Diamond Hard Science Fiction

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Is anyone here familiar with the works of Greg Egan? These stories are great… and hard. My favorites are his earlier stories: “The Extra”, “The Vat”, “Closer”, and “Oceanic”. They’re available for free to read at the website I linked to, as well as 18 other stories. But beware, the material is dense, and if you have reading comprehension problems, it’s impenetrable. My favorites are actually on the lighter side of technicality, but that’s because I love the atmosphere they surround me in, not because I can’t appreciate the harder ones.
MrDiamondMind loves diamond hard SF.

I'm not generally fond of hard science-fiction, although to be honest, I have read a few examples, like Starfish, and I really should read Red Mars sometime. But hard science fiction is a little hard to find fun. I like scientifically plausible science fiction, but I also keep the MST3K Mantra in mind.

I have recently finished writing a novel which is at least a little harder than, say, Doctor Who or Star Trek, but doesn't let the science get in the way of the story and human drama. I am currently writing another novel that has somewhat harder science behind it, but is still based on speculation.

This is actually one of the reasons I really love hard science fiction. Every story out there is heavily human-focused, and what hard SF does is it loosens feelings of anthropocentrism in people's minds. A reality check, if you will.

What? I would have thought that soft sci-fi would have a slightly better chance at being less anthropocentric, if by that, I am assuming non-human centred. Hard science fiction has a little less chance of having aliens (Starfish, Red Mars, Stephen Baxter's Time are examples that come most readily to mind). I thought hard sci-fi tended to be more about human drama, and not anti-anthropocentrism.

Just out of interest, would you consider the Sector General books hard or soft science fiction? Or Dune, for that matter, genetic memory notwithstanding?

BTW, I dunno whether you have heard of the television serials I take my username from, but there is enough hard science in the Quatermass serials. Nigel Kneale researched the first story fairly thoroughly in terms of rocket science, even if it later became very dated.

In any case, I generally like my science fiction to be in the style of Doctor Who/Blake's 7, which is basically an adventure-fantasy story with a scientific flavour. The story itself should be good. I will wince at some of the scientific inaccuracies, but otherwise just enjoy the show.

Apparently Hal Clement once said something interesting. I was just checking the TV Tropes page for the hardness scale for science fiction, and found this quote:



On the Mohs Scale of Sci-Fi Hardness, I'd say that the novel I finished ranks about a 2 (0 being the extreme of soft sci-fi and 8 being real life) while the one I am currently working on ranks about a 5-7, depending on the technology involved in it. One piece of technology ranks a 5, but the rest of the concept is handled around the 6-7 mark.

But, MrDiamondMind, do you enjoy soft science fiction at all? I'm just curious.

I read Schild's Ladder the other day. I didn't like it much, though. It was alright, and the idea was interesting, but the story was flimsy.

But they are not aliens because Most Writers Are Human. And so, ironically in this aspect, hard SF remains neutral with regards to being anthropocentric by not introducing minds from other planets, while soft SF greatly increases anthropocentrism by introducing such minds and depicting them as more or less just like our own.


Well, perhaps that is what it's about. Though, still, anti-anthropocentrism lurks in the tone of hard SF more than anywhere else. And Greg Egan's stories push that tone to the extreme sometimes. For example, his novel Diaspora.


I haven't read those two. I'm not really diverse in my SF reading.


I consider soft SF to be Fantasy wearing science's clothing. And I think I like Fantasy, but would prefer it without the attire.

alastair reynolds can certainly spin a good yarn.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alastair_Reynolds - SPOILERS to 'revelation space' start from the third paragraph in the main text.

James White's Sector General stories posits three technologies we do not have - FTL travel, artificial gravity, and memory recording. However, the technologies are both thoroughly worked out by the author, and the implications followed up on (the primary weapons of Monitor Corps vessels are focused tractor/pressor beams - when polarization is reversed at rapid intervals, this has the effect of shaking the target to pieces, thus the weapon's common name of "rattler"; when one of the paired FTL generators of an alien ship fails in flight, the debris is depicted as stretching along a more-or-less straight path over a lightyear long; Educator tapes, while transferring all the knowledge of a brilliant surgeon of another species, will also transfer the personality, which can be quite trying at times).

The various alien life forms are reasonable for their environments - the author is also a biologist, which shows in his work. For instance, the Illensan PVSJs, who breathe chlorine, must wear pressure suits at all times in most of the hospital, as most life forms breathe either water or an oxygen-based atmosphere, either one of which causes lethal damage to an Illensan's skin and lungs. Any doctor visiting the S and T wards must travel in what amounts to a small tank with heaters inside and coolers outside, as the residual heat radiation from a simple pressure suit would kill the methane-based life forms there.

It's also interesting to see a doctor with an Educator tape in his brain trying to eat - the Tralthan ELNTs, for example, are herbivorous, and a human or Kelgian doctor with an ELNT tape can't even enjoy a steak. It's even worse with MSVKs, who eat something resembling large birdseed, and regard the diets of most other species as disgusting. Most doctors with long-term Educator tapes are forced to resort to a lot of sandwiches, so they can't see what they're eating.

They are as alien in their thought processes as it's possible for a human to write, I think. For instance, since a Kelgian's fur is constantly moving in response to its emotions, they find it pointless to lie to one another, or even to shade the truth, so they feel the same about talking with other species - politeness is silly, to them, and I gather (although it's not directly discussed) that one of the things they found hardest to understand about other species after their first contact was the concept of "fiction", deliberate lies. They can come across as abrasive and rude, if you don't understand this... Cinrusskin GLNOs, on the other hand, are invariably polite to everyone, because they're empathic. If they hurt your feelings, they feel it too, so it's in their own best interests to make you as happy as possible. (That's one of the reasons Dr. Prilicla is Dr. Conway's best friend - well, that and Prilicla eats spaghetti [braided with carrot strips] with a fork, doesn't insist on hovering during meals like the Ian GKNMs, and doesn't mind the appearance or smell of meat when dining with Conway.)

DeaconBlues, alright, thanks for the summary. It sounds like it could be at least medium-hard SF, based on your description, which is interesting enough for me, I guess.
Also, while artificial gravity and especially memory recording sound permissible, FTL certainly is too much of a stretch for hard SF.

Ambivalence, what stories do you like by Greg Egan, if any?

psych, does Alastair Reynolds have any stories for free online?

I have been reading science fiction since about 1936. There is no question that excellent writing makes it enjoyable and worthwhile but the real draw in the field comes from the "what if" factor. The less solid the science, the weaker the possibilities for the future are. No doubt Star Wars and much of Star Trek is enjoyable as fairy tales with a technological gloss but for me the real impact of a good science fiction story follows from a novel understanding of the consequences of a possibility or the extension of a current element of society into the future. One does not have to believe in the reality of FTL travel to watch what might happen if it became possible. That would not eliminate it from hard science fiction. H.G.Well's invisible man was about the consequences of a possibility that seems physically unlikely although minor advances lately indicate some movement in the area. But the interest does no lie in whether or not it is possible but what happens if it were. Heinlein, Asimov, Forward, Hoyle, Clarke all explored in a "hard" way things that may be possible or may be somewhat over the edge but wrote well enough to make the concepts fascinating. Star Wars is amusing but not novel. It's cowboys and Indians or the princess and the prince in space and the motivations in the stories are ones of character and personal ambition not dealing with alien concepts. For me, that eliminates them from science fiction.

Absolutely, Sand. I don't consider introducing FTL (or whatever) to be a great softening - if something is "black-boxed" and the possibilities it raises are examined in a consistent way, that's cool. The minimums I require to enjoy space opera are consistency, and an understanding by the author of how the universe works in reality - the Culture books, for instance, are soft in many respects, but the blackboxing is reasonably consistent and Mr Banks knows what a star is and what a planet is and how far apart they are, and so on, so I'm happy to like them for their humour and social commentary. The overwhelming majority of TV skiffy totally fails both consistency and author understanding, so I find it harder to like. It helps when it's done knowingly tongue-in-cheek and doesn't try to pass itself off as science.

MrDiamondMind - I'm not sure what else of his I have read. I'm positive I've read something (and I'm not confusing him with Greg Bear!), but a quick skim of his bibliography doesn't remind me any. Short stories I suppose.

I like Alastair Reynolds, who psych mentioned. Felka!

http://freesf.awardspace.com/ReynoldsAlastair.html

DiamondMind, does FTL whose characteristics have been carefully worked out by a researcher at CalTech work for you? If so, you might be interested in Jerry Pournelle's Co-Dominium stories, culminating in the novels The Mote In God's Eye and The Gripping Hand (cowritten with Larry Niven). Dr. Dan Alderson came up with the concept, which is why he gets the drive named for him - it involves lines of flux in spacetime that could exist between stars. Not every pair of stars is so connected, and not every such pathway is considered useful (the Alderson point for the Mote system, for instance, went uninvestigated until the 3050s because it was inside the red giant Murcheson's Star, in the outer layers of the photosphere). Also, stellar events can affect the "tramlines" - part of the plotline of The Gripping Hand involved concerns over a new Alderson point to the Mote opening up after Buckman's Protostar collapsed into a new white dwarf several thousand years earlier than the Moties had assured Dr. Buckman it would.

The alien Moties also have thought processes which, while more-or-less comprehensible to humans, are decidedly different, to the point that Moties who try too hard to think like humans go insane (by Motie standards, anyway). These thought processes are largely driven by the pressures brought to bear by their - um - unique physiology.

Pournelle's earlier Co-Dominium stories don't have intelligent aliens, so that part gets completely avoided (although it could be argued that the genetically-engineered supermen deployed by Sauron System during the Secession Wars aren't really human as such). And other than the Alderson Drive and Langston Field (which absorbs and reradiates incoming energies - the first goal in any space battle is to overload your opponent's Langston Field generators), the science is as hard as it gets - most members of the Imperial Navy are physically-perfect specimens so they can withstand high thrust, and still have to resort to motorized acceleration couches when the ship has to go higher than about 3 gravities of thrust (if constant thrust isn't needed, the ships conserve fuel by rotating for gravity, or just going with free fall - one merchant complains about his wine-carrying ships having to maintain constant thrust so the sediments stay at the bottom of the bottles). Weapon systems are either high-powered lasers or nuclear missiles, because the Imperial Navy never heard of "shooting to disable" - they will accept surrender after an enemy's Langston Field has collapsed, but they don't shoot with anything that can't blow a target up completely.

I'm not into extra hard science fiction. It detracts from the experience.

The strongest points for really hard SF for me was that i was educational. As a young teen-ager I learned about the frontiers of scientific conception by the problems the protagonists encountered and as the best of the genre was written by leading scientists I learned a good deal about the imaginative concepts by people actually working in the field. If you are not really interested in science there are far more mature stories involving character and social motivation outside of science fiction.

Here's a free hard SF novel about uploading:

After Life by Simon Funk