Relativity
(The Special Theory of )
Benford,
Gregory "Relativistic Effects" in In Alien Flesh. 1986,
TOR. A ram-scoop spaceship accelerates very close to the speed
of light and flies between two galaxies about to collide, able
to remove some of the interstellar matter that would have flown
between them, due to relativistic effects.
Forward,
Robert "Twin Paradox" in Indistinguishable from Magic. 1995,
Baen. One twin travels to the stars at relativistic speed, the
other stays on Earth but stops aging. So traveling twin gets
to be older.
Haldeman,
Joe The Forever War. 1974, Ballantine. Award‑winning
novel of an interstellar war involving concepts from both special
and general relativity.
Haldeman,
Joe "Tricentennial" in Infinite Dreams. 1978, St. Martin's.
Traveling near speed of light and the effects of time dilation.
Masson,
David "Traveler's Rest" in Silverberg, Robert, ed. Voyagers
in Time. 1967, Tempo. Intricate, brilliant story; relativistic
time dilation becomes a function of latitude.
Sheffield,
Charles "The Long Chance" in Vectors. 1979, Ace. Traveling
into the future using relativistic space travel and suspended
animation.
Stith,
John Redshift Rendezvous. 1990, Ace. Explores the effects
of a voyage in a "hyperspace" where the speed of light is 30 meters
per second.
Varley,
John "The Pusher" in Blue Champagne. 1986, Berkley. Poignant
story on loneliness of relativistic space travel; time dilation
makes it difficult to have a family on Earth.
Note:
For stories involving the General Theory of Relativity, see under
"Black Holes" and "Cosmology"
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Saturn
(and its Satellites)
Clarke,
Arthur "Saturn Rising" in Tales of Ten Worlds. 1962, Signet.
Story of a man who is driven by childhood trauma to build a hotel
in Titan. (Dated science, but good for its time.)
McDevitt,
Jack "Melville in Iapetus" in Cryptic: The Best
Short Fiction of Jack McDevitt. (2009, Subterranean Press)
[also on the Web at: http://www.webscription.net/chapters/1596061958/1596061958___7.htm]
An alien statue is discovered on this moon of the ringed planet
and a human expedition wonders at the motivation of the artist.
Nice descriptions of Saturn as seen from a tidally locked satellite.
Reynolds, Alastair Pushing Ice. 2005, Ace. Saturn's
moon Janus turns out to be an alien craft, comes out of orbit,
and takes a human spaceship on a remarkable interstellar adventure.
Swanwick,
Michael "Slow Life" in Hartwell, D, ed. Best SF 8.
2003, Eos. Story of the first expedition to Titan; suggests a
form of life that can survive deep under Titan's seas.
Varley,
John "Gotta Sing, Gotta Dance" in The Persistence of Vision.
1978, Dell. Symbiotic humans and plants adapt to life in the rings
of Saturn and make unearthly music.
Zelazny,
Roger "Dreadsong" in Preiss, Byron, ed. The Planets. 1985,
Bantam. Life forms that could live in Saturn's atmosphere.
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Science
in General
Benford,
Gregory Timescape. 1981, Pocket Books. An excellent
novel that is one of the best depictions of the nature and pressures
of scientific research; features astronomers such as Fred Hoyle
and Geoffrey and Margaret Burbidge as characters.
Benford,
Gregory Cosm. 1998, Avon/EOS. A Brookhaven physicist makes
a universe in a particle accelerator. Has excellent (and often
caustic) portrayals of how big science is done today in physics
and astronomy.
Chiang,
Ted "Exhalation" in Hartwell, D. & Cramer, K.,
eds. Year's Best SF 14. 2009, Eos. A scientist, who
is a mechanical being, tries to reason out his own anatomy by
applying the scientific method.
Sagan,
Carl Contact. 1985, Simon & Schuster. Good
portrayal of how astronomical research is carried out and an interesting
attempt to work out some modern issues between science and religion.
Weinberg,
Gerald "The Moon is a Harsh Pig" in Brotherton, Mike,
ed. Diamonds in the Sky. 2009, at http://www.mikebrotherton.com/diamonds/?page_id=47
On another planet, a bet about the cause for the phases of the
moon leads a graduate student in astronomy to think more about
science is done.
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SETI:
The Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence via Radio Surveys
Baxter,
Stephen "Last Contact" in Dozois, G., ed. The Year's
Best Science Fiction, 25. 2008, St. Martin's. [Also
available on the web at: http://www.solarisbooks.com/books/newbookscifi/last-contact.asp]
In the near future, the acceleration of the universe's expansion
increases to such a degree that even stars in our own galaxy begin
to be carried away very fast. Suddenly, SETI scientists pick up
many messages: civilizations need to say goodbye.
Benford, Gregory “Bow Shock” in The Year’s Best Science Fiction: 24th Annual Collection, Gardner Dozois, ed. (2007, St. Martin’s). A radio astronomer studying fast-moving neutron stars discovers the signature of an alien space ship.
Benford,
Gregory "Dance to Strange Musics" in Year's Best Science
Fiction 4, ed. David Hartwell. 1999, Eos/HarperCollins. First
expedition to Alpha Centauri finds a planet-wide, collective life
form that is sending out huge, information-rich SETI messages
to one star after another.
Brin, David
"Lungfish" in The River of Time. 1987, Bantam. Interesting
contemplation of the many purposes to which alien civilizations
might put self-replicating "von Neumann probes" and
how conflicts between probes from different civilizations might
arise.
Gunn,
James The Listeners. 1972, Signet. Good early
portrayal of a scientifically reasonable search. (Note that the
author is not the James Gunn who is an astronomer.)
McDevitt,
Jack The Hercules Text. 1986, Ace. Flawed, but interesting
novel about radio communication with a distant civilization.
McDevitt,
Jack "Nothing Ever Happens in Rock City" in Nebula
Awards Showcase 2004, ed. Vonda McIntyre. 2004, ROC/Penguin.
The first radio SETI discovery as seen from the perspective of
the owner of the liquor store closest to the observatory.
Morton,
Oliver "The Albian Message" in Year's Best SF 11,
Hartwell, David & Cramer, Kathryn, eds. 2006, Eos. Suggests
that the place to search for alien messages is in the human genome.
Piper, H. Beam “Omnilingual” in several short story collections, and free on the web at: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/19445 (1957). This story is somewhat dated (an expedition on Mars has found the ruins of extinct civilization, which is not scientifically reasonable with what we know today.) But the key idea is timeless -- that the “Rosetta Stone” which enables an archaeologist to decipher their ancient language, turns out to be the periodic table of the elements.
Sagan,
Carl Contact. 1985, Simon & Schuster. The
discovery of radio signals from extra‑terrestrial intelligence
leads humanity to re-evaluate its self-image.
Sawyer,
Robert Factoring Humanity. 1998, Tor. A radio message from
Alpha Centauri helps humanity get in touch with another civilization
and itself.
Sawyer, Robert
Rollback. (2007, TOR) A message from a civilization 19 LY away
is received by SETI scientists, and turns out to be a survey on
issues of morality for which they want many answers. We send a
reply, and then their reply is eventually received, with instructions
for incubating two baby aliens. Considers some of the issues of
altruism and message construction that SETI researchers have been
debating.
Spinrad,
Norman "The Helping Hand" in Full Spectrum 3, ed.
Lou Aronica, et al., 1991, Bantam. An alien message unites humanity,
but turns out to be a benevolent lie.
Zerwick,
C. & Brown H. The Cassiopeia Affair. 1968, Curtis.
An exploration of the effects that an alien radio message might
have on Earth. One of the authors is a geochemist.
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Solar
System: General
Asimov,
Isaac, et al., eds. The Science Fictional Solar System.
1979, Panther/Granada. A collection of short stories set
on the planets and satellites of our solar system.
Preiss,
Byron, ed. The Planets. 1985, Bantam. A collection
of essays by noted astronomers about the planets in the solar
system and science fiction stories inspired by our current
understanding of each world.
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Space
Flight
Garn,
Jake & Cohen, Stephen Night Launch. 1989, William Morrow.
A techno-thriller about the hijacking of the Space Shuttle in
space, written by the first Senator to fly on the Shuttle.
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Space
Travel (Realistic)
Anderson,
Poul Tau Zero. 1970, Berkley. While the ending
is fanciful, this novel very nicely portrays some of the issues
involving relativistic space travel.
Benford,
Gregory "Relativistic Effects" in In Alien Flesh. 1986,
TOR. A ram-scoop spaceship accelerates very close to the speed
of light and flies between two galaxies about to collide.
Brin,
David "An Ever-Reddening Glow" in Hartwell, D. &
Cramer, K., eds. The Hard SF Renaissance. 2002, Orb. Suggests
that it is the stretching of space by the general relativistic
"metric surfing" (travel near the speed of light)
of countless intelligent species that is responsible for the expansion
of the universe, and that no species is willing to give up the
thrill. (Very nice parallel with the ecological damage we all
do to the Earth.)
Haldeman,
Joe "Tricentennial" in Infinite Dreams. 1978, St. Martin's.
Traveling near the speed of light and the effects of time dilation
for the traveler.
Reynolds,
Alistair "Beyond the Aquila Rift" in Year's Best
SF 11, Hartwell, David & Cramer, Kathryn, eds. 2006, Eos.
Proposes a network of ancient pathways like black holes that allow
faster-than-light travel. Local stations can be reached fast,
but the protagonist winds up in the Magellanic Clouds.
Varley,
John "The Pusher" in Blue Champagne. 1986, Berkley. Poignant
story about the loneliness of relativistic space travel; time
dilation makes it difficult to have a family on Earth.
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