scholarly journals “All these worlds are yours except …”: Science Fiction and Folk Fictions at NASA

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 135
Author(s):  
Janet Vertesi
Keyword(s):  
Solar System ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Project Team ◽  
Star Trek ◽  
Daily Work ◽  
Political Dynamics ◽  
Course Of Action ◽  
Scientists And Engineers

Although they command real spacecraft exploring the solar system, NASA scientists refer frequently to science fiction in the course of their daily work. Fluency with the Star Trek series and other touchstone works demonstrates membership in broader geek culture. But references to Star Trek, movies like 2001 and 2010, and Dr. Strangelove also do the work of demarcating project team affiliation and position, theorizing social and political dynamics, and motivating individuals in a chosen course of action. As such, science fiction classics serve as local folk fictions that enable embedded commentary on the socio-political circumstances of technoscientific work: in essence, a form of lay social theorizing. Such fiction references therefore allow scientists and engineers to openly yet elliptically discuss their social, political, and interactional environment, all the while maintaining face as credible, impartial, technical experts.

Life, But Not as We Know It!

2019 ◽  
pp. 172-179
Author(s):  
Nicholas Mee
Keyword(s):  
Solar System ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Neutron Stars ◽  
Star Trek ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Open Questions ◽  
Satellites Of Jupiter ◽  
Silicon Based

One of the biggest open questions is whether life is unique to Earth or whether it exists elsewhere. Science fiction authors have speculated about lifeforms that are very different to the life that we are familiar with. These speculations include silicon-based lifeforms on Star Trek, Fred Hoyle’s sentient Black Cloud and even nuclear lifeforms on neutron stars in the novel Dragon’s Egg. Several bodies in the Solar System have been proposed as possible homes to life. These include Mars and the satellites of Jupiter and Saturn, several of which are believed to have subsurface oceans. The most intriguing possibilities are Europa, Enceladus and Titan.

Perdre la mesure… Or, The Ecologics of Extinction

CounterText ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 15-30
Author(s):  
Stefan Herbrechter
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Solar System ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Current Level ◽  
Recent Book ◽  
Human Race ◽  
World Picture ◽  
Adequate Measurement ◽  
Ecological Catastrophe

The article takes its cue from Olivier Rey's recent book Une question de taille (a question of size) and develops the idea of humanity ‘losing its measure, or scale’ in the context of contemporary ecological catastrophe. It seems true that the current level of global threats, from climate change to asteroids, has produced a culture of ambient ‘species angst’ living in more or less constant fear about the survival of the ‘human race’, biodiversity, the planet, the solar system. This indeed means that the idea of a cosmos and a cosmology may no longer be an adequate ‘measurement’ for scaling the so far inconceivable, namely a thoroughly postanthropocentric world picture. The question of scale is thus shown to be connected to the necessity of developing a new sense of proportion, an eco-logic that would do justice to both, things human and nonhuman. Through a reading of the recent science fiction film Interstellar, this article aims to illustrate the dilemma and the resulting stalemate between two contemporary ‘alternatives’ that inform the film: does humanity's future lie in self-abandoning or in self-surpassing, in investing in conservation or in exoplanets? The article puts forward a critique of both of these ‘ecologics’ and instead shows how they depend on a dubious attempt by humans to ‘argue themselves out of the picture’, while leaving their anthropocentric premises more or less intact.

scholarly journals Star Trek : paradigme juridique et laboratoire du droit

2016 ◽  
Vol 45 (2) ◽  
pp. 613-635
Author(s):  
Fabrice Defferrard
Keyword(s):  
Science Fiction ◽  
Star Trek

Star Trek est un univers de science-fiction paradigmatique pour le droit. Il repose pour l’essentiel sur une architecture juridique et judiciaire complexe, inspirée d’un modèle universaliste mettant en valeur les libertés publiques, les droits fondamentaux et une justice équitable. Chargés d’explorer pacifiquement l’espace, les officiers de Starfleet nouent des liens de droit et résolvent des conflits de normes dans des situations parfois inédites qui font de cette divertissante saga un véritable laboratoire du droit.

scholarly journals Visions of Human Futures in Space and SETI

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jason T. Wright ◽  
Michael P. Oman-Reagan
Keyword(s):  
Solar System ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Dark Matter Particle ◽  
Short Term ◽  
National Science ◽  
The Galaxy ◽  
Near Future ◽  
Far Future ◽  
Made In

We discuss how visions for the futures of humanity in space and SETI are intertwined, and are shaped by prior work in the fields and by science fiction. This appears in the language used in the fields, and in the sometimes implicit assumptions made in discussions of them. We give examples from articulations of the so-called Fermi Paradox, discussions of the settlement of the Solar System (in the near future) and the Galaxy (in the far future), and METI. We argue that science fiction, especially the campy variety, is a significant contributor to the ‘giggle factor’ that hinders serious discussion and funding for SETI and Solar System settlement projects. We argue that humanity's long-term future in space will be shaped by our short-term visions for who goes there and how. Because of the way they entered the fields, we recommend avoiding the term ‘colony’ and its cognates when discussing the settlement of space, as well as other terms with similar pedigrees. We offer examples of science fiction and other writing that broaden and challenge our visions of human futures in space and SETI. In an appendix, we use an analogy with the well-funded and relatively uncontroversial searches for the dark matter particle to argue that SETI's lack of funding in the national science portfolio is primarily a problem of perception, not inherent merit.Also on arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/1708.05318Please cite this version:Wright, Jason T., and Michael P. Oman-Reagan. “Visions of Human Futures in Space and SETI.” International Journal of Astrobiology, 2017, 1–12. doi:10.1017/S1473550417000222.

Conference in Honour of the 90th Birthday of Freeman Dyson

2014 ◽  
Vol 03 (01) ◽  
pp. 18-21
Author(s):  
APPN Editorial Team
Keyword(s):  
Science Fiction ◽  
Surface Area ◽  
Popular Science ◽  
Star Trek ◽  
Inside Surface ◽  
90Th Birthday ◽  
Next Generation ◽  
Freeman Dyson ◽  
Data Informed

In an episode of the popular science fiction series Star Trek: The Next Generation, the crew of the USS Enterprise-D happened upon a full Dyson sphere when its gravitational fluctuations brought them to a stop. After some analysis of the sphere, Lieutenant Commander Data informed that the inside surface area of the sphere was equal to "250 million class-M worlds".

Fighting for the Future

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Studies ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Media Studies ◽  
Star Trek ◽  
Literary Studies ◽  
The Political ◽  
Television Series ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
The Moment

The first two seasons of the television series Star Trek: Discovery, the newest instalment in the long-running and influential Star Trek franchise, received media and academic attention from the moment they arrived on screen. Discovery makes several key changes to Star Trek’s well-known narrative formulae, particularly the use of more serialized storytelling, appealing to audiences’ changed viewing habits in the streaming age – and yet the storylines, in their topical nature and the broad range of socio-political issues they engage with, continue in the political vein of the franchise’s megatext. This volume brings together eighteen essays and one interview about the series, with contributions from a variety of disciplines including cultural studies, literary studies, media studies, fandom studies, history and political science. They explore representations of gender, sexuality and race, as well as topics such as shifts in storytelling and depictions of diplomacy. Examining Discovery alongside older entries into the Star Trek canon and tracing emerging continuities and changes, this volume will be an invaluable resource for all those interested in Star Trek and science fiction in the franchise era.

Joanna Russ and the New Wave

Joanna Russ ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 20-38
Author(s):  
Gwyneth Jones
Keyword(s):  
Science Fiction ◽  
Star Trek ◽  
New Wave ◽  
Protest Movements ◽  
Joanna Russ ◽  
Modernist Novel ◽  
The 1960S

“Experiment and Experience” covers Joanna’s first years as a reviewer for the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, under the editorship of Judith Merril, and her first post as a university teacher at Cornell, and discusses modernism in sf, Joanna’s role as interpreter of the British “New Worlds” writers and the American New Wave and her response to the protest movements and cultural revolutions of the 1960s (in the psychedelic “Modernist novel by a Star Trek fan”) And Chaos Died. Essays and stories (1968-1971) examined include the important “The Wearing Out of Genre Materials,” and autobiographical short fictions that foreshadow The Female Man and illuminate And Chaos Died.

scholarly journals The Blackness of Liet-Kynes: Reading Frank Herbert’s Dune Through James Cone

Religions ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (9) ◽  
pp. 281
Author(s):  
Peter Herman
Keyword(s):  
Solar System ◽  
Science Fiction ◽  
White Identity ◽  
Ethical Considerations ◽  
The Social ◽  
Far Future

Frank Herbert’s landmark science fiction novel Dune has received numerous sequels, prequels, and film treatments. Detailing the saga of humanity’s far future beyond our present solar system, the work plays successfully with religious, political, and ecological themes. This essay deals with the social/theological implications of two figures within the story-world of Dune: Its protagonist and visible hero, Paul Atreides/Muad’Dib and the lesser figure of the “Imperial Planetologist” Dr. Kynes, also known to the Fremen as “Liet”. By reading these two figures through the theology of James Cone, we discover that the obvious hero is not a messianic figure but a demonic one. Further, it is the lesser character of Liet-Kynes who actually fulfills the messianic role in Cone’s theological system. This essay is preceded by and makes use of Jeremy Ian Kirk’s work with the film Avatar that provides similar analysis. Where Kirk’s principal concern is with the ethical considerations of Avatar, this essay will more closely bear on Cone’s dynamic of redemption and conversion, specifically his notion of dying to white identity to be reborn in blackness.

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