8 amazing works you may not have seen from anime's greatest directors. Behold the incredible places where we'll build cities in space. Another thought provoking article at io9. Europa is a must-go-now destination. Forget about the very entertaining film of the same name, I want to see a global effort to send a submersible probe, outfitted with a drill to find passage beneath it's icy surface, and I don't want to wait twenty years for this to happen. The exploration, militarization and colonization of our solar systems jurisdiction is "crucial" to the survival of our species.
For now...I believe that we should concentrate on building large ships and probe our system bodies. <—-don't take that statement someplace other than what it was written to mean. I like the idea of planetary bases, but if radiation is one of our largest enemies, maybe a synthetic atmosphere is a nice goal. I'm referring to terraforming atmosphere. If we create an artificial atmosphere, wouldn't that be the best shield to deflect radiation and even meteors? And yes, I know this is fanciful thinking, but so was the Star Trek communicator 40 years ago. OMNI Magazine Collection : Free Texts. From Wikipedia: OMNI was a science and science fiction magazine published in the US and the UK.
It contained articles on science fact and short works of science fiction. The first issue was published in October 1978, the last in Winter 1995, with an internet version lasting until 1998. OMNI was launched by Kathy Keeton, long-time companion and later wife of Penthouse magazine publisher Bob Guccione, who described the magazine in its first issue as "an original if not controversial mixture of science fact, fiction, fantasy and the paranormal". Before launch it was referred to as Nova, but the name was changed before the first issue to avoid a conflict with the PBS science show of the same name, NOVA. The magazine was initially edited by Frank Kendig, who left several months after the magazine's launch.
OMNI entered the market at the start of a wave of new science magazines aimed at educated but otherwise "non-professional" readers. All items (most recently added first) Classic European scifi movies you probably haven't seen - but you should. The Weekly Ansible, 50 Sci-Fi & Fantasy Works Every Socialist Should Read (by China Mieville)
We Want To Hear Your Six-Word Science Fiction Tales! The World's Most Fascinating Places, As Seen In Science Fiction Books. Who Cares If Science Fiction Actually Predicts The Future? Science Fiction Does Something Way Better Than Predict The Future. Isn't it plausible to say it has created the future as well. SciFi has influenced so many people, maybe influenced some to the point where they wanted to create what they have loved for so long. Examples are everywhere, especially with our latest technology. Ofcourse it does that. Influence and inspiration is such a prime mover that it is bound to have consequences, both in the negative and the positive. Pick up a book like Stand on Zanzibar, and do a little research, and it is easy to find examples of people who took inspiration from there to ideas, and ultimately to processes of creation.
But even on a more general / collective level, perspectives that become internalised by social dynamics, the group level of human perception, pave the road for those groups to create conditions and circumstances that follow (and fill) anticipations and expectations created by what and how groups internalise concepts. The Matrix Virtual Theatre. Matrix Virtual Theatre Wachowski Brothers Transcript Nov. 6, 1999 Welcome to the first live Virtual Theatre presentation in the world! Tonight you'll be able to watch The Matrix with special guests Andy and Larry Wachowski, the creators of the film.
WachowskiBros: Hi! ILoveNatPortman says: Can you give any information on the sequels, or even confirm their existence? WachowskiBros: Yes, we are working on them right now. Well, we would be working on them right now except we have to be here in the chat room right now, LOL blindrocket says: Do you practice Martial Arts? AgentMartin says: Why didn't you both do the commentary on the DVD, time restraints? Hiryu says: Which Anime inspired you the most and why? AgentMartin says: Is there anything in The Matrix which you weren't too happy with; wished you could have done differently?
Blindrocket says: Would you consider yourselves computer nerds? Enigma says: What is the role or faith in the movie? Sealouse says: Why was it filmed in Australia? Did the very first science fiction magazine appear in Russia in 1894? 5 Essential Frank Herbert Novels That Aren't About Dune. There are probably several schools on this. One school (of which I'm a member) would be that God Emperor (the fourth book) basically jumped the shark (or maybe the shark was jumped somewhere in Children Of Dune, even) and that while Herbert may have been getting back into the driver's seat right before he died, Chapterhouse: Dune isn't really good enough to justify slogging through its two predecessors.
So you can safely just read the first three books (Dune, Dune Messiah, Children Of Dune) and pretend the rest never happened. The second school, I believe, would be that God Emperor Of Dune is Frank Herbert's masterpiece (or something close to it) and you really need to read it (and Dune, of course), and then the remaining books in the original sextet become essential filler. As for the sequels and prequels co-authored by Frank Herbert's son, Brian, allegedly from Frank Herbert's notes: there's an even wider divide between people who think the Brian Herbert/Kevin J. Dune Heretics of Dune. The Twenty Science Fiction Novels that Will Change Your Life. A Mosque Among The Stars available for free! | Islam and Science Fiction. A Mosque Among The Stars was the first anthology that dealt with the subject of Muslim characters and/or Islamic themes and Science Fiction.
It was edited by me (Muhammad Aurangzeb Ahmad) and the Canadian Muslim author Ahmad Khan. It came out in 2007. Now that it has been years since it was released in printed form, we have decided to release A Mosque Among The Stars to the public as a Creative Commons Licensed (Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs) book. This means that you can download it for free and share with others as long as you dont make any changes to it and also do it for free. So without much further ado here is where you can download the book. Download the Book For the readers who are coming to this website for the first time be sure to check out my other sci-fi related Art-Project – Silicon Arabic. Was poet John Milton the father of science fiction? Image from Wikimedia Commons Before an ominous two-handed engine called “budget constraints” smote it into oblivion, a movie adaption of Milton’s Paradise Lost was slated to arrive in 2013.
Directed by Alex Proyas and starring Bradley Cooper as Satan, the film was billed as a science fiction actioner featuring 3-D “aerial warfare” between heavenly hosts and (probably) a lot of dark muttering about forbidden knowledge. Now Legendary Pictures has scrapped the epic, leaving us to contemplate our theology this Christmas without the promise of Cooper lolling around in a lake of fire, looking roguish.
Katy Waldman is a Slate assistant editor. Follow her on Twitter. Follow But that doesn’t mean we should forget Paradise Lost as the holidays roll in. Not to mention that the text of Paradise Lost is saturated in science. Also, Milton kinda sorta thought that extraterrestrial life might be possible. Then there’s Milton’s obsession with secret, all-powerful technologies. Yikes. Science Fiction Under Totalitarian Regimes, Part 2: Tsarist and Soviet Russia.
“Aelita is a planetary romance in which Los, a Soviet scientist and inventor, travels to Mars and, with the help of a Red Army officer, overthrows the fascist civilization there and institutes a Communist paradise.” - Well, this summary of the plot is, of course, wonderfully snappy with that added ironic underside of dismissive hindsight, but is utterly incorrect. As anyone who has actually read the soviet ‘Princess of Mars’ knows, the two protagonists - ‘Los the engineer’ and ‘Gusev the red soldier of fortune’ – are at odds from the start. Los is a moody dreamer, content to remain on decadent Mars and maybe make love to Aelita, while Gusev can’t wait to stir up trouble. The Martian society (based on a conquest of locals by migrating Earth Atlanteans thousands of years ago) is dying, yet Gusev manages to infect the fatalist working underclass with the energy for an uprising, which quickly degenerates into chaos and is crushed.
Pulp Science Fiction Under German Totalitarianism. Strange, yesterday came across old German pulp magazines as I was researching the whole Eurospy genre. Rolf Torring, Kommissar X, Henry Cotton (of which they created a terrible, terrible reboot film) but most of all Perry Rhodan. I think PR is among the most popular ongoing SF pulp fiction in the world, there are still many, many readers. Flagged. 211, William Gibson. Get more interviews like this—plus fiction, poetry, art, and more—and subscribe to The Paris Review today! Vancouver, British Columbia, sits just on the far side of the American border, a green-glass model city set in the dish of the North Shore Mountains, which enclose the city and support, most days, a thick canopy of fog.
There are periods in the year when it’ll rain for forty days, William Gibson tells me one mucky day there this winter, and when visibility drops so low you can’t see what’s coming at you from the nearest street corner. But large parts of Vancouver are traversed by trolley cars, and on clear nights you can gaze up at the wide expanse of Pacific sky through the haphazard grid of their electric wires. Gibson came to Vancouver in 1972, a twenty-four-year-old orphan who’d spent the past half-decade trawling the counterculture in Toronto on his wandering way from small-town southern Virginia. Pattern Recognition was the first of that series. —David Wallace-Wells No. E. 10 Literary Devices, And Where You Can Find Them in Science Fiction. Classic SF of the 1950s: beautiful books introduced by Gibson, Gaiman, Reed, Willis, Straub and others. Metropolis: A Rare Film Programme for Fraitz Lang's 1927 Masterpiece. Original programme for the British premiere of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis in 1927.
The world’s most valuable movie poster, for Fritz Lang’s 1927 masterpiece Metropolis, is to be auctioned again after making a record $690,000 in 2005. Ephemera related to the film is notoriously scarce, with only four copies of the poster known to survive. Almost as uncommon is this amazing film programme produced for the London premiere at the Marble Arch Pavilion on March 21, 1927, one of only three copies that we have handled.
Not only a list of cast and crew, it includes eleven short pieces on the making of the movie, commentary from the director and cast, and numerous production photographs and film stills, many attractively arranged as modernist collages. One of the most interesting sections shows in parallel columns how a passage of film scenes was adapted from the novel of the same name by Lang’s wife, Thea von Harbou. Recovered 1927 Metropolis Film Program Goes Behind the Scenes of a Sci-Fi Masterpiece | Underwire. Always Coming Home by Ursula K. Le Guin - Reviews, Discussion, Bookclubs, Lists. 10 Science Fiction Novels You Pretend to Have Read (And Why You Should Actually Read Them)
Here Are the 1960s Science Fiction Novels Everyone Should Read. Personally, I think it's an age thing, and society's evolving view of Nazis. The novel was published less than 20 years after WWII, and post-war nostalgia and pop culture was all about the US kicking some Nazi butt. Dick's alternate world where the Axis won was an interesting but unimaginable thought experiment for adults of the 60s. Then Vietnam happened, and war wasn't cool any more, and WWII was our parents war. So the media turned the Nazis into clowns and buffoons with Hogan's Heroes and Raiders of the Lost Ark. Then in the 90s we remembered the Holocaust, and Nazis weren't funny any more. Philip K. The Victorian Hugos: 1891. SExpand For anybody curious, the title image may be from somebody's flickr... but it's a picture (or copy) of "The Picture of Dorian Grey" by Ivan Albright. I remember stumbling upon that painting at the Art Institute in Chicago.
Quite jarring comparred to the other works that are hanging in the gallery. How our predictions for the Year 2000 changed throughout the 20th Century. The 6 Most Important Sci-Fi Ideas (Were Invented by a Hack) The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells is credited as one of the most influential science fiction books ever written, having introduced ideas like super-advanced aliens coming to Earth and said aliens hating the shit out of us and trying to wipe us out. Even though it was published as a novel all the way back in 1898, it's seen as the blueprint for every alien invasion blockbuster released more than a century later. This article isn't about that book. In the same year, a writer named Garrett P. Serviss crapped out an unauthorized sequel to Wells' book called Edison's Conquest of Mars, in which famed inventor Thomas Edison turns the tables on the aliens from The War of the Worlds by flying to Mars and killing all of them with his revenge boner -- it's the Victorian-era equivalent of shameless straight-to-DVD crapfests like Transmorphers and Titanic II.
Via Gutenberg.orgOh, you thought we were joking about the boner part? Also, it was one of the most revolutionary sci-fi novels ever written. The Victorian Hugos: 1890. Watch Arthur C. Clarke predict the internet and the iPads decades before they were invented. He was extraordinarily prescient with regard to comm tech, his specialty, but I don't think he got the social impact right. His claim that cities would dissolve because biz could be done anywhere is 180 degrees off. Cities are more important than ever as gathering places for people who need to interact, and in fact a higher proportion of people live in them than ever before. In the 60s and 70s cities in the US were being hollowed out by white flight to the suburbs, but now they're more in demand than ever. Too much so if anything, since gentrification has driven the poor and bohemian out of them.
A lot of this is because of retirees, who are sick of having to drive everywhere and want rapid-response ambulance service, but a lot of it is straight-up business interaction. Business travel is also bigger than ever, so face-to-face interaction seems more important than Clarke thought. Self Atomising Machines: Hypnagogic Cyberpunk, Reality and Utopia | the shape of utopia to come. What do you do when you find weird racism in old science fiction books? Bruce McCall Illustrates the Future That Wasn't. Ten Inventions Inspired by Science Fiction. Blade Runner cumple 30 años: curiosidades y vídeos de una obra irrepetible | Retrogeek. Did this blogger just invent a new subgenre of science fiction?
Thinking About Futurism. Before the Jetsons, Arthur Radebaugh Illustrated the Future. The Origins of Futurism. 10 Ultra-Weird Science Fiction Novels that Became Required Reading. 10 Weirdest Science Fiction Novels That You've Never Read. Science Fiction Society’s massive library is out of this world. Did Philip K. Dick disclose the real Matrix in 1977? Philip K. Dick rare interview in France, Part 1 - 1977. If it is realistic or plausible, then it is not science fiction. Why We Don't Like Creativity | Innovations. William Gibson - Official Website. Michael Synergy | nomadic utopianism. Science Fiction Conversations. The Complete History of Time Paradoxes. New invention brings us one step closer to an all-consuming, self-replicating grey goo. Take a vacation to Arrakis with Dune travel posters.
10 Words You Might Think Came from Science (But Are Really From Science Fiction ) Robert Heinlein's predictions for the Year 2000 (from 1952) Science fiction writers have a job, and it's time to do it, says Neal Stephenson. Awesome graphic novels that even non-comics readers will love. The Death of Philip K. Dick and the Birth of Cyberpunk. Watch a complete 1990 documentary about cyberpunk, featuring a young William Gibson. The Victorian Hugos: 1887. When Will White People Stop Making Movies Like "Avatar"? The many meanings of the dragon archetype in fantasy stories. I wrote 100 terrible short stories that I'm glad you'll never read. The Victorian Hugos: 1889. 10 Weirdest Scientific Theories Proposed in Science Fiction. 10 Futuristic Technologies That Will Never Exist. 2011 Hugo Awards: A good night for time travel, artificial intelligence, and Asimov's Magazine. 10 Science Fiction Books That Changed the Course of History.
Hilariously optimistic 1954 magazine article proclaimed we'd all be piloting flying saucers by 1965. 10 Most Far-Fetched Future Dystopias. The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Books of 2011. Read Arthur C. Clarke's original "Hammer of God" short story online. Why does Edgar Rice Burroughs still matter? Why Science Fiction Writers are Like Porn Stars. The 1986 infomercial for the Neuromancer movie that never was. Kim Jong-il is dead. Here's his monster movie. City of Treelike Buildings | Paleofuture. Mutant Hunt = the best movie about robots doing drugs in human history. Your robots know that nature is a lie. An algorithm that makes robots appear more human. William Gibson explains why cyberpunk was made to be co-opted. 211, William Gibson.
Wired 1.04: Disneyland with the Death Penalty. Rudy Rucker interview: "All these years, and I'm still looking for the big aha." 10 Recent Novels About the Future of Videogames. 1st Science Fiction Movie Filmed in Space Stays Underground | Richard Garriott, 'Man on a Mission,' & 'Apogee of Fear' | Space Tourism & Private Spaceflight. Your Picks: Top 100 Science-Fiction, Fantasy Books. Five Science Fiction Technology Predictions That Came True. Hugo Gernsback. Document: The Symbolism Survey, Sarah Funke Butler. THE FIRST CON (1937)
Mondo 2000. The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. Blog/Vlog » Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence. Ray Bradbury, 19 frases para celebrar su cumpleaños 91. Under a 'Frankenstein' Moon: Astronomer Sleuths Solve Mary Shelley Mystery | Lord Byron Challenge & Mary Shelley Controversy | Moonlight & Moon Phases. Ray Bradbury Remembered: NASA Pays Video Tribute to Sci-Fi Legend.