posts a bond, promising to travel (if elected) to a major convention on the other side of the Atlantic; and has provided signed nominations and a platform.
Voting is by secret ballot, using instant-runoff voting; and is open to anyone who has been active in fandom for the prior year or more and who contributes to the Fund. Ballots are signed, to prevent ballot-box stuffing and to enable the election administrators to identify each voter as a known member of fandom.
Although the winner is expected to attend Worldcon or a specific national convention, TAFF delegates generally also tour the country before and/or after the convention in order to meet a variety of fans.
Winning TAFF candidates are expected to write a trip report, which customarily takes the form of a fanzine or a series of fanzine articles. These fanzines are sometimes sold in order to help raise funds towards future TAFF trips. In addition, winners take over the administration of the fund for their region (Europe or North America) until the next regional TAFF delegate is selected (usually a period of two years, unless the next race is delayed). At any given time, there are at least two administrators, one for each region.
List of TAFF winners.
Past TAFF winners by year.
Westbound races are marked « and eastbound ».
There were no TAFF races in 1953, 1967, 1972, 1975, 1978, 1990, 1994, and 1997.
The second 1998 race was announced to "catch up" after the lack of a 1997 race.
The 2007 race between Chris Garcia and Mary Kay Kare was cancelled due to the cancellation of the 2007 Eastercon; Garcia stood again in 2008 and won.
The direction of the 2016 race was switched by the administrators (Nina Horvath, Jim Mowatt and Curt Phillips) to align with the 2017 Worldcon being held in Helsinki, Finland, and the likelihood of the 2019 Worldcon being held in Dublin, Ireland. The race for 2020 is again east-bound, and is sending a North American TAFF delegate to the 2020 Eastercon. |
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} | m2d2_wiki | The Science Fiction Forum
The Science Fiction Forum, founded in 1968 by James Frenkel, is a student club at Stony Brook University.
The club maintains a large lending library of science fiction, fact, fantasy and horror with over 18,000 volumes.
Since 1983, the Science Fiction Forum has produced "Destinies-The Voice of Science Fiction," a weekly radio show airing on Fridays at 11:30 PM on WUSB, 90.1FM.
As of the spring semester of 2021, the Science Fiction Forum (often abbreviated SF4M) is located in the basement level of the newly renovated Student Union. The forum is expected to be open in person for fall 2021.
Membership is officially obtained through registration with the currently appointed secretary, or by simply walking through the main lounge doors twice of the applicant's own free will, whichever comes first. |
Subsets and Splits