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San Francisco, 8:26 PM
Sat Nov 21
18 posts in the last 24 hours
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04/15/09
04/15/09
Star Wars aside, I prefer my science fiction without nonsense like psychic powers. To me that's just magic and belongs in a fantasy story.
I guess I'm willing to make exceptions though. I liked Minority Report as movie though. I just ignored all the precognition stuff and focused on the futuristic, and mostly plausible, tech.
04/15/09
04/15/09
If the telepathy could be explained in a way that is remotely plausible, perhaps zillions of nanobots in my brain wiretapping my neurons, sending these signals out through a fiber optic cable to another person with similar nanobots and cable in his head. This might be just remotely believable enough for me to suspend disbelief. But telepathy based on some mysterious, physics defying ectoplasmic juice? No.
Precognition might also just be remotely acceptable to me if it was some very indirect, mathematical refinement to social sciences, like psychohistory. But having dreams about my mother dying in a car crash the night before. No. That's just coincidence.
Telekineses or any form of mind over matter is right out. If I wanna set something on fire, I don't just furrow my brow and chant real hard, I just turn a flamethrower on it.
All my examples require an instrumentality of some kind and are based real science that's just remotely possible.
Ectoplasmic psionic juice or The Force is just other words for mana or magic. It's hooey that ruins a modern science fiction story for me.
04/15/09
one century's man's ectoplasmic juice could be another century's man's quantum entanglement.
04/15/09
Sorry but quantum theory provides no support at all for psychic powers.
All the quantum la-la books that has been touted over the last 30 years where the authors claim that QM supports auras, dowsing and other such nonsense are just arm chair theorists who don't really understand quantum theory.
Of course we could discover some utterly new kind of physics that somehow extends known physics and somehow supports the claims of spirit mediums, Jeane Dixon, Uri Geller and so on then okay. But in over two centuries of looking and decades of parapsychological research we haven't found anything yet.
Now, a real scientist would say lack of evidence is no reason, by itself, to stop looking and I believe parapsychology research should go on. But in my personal opinion, psychic stuff is bunk.
04/15/09
04/08/09
[www.sublevel12.de]
04/08/09
I wish you continued success and hope to find more of your work in English in the future!
04/07/09
you kinda touch on the reason for why, though: perry rhodan.
that series has such an outrageous mind share in the general public, it's really hard to penetrate into the collective consciousness with a notion that SF is something -- ANYTHING -- other than hyper-trashy pulp rags. you say some aspects of trek and doctor who are kinda trashy and whatnot also -- honestly, diane carey's mary sue trek novels, every last episode of doctor who and 'spock's brain' are to perry rhodan what stranger in a strange land, the foundation series and dune are to SF.
it's really just not a comparison. i was once gifted 6 perry rhodan mags and after reading the first, was flabbergasted just how bad it was. in retrospect, reading the remaining 5 to see if it ever got any better was an exercise in masochism at an early age.
i suspect that the general low opinion of SF due perry rhodan has kinda undercut proliferation of SF in german speaking realm. whereas in east germany (where PR wasn't exactly common), it flourished (and you're right on the button btw -- all the best SF i remember came out of east germany, hungary and the then-CSSR.)
incidentially, nice seeing books with the 'heyne' tradedress again. germany has some truly amazing paperback publishers. heyne and DTV are two publishers i sorely miss (oh, and the one with the black and white pinstriped trade dress -- forget their name, they published all the james bond books i read as a kid.)
04/07/09
I first read some PR when I was nine years old and thought "Wow, this is awful!" And this is when I thought Godzilla and Jason of Star Command was Serious Art.
The stuff coming from the GDR really intrigued me, what could you recommend from that era?
04/07/09
This seems curious, since Nietzsche's supermen were also "a mentally advanced race with a corresponding superior moral sense" ... last time I checked, anyway.
Of course, no one really agrees about Nietzsche, but it would be interesting to know exactly what differentiated the ideas of these writers from his views.
04/07/09
Lassiwitz felt the more developed a people were, the more caring and benevolent they would become.
04/07/09
Rottensteiner published many very interesting anthologies but I can't find an exact equivalent to this one.
Maybe they assumed (wrongly) that german-speaking Science Fiction fans already know about all the featured authors.
But it would certainly feel weird if I read it in english. :/
04/07/09
[www.phantastik-news.de]
[www.sf-hefte.homepage.t-online.de]
[www.chpr.at]
04/07/09
So now I put it to you, my io9 siblings around the world:
what non-English-language SF authors really excite you? Please share with us your favorites.
(Just so we don't get too off topic: Most of us already know Stanislaw Lem and probably at least heard of the Strugatsky brothers. Manga and Anime probably don't count as that gets translated everywhere. kthnxbai)
04/07/09
It appears that Karin Boye wrote some sci-fi though, which is interesting considering she's a pretty famous poet and writer up here. Mostly since I never heard of it, but anyway, it's called [b]Kallocain[/b], and is apparently pretty famous and translated to several languages, so it might not be news I suppose.
At least I'm gonna have to read it.
Earliest Swedish sci-fi is [b]Oxygen and Aromasia[/b] by Claes Lundin, from 1878. I have no idea if it's any good, or is even available in English.
04/07/09
The German story is at times very jokey with silly names and a heroine who plays the "odorchord", an instrument that produces music and scents. But there is also serious debate between science/rationality and art/emotion. I also like a scene in the distant future with a pair of posthuman "Cerebrals" who fly with propeller feet.
Might be well worth checking out the longer Swedish version.
04/07/09
He's one of my scientific patron saints. Wikipedia him, at least; he was a cool guy. He contributed greatly to the study of sensation and perception in psychology.
He also went a little bit weird and tried to detect the souls of plants through objective measure, but that just makes him even more colorful and awesome.
04/07/09
02/16/09
01/12/09
01/12/09
01/12/09
01/12/09
01/12/09
War with the Newts really was a novel, though.
01/12/09
01/12/09
01/12/09
Well done!
01/12/09
01/12/09
Nevins is like a SpecFic Librarian Warlod Supreme. Has i09 ever done an interview with him?
01/12/09
Don't remember the name of the short film for the life of me, but the premise was that androids did menial tasks in an office environment day in and day out, suffering humiliation and degradation by the humans that ran them, and were left in the office every night to charge.
Eventually, a male android notices a female android in the building across the street and breaks his programming to go meet her, where they both instantly fall in love with each other, while the humans look on in amusement and horror.
It kind of made you feel ashamed to be a human after watching it.
01/12/09
01/12/09
01/12/09
01/12/09
01/12/09
01/12/09
01/12/09
How about the horror on Tictok's part... one spring for talking, one for thinking, one for moving... none that he can reach.
01/12/09
01/12/09
That movie was so perfect it was awe-inspiring. It just nails the eerie atmosphere of the books.
@Adah: That's The Marvellous Land of Oz which is the second one. Ozma is the third.
01/13/09
01/13/09
12/16/08