Best Sci-Fi Reading for the summer...
Mark
- I could do with some good suggestions.
It is getting a little difficult pulling out some genuinely good sci-
fi reads amongst the plethora of very mediocre fantasy stuff being
churned out. I read a lot on my summer hols and what to take 4-5
really good sci-fi.
I have read a lot before (virtually all of Asimov, Dick, Clarke,
Heinlein) and have more recently enjoyed books by Bear, Vinge, Stanley-
Robinson etc.. but I have also picked up some bad stuff too. I like
'wide-scale' plots but don't 'get off' on anything that loses itself
in too much techy stuff. Quite like stuff on alien civilisations,
space conflict etc... (foundation series was excellent).
I would really appreciate some recommendations from anything recent
(say last 10 years) but am also looking to discover one or two
'classic' authors other than the obvious ones I have listed.
Just a few suggestions from anyone would be very welcome!!
Thanks
Mark
Egil
> Just a few suggestions from anyone would be very welcome!!
I have recently finished Peter F. Hamiltons Pandora's Star and Judas
Unchained, which I found to be very good. I liked them better than his
"Night's Dawn" trilogy.
I also recently read Jack McDevitt's "A Talent for War" which was also
very good. It was really interesting how you learned about the
interstellar war through the main characters investigative efforts
instead of being told firsthand.
mvh
E
Anthony Nance
Given your helpful data above, I highly recommend the Dread Empire's
Fall trilogy by Walter Jon Williams (_The Praxis_, _The Sundering_,
_Conventions of War_, published 2002-2004).
Since you mention 'classic' authors, H Beam Piper's _Space Viking_
also seems to fit well. Lighter on space conflict but very well
fitting the rest is Jack Vance's Demon Princes five-some.
Lastly, if you think you'd like "U-Boats in space" without tons of
techy stuff, I also recommend Glen Cook's recently re-released (by
Night Shade) _Passage At Arms_. It is usually listed as a fourth/final
book in his Starfishers series, but it definitely works as a stand-alone.
(I read the trilogy after I read PAA and imho they are barely related
at all; certainly not in plot-important ways.)
Happy hunting!
Tony
Barb
and have new books out now. I think if you liked Hamilton, you'll like
these.
Neal Asher - later books quite difficult to understand sometimes,
over-technical and bizarre - but well worth a go.
Back to the classics: Anything by William Gibson - try The Bridge Trilogy -
not only wonderful, mind-bending stuff, but beautifully written.
Barb UK
"Mark" <mark....@btinternet.com> wrote in message
news:1183032691....@c77g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
Andy Leighton
> On Jun 28, 2:11 pm, Mark <mark.kir...@btinternet.com> wrote:
>
>> Just a few suggestions from anyone would be very welcome!!
>
> I have recently finished Peter F. Hamiltons Pandora's Star and Judas
> Unchained, which I found to be very good. I liked them better than his
> "Night's Dawn" trilogy.
Neal Asher's stuff would probably suit as well.
Alastair Reynold's _Century Rain_ would be a good choice as well. He has
a couple of short story collections out which are also to be recommended.
--
Andy Leighton => an...@azaal.plus.com
"The Lord is my shepherd, but we still lost the sheep dog trials"
- Robert Rankin, _They Came And Ate Us_
Jon Schild
_Spin_ by Robert Charles Wilson
_Old Man's War_, _The Ghost Brigades_, _The Last Colony_ by John Scalzi
for humor, _The Android's Dream_ by John Scalzi (not related to the
above 3 books)
Many here will disagree with these, but _Hominids_, _Humans_, _Hybrids_
by Robert J Sawyer
art...@yahoo.com
The Years Best SF is always worth a read.
This years includes an alternate history with a protagonist that is
writing an alternate history and one of the best stories about dog-
hating aliens that I have ever read.
David Mitchell
> I expect this sort of question gets asked a lot - but here goes again
> - I could do with some good suggestions.
>
> It is getting a little difficult pulling out some genuinely good sci-
> fi reads amongst the plethora of very mediocre fantasy stuff being
> churned out. I read a lot on my summer hols and what to take 4-5
> really good sci-fi.
>
> I have read a lot before (virtually all of Asimov, Dick, Clarke,
> Heinlein) and have more recently enjoyed books by Bear, Vinge, Stanley-
> Robinson etc.. but I have also picked up some bad stuff too. I like
> 'wide-scale' plots but don't 'get off' on anything that loses itself
> in too much techy stuff. Quite like stuff on alien civilisations,
> space conflict etc... (
I quite enjoy Weber; but there's a conflict there between liking space
battles, and not liking techy stuff, since it's full of both.
OTOH, you can download almost all of it for free from Baen, so nothing is
lost if you hate it.
--
=======================================================================
= David --- If you use Microsoft products, you will, inevitably, get
= Mitchell --- viruses, so please don't add me to your address book.
=======================================================================
Skua
INHERIT THE STARS by James P. Hogan - one of the best "puzzle" science
fiction books ever. The sequels drop off in quality, but the first
sequel is still quite good. If for nothing else, read it for the
insanely cool concepts - the Ganymeans, though probably implausible
(completely peaceful herbivores on a world without carnivores would be
unlikely to evolve intelligence), are a neat alien race with truly alien
psychology.
If you haven't read them already, almost anything early by Hal Clement.
MISSION OF GRAVITY and the semi-sequel STAR LIGHT, and CYCLE OF FIRE are
some of the best exploration-adventure SF. CLOSE TO CRITICAL is simply
awesome - well-thought-out world, exciting plot, great characters (human
and alien). I've read these many times. Some of them get better every
time. THE NITROGEN FIX and ICEWORLD are a bit odd, but still worth reading.
If you haven't read them already, Clarke's THE SONGS OF DISTANT EARTH
and THE HAMMER OF GOD.
Jeffrey Kaplan
> I have read a lot before (virtually all of Asimov, Dick, Clarke,
> Heinlein) and have more recently enjoyed books by Bear, Vinge, Stanley-
> Robinson etc.. but I have also picked up some bad stuff too. I like
> 'wide-scale' plots but don't 'get off' on anything that loses itself
> in too much techy stuff. Quite like stuff on alien civilisations,
> space conflict etc... (foundation series was excellent).
Almost anything by Elizabeth Moon. She's got several series, including
the "Sassinak" duology "coauthored" with Anne McAffrey. For fantasy,
she has "The Deed of Paksenarrion" trilogy and optional prequel duology
(read them later, if at all). For space opera, there's the
double-trilogy Serrano/Familias Reginat set (it changes viewpoint to a
new main character in book 4), and her latest series, "Vatta's War".
Book for just came out in hardcover earlier this year. Stay away from
"Speed of Dark", it's more of a treatise on autism than an SF book.
Moon is one of the very few authors who can keep me up at night because
I don't want to put the book down.
Lois McMaster Bujold is another such author, especially with the
Vorkosigan (SF) series. I found the Charion (Fantasy) trilogy to be a
mixed bag, with the first one definitely the best, and as enjoyable to
read as the Vorkosigan books.
John Varley. I've only read two of his, "Steel Beach" and its
semi-sequel "Golden Globe". Both very enjoyable.
Jack McDevitt has a couple series out. I'm not sure of their official
series titles, but I call them "the Alex Benedict" and "Academy"
series. The first starts with "A Talent For War" and the second with
"Engines of God". He also has a few stand-alone novels which are
mostly good. I thought "Eternity Road" was rather poor, I really liked
the rest.
--
Jeffrey Kaplan www.gordol.org
The from userid is killfiled Send personal mail to gordol
Tips for evil cult members: 3. Avoid needless embarrassment. Practice
the correct pronunciation of your deity's name in private before
chanting it in public. Flash cards are helpful. Be very careful to
pronounce only one syllable at a time; some deities pop up at every
mention of their name, and expect to have an acceptable sacrifice
waiting for them.
David DeLaney
>It is getting a little difficult pulling out some genuinely good sci-
>fi reads amongst the plethora of very mediocre fantasy stuff being
>churned out. I read a lot on my summer hols and what to take 4-5
>really good sci-fi.
>
>I have read a lot before (virtually all of Asimov, Dick, Clarke,
>Heinlein) and have more recently enjoyed books by Bear, Vinge, Stanley-
>Robinson etc.. but I have also picked up some bad stuff too. I like
>'wide-scale' plots but don't 'get off' on anything that loses itself
>in too much techy stuff. Quite like stuff on alien civilisations,
>space conflict etc... (foundation series was excellent).
>I would really appreciate some recommendations from anything recent
>(say last 10 years) but am also looking to discover one or two
>'classic' authors other than the obvious ones I have listed.
Well - I am currently reading, for the first time, Sean McMullen's Greatwinter
trilogy (Souls In The Great Machine, The Miocene Arrow, Eyes of the Calculor)
- and it may catch your interest. (But may also be not that easy to find...)
Post-apocalyptic, steampunk-level, except there's also nanotech in orbit (the
first book _starts_ with someone observing that a trench on the Moon has
deepened in the past few years), at least two alien races and an AI, and
some rapid developments in technology. As well as a wide-ranging plot following
several main characters over (for the first book) much of what used to be
Australia...
Dave
--
\/David DeLaney posting from d...@vic.com "It's not the pot that grows the flower
It's not the clock that slows the hour The definition's plain for anyone to see
Love is all it takes to make a family" - R&P. VISUALIZE HAPPYNET VRbeable<BLINK>
http://www.vic.com/~dbd/ - net.legends FAQ & Magic / I WUV you in all CAPS! --K.
over...@spam.ftc.gov
wrote:
>It is alleged that Mark claimed:
>
>> I have read a lot before (virtually all of Asimov, Dick, Clarke,
>> Heinlein) and have more recently enjoyed books by Bear, Vinge, Stanley-
>> Robinson etc.. but I have also picked up some bad stuff too. I like
>> 'wide-scale' plots but don't 'get off' on anything that loses itself
>> in too much techy stuff. Quite like stuff on alien civilisations,
>> space conflict etc... (foundation series was excellent).
>
>Almost anything by Elizabeth Moon. She's got several series, including
>the "Sassinak" duology "coauthored" with Anne McAffrey. For fantasy,
>she has "The Deed of Paksenarrion" trilogy and optional prequel duology
>(read them later, if at all). For space opera, there's the
>double-trilogy Serrano/Familias Reginat set (it changes viewpoint to a
>new main character in book 4), and her latest series, "Vatta's War".
>Book for just came out in hardcover earlier this year. Stay away from
>"Speed of Dark", it's more of a treatise on autism than an SF book.
>Moon is one of the very few authors who can keep me up at night because
>I don't want to put the book down.
>
Speed of Dark isn't SF at all. It's an outstanding exploration of
autism. If you have any need to understand the autistic, read it.
Jim
Jon Schild
Skua wrote:
> INHERIT THE STARS by James P. Hogan - one of the best "puzzle" science
> fiction books ever. The sequels drop off in quality, but the first
> sequel is still quite good. If for nothing else, read it for the
> insanely cool concepts - the Ganymeans, though probably implausible
> (completely peaceful herbivores on a world without carnivores would be
> unlikely to evolve intelligence), are a neat alien race with truly alien
> psychology.
I have never read any of these. I looked them up on ISFDB to see what
the sequel titles might be, and found this:
• Minervan Experiment
o The Minervan Experiment (1981) [O/1,2,3]
o The Two Moons (2006) [O/1,2]
o 1 Inherit the Stars (1977)
o 2 The Gentle Giants of Ganymede (1978)
o 3 Giants' Star (1981)
o 4 Entoverse (1991)
o 5 Mission to Minerva (2005)
I can see where numbers 1-5 fit; that's pretty obvious. But I don't
understand the notations [O/1,2,3] and [O/1,2]. Could you enlighten me
please? Thanks.
Mike Schilling
<over...@spam.ftc.gov> wrote in message
news:68s783tl9ogajec2f...@4ax.com...
> Speed of Dark isn't SF at all.
Except for being set in a future in which autistics are treated quite
differently than they are today.
Michael Stemper
>I expect this sort of question gets asked a lot - but here goes again
>- I could do with some good suggestions.
>I have read a lot before (virtually all of Asimov, Dick, Clarke,
>Heinlein) and have more recently enjoyed books by Bear, Vinge, Stanley-
>Robinson etc.. but I have also picked up some bad stuff too. I like
>'wide-scale' plots but don't 'get off' on anything that loses itself
>in too much techy stuff. Quite like stuff on alien civilisations,
>space conflict etc... (foundation series was excellent).
>
>I would really appreciate some recommendations from anything recent
>(say last 10 years) but am also looking to discover one or two
>'classic' authors other than the obvious ones I have listed.
Have you read any 1960s Niven? Early Egan is quite good for sensawunda.
John Varley and Walter Jon Williams also come to mind as candidates
for somebody with your tastes.
--
Michael F. Stemper
#include <Standard_Disclaimer>
I feel more like I do now than I did when I came in.
David DeLaney
>• Minervan Experiment
> o The Minervan Experiment (1981) [O/1,2,3]
> o The Two Moons (2006) [O/1,2]
> o 1 Inherit the Stars (1977)
> o 2 The Gentle Giants of Ganymede (1978)
> o 3 Giants' Star (1981)
> o 4 Entoverse (1991)
> o 5 Mission to Minerva (2005)
>
>I can see where numbers 1-5 fit; that's pretty obvious. But I don't
>understand the notations [O/1,2,3] and [O/1,2]. Could you enlighten me
>please? Thanks.
Those two are collections of books 1,2,3 and 1,2.
Lawrence Watt-Evans
wrote:
>
O = "Omnibus." O/1,2,3 means it's an omnibus of the first three
novels.
--
My webpage is at http://www.watt-evans.com
The fourth issue of Helix is at http://www.helixsf.com
The tenth Ethshar novel has been serialized at http://www.ethshar.com/thevondishambassador1.html
Gene Ward Smith
@c77g2000hse.googlegroups.com:
> I would really appreciate some recommendations from anything recent
> (say last 10 years) but am also looking to discover one or two
> 'classic' authors other than the obvious ones I have listed.
>
Well, you've gotta read The Mote in God's Eye given the stuff you like.
Gene Ward Smith
> _Spin_ by Robert Charles Wilson
> _Old Man's War_, _The Ghost Brigades_, _The Last Colony_ by John Scalzi
> for humor, _The Android's Dream_ by John Scalzi (not related to the
> above 3 books)
> Many here will disagree with these, but _Hominids_, _Humans_, _Hybrids_
> by Robert J Sawyer
>
Oh, why Sawyer? No one has mentioned Bujold or Cherryh, and you want
Sawyer.
Gene Ward Smith
$4c36...@roadrunner.com:
> INHERIT THE STARS by James P. Hogan - one of the best "puzzle" science
> fiction books ever.
It would be if the puzzle made sense. It does not. I was groaning towards
the end, saying to myself "He *can't* be meaning to do that!" But he did.
tkma...@yahoo.co.uk
> On Thu, 28 Jun 2007 12:27:09 -0000, Egil <egil.br...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Alastair Reynold's _Century Rain_ would be a good choice as well. He has
> a couple of short story collections out which are also to be recommended.
Yesterday, I finished Alastair Reynold's "Turquoise Days" - a rather
complex cocktail that combines Asimov's "Nemesis" (?) with Clarke's "The
Songs of Distant Earth". Probably my first Alastair.
Not sure if this is representative, but his plot development here is
rather complex, & jargon filled. This one was almost entirely fantasy.
Are most of his works more fantasy than science fiction?
Gene Ward Smith
> I can see where numbers 1-5 fit; that's pretty obvious. But I don't
> understand the notations [O/1,2,3] and [O/1,2]. Could you enlighten me
> please? Thanks.
>
It appears to mean 1,2,3 and 1,2 of the original trilogy.
Andrew Plotkin
I think you are lining yourself up for a "fantasy versus SF" argument
that will not wind up satisfying you.
Reynolds has written a lot of stories and novels in the same universe
as "Turquoise Days". They span a lot of time -- as you'd expect from
the setting -- but they all have a lot of high-end technology as an
integral part of the plot. Brain enhancement, personality transfer,
condensed matter weapons. Lots of flashy stuff.
On the other hand, in that universe, Reynolds adheres strictly to a
"no FTL" framework. All travel is relativistic, all communication is
electromagnetic. Maybe that's what you're looking for.
(He's also written stories, not in that series, which have FTL.)
--Z
--
"And Aholibamah bare Jeush, and Jaalam, and Korah: these were the borogoves..."
*
If the Bush administration hasn't shipped you to Syria for interrogation, it's
for one reason: they don't feel like it. Not because of the Eighth Amendment.
tkma...@yahoo.co.uk
> Here, tkma...@yahoo.co.uk wrote:
>> Andy Leighton wrote:
>>> On Thu, 28 Jun 2007 12:27:09 -0000, Egil <egil.br...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>> Alastair Reynold's _Century Rain_ would be a good choice as well. He has
>>> a couple of short story collections out which are also to be recommended.
>> Yesterday, I finished Alastair Reynold's "Turquoise Days" - a rather
>> complex cocktail that combines Asimov's "Nemesis" (?) with Clarke's "The
>> Songs of Distant Earth". Probably my first Alastair.
>>
>> Not sure if this is representative, but his plot development here is
>> rather complex, & jargon filled. This one was almost entirely fantasy.
>> Are most of his works more fantasy than science fiction?
>
> I think you are lining yourself up for a "fantasy versus SF" argument
> that will not wind up satisfying you.
>
> Reynolds has written a lot of stories and novels in the same universe
> as "Turquoise Days". They span a lot of time -- as you'd expect from
> the setting -- but they all have a lot of high-end technology as an
> integral part of the plot. Brain enhancement, personality transfer,
> condensed matter weapons. Lots of flashy stuff.
>
> On the other hand, in that universe, Reynolds adheres strictly to a
> "no FTL" framework. All travel is relativistic, all communication is
> electromagnetic. Maybe that's what you're looking for.
>
> (He's also written stories, not in that series, which have FTL.)
>
> --Z
Thanks Andrew. I guess I enjoy books that use *less* jargon & still end
up being entertaining & make a point. I liked both Nemesis & Songs. I
loved Clarke's Superiority & First Encounter - in spite of unknowable
technology (former) & humanoid aliens (later).
Reynolds seemed to use too much jargon in TuquoiseD, & didn't actually
add any really interesting new stuff.
Joe Bednorz
<1183032691....@c77g2000hse.googlegroups.com>:
Try David Weber's "Empire from the Ashes" trilogy. It is NOT in the
Honor Harrington universe. Space conflict, alien civilizations, wide
scale.
The first book is available in its entirety here:
<http://www.webscription.net/chapters/0743435931/0743435931.htm?blurb>
Try it. I did and bought the book. If you don't like it, don't buy
the book. "Empire from the Ashes" has all three books, so this is
technically a free sample even though it's only one of the three books
in the volume.
Baen has an entire free library online. Try and see if you like
anything. Buy it if you want hardcopy.
<http://www.baen.com/library/>
David Drake has some nice stuff. "With the Lightnings" isn't bad.
Not too much alien civilization. It's the first book in a series that
continues with "Lt. Leary Commanding", "Far Side of the Stars" and
some others.
Those three books are available free online as well, along with many
more.
In fact, Baen has a free library, free samples, and 12 CDs of books
made available free.
The free CDs online:
<http://files.plebian.net/baencd/>
See the webpage in my signature for all those and more.
If you prefer reading online, you've got it made. If you prefer
hardcopy, you can at least try them first.
--
Links to Gigabytes of free books on line, emphasis on SF:
<http://www.mindspring.com/~jbednorz/Free/>
All the Best,
Joe Bednorz
James Nicoll
Andrew Plotkin <erky...@eblong.com> wrote:
>
>On the other hand, in that universe, Reynolds adheres strictly to a
>"no FTL" framework. All travel is relativistic, all communication is
>electromagnetic. Maybe that's what you're looking for.
>
nobody would ever use it.
--
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/immigrate/
http://www.livejournal.com/users/james_nicoll
http://www.cafepress.com/jdnicoll (For all your "The problem with
defending the English language [...]" T-shirt, cup and tote-bag needs)
Joe Bednorz
<f60dii$bti$1...@charm.magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu>:
>Mark <mark....@btinternet.com> wrote:
>> Just a few suggestions from anyone would be very welcome!!
>
>Given your helpful data above, I highly recommend the Dread Empire's
>Fall trilogy by Walter Jon Williams (_The Praxis_, _The Sundering_,
>_Conventions of War_, published 2002-2004).
>
>Since you mention 'classic' authors, H Beam Piper's _Space Viking_
Which is available free from Project Gutenberg.
<http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/20728>
I've always heard good things about it. Guess it's time to give it
a try.
>also seems to fit well. Lighter on space conflict but very well
>fitting the rest is Jack Vance's Demon Princes five-some.
>
>Lastly, if you think you'd like "U-Boats in space" without tons of
>techy stuff, I also recommend Glen Cook's recently re-released (by
>Night Shade) _Passage At Arms_. It is usually listed as a fourth/final
>book in his Starfishers series, but it definitely works as a stand-alone.
>(I read the trilogy after I read PAA and imho they are barely related
>at all; certainly not in plot-important ways.)
I fully concur with the above evaluation.
Joe Bednorz
<200706281749....@walkabout.empros.com>:
Early Niven, yes. "Tales of Known Space." Might even try "The Mote
in God's Eye," Niven and Pournelle. Hugo winner. Alien
civilizations, space conflict. Pretty wide scale and deep time.
Seems perfect, now that I think about it.
Andy Leighton
> In article <1183032691....@c77g2000hse.googlegroups.com>,
Mark writes:
>>I expect this sort of question gets asked a lot - but here goes again
>>- I could do with some good suggestions.
>
>>I have read a lot before (virtually all of Asimov, Dick, Clarke,
>>Heinlein) and have more recently enjoyed books by Bear, Vinge, Stanley-
>>Robinson etc.. but I have also picked up some bad stuff too. I like
>>'wide-scale' plots but don't 'get off' on anything that loses itself
>>in too much techy stuff. Quite like stuff on alien civilisations,
>>space conflict etc... (foundation series was excellent).
>
> John Varley and Walter Jon Williams also come to mind as candidates
> for somebody with your tastes.
Egan probably has too much "techy stuff" (sic) for the OP.
Maybe Allen Steele's Coyote novels might work - no space-battles
(well not really) but a story of colonising a planet and lots of
human politics involved.
Skua
Well, it's (nearly) physically impossible, but that's not quite the same
as "doesn't make sense." It fits all the evidence brought up earlier in
the book.
I loved the book, though.
endy9
news:1183032691....@c77g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
>I expect this sort of question gets asked a lot - but here goes again
> - I could do with some good suggestions.
>
> fi reads amongst the plethora of very mediocre fantasy stuff being
> churned out. I read a lot on my summer hols and what to take 4-5
> really good sci-fi.
>
> Heinlein) and have more recently enjoyed books by Bear, Vinge, Stanley-
> Robinson etc.. but I have also picked up some bad stuff too. I like
> 'wide-scale' plots but don't 'get off' on anything that loses itself
> in too much techy stuff. Quite like stuff on alien civilisations,
> space conflict etc... (foundation series was excellent).
>
> (say last 10 years) but am also looking to discover one or two
> 'classic' authors other than the obvious ones I have listed.
>
>
> Mark
One read that always reminds me of summer is Dan Simmons, Hyperion and Fall
of Hyperion. Read those back in the early 90s while on a family vacation at
Panama City. Great reads.
Another I can see as a summer read if you like horror is Simmons, Summer of
Night.
--
Dennis/Endy
http://home.comcast.net/~endymion91/
~I was born to rock the boat. Some will sink but we will float.
Grab your coat. Let's get out of here.
You're my witness. I'm your Mutineer~ - Warren Zevon
- -
Gene Ward Smith
news:468457e3$0$7999$4c36...@roadrunner.com:
>> It would be if the puzzle made sense. It does not. I was groaning
>> towards the end, saying to myself "He *can't* be meaning to do that!"
>> But he did.
>
> Well, it's (nearly) physically impossible, but that's not quite the
> same as "doesn't make sense." It fits all the evidence brought up
> earlier in the book.
It's physically impossible, and therefore doesn't make sense. It also
contradicts known facts about the moon, and therefore doesn't make sense.
As science, it's complete, 100% garbage.
Peter D. Tillman
Mark <mark....@btinternet.com> wrote:
> I would really appreciate some recommendations from anything recent
> (say last 10 years) but am also looking to discover one or two
> 'classic' authors other than the obvious ones I have listed.
I'd highly recommend you take along John Scalzi's THE ANDROID'S DREAM:
<http://www.sfsite.com/03a/ad243.htm>
This is a pretty near perfect light planetary romance, just right for
vacation reading. Light SF don't get much better than this. *Any* SF
doesn't get much better. Hot stuff, boyo.
In the classic dept, look for Doris Egan's IVORY series, reprinted not
too long ago in a convenient omnibus volume:
<http://www.sfsite.com/02a/ivo26.htm>
I can't think of anyone in SF who writes better light
action-adventure-romance SF. The first two of these are pretty near
perfect. If you haven't yet encountered "Ivory", you have a real treat
in store.
Happy reading--
Pete Tillman
--
Book Reviews: http://www.sfsite.com/revwho.htm#Peter20D.20Tillman
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/cm/member-reviews/-/A3GHSD9VY8XS4Q/
http://www.infinityplus.co.uk//nonfiction/reviews.htm
Tony Williams
> I expect this sort of question gets asked a lot - but here goes again
> - I could do with some good suggestions.
>
> It is getting a little difficult pulling out some genuinely good sci-
> fi reads amongst the plethora of very mediocre fantasy stuff being
> churned out. I read a lot on my summer hols and what to take 4-5
> really good sci-fi.
>
> I have read a lot before (virtually all of Asimov, Dick, Clarke,
> Heinlein) and have more recently enjoyed books by Bear, Vinge, Stanley-
> Robinson etc.. but I have also picked up some bad stuff too. I like
> 'wide-scale' plots but don't 'get off' on anything that loses itself
> in too much techy stuff. Quite like stuff on alien civilisations,
> space conflict etc... (foundation series was excellent).
>
> (say last 10 years) but am also looking to discover one or two
> 'classic' authors other than the obvious ones I have listed.
>
John Varley's Gaean trilogy (Titan, Wizard and Demon) are among my
favourite SF books. The plot is based on the exploration of a vast
alien construct found orbiting Saturn.
If you like space opera, check out Catherine Asaro's Skolian Empire
series (11 so far and counting) - start with 'Primary Inversion'.
Tony Williams
Scales (2007), The Foresight War (2004)
Homepage: http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk
Blog: http://sciencefictionfantasy.blogspot.com/
Leif Magnar Kj|nn|y
David DeLaney <d...@gatekeeper.vic.com> wrote:
>
>Well - I am currently reading, for the first time, Sean McMullen's Greatwinter
>trilogy (Souls In The Great Machine, The Miocene Arrow, Eyes of the Calculor)
>- and it may catch your interest. (But may also be not that easy to find...)
I'd second these books, they're great fun. McMullen strikes a decent balance
between serious and not quite so serious. His "Moonworlds" series (fantasy)
is also quite good.
--
Leif Kjønnøy, cunctator maximus. http://www.pvv.org/~leifmk
Jon Schild
David DeLaney wrote:
> On Thu, 28 Jun 2007 11:43:46 -0700, Jon Schild <j...@xmission.com> wrote:
>
>>• Minervan Experiment
>> o The Minervan Experiment (1981) [O/1,2,3]
>> o The Two Moons (2006) [O/1,2]
>> o 1 Inherit the Stars (1977)
>> o 2 The Gentle Giants of Ganymede (1978)
>> o 3 Giants' Star (1981)
>> o 4 Entoverse (1991)
>> o 5 Mission to Minerva (2005)
>>
>>I can see where numbers 1-5 fit; that's pretty obvious. But I don't
>>understand the notations [O/1,2,3] and [O/1,2]. Could you enlighten me
>>please? Thanks.
>
>
> Those two are collections of books 1,2,3 and 1,2.
>
> Dave
OK, thanks.
--
You see writers are like sewers ... what you get out depends a great
deal on what you put in.
-- J. Michael Straczynski
Jon Schild
I have liked almost all of his books. Never read any Bujold, so don't
have any opinion there. The only Cherryh I ever tried to read was so
bad I couldn't get past about page 50. Very disappointing. After I met
her I thought her writing would be really great. WRONG!
Scott Lurndal
My, you are a bitter person.
As Science Fiction is it 100% fun.
scott
Gene Ward Smith
@newssvr21.news.prodigy.net:
>>As science, it's complete, 100% garbage.
> My, you are a bitter person.
I'm not the one screaming because the truth hurts. That would be you.
Scott Lurndal
I guess I'm still struggling with the concept that Science Fiction
must be scientifically accurate.
scott
Gene Ward Smith
@newssvr11.news.prodigy.net:
> I guess I'm still struggling with the concept that Science Fiction
> must be scientifically accurate.
>
If it's a puzzle story and the puzzle makes no sense, it doesn't work very
well as a story. It's like a locked room mystery where the ending is
impossible rather than just absurdly improbable.
Robert Hutchinson
I don't remember a lot of jargon in "Turquoise Days", but that could just be my
faulty memory.
As for fantasy vs. science fiction: the Pattern Jugglers are pretty much the
fantastical exception to the SFnal rule in that particular universe. The only
other things that tend to get that hand-wavy do so usually because they are
meant to be insanely advanced/ancient/impenetrable.
--
Robert Hutchinson
"The cake is ticking loudly: tock tock, tock tock. Puzzled, the cat holds it
up to one ear. He listens closely. A terrible knowledge dawns in his eyes."
<http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2004/04/19/040419fi_fiction?printable=true>
Robert A. Woodward
sc...@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) wrote:
SF stories really should avoid scientific howlers (complete with
marching bands).
--
Robert Woodward <robe...@drizzle.com>
<http://www.drizzle.com/~robertaw>
Gene Ward Smith
2DA1F4.220...@news.individual.net:
> SF stories really should avoid scientific howlers (complete with
> marching bands).
>
There's also a cost-benefit analysis one can make. The idiot premise of
Protector allowed for a cute story, but I don't think Hogan's story was
cute enough to justify the butchery.
Calimero
Considering your taste for well-told "classic" SF, you should really
like Robert Charles Wilson's "Spin" (hugo winner and it will get a
sequel in september). Of his previous books, I like "The Chronoliths"
most. And already a bit older, but if you haven't read it, you can't go
wrong with "Hyperion" by Dan Simmons.
If you can handle "hard sf", it doesn't come better than the
intelligent "Blindsight" by Peter Watts. Could win the Hugo this year.
Also check "Glasshouse" by Charles Stross.
cheers,
Calimero
William December Starr
jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
> In article <f6111o$q41$1...@reader2.panix.com>,
> Andrew Plotkin <erky...@eblong.com> wrote:
>
>> On the other hand, in that universe, Reynolds adheres strictly
>> to a "no FTL" framework. All travel is relativistic, all
>> communication is electromagnetic. Maybe that's what you're
>> looking for.
>
> As I recall, there _is_ FTL but the side-effects are such that
> nobody would ever use it.
[*]
--
William December Starr <wds...@panix.com>
William December Starr
na...@math.ohio-state.edu (Anthony Nance) said:
> Lastly, if you think you'd like "U-Boats in space" without tons of
> techy stuff, I also recommend Glen Cook's recently re-released (by
> Night Shade) _Passage At Arms_. It is usually listed as a
> fourth/final book in his Starfishers series, but it definitely
> works as a stand-alone.
It's more like the zeroth book; it may have been published a few
years later but it takes place a century or two before the
Starfishers trilogy. And yes, the two aren't connected at all in
terms of story.
William December Starr
William December Starr
Joe Bednorz <inv...@invalid.invalid> said:
> Try David Weber's "Empire from the Ashes" trilogy. It is NOT in
> the Honor Harrington universe. Space conflict, alien
> civilizations, wide scale.
Is that Weber and/or Baen's official name for the MUTINEERS' MOON /
THE ARMAGEDDON INHERITANCE / HEIRS OF EMPIRE trilogy, or is it just
what the SFBC hapopened to call their omnibus edition?
Gene Ward Smith
@panix1.panix.com:
>>>> As science, it's complete, 100% garbage.
>>>
>>> My, you are a bitter person.
>>
>> I'm not the one screaming because the truth hurts. That would be you.
>
> I detect no screams here.
>
"You are a bitter person" in response to a claim that Hogan's book makes no
sense scientifically is a scream. It certainly isn't a rational rejoinder.
Andrew Plotkin
"Garbage" is nowhere near "makes no sense", in tearing-each-other-
apart-on-Usenet land.
It's right next door to "bitter", though.
--Z
--
"And Aholibamah bare Jeush, and Jaalam, and Korah: these were the borogoves..."
*
If the Bush administration hasn't thrown you in military prison without trial,
it's for one reason: they don't feel like it. Not because you're patriotic.
James Nicoll
screwing with FTL was a good way to get completely erased from the
history of the universe. FTL = time machines and in this universe,
the most stable configuration is the one where the researcher never
existed to invent FTL.
--
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/immigrate/
http://www.livejournal.com/users/james_nicoll
http://www.cafepress.com/jdnicoll (For all your "The problem with
defending the English language [...]" T-shirt, cup and tote-bag needs)
Gene Ward Smith
news:f68vhg$col$1...@reader2.panix.com:
>> "You are a bitter person" in response to a claim that Hogan's book
>> makes no sense scientifically is a scream. It certainly isn't a
>> rational rejoinder.
>
> "Garbage" is nowhere near "makes no sense", in tearing-each-other-
> apart-on-Usenet land.
>
> It's right next door to "bitter", though.
>
So do you think the moon business in Hogan is garbage or not garbage?
James Nicoll
Isn't "how the heck do you blow up a planet the size of Earth"
also an issue with that book? And also "where is the massive extinction
event that should have been caused by all that debris?"
Gene Ward Smith
@reader2.panix.com:
>>So do you think the moon business in Hogan is garbage or not garbage?
>
> Isn't "how the heck do you blow up a planet the size of Earth"
> also an issue with that book? And also "where is the massive extinction
> event that should have been caused by all that debris?"
>
Well, so long as you are asking, what about "How did Pluto manage to make
it all the way out there from Minerva's orbit?" and "Why does the Moon seem
to be old?"
Andrew Plotkin
I think the term "glorious nonsense" suits.
--Z
--
"And Aholibamah bare Jeush, and Jaalam, and Korah: these were the borogoves..."
*
If the Bush administration hasn't shipped you to Syria for interrogation, it's
for one reason: they don't feel like it. Not because of the Eighth Amendment.
Gene Ward Smith
@reader2.panix.com:
>> So do you think the moon business in Hogan is garbage or not garbage?
>
> I think the term "glorious nonsense" suits.
>
That would be the nonsense in Protector, but Hogan's nonsense has an
unfavorable groans-to-gasps ratio.
Sean O'Hara
declared:
>
> I could be misremembering the details but as I recall it,
> screwing with FTL was a good way to get completely erased from the
> history of the universe. FTL = time machines and in this universe,
> the most stable configuration is the one where the researcher never
> existed to invent FTL.
Except the people working on the FTL driver were already using
quantum buggery-boo to communicate with their future selves. There
was nothing to indicate that FTL was completely impossible, but the
people working on it were in a hurry to get it working and ended up
achieving c by the simplest possible means -- converting themselves
to photons.
--
Sean O'Hara <http://diogenes-sinope.blogspot.com>
Both the cockroach and the cat would get along very well without us,
although he cockroach would miss us most.
-Joseph Wood Krutch
James Nicoll
Most of the mass of Minerva is missing and since we know it didn't
turn into energy (Because 1 Earth mass going MC^2 leaves a hell of a smudge
mark), most of the material must have been ejected at speeds faster than
Solar escape at 2.5 AU (which just makes the question of where the energy
to disrupt Minerva from that much worse, because now the material needs
another 8 km/s ... Wait, no. Higher than that, because not all of the
material will be ejected in the direction of Minerva's motion). Pluto
got spat out fast enough to _almost_ get ejected.
How its periapsis got changed is an interesting question.
How it is that (from a later book) people on what became Pluto
survived the ejection is also an interesting question.
The Moon is just as old as it looks. It just formed somewhere
else. How it formed somewhere else and still managed to look as though
it formed in the same neighborhood as the Earth is an interesting
question.
James Nicoll
It's a pity that the one point I really liked on the Hogan, the
idea that if you have something as similar to apes as humans are, the
two must be related regardless of the apparent planet of origin of the
humans, is one that Hogan has since abandoned. At least one of his recent
short stories has a galaxy filled with unrelated hominids thanks to
intelligent design.
Gene Ward Smith
@reader2.panix.com:
> The Moon is just as old as it looks. It just formed somewhere
> else. How it formed somewhere else and still managed to look as though
> it formed in the same neighborhood as the Earth is an interesting
> question.
>
It should have recent material on it, though. And of course, it should have
rocks related to Minerva, not the Earth.
James Nicoll
>@reader2.panix.com:
>
>> The Moon is just as old as it looks. It just formed somewhere
>> else. How it formed somewhere else and still managed to look as though
>> it formed in the same neighborhood as the Earth is an interesting
>> question.
>>
>
>It should have recent material on it, though.
face had had a lot of material deposited on it.
>And of course, it should have
>rocks related to Minerva, not the Earth.
Yep. That's what I was refering to when I said "How it formed
somewhere else and still managed to look as though it formed in the
same neighborhood as the Earth is an interesting question." By
"interesting question" I mean "requires a more plausible answer
than I think we will get."
Wayne Throop
:: Isn't "how the heck do you blow up a planet the size of Earth" also
:: an issue with that book? And also "where is the massive extinction
:: event that should have been caused by all that debris?"
: Gene Ward Smith <ge...@chewbacca.org>
: Well, so long as you are asking, what about "How did Pluto manage to
: make it all the way out there from Minerva's orbit?" and "Why does the
: Moon seem to be old?"
Or, for that matter, where's "all that debris"? The exploding planet
theory was fairly common back in the day, but by the time of the Hogan
"Giants" epics, it was fairly clear that all the asteroids put together
weren't nearly massive enough for that, even if you throw in several
other planetoids and/or moons. Though I suppose if you assume enough of
it reached solar escape velocity it resolves some things (such as, where
did the potential energy come from to get pluto out there)... but that
just makes all the other problems far worse (such as, once pluto was out
there, how did it getsits orbit so nearly circular and neatly
synchronized with Neptun and so on).
Of course, Hogan has now settled on the much more reasonable
dogma of Saturnism.
Wayne Throop thr...@sheol.org http://sheol.org/throopw
William December Starr
jdni...@panix.com (James Nicoll) said:
[ re Alistair Reynolds' "Revelation Space" universe[1] ]
*1 Does it have a better/more official name than that?
>>> As I recall, there _is_ FTL but the side-effects are such that
>>> nobody would ever use it.
>>
>> [*]
>
> I could be misremembering the details but as I recall it, screwing
> with FTL was a good way to get completely erased from the history
> of the universe. FTL = time machines and in this universe, the
> most stable configuration is the one where the researcher never
> existed to invent FTL.
Hell, *I* wouldn't let that stop me from trying to use it to my
benefit, and I'm probably more into self-preservation than a fair
number of people.
(Also, it would be quite attractive to many as the first/only
*perfect* suicide mechanism in human history, thought probably no
one except an omniscient narrator would ever know about those
cases...)
William December Starr
Gene Ward Smith <ge...@chewbacca.org> said:
> wds...@panix.com (William December Starr) wrote:
>
>>>>> As science, it's complete, 100% garbage.
>>>>
>>>> My, you are a bitter person.
>>>
>>> I'm not the one screaming because the truth hurts. That would be you.
>>
>> I detect no screams here.
>
> "You are a bitter person" in response to a claim that Hogan's book
> makes no sense scientifically is a scream.
In your opinion. Not mine.
> It certainly isn't a rational rejoinder.
Ibid.
il...@rcn.com
> complex cocktail that combines Asimov's "Nemesis" (?) with Clarke's "The
> Songs of Distant Earth". Probably my first Alastair.
I love Reynold's future history (a.k.a. "Inhibitors Universe" * ), but
IMO "Tuquoise Days" is by far the weakest story in that collection so
far. Did you find it as a standalone publication somewhere? I only had
seen it in the two-novella book, and the other novella, "Diamond
Dogs", is much better -- if you do not mind gothic horror. Elements of
the latter exist in almost all Reynold's stories, but "Turquoise Days"
lacks it, while "Diamond Dogs" is entirely a horror story.
* -- I do not care for Inhibitors themselves. I think Reynold's future
history would be better off without them.
Andrew Wheeler
You'd have to ask Weber if it's "official," but it was the title for the
Baen Books 3-in-1 edition.
(I'm not sure why one publisher's titles would be "less official" than
any other's, either.)
--
Andrew Wheeler: Professional Editor, Amateur Wise-Acre
--
Also available in blog form!
http://antickmusings.blogspot.com
tkma...@yahoo.co.uk
>> Yesterday, I finished Alastair Reynold's "Turquoise Days" - a rather
>> complex cocktail that combines Asimov's "Nemesis" (?) with Clarke's "The
>> Songs of Distant Earth". Probably my first Alastair.
>
> seen it in the two-novella book, and the other novella, "Diamond
> Dogs",
I read it in an anthology - Best of 2002, I think - with some 20 odd
stories. Editor is someone named Gardner(?). A friend has borrowed the
book - so I don't have bibliographic info handy.
Anthony Nance
Indeed - thanks for clearing up the ambiguity I left sitting there.
- Tony
Keith F. Lynch
> Most of the mass of Minerva is missing ... most of the material
> must have been ejected at speeds faster than Solar escape at 2.5
> AU (which just makes the question of where the energy to disrupt
> Minerva from that much worse, because now the material needs another
> 8 km/s ... Wait, no. Higher than that, because not all of the
> material will be ejected in the direction of Minerva's motion).
Giving Hogan the benefit of the doubt, it didn't necessarily leave
solar orbit at once. Or even in the first ten thousand years. I seem
to recall that it's been proven that most randomly selected orbits in
the asteroid belt are not stable over the long term. Perturbations
from Jupiter will pump an object's eccentricity up until it either
drops into the sun or makes a close pass to Jupiter and is ejected
from the solar system. Quite possibly the mass of material in the
asteroid belt was once the mass of a planet, but nothing is left
except the small amount that happened to be in a stable resonance
with Jupiter.
Also, Hogan said that disrupting orbits is a side effect of operating
the Ganymean space drive inside a solar system, and that the Ganymeans
did so immediately after the destruction of Minerva, to rescue people
stranded on Luna and ferry them to Earth. With a little handwaving,
that might explain how debris got quickly kicked out the solar system,
how Pluto got into its present orbit, and how Luna got into an
Earth-crossing orbit. But it's not at all clear to me how Earth
subsequently captured Luna into its present near-circular orbit.
However, even just blowing up Minerva is quite an accomplishment. Why
would anyone build a weapon that could do that? That's many, many,
many orders of magnitude more energy than it would take to simply kill
every person and destroy every machine on the planet.
Hogan mentions that Minerva had a thin crust and was more tectonically
active than Earth. He seems to share with Greg Bear the misconception
that planets, like eggs, are held together largely by the strength and
solidity of their hard outer shell, rather than by gravity.
I once worked out that the energy it would take to dismantle Earth
exceeds the energy it would take to *vaporize* Earth. Earth-sized
planets simply aren't going to come apart like an egg or cinderblock
struck with a hammer.
> The Moon is just as old as it looks. It just formed somewhere else.
> How it formed somewhere else and still managed to look as though
> it formed in the same neighborhood as the Earth is an interesting
> question.
In all fairness, I'm not sure the fact that Luna is more similar to
Earth than to other planets was known when _Inherit the Stars_ was
written. Neither was it known that Pluto had satellites, that its
density was low, or that there were other Pluto-like worlds in the
outer solar system.
--
Keith F. Lynch - http://keithlynch.net/
Please see http://keithlynch.net/email.html before emailing me.
PumpkinEscobar
Gardner Dozois. He was the editor for 'Asimov's' magazine.
--
PumpkinEscobar
il...@rcn.com wrote:
Yes, the novella was released as a stand alone in the U.K.
http://trashotron.com/agony/images/con_jose_turquoise_days.jpg
--
tkma...@yahoo.co.uk
Yes - I can now recall. Title is "The Year's Best Science Fiction:
Twentieth Annual Collection". Amazon description at
<http://www.amazon.com/Years-Best-Science-Fiction-Collection/dp/0312308604>
Actually, I didn't find the selections very good. Of the half dozen
stories I read - from beginning, then end of contents list - I found
only one worthy for a "Best" collection: Kage Baker's "The Hotel At
Harlan's Landing". But that is not quite sf - if you ignore some hominid
aliens that appear in the middle for a very short while. I liked it for
fantastic prose - a woman's rather simple description of "good" life
that was in a mostly abandoned town on California coast that is now
becoming "modern". I actually liked a passage so much, I wrote it down:
"Uncle Jacques brought me a radio he’d tinkered with, he called it a
wireless, and I don’t know if it ran on a battery or what it had in it,
but we set it behind the bar and we could get it to pull in music and
shows."
Michael Grosberg
> Gene Ward Smith <g...@chewbacca.org> writes:
>
>
>
> >Skua <bank...@houston.rr.com> wrote in
> >news:468457e3$0$7999$4c36...@roadrunner.com:
>
> >>> It would be if the puzzle made sense. It does not. I was groaning
> >>> towards the end, saying to myself "He *can't* be meaning to do that!"
> >>> But he did.
>
> >> Well, it's (nearly) physically impossible, but that's not quite the
> >> same as "doesn't make sense." It fits all the evidence brought up
> >> earlier in the book.
>
> >It's physically impossible, and therefore doesn't make sense. It also
> >contradicts known facts about the moon, and therefore doesn't make sense.
>
> >As science, it's complete, 100% garbage.
>
> My, you are a bitter person.
>
>
> scott
Afraid not. Apart from the scientific puzzle there's zero plot. There
are scientists who talk and raise theories and debate findings, and
that's it. The puzzle is 50,000 years old and IIRC has no relevance to
them. I seem to remember there were no female characters at all.
And the sequel is just as bad, containing a huge infodump about an
alien biology which is even more improbable than the puzzle in the
first book, if you can believe it.
James Nicoll
Michael Grosberg <grosberg...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>Afraid not. Apart from the scientific puzzle there's zero plot. There
>are scientists who talk and raise theories and debate findings, and
>that's it. The puzzle is 50,000 years old and IIRC has no relevance to
>them.
The fate of the Minervans serves as a terrible example of what
might have happened to Earth had the nations of Earth not united under
the UN and turned the energies that once went into nationalism to serve
space exploration.
Also, any time that you find out your understanding of your
lineage has a great honking hole in it, it's relevent to you.
>I seem to remember there were no female characters at all.
There was at least one. In fact, although she barely
managed to be one dimensional, I think she is the one who figures
out what the calender is.
Jasper Janssen
>However, even just blowing up Minerva is quite an accomplishment. Why
>would anyone build a weapon that could do that? That's many, many,
>many orders of magnitude more energy than it would take to simply kill
>every person and destroy every machine on the planet.
They probably made a weapon to kill everything on Jupiter in one shot, and
then turned it on a small rocky planet instead.
Incidentally, it seems to be really very, very hard to kill everything on
a planet -- extinction-level events, sure, but killing off all the
bacteria is a lot harder. Maybe they just overdesigned to make sure they
didn't underdesign.
And hell, the plutoans *still* survived, according to the thread.
Jasper
Jasper Janssen
wrote:
> Try it. I did and bought the book. If you don't like it, don't buy
>the book. "Empire from the Ashes" has all three books, so this is
>technically a free sample even though it's only one of the three books
>in the volume.
> In fact, Baen has a free library, free samples, and 12 CDs of books
>made available free.
And on CD9 is the full Empire from the Ashes, incidentally.
Jasper
Jasper Janssen
<acwh...@optonline.net> wrote:
>William December Starr wrote:
>> In article <8m28831a11abe1j2u...@4ax.com>,
>> Joe Bednorz <inv...@invalid.invalid> said:
>>
>> > Try David Weber's "Empire from the Ashes" trilogy. It is NOT in
>> > the Honor Harrington universe. Space conflict, alien
>> > civilizations, wide scale.
>>
>> Is that Weber and/or Baen's official name for the MUTINEERS' MOON /
>> THE ARMAGEDDON INHERITANCE / HEIRS OF EMPIRE trilogy, or is it just
>> what the SFBC hapopened to call their omnibus edition?
>
>You'd have to ask Weber if it's "official," but it was the title for the
>Baen Books 3-in-1 edition.
>
>(I'm not sure why one publisher's titles would be "less official" than
>any other's, either.)
If Baen and the SFBC each have an omnibus, with different names, for the
same series originally published at Baen or from an author with
longstanding relationship with Baen, I'd be tempted to consider Baen's
title more canon than the SFBC's one, which was probably generated without
any input from the writer at all and quite possibly without the publisher
even reading the books.
Jasper
Andrew Wheeler
>
> On Sun, 01 Jul 2007 21:00:46 -0400, Andrew Wheeler
> <acwh...@optonline.net> wrote:
> >William December Starr wrote:
> >> In article <8m28831a11abe1j2u...@4ax.com>,
> >> Joe Bednorz <inv...@invalid.invalid> said:
> >>
> >> > Try David Weber's "Empire from the Ashes" trilogy. It is NOT in
> >> > the Honor Harrington universe. Space conflict, alien
> >> > civilizations, wide scale.
> >>
> >> Is that Weber and/or Baen's official name for the MUTINEERS' MOON /
> >> THE ARMAGEDDON INHERITANCE / HEIRS OF EMPIRE trilogy, or is it just
> >> what the SFBC hapopened to call their omnibus edition?
> >
> >You'd have to ask Weber if it's "official," but it was the title for the
> >Baen Books 3-in-1 edition.
> >
> >(I'm not sure why one publisher's titles would be "less official" than
> >any other's, either.)
>
> If Baen and the SFBC each have an omnibus, with different names, for the
> same series originally published at Baen or from an author with
And if my aunt had balls, she'd be my uncle. _Empire From the Ashes_ has
the same title from both publishers.
> longstanding relationship with Baen, I'd be tempted to consider Baen's
> title more canon than the SFBC's one, which was probably generated without
> any input from the writer at all and quite possibly without the publisher
> even reading the books.
To your last point: either you're not aware who you're responding to, or
you're being deliberately insulting. For the moment, I'll assume it was
the former...
William December Starr
Jasper Janssen <jas...@jjanssen.org> said:
[ re events in James P. Hogan's INHERIT THE STARS (I think) ]
> They probably made a weapon to kill everything on Jupiter in one
> shot, and then turned it on a small rocky planet instead.
>
> Incidentally, it seems to be really very, very hard to kill
> everything on a planet -- extinction-level events, sure, but
> killing off all the bacteria is a lot harder. Maybe they just
> overdesigned to make sure they didn't underdesign.
As a side note: there was a short (six one-hour episodes)
documentary series called "Miracle Planet" made in 2004 [1] and
shown on U.S. cable tv on The Science Channel in 2006. Its first
segment is called "The Violent Past" and includes the theory that
the early Earth was hit about six to eight times by rocks of about
500 kilometers in diameter. This led to the question of whether
life on the planet could have survived such an impact, which in turn
led to a really, really cool-looking (if faintly terrifying) CGI
simulation of what would happen if a 500-km rock, traveling at 20
km/sec, hit the Earth today[2].
*1 A joint production of the National Film Board of Canada
and NHK Japan.
*2 This part of the episode begins at about nineteen or twenty
minutes in. Unfortunately it doesn't run uninterrupted from
start to finish -- which would really be a powerful experience, I
think -- but rather is interrupted first by a feature about
scientists using NASA's World's Biggest Air Pistol to simulate
high-velocity impacts on rock or water and later by a commercial
break. Incidentally, early in the episode, about four minutes
in, is some nice computer simulation of large rock-to-rock
collisions and mergers in the early Solar system, including the
one that created Earth's moon.[3]
*3 During which the narration says that the planetoid that hit Earth
"gave it its iron core," which I'm a bit dubious about. As I
understand it the most widely accepted theory is that the impact
splashed a lot of the primordial Earth's crust and mantle up into
orbit and that non-core gunk then coalesced into the moon --
explaining why Luna is so low on iron and other deep-Earth
materials -- but says nothing about the pre-collision Earth not
already having had an iron-rich core.
So, back to the simulated big collision. Summary re the human race:
"That's it man, game over." If you're on Earth or in its atmosphere
when this happens, you don't even get a saving throw. Your maximum
survival time might be as much as 24 hours if you're at the point on
the globe antipodal to impact. (In the simulation, the impact was
in the Pacific Ocean "about a thousand miles south of Japan." Not
that, at this magnitude, there seems to be any meaningful difference
between land and water impacts.)
Vast quantities of rock at the impact point are turned into
super-hot vapor that spreads out in a circle from the impact point.
The oceans boil away. The salt residue at the floor of the oceans
boils away. Other chunks of rock that splashed up into the upper
atmosphere or higher but failed to achieve escape velocity rain back
down, also transfering heat to the planet. When things calm down,
the surface temperature of the planet is about 2,000 degrees C [4].
Utter sterilization of the surface and atmosphere.
*4 A question of interest to me, but not addressed in the show, is
whether any _artifacts_ of humanity might survive on the planet,
to perhaps be discovered by alien explorers. The simulation had
a few shots of the Parthenon with its stones glowing with heat
but still intact, overlooking a sea of magma, but that may have
been artistic license rather than the result of number-crunching
by actual scientists.
Eventually, the planet heals. With its reasonably strong gravity,
most of the water that was vaporized has stayed in its atmosphere
and within only about a thousand years enough heat has been radiated
away into space for rain to begin falling, with torrential downpours
continuing for about three thousand years.
What about life? Nothing survives on the surface, of course, nor
anything in even the deepest oceans (see "boils away," above). But:
we've found microbes living in cracks in the rock as far as three
kilometers below the planet's surface, in temperatures up to 50
degrees C. And their genetic profile shows that they have, dormant,
the code for being aerobic, that is, oxygen-breathing, meaning that
(1) they evolved from such life and (2) presumably could make the
evolutionary journey back to oxygen-breathing. Could any of these
survive a hypothetical Big Impact?
Answer: very probably yes. As said above, the impact would heat the
planetary surface to 2,000 degrees C, but that heat would _not_
spread so far down into the rock as to completely destroy a
relatively cool -- that is, 50 C or below -- Goldilocks zone between
the surface and the deep, mantle-and-core-heated hot zones.
Anaerobic microbial life in there could and presumably would survive,
and eventually, slowly, expand into the no-life void above it, all
the way up to the floors of the new oceans, and then into the water,
and eventually to the surface and then onto land, evolving into
oxygen-breathers along the way. And, according to the theory,
that's already happened in Earth's distant past; that all life today
is descended from such microbial life that was the only survivor of
an impact three and a half to four billion years ago.
Well, it's a nice thought anyway. I recommend that people check out
that first "Miracle Planet" episode if they get the chance, because
the visuals are really cool. (I've got the rest on dvd somewhere
but haven't gotten around to watching them yet.)
Andrew Plotkin
Here, William December Starr <wds...@panix.com> wrote:
> In article <bnk2935anpvlre8ae...@4ax.com>,
> Jasper Janssen <jas...@jjanssen.org> said:
>
> [ re events in James P. Hogan's INHERIT THE STARS (I think) ]
>
> > They probably made a weapon to kill everything on Jupiter in one
> > shot, and then turned it on a small rocky planet instead.
> >
> > Incidentally, it seems to be really very, very hard to kill
> > everything on a planet -- extinction-level events, sure, but
> > killing off all the bacteria is a lot harder. Maybe they just
> > overdesigned to make sure they didn't underdesign.
>
> As a side note: there was a short (six one-hour episodes)
> documentary series called "Miracle Planet" made in 2004 [1] and
> shown on U.S. cable tv on The Science Channel in 2006. Its first
> segment is called "The Violent Past" and includes the theory that
> the early Earth was hit about six to eight times by rocks of about
> 500 kilometers in diameter. This led to the question of whether
> life on the planet could have survived such an impact, which in turn
> led to a really, really cool-looking (if faintly terrifying) CGI
> simulation of what would happen if a 500-km rock, traveling at 20
> km/sec, hit the Earth today[2].
This has circulated on the Web.
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4s2q5KkO10E>, I find. (Narration is
Japanese, though. I haven't seen a translated version.)
> So, back to the simulated big collision. Summary re the human race:
> "That's it man, game over."
Right.
> Vast quantities of rock at the impact point are turned into
> super-hot vapor that spreads out in a circle from the impact point.
> The oceans boil away. The salt residue at the floor of the oceans
> boils away. Other chunks of rock that splashed up into the upper
> atmosphere or higher but failed to achieve escape velocity rain back
> down, also transfering heat to the planet. When things calm down,
> the surface temperature of the planet is about 2,000 degrees C [4].
> Utter sterilization of the surface and atmosphere.
>
> *4 A question of interest to me, but not addressed in the show, is
> whether any _artifacts_ of humanity might survive on the planet,
> to perhaps be discovered by alien explorers. The simulation had
> a few shots of the Parthenon with its stones glowing with heat
> but still intact, overlooking a sea of magma, but that may have
> been artistic license rather than the result of number-crunching
> by actual scientists.
Looked like artistic license to me. My guess is more like "Earthquake
knocks down all human constructions, and then the pieces blow away in
the breeze." (Up to and including the multi-ton pieces.)
> What about life? Nothing survives on the surface, of course, nor
> anything in even the deepest oceans (see "boils away," above). But:
> we've found microbes living in cracks in the rock as far as three
> kilometers below the planet's surface, in temperatures up to 50
> degrees C. And their genetic profile shows that they have, dormant,
> the code for being aerobic, that is, oxygen-breathing, meaning that
> (1) they evolved from such life and (2) presumably could make the
> evolutionary journey back to oxygen-breathing. Could any of these
> survive a hypothetical Big Impact?
>
> Answer: very probably yes. As said above, the impact would heat the
> planetary surface to 2,000 degrees C, but that heat would _not_
> spread so far down into the rock as to completely destroy a
> relatively cool -- that is, 50 C or below -- Goldilocks zone between
> the surface and the deep, mantle-and-core-heated hot zones.
Excellent.
--Z
--
"And Aholibamah bare Jeush, and Jaalam, and Korah: these were the borogoves..."
*
It used to be that "conservatives" were in favor of smaller government,
fiscal responsibility, and tighter constraints on the Man's ability to
monitor you, arrest you, and control your life.
Derek Lyons
>Answer: very probably yes. As said above, the impact would heat the
>planetary surface to 2,000 degrees C, but that heat would _not_
>spread so far down into the rock as to completely destroy a
>relatively cool -- that is, 50 C or below -- Goldilocks zone between
>the surface and the deep, mantle-and-core-heated hot zones.
Why not? Earlier you state that zone is three kilometers down - and
with a thousand years to do so, why would't the heat penetrate that
far?
D.
--
Touch-twice life. Eat. Drink. Laugh.
-Resolved: To be more temperate in my postings.
Oct 5th, 2004 JDL
Arkalen
I've never understood the problem people had with FTL. After all
Einstein's equations show clearly that anything going faster than c
has imaginary mass, which is the case of all the FTL ships I've read
about.
Ido Yehieli
> I would really appreciate some recommendations from anything recent
> (say last 10 years) but am also looking to discover one or two
> 'classic' authors other than the obvious ones I have listed.
"Singularity Sky", Charles Stross. Also- "The Metamorphosis of Prime
Intellect" by Roger Williams which is availble for free online at
www.kuro5hin.org/prime-intellect/
Del Cotter
Derek Lyons <fair...@gmail.com> said:
>wds...@panix.com (William December Starr) wrote:
>>Answer: very probably yes. As said above, the impact would heat the
>>planetary surface to 2,000 degrees C, but that heat would _not_
>>spread so far down into the rock as to completely destroy a
>>relatively cool -- that is, 50 C or below -- Goldilocks zone between
>>the surface and the deep, mantle-and-core-heated hot zones.
>
>Why not? Earlier you state that zone is three kilometers down - and
>with a thousand years to do so, why would't the heat penetrate that
>far?
It wouldn't be two thousand degrees when it got there. Technically,
we're talking about the surface of a sphere, which is notoriously hard
for mere graduate like me to model analytically, but in practice, we're
actually talking about a shell so thin it might as well be modelled as a
plane, and the mathematics of that are much more straightforward. If you
have two thousand degrees three kilometers away, and fifty degrees in
the immediate vicinity, you don't get two thousand degrees in the
vicinity in reasonable timescales. What you get when the heat has
penetrated that distance is a gradient of two thousand degrees at the
surface and fifty degrees plus a tiny increment at three kilometers
depth, and a heat flow continuing downward, where the cool rock below
continues to chill the rock in the vicinity.
It's much the same mathematics that explains why the hot rock deep down
doesn't burn our feet here on the surface.
--
Del Cotter
NB Personal replies to this post will send email to d...@branta.demon.co.uk,
which goes to a spam folder-- please send your email to del3 instead.
GSV Three Minds in a Can
person Del Cotter <d...@branta.demon.co.uk> said
Not quite - the reason for that is because the surface radiates it away
fast enough to stop the temperature climbing to match the Earth's core
(which is what would eventually happen if we wrapped a perfect insulator
around the planet). The surface is trying to achieve (by radiation)
thermal equilibrium with outer space (3 degrees K), plus a bit of the
sun/moon/stars (rather warmer!).
A pulse of heat from the surface would travel down, slowly, while the
surface radiated merrily away to get back to equilibrium with the solar
system / space /etc. Whatever arrived at any one level would only have
one way to escape - back the way it came. It does get cooler as it goes
though just because it has to be spread over more rock. 300m at 2000
degrees, is (roughly) 3km at 200 degrees .. still pretty uncomfortable
.. but it spread laterally too, which helps, if it started as a small
spot.
However I doubt you'd actually get 300m of molten rock .. the stuff that
gets much hotter than that would be off and away (as gas, or plasma), so
getting hot liquid rock to stay around and heat the underlying substrate
is not easy.
If you KEPT pumping heat into the surface (lots and lots of terawatt
lasers, or a nice red giant phase sun) then you really could sterilise
the planet, all the way through. A meteor strike isn't going to do it.
--
GSV Three Minds in a Can
8,963 Km walked. 1,746Km PROWs surveyed. 31.7% complete.
Del Cotter
GSV Three Minds in a Can <G...@quik.clara.co.uk> said:
>Del Cotter <d...@branta.demon.co.uk> said
>>>>Answer: very probably yes. As said above, the impact would heat the
>>>>planetary surface to 2,000 degrees C, but that heat would _not_
>>>>spread so far down into the rock
>>>Why not? Earlier you state that zone is three kilometers down - and
>>>with a thousand years to do so, why would't the heat penetrate that
>>>far?
>>
>>It wouldn't be two thousand degrees when it got there.
>>It's much the same mathematics that explains why the hot rock deep
>>down doesn't burn our feet here on the surface.
>
>Not quite - the reason for that is because the surface radiates it away
>fast enough to stop the temperature climbing to match the Earth's core
Quite. But while your "radiation from the surface" explanation explains
why the surface is only 30 degrees C when the deeps are 2,000 degrees,
what explains why the intermediate depths aren't at 2,000 degrees? They
don't have a cold sky available to them, only the neighbouring cool
conducting rock.
It's the same equations, just with a different set of variables plugged
in. The point I wanted to make is that when the heat gets down to the
level you're trying to warm, it isn't going to stay there: it's in
contact with material that will conduct that heat away. Not nearly as
rapidly as radiation does, but it can't be ignored (if it could be, you
could ignore the heat coming in from above, too).
In theory you could pound the planet until it's hot all the way through,
but in practice that doesn't happen, and if you have a naive model in
your head that says 2,000K at the surface must become 2,000K 3km down,
you won't understand why it doesn't.
Derek Lyons
>On Tue, 24 Jul 2007, in rec.arts.sf.written,
>Derek Lyons <fair...@gmail.com> said:
>
>>wds...@panix.com (William December Starr) wrote:
>>>Answer: very probably yes. As said above, the impact would heat the
>>>planetary surface to 2,000 degrees C, but that heat would _not_
>>>spread so far down into the rock as to completely destroy a
>>>relatively cool -- that is, 50 C or below -- Goldilocks zone between
>>>the surface and the deep, mantle-and-core-heated hot zones.
>>
>>Why not? Earlier you state that zone is three kilometers down - and
>>with a thousand years to do so, why would't the heat penetrate that
>>far?
>
>It wouldn't be two thousand degrees when it got there. Technically,
>we're talking about the surface of a sphere, which is notoriously hard
>for mere graduate like me to model analytically, but in practice, we're
>actually talking about a shell so thin it might as well be modelled as a
>plane, and the mathematics of that are much more straightforward. If you
>have two thousand degrees three kilometers away, and fifty degrees in
>the immediate vicinity, you don't get two thousand degrees in the
>vicinity in reasonable timescales.
You'll note nobody said anything about it reaching two thousand
degrees down in the Goldilocks zone - only reaching a temperature
sufficient to kill the life therein. (A couple of hundred degrees C
likely.)
>What you get when the heat has penetrated that distance is a gradient of
>two thousand degrees at the surface and fifty degrees plus a tiny increment
>at three kilometers depth, and a heat flow continuing downward, where the
>cool rock below continues to chill the rock in the vicinity.
That's the question - how large that increment will actually be.
>It's much the same mathematics that explains why the hot rock deep down
>doesn't burn our feet here on the surface.
Actually - it's not really. Mostly because we are insulated from the
really hot rock by much more than three kilometers.
Derek Lyons
>A pulse of heat from the surface would travel down, slowly, while the
>surface radiated merrily away to get back to equilibrium with the solar
>system / space /etc. Whatever arrived at any one level would only have
>one way to escape - back the way it came. It does get cooler as it goes
>though just because it has to be spread over more rock.
Not true - as the heat goes down it is penetrating into a smaller
volume of rock. (Infinitesimally smaller - but smaller none the
less.)
>300m at 2000 degrees, is (roughly) 3km at 200 degrees .. still pretty
>uncomfortable but it spread laterally too, which helps, if it started
>as a small spot.
It's not starting as a small spot with a meteor impact on the scale we
are discussing - it's starting as essentially the entire surface of
the planet.
>However I doubt you'd actually get 300m of molten rock .. the stuff that
>gets much hotter than that would be off and away (as gas, or plasma), so
>getting hot liquid rock to stay around and heat the underlying substrate
>is not easy.
You have to keep in mind the timescale - that gas/plasma will have
from decades to centuries to heat the liquid rock, which in turn heats
the solid rocks beneath, thus increasing the length of the heat pulse.
JimboCat
> INHERIT THE STARS by James P. Hogan - one of the best "puzzle" science
> fiction books ever. The sequels drop off in quality, but the first
> sequel is still quite good. If for nothing else, read it for the
> insanely cool concepts - the Ganymeans, though probably implausible
> (completely peaceful herbivores on a world without carnivores would be
> unlikely to evolve intelligence), are a neat alien race with truly alien
> psychology.
Mileage sure does vary! IMHO, the "puzzle" is ridiculous: I knew the
"answer" 100 pages before the protagonist figured it out. I felt the
trilogy /improved/ markedly as it went along. What I loved about the
third book was the battle between huge spacefleets -- one of which
didn't even exist -- in which hardly anyone died and the goodguys won
mostly through psychology rather than force.
Never read any but the original trilogy (ItS, tGGoG, GS), and based on
other subsequent efforts by the author I never will. But the trilogy
is still among my favorites.
Can't resist recommending "Perdido Street Station" and Bujold's
Vorkosigan series, too.
Jim Deutch (JimboCat)
--
"My parents visited a planet where the life-forms were not bilaterally
symmetrical and all I got was this lousy F-shirt."
GSV Three Minds in a Can
>GSV Three Minds in a Can <G...@quik.clara.co.uk> said:
>
>>Del Cotter <d...@branta.demon.co.uk> said
>>>>>Answer: very probably yes. As said above, the impact would heat the
>>>>>planetary surface to 2,000 degrees C, but that heat would _not_
>>>>>spread so far down into the rock
>
>>>>Why not? Earlier you state that zone is three kilometers down - and
>>>>with a thousand years to do so, why would't the heat penetrate that
>>>>far?
>>>
>>>It wouldn't be two thousand degrees when it got there.
>
>>>It's much the same mathematics that explains why the hot rock deep
>>>down doesn't burn our feet here on the surface.
>>
>>Not quite - the reason for that is because the surface radiates it
>>away fast enough to stop the temperature climbing to match the Earth's
>>core
>
>Quite. But while your "radiation from the surface" explanation explains
>why the surface is only 30 degrees C when the deeps are 2,000 degrees,
>what explains why the intermediate depths aren't at 2,000 degrees? They
>don't have a cold sky available to them, only the neighbouring cool
>conducting rock.
The diffusion equations explain it. Heat/Energy transfer rate is a
function of delta-T. The layer below the surface is only mm away from
30c, so it gets to 30c+a little bit. The area below that is only mm away
from 30c+a little bit, so it gets to 30c and a little bit and a little
bit more, etc. etc.
>It's the same equations, just with a different set of variables plugged
>in. The point I wanted to make is that when the heat gets down to the
>level you're trying to warm, it isn't going to stay there: it's in
>contact with material that will conduct that heat away.
It will stay there until/unless there is a lower temperature region
adjacent into which it can diffuse. So yeah, there will be a thermal
peak 3km down, as the heat reaches you, and then the heat will continue
to diffuse down, until you get a to a depth where the underlying rock is
equally hot. You may, or course, have been cooked by then, depending on
your insulation from the surrounding rock.
While this is going on the surface has cooled, so there is a race on.
This all ignores the fact heat can diffuse sideways equally well, unless
the rocks to each side are at the same temperature (which is almost the
case if you are in the middle of a massive strike area).
>In theory you could pound the planet until it's hot all the way
>through, but in practice that doesn't happen, and if you have a naive
>model in your head that says 2,000K at the surface must become 2,000K
>3km down, you won't understand why it doesn't.
Not me, I used to do differential equations for a living, long ago and
far away.. Unpleasant when you get into the real world though, with
nasty boundary conditions, anisotropic rocks, etc. Give me a nice CPU
heatsink every time, and an iterative numerical solution. 8>.
--
GSV Three Minds in a Can
GSV Three Minds in a Can
person Derek Lyons <fair...@gmail.com> said
>GSV Three Minds in a Can <G...@quik.clara.co.uk> wrote:
>
>>A pulse of heat from the surface would travel down, slowly, while the
>>surface radiated merrily away to get back to equilibrium with the solar
>>system / space /etc. Whatever arrived at any one level would only have
>>one way to escape - back the way it came. It does get cooler as it goes
>>though just because it has to be spread over more rock.
>
>Not true - as the heat goes down it is penetrating into a smaller
>volume of rock. (Infinitesimally smaller - but smaller none the
>less.)
No, because it never (ALL) leaves the rock it is already in. I guarantee
that object X at Y degrees can never heat anything (however small) to
more than (Y-delta) degrees by any reasonable mechanism. If it could, I
can build you a neat perpetual motion machine.
>>300m at 2000 degrees, is (roughly) 3km at 200 degrees .. still pretty
>>uncomfortable but it spread laterally too, which helps, if it started
>>as a small spot.
>
>It's not starting as a small spot with a meteor impact on the scale we
>are discussing - it's starting as essentially the entire surface of
>the planet.
What, BOTH hemispheres?
>>However I doubt you'd actually get 300m of molten rock .. the stuff that
>>gets much hotter than that would be off and away (as gas, or plasma), so
>>getting hot liquid rock to stay around and heat the underlying substrate
>>is not easy.
>
>You have to keep in mind the timescale - that gas/plasma will have
>from decades to centuries to heat the liquid rock, which in turn heats
>the solid rocks beneath, thus increasing the length of the heat pulse.
Nope it won't, it'll be off into space, either physically, or else it
will lose it's heat by radiation (unless you figure we've blanketed the
whole planet somehow).
--
GSV Three Minds in a Can
Del Cotter
GSV Three Minds in a Can <G...@quik.clara.co.uk> said:
>Del Cotter <d...@branta.demon.co.uk> said
>>>>>>Answer: very probably yes. As said above, the impact would heat the
>>>>>>planetary surface to 2,000 degrees C, but that heat would _not_
>>>>>>spread so far down into the rock
>>
>>>>>Why not? Earlier you state that zone is three kilometers down - and
>>>>>with a thousand years to do so, why would't the heat penetrate that
>>>>>far?
>>>>It's much the same mathematics that explains why the hot rock deep
>>>>down doesn't burn our feet here on the surface.
>>while your "radiation from the surface" explanation explains why the
>>surface is only 30 degrees C when the deeps are 2,000 degrees, what
>>explains why the intermediate depths aren't at 2,000 degrees?
>The diffusion equations explain it.
Bingo. And that's why the rock 3km down is safe from bombardment above,
in realistic scenarios.
>>In theory you could pound the planet until it's hot all the way
>>through, but in practice that doesn't happen, and if you have a naive
>>model in your head that says 2,000K at the surface must become 2,000K
>>3km down, you won't understand why it doesn't.
>
>Not me, I used to do differential equations for a living, long ago and
>far away..
I'm referring to Derek Lyons, who's being stubborn.
Andrew Plotkin
> Bitstring <46ac77fd....@news.supernews.com>, from the wonderful
> person Derek Lyons <fair...@gmail.com> said
> >GSV Three Minds in a Can <G...@quik.clara.co.uk> wrote:
> >
> >It's not starting as a small spot with a meteor impact on the scale we
> >are discussing - it's starting as essentially the entire surface of
> >the planet.
>
> What, BOTH hemispheres?
Just the far hemisphere. The near hemisphere has much weightier
problems than simple heat conduction.
(500 km of rock piled on top of it. As that subsides, the frictional
heating will reach way down.)
--Z
--
"And Aholibamah bare Jeush, and Jaalam, and Korah: these were the borogoves..."
*
When Bush says "Stay the course," what he means is "I don't know what to
do next." He's been saying this for years now.
Gene Ward Smith
news:1185383880.7...@w3g2000hsg.googlegroups.com:
>> INHERIT THE STARS by James P. Hogan - one of the best "puzzle" science
>> fiction books ever. The sequels drop off in quality, but the first
>> sequel is still quite good. If for nothing else, read it for the
>> insanely cool concepts - the Ganymeans, though probably implausible
>> (completely peaceful herbivores on a world without carnivores would be
>> unlikely to evolve intelligence), are a neat alien race with truly alien
>> psychology.
>
> Mileage sure does vary! IMHO, the "puzzle" is ridiculous: I knew the
> "answer" 100 pages before the protagonist figured it out. I felt the
> trilogy /improved/ markedly as it went along.
I did also, which left me screaming and moaning and saying "He *can't be
planning to do that!"
Keith F. Lynch
> documentary series called "Miracle Planet" made in 2004 [1] and
> shown on U.S. cable tv on The Science Channel in 2006. Its first
> segment is called "The Violent Past" and includes the theory that
> the early Earth was hit about six to eight times by rocks of about
> 500 kilometers in diameter. This led to the question of whether
> life on the planet could have survived such an impact, which in turn
> led to a really, really cool-looking (if faintly terrifying) CGI
> simulation of what would happen if a 500-km rock, traveling at 20
> Summary re the human race: "That's it man, game over." If you're on
> Earth or in its atmosphere when this happens, you don't even get a
> saving throw.
I agree.
> Your maximum survival time might be as much as 24 hours if you're at
> the point on the globe antipodal to impact.
I doubt it would be nearly that long. I'm not sure what would reach
you first: The shockwave from below, which would be about like being
in a supersonic jet slamming straight down into the ground at full
speed, or teratons of splashed debris reentering and lighting the sky
to incandescence, which would be like having an H-bomb go off a mile
over your head. Maybe if you were in an Army tank parked in the
center of an iceberg, which in turn was in the center of cubic
kilometer of styrofoam beads, you could survive for an hour or two,
for all the good that would do you.
> A question of interest to me, but not addressed in the show, is
> whether any _artifacts_ of humanity might survive on the planet, to
> perhaps be discovered by alien explorers.
Possibly some wonky isotope ratios where there used to be a nuclear
reactor. But if and when intelligent life re-evolved and noticed it,
it would be dismissed as some weird natural phenomenon. Just as we
dismiss the remains of the billion-year-old nuclear reactor in Africa.
> Nothing survives on the surface, of course, nor anything in even the
> deepest oceans (see "boils away," above). But: we've found microbes
> living in cracks in the rock as far as three kilometers below the
> planet's surface, in temperatures up to 50 degrees C. And their
> genetic profile shows that they have, dormant, the code for being
> aerobic, that is, oxygen-breathing, meaning that (1) they evolved
> from such life and (2) presumably could make the evolutionary
> journey back to oxygen-breathing. Could any of these survive a
> hypothetical Big Impact?
ObSF: _Light of Other Days_ by Clarke and Baxter, in which precisely
this turns out to have happened.
> Answer: very probably yes. As said above, the impact would heat
> the planetary surface to 2,000 degrees C, but that heat would
> _not_ spread so far down into the rock as to completely destroy a
> relatively cool -- that is, 50 C or below -- Goldilocks zone between
> the surface and the deep, mantle-and-core-heated hot zones.
I'm skeptical. I would think the shock wave would heat everything
greatly as it passed through.
What would keep people from building shelters in that zone and living
in them? They would of course be nuclear powered, to provide power
for lights to grow plants to be eaten and provide oxygen. And of
course nuclear-powered air conditioners.
If only a thin layer was heated to thousands of degrees, it wouldn't
take very long to cool off. Probably less than a century. Maybe
less than a decade. Heat loss increases with the *fourth power*
of the absolute temperature, so a white-hot surface won't remain
white-hot for long unless the heat is replenished from below.
> Anaerobic microbial life in there could and presumably would
> survive, and eventually, slowly, expand into the no-life void above
> it, all the way up to the floors of the new oceans, and then into
> the water, and eventually to the surface and then onto land,
> evolving into oxygen-breathers along the way. And, according to the
> theory, that's already happened in Earth's distant past; that all
> life today is descended from such microbial life that was the only
> survivor of an impact three and a half to four billion years ago.
What reason is there to believe that the first life didn't evolve
after the last such impact? Quite likely there was no life around to
be killed in any of the impacts. Maybe without the impacts, there
wouldn't be such a variety of elements available at the surface, many
of which may be necessary for life. Without the impacts, maybe all
the iron and other heavy elements would be locked up uselessly in
the core.
--
Keith F. Lynch - http://keithlynch.net/
Please see http://keithlynch.net/email.html before emailing me.
John Savard
wrote, in part:
>What would keep people from building shelters in that zone and living
>in them? They would of course be nuclear powered, to provide power
>for lights to grow plants to be eaten and provide oxygen. And of
>course nuclear-powered air conditioners.
24 hours isn't really enough time to build such a shelter.
Of course, if people *were* living in such shelters *in advance of the
impact* it would work, but it's not necessarily true that there would be
enough advance warning.
John Savard
http://www.quadibloc.com/index.html
Derek Lyons
>Bitstring <46ac77fd....@news.supernews.com>, from the wonderful
>person Derek Lyons <fair...@gmail.com> said
>>GSV Three Minds in a Can <G...@quik.clara.co.uk> wrote:
>
>>>300m at 2000 degrees, is (roughly) 3km at 200 degrees .. still pretty
>>>uncomfortable but it spread laterally too, which helps, if it started
>>>as a small spot.
>>
>>It's not starting as a small spot with a meteor impact on the scale we
>>are discussing - it's starting as essentially the entire surface of
>>the planet.
>
>What, BOTH hemispheres?
Yes. The strike postulated at the head of the thread was a body 500
km across, orders of magnitude bigger than the Dinosaur Killer that is
the usual subject of asteroid impact discussion.
>>>However I doubt you'd actually get 300m of molten rock .. the stuff that
>>>gets much hotter than that would be off and away (as gas, or plasma), so
>>>getting hot liquid rock to stay around and heat the underlying substrate
>>>is not easy.
>>
>>You have to keep in mind the timescale - that gas/plasma will have
>>from decades to centuries to heat the liquid rock, which in turn heats
>>the solid rocks beneath, thus increasing the length of the heat pulse.
>
>Nope it won't, it'll be off into space, either physically, or else it
>will lose it's heat by radiation (unless you figure we've blanketed the
>whole planet somehow).
Wait - you think the heat in the atmosphere will only travel in *one*
direction? If I hold a blowtorch over (and paralell to) a surface,
that surface is going to get hot.
Derek Lyons
>On Wed, 25 Jul 2007, in rec.arts.sf.written,
>GSV Three Minds in a Can <G...@quik.clara.co.uk> said:
>
>>Del Cotter <d...@branta.demon.co.uk> said
>>>>>Answer: very probably yes. As said above, the impact would heat the
>>>>>planetary surface to 2,000 degrees C, but that heat would _not_
>>>>>spread so far down into the rock
>
>>>>Why not? Earlier you state that zone is three kilometers down - and
>>>>with a thousand years to do so, why would't the heat penetrate that
>>>>far?
>>>
>>>It wouldn't be two thousand degrees when it got there.
>
>>>It's much the same mathematics that explains why the hot rock deep
>>>down doesn't burn our feet here on the surface.
>>
>>Not quite - the reason for that is because the surface radiates it away
>>fast enough to stop the temperature climbing to match the Earth's core
>
>Quite. But while your "radiation from the surface" explanation explains
>why the surface is only 30 degrees C when the deeps are 2,000 degrees,
>what explains why the intermediate depths aren't at 2,000 degrees?
Nobody asked for the intermediate depths to be at 2,000 degrees. If I
gave that impression, I corrected it in a subsequent message.
>In theory you could pound the planet until it's hot all the way through,
>but in practice that doesn't happen, and if you have a naive model in
>your head that says 2,000K at the surface must become 2,000K 3km down,
>you won't understand why it doesn't.
It's fascinating that you revert to insults rather than addressing the
points I raise and answering the questions I ask.
Wayne Throop
::: from decades to centuries to heat the liquid rock, which in turn
::: heats the solid rocks beneath, thus increasing the length of the
::: heat pulse.
:: Nope it won't, it'll be off into space, either physically, or else it
:: will lose it's heat by radiation (unless you figure we've blanketed
:: the whole planet somehow).
: fair...@gmail.com (Derek Lyons)
: Wait - you think the heat in the atmosphere will only travel in *one*
: direction?
I don't know about him, but I'm thinking the plasma won't stay hot for
decades, if it's losign heat by radiation. The total amount of heat in
the atmosphere is much smaller than that in the same volume of rock, and
thus it would cool much faster. Further, a "plasma" will start to cool by
evaporation as molecules get boosted to beyond escape velocity.
So... why will the unconfined gas/plasma remain hot for "decades to
centuries"? Or is it confined? If so, how?
: If I hold a blowtorch over (and paralell to) a surface, that surface
: is going to get hot.
If you kept dumping energy into the atmosphere, as is being done to that
torch flame, then it could stay hot. What's the source of that energy?
Wayne Throop thr...@sheol.org http://sheol.org/throopw