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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
Does Science Fiction Dampen Interest in Space Exploration?
July 14th, 2008
Here’s the brief article quoting Buzz Aldrin:
I blame the fantastic and unbelievable shows about space flight and rocket ships that are on today. All the shows where they beam people around and things like that have made young people think that that is what the space program should be doing. It’s not realistic…if you start dealing with fantasy and beaming people up and down and traveling seven times the speed of light, you are doing damage. You’re not helping. You have young people who have got expectations that are far unrealistic, and you can’t possibly live up to the expectations you have created in young people. Why do they get bored with the space program? That’s why.
I think Aldrin has a point, but not an absolute one. I was inspired to go into science in part because of my love of science fiction, and Star Trek was the first introduction to sf I can remember. Star Trek itself probably owes the space program for getting greenlit, so there’s something circular going on here. Science fiction definitely inspires, or supports, the dreams of some folks who embrace space exploration.
As an educator, I’ve seen Aldrin’s point plenty enough, however. There are a lot of ridiculous space fantasies out there, and I believe they do have the effect of undermining the real thing. They do lead to unrealistic expectations, misconceptions, and more. TV and movies in particular trivialize serious problems. The worst offenders get the science wrong, but portray themselves as science-savvy if only for the window dressing of high-tech stuff.
Aldrin seems to fall into the camp advocating mundane science fiction rather than hard sf (see my explanation of the distinction), but we have common goals: educating people about the realities of the endeavor to explore space and getting them excited about it. My space exploration involves objects much more distant than the moon, but suffers from a similar lack of support among some. Getting answers to our questions about quasars and such is a slow, laborious, and expensive process and depends on complex, multi-level supporting arguments that need constant checking and sometimes revision. It isn’t cheap or easy and takes a lot longer to communicate how and why something is really cool — a problem for some in the post-Star Wars generation of CGI and broadband.
My personal contribution to addressing Aldrin’s issue has been to try to educate writers at Launch Pad about modern space science and astronomy, leading to, I hope, more stories that have better quality science and realism.
So, is Aldrin mostly right? Mostly wrong? Or is it more complicated?
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July 14th, 2008 at 11:51 am
Does Science Fiction Dampen Interest in Space Exploration?…
I was inspired to go into science in part because of my love of science fiction, and Star Trek was the first introduction to sf I can remember. Star Trek itself probably owes the space program for getting greenlit, so there’s something ……
July 14th, 2008 at 9:55 pm
[...] Does science fiction dampen interest in space exploration? [...]
July 14th, 2008 at 10:34 pm
Ask NASA or any other large tech company, or maybe your telco or television broadcaster if satellites are handy. They were a concept in a SCIENCE FICTION story by Arther C. Clarke(I believe) in the fifties. Many of todays everyday articles were once casually mentioned in SF. I Don’t believe SF dampens interest in anything.
[quote]All the shows where they beam people around and things like that have made young people think that that is what the space program should be doing. It’s not realistic[/quote]
Scientists have now “beamed” a particle of light from one place to another. It’s a start.
I have a grievance with people who make blanket statements without checking the facts.
Also, check out the many groups working on asteroid mining, space elevator, moon habitations and space habitats. They have not had their interest dampened, they’ve had it piqued.
jim
July 15th, 2008 at 1:18 pm
[...] opposite phenomenon: when science fiction hurts good science. [io9, Science Fiction in Biology and Mike Brotherton via SF [...]
July 15th, 2008 at 5:33 pm
[...] Others have been posting on this as well, I’ve found, including scifi writer (and BABloggee!) Mike Brotherton and the scifi blog [...]
July 17th, 2008 at 12:30 am
[...] wasn’t the only one to comment on Buzz Aldrin’s statements regarding science fiction and space exploration. Annalee Newitz at io9 responded nicely with a list of science fiction than hindered and inspired [...]
October 29th, 2008 at 5:36 am
[...] I blogged about this over the summer, and there’s a poll there, too, and now update my answer: I have to be a weenie and equivocate. For some people yes, for some people, no, and for some people it isn’t an issue. [...]
April 8th, 2009 at 7:06 pm
[...] statement. According to him, the reason kids are not as interested in the space program anymore is because they’ve been exposed to all kinds of unrealistic fantasy in science fiction stories. I can totally see where he’s coming [...]