Spider Star
The human colony on the planet Argo has long explored and exploited the technology left behind by an extinct alien race. But then an archaeology team accidentally activates a terrible weapon...
Read More.Praise for Star Dragon
"Seldom does a storytelling talent come along as potent and fully mature as Mike Brotherton. His complex characters take you on a voyage that is both fiercely credible and astonishingly imaginative. This is Science Fiction."
-- David Brin"Star Dragon is terrific fare, offering readers a fusion of hard science and grand adventure."
-- Locus Magazine"Star Dragon is steeped in cosmology, the physics of interstellar travel, exobiology, artificial intelligence, bioscience. Brotherton, author of many scientific articles in refereed journals, has written a dramatic, provocative, utterly convincing hard science sf novel that includes an ironic twist that fans will love."
-- Booklist starred review"Readers hungry for the thought-provoking extrapolation and rigorous technical detail of old-fashioned hard SF are sure to enjoy astronomer Brotherton's first novel."
-- Publishers Weekly"Mike Brotherton, himself a trained astrophysicist, combines the technical acuity and ingenuity of Robert Forward with the ironic, postmodern stance and style of M. John Harrison. In this, his debut novel, those twin talents unite to produce a work that is involving on any number of levels. It's just about all you could ask for in a hardcore SF adventure."
-- Paul di Fillippo, SCI-FI.COM
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Super Late Sunday Starlinks
January 23rd, 2012
Some starlinks for this week. I have a load more on another machine, mostly science/politics/education, and may post those later this week. In the meantime, lots of interesting things:
An old friend of mine now has a nice gig at Forbes.com and reports that NASA is relenting about releasing Richard Garriot’s science fiction film made in space. I probably should have listed him as one of my multiple-threat genre heroes in my post from a few weeks back.
Another cute, short science fiction film making the rounds. It’s only about the length of a pop song, so check it out.
Scientist pickup lines, backed by Howard Wollowitz. I don’t suggest anyone actually use any of these, but thinking of them as bad science jokes, they’re worth a few moments diversion. A couple may be LOL worthy.
Some astronomy news from the National Science Foundation on new classes of planets and the origins of some supernovas.
And the Milky Way hosts at least 100 billion planets.
Astronomers to attempt to image the black hole at the center of our galaxy.
How to make your own light-up Cyclops visor. Am I the only one whose favorite X-Man is Cyclops?
A scientific literacy quiz. Kind of dumb from question one, which doesn’t specify a percentage by mass or particle density or an altitude. Sort of the science factoid version of scientific literacy, which I think is insufficient as literacy about the scientific process is equally valuable. OK, I just did the first 12 of 50, getting them all correct, and have to say it’s slow and too many questions are really science trivia for my taste.
Nine of ten of the hottest years on record have been since 2000. Phil Plait on climate change and telling deniers that they’re full of crap.
Creepiest thing I’ve seen in a while: Real-life Beavis and Butthead. Huh huh huh.
George Lucas accepts the blame for the Indiana Jones in the fridge scene.
Fringe renewal sounds iffy again. I like the show and wish it continues, but mostly I’d be happy with an ending at this stage when it does go. I’m still haunted by Twin Peaks.
Former astronaut to lead starship project. I love it that there’s a starship project.
Related news, interstellar space sex not so sexy, unfortunately.
How much energy required by the Death Star to destroy Earth? Ah, a good physics problem to give my students…
The rise of, and limitations of, groupthink. This is one reason I stopped playing RPGs in favor of writing.
Digital textbooks. As a college professor, I have been giving thought to the future of (higher) education. Some opportunities to do some things better and cheaper, but also some potential pitfalls.
More future predictions: twenty of them for 100 years from now. Agree with many of them. A few seem implausible.
What if humans were twice as intelligent? Republicans wouldn’t exist? Ha ha! Ok, that’s a biased, partisan joke that not everyone would find funny. I do wonder about the changes if the intelligence distribution were changed in various ways, as well as the distribution of personal work ethic, creativity, physical appearance, gender, etc. Mess with any of them and you’ve got an interesting science fiction story. Yeah, many of them have been done, but an infinity remain.
An update on SETI, with good news and bad news…and this is NOT aliens.
Do those in the humanities fields suffer physics envy?
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January 26th, 2012 at 5:43 pm
Is there a good science literacy quiz? I would like to know of any reasonable standardized test of approximately 50-items I could give to college freshman and then give again to them as seniors to see if their scientific literacy improved during their college education. I’d like to have such tests for pre-test/post-test comparisons in a variety of general fields. One could always have students take some sort of general science achievement test, but I’m not interested in a long and detailed test, just a modest quiz someone could do in 20-30 minutes. Know of anything like this?
January 26th, 2012 at 5:59 pm
Well, the one here, but I’m not wild about it, as I said. There is a standard one administered every year by some national organization. Let me see if I can find it and it’s available…
No, can’t find what I was thinking of. There are exams out there, but I don’t know one off the top of my head that meets your specs. Also you’re probably aware of science literacy vs. scientific literacy, and there will be quizes online for both of varying quality.
January 26th, 2012 at 6:01 pm
Okay, I’ll keep an eye out for one, and if I ever find one, I’ll let you know. This one you don’t like very much isn’t really suitable. It’s more a science trivia quiz, which can be fun, I guess, but it’s not really good enough.
January 26th, 2012 at 6:08 pm
Actually, now that I’ve gone deeper into the Christian Science Monitor test, I notice that the questions get better. I think it could be the basis for a good test, with some modifications.