Writer's background in his science fiction

[Isaac Law]

They were alien animals, right? Alien can refer to microbes on Mars or a non-sapient predator or prey that developed and evolved on another planet, right?

 

[KatG]

Isaac, you might want to take a look at the work of Peter Watts, who is a marine biologist, and Julie Czernada, who was a biologist specializing in insects. Both have made interesting alien races and ideas about animal development. You might also be interested in the Old Man's War books of John Scalzi. Scalzi is not a scientist, but he has come up with some colorful aliens for those novels.

C.J. Cherryh is a good one for aliens also. She was a classics professor but also studied engineering, and NASA named an asteroid after her cause they liked her stuff. David Brin does create some interesting aliens in Uplift. Brin is a physicist, not a biologist, but he came up with some inventive species.

Completely separate from that, you might want to read a non-fiction book called Your Inner Fish by Neil Shubin. The book is a primer in biological development on Earth, going over eyes, hands, etc. and so might give you a basic framework of how bodies operate and change to work from.

 

[Pennarin]

They were alien animals, right? Alien can refer to microbes on Mars or a non-sapient predator or prey that developed and evolved on another planet, right?

Alien is any non-Earth life. For most people? ... intelligent, non-Earth life.
People will tend to gravitate towards statements like "This feline-like creature comes from the first alien planet we visited" and "This feline-like alien comes from the first planet we visited"; the former seems to denote an animal, the latter an intelligent creature. An aliens seems for many to refer to an intelligent alien. Too many movies and written stories of spaceborn encounters or Earthly visitations, and not enough complete ecosystems encountered, in which one assumes (as on Earth) 99.99999999 percent of life is dumb.

 

[Isaac Law]

Isaac, you might want to take a look at the work of Peter Watts, who is a marine biologist, and Julie Czernada, who was a biologist specializing in insects. Both have made interesting alien races and ideas about animal development. You might also be interested in the Old Man's War books of John Scalzi. Scalzi is not a scientist, but he has come up with some colorful aliens for those novels.

C.J. Cherryh is a good one for aliens also. She was a classics professor but also studied engineering, and NASA named an asteroid after her cause they liked her stuff. David Brin does create some interesting aliens in Uplift. Brin is a physicist, not a biologist, but he came up with some inventive species.

Completely separate from that, you might want to read a non-fiction book called Your Inner Fish by Neil Shubin. The book is a primer in biological development on Earth, going over eyes, hands, etc. and so might give you a basic framework of how bodies operate and change to work from.

I have some of those book and plan to get them on audiobook. I'd like to study science, but which one, which one? I'd just stick with theoretical physics and biology, because I like ideas like, time travel, space travel and I like living organisms. I also like the weird stuff like saucer ships and one I want to do is to make the Flying Saucer aliens more believable to SF fans who take science seriously and seem a little TOO skeptical. If your willing, we can talk more often.

 

[Awesomov]

Though scientific background can certainly add to and bring about great stories, having a background should absolutely not be necessary for writing great science fiction. I don't know about anyone else here, but I find the task quite simple while still being able to bring about unique ideas and such.

 

[ian_sales]

Though scientific background can certainly add to and bring about great stories, having a background should absolutely not be necessary for writing great science fiction. I don't know about anyone else here, but I find the task quite simple while still being able to bring about unique ideas and such.

A scientific background is completely irrelevant for writing sf.

 

[psikeyhackr]

A scientific background is completely irrelevant for writing sf.

This is where we get the difference between

SCIENCE Fiction and Sci-TROPE Fiction

And then there are readers who either cannot recognize or do not care how bad the science in a story really is.

I believe a scientific perspective affects a persons thinking at an early age. Bujold's father was an engineer and she was a pharmacist. Even her stories which do not have much science have a consistency that shows how she thinks.

psik

 

[ian_sales]

This is where we get the difference between

SCIENCE Fiction and Sci-TROPE Fiction

And then there are readers who either cannot recognize or do not care how bad the science in a story really is.

I believe a scientific perspective affects a persons thinking at an early age. Bujold's father was an engineer and she was a pharmacist. Even her stories which do not have much science have a consistency that shows how she thinks.

psik

Someone with an arts background can write a perfectly good hard sf novel. It's all in the research. People with scientific backgrounds are no better and no worse than people without them. The distinction between science and "sci-tropes" exists only in your head. It's not a meaningful distinction in the real world. Sf is a mode of fiction. The actual validity of the scientific content - or indeed the necessity for any - is irrelevant.

Rigour, however, is an entirely different thing, and I wonder if that's what you mean.

 

[psikeyhackr]

Someone with an arts background can write a perfectly good hard sf novel. It's all in the research. People with scientific backgrounds are no better and no worse than people without them. The distinction between science and "sci-tropes" exists only in your head.

Rather then make generalisations I tried specifying examples and rating them.

http://www.sffworld.com/forums/show...ies-A-Proposal&p=709804&viewfull=1#post709804

Artificial gravity without rotation is a standard sci-fi trope. Lots of books have it and no one tries to explain it. But we do not know if it is possible. But unlike FTL There is no physics indicating a likely impossibility.

psik

 

[Val_1999]

Rather then make generalisations I tried specifying examples and rating them.

http://www.sffworld.com/forums/show...ies-A-Proposal&p=709804&viewfull=1#post709804

Artificial gravity without rotation is a standard sci-fi trope. Lots of books have it and no one tries to explain it. But we do not know if it is possible. But unlike FTL There is no physics indicating a likely impossibility.

psik

Psik,

I have read Red Nails a few times, why is this being classified as Sci-Fi? Is it because of the magazine it original appeared in? Strange....

 

[psikeyhackr]

Psik,

I have read Red Nails a few times, why is this being classified as Sci-Fi? Is it because of the magazine it original appeared in? Strange....

I am not classifying it as sci-fi. I am using it as a clear demonstration of fantasy. But in the battle at the end of the story the "fantasy technology" is no less explained than what is used in Cat and Mouse. And it is the only Conan story in Project Gutenberg.

This is what I said:

#1 is blatantly not science fiction but instead sword and sorcery fantasy.

They could be numbered 0 thru 4 with ZERO indicating NOT science fiction. The numbers are not the point. It is having references for comparison.

psik

 

[ian_sales]

Rather then make generalisations I tried specifying examples and rating them.

http://www.sffworld.com/forums/show...ies-A-Proposal&p=709804&viewfull=1#post709804

Artificial gravity without rotation is a standard sci-fi trope. Lots of books have it and no one tries to explain it. But we do not know if it is possible. But unlike FTL There is no physics indicating a likely impossibility.

psik

IOW, if it's not Mundane sf, you don't consider it sf. Which seems to me to miss the point of sf.

 

[psikeyhackr]

IOW, if it's not Mundane sf, you don't consider it sf. Which seems to me to miss the point of sf.

So you are accomplishing something by putting words in my mouth. I never said anything of the kind.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mundane_science_fiction

I was reading science fiction decades before that usage came up.

Mundane was used to refer to people who did not read science fiction.

psik

 

[ian_sales]

Your description of anti-gravity as a trope with "no physics indicating a likely impossibility" sounds like a way to describe Mundane SF to me.

And we were all reading science fiction decades before Geoff Ryman et al proposed the Mundane movement. As was Ryman himself. It's irrelevant.

 

[Rosie Oliver]

Rather then make generalisations I tried specifying examples and rating them.

http://www.sffworld.com/forums/show...ies-A-Proposal&p=709804&viewfull=1#post709804

Artificial gravity without rotation is a standard sci-fi trope. Lots of books have it and no one tries to explain it. But we do not know if it is possible. But unlike FTL There is no physics indicating a likely impossibility.

psik

I actually go some way to explaining how artificial gravity works (the non-rotation type) on my blog. So please don't say no one tries to explain it.

 

[psikeyhackr]

Your description of anti-gravity as a trope with "no physics indicating a likely impossibility" sounds like a way to describe Mundane SF to me.

Gravity is not mentioned in that page about Mundane SF.

psik

 

[psikeyhackr]

I actually go some way to explaining how artificial gravity works (the non-rotation type) on my blog. So please don't say no one tries to explain it.

I have not read your blog. Link?

I am not aware of any physicists explaining how artificial gravity might actually be done. Bujold uses the invention of artificial gravity to make her quaddies obsolete but says noting about how it might work.

psik