{"id":1044,"date":"2007-01-20T09:59:39","date_gmt":"2007-01-20T09:59:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/scienceblogs.com\/principles\/2007\/01\/20\/sf-and-the-history-of-science\/"},"modified":"2007-01-20T09:59:39","modified_gmt":"2007-01-20T09:59:39","slug":"sf-and-the-history-of-science","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/2007\/01\/20\/sf-and-the-history-of-science\/","title":{"rendered":"SF and the History of Science"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’m going to be on a few program items at Boskone<\/a> again this year. The highly preliminary schedule I received a couple of days ago includes a Saturday afternoon talk on “Spooky Action at a Distance,” which will be a sort of popular-audience explanation of the EPR Paradox and Bell’s Theorem. “Weird Quantum Phenomena” was a hit last year, so I’m looking forward to this one.<\/p>\n

Also on the list is “SF and the History of Science,” described thusly:<\/p>\n

\n

Let’s look at SF (or historical fantasy) involving the development of science: something that’s interested writers in our genre from DeCamp to Stephenson. Are tales where certain technology isn’t<\/i> developed more fun? Why not change the laws of physics in a story? Can you set true science in the ancient world, or does it begin with the Enlightenment? Does explaining both history and science double the infodumps?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

This sounds like a fascinating topic, but I’m not sure I’ve read enough relevant books to hold my own (particularly given that the other panelists are Gregory Feeley and Guy Consolmagno). I’ve read Stevenson’s Baroque Cycle, and last night I dug out a copy of Lest Darkness Fall<\/cite> to look at that, but it seems like I ought to know more books in this vein.<\/p>\n

It also probably wouldn’t kill me to know more about the history and philosophy of science than I do. I know odd bits of trivia regarding the origins of modern physics, because I use them to liven up my lectures, but I don’t have a really coherent picture of the development of science as a whole.<\/p>\n

So, what should I be reading to be able to talk intelligently about this topic? Some idle thoughts:<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

I’m not a real big reader of historical fiction, so looking over the shelves doesn’t provide a lot of examples to choose from. Well, OK, there’s a whole shelf full of Patrick O’Brian books, but those are Kate’s, and I’ve only read one.<\/p>\n

The obvious historical antecedent would be Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court<\/cite>, which I read approximately a hundred years ago. It’s the obvious precursor of the DeCamp (which I’m fifty pages into), but DeCamp takes it more seriously.<\/p>\n

Does The Name of the Rose<\/cite> count, do you think?<\/p>\n

What about all the John Dee stuff in John Crowley’s Aegypt<\/cite>? And isn’t that the book that goes on about Giordano Bruno at some length?<\/p>\n

In the counterfactual sort of vein, I suppose Robinson’s The Years of Rice and Salt<\/cite> might count. It’s not directly about science, but there are scientists toward the end.<\/p>\n

In the “completely loopy” category, there’s James P. Blaylock’s Lord Kelvin’s Machine<\/cite> and Homunculus<\/cite>…<\/p>\n

I’m aware of, but haven’t read (and don’t remember the title of) a book in which Aristotelian physics holds. I think it involves a ship traveling up to the Sun to steal fire from it (or some such). Are there other good alternate-cosmology books in which different pre-scientific worldviews turn out to be correct?<\/p>\n

How about non-fictional discussions of the history and philosophy of science? I read The Structure of Scientific Revolutions<\/cite> some time back, but I mostly recall finding Kuhn kind of irritating. Is there something else that gives a good overview of the origin of scientific thought?<\/p>\n

What else am I missing?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’m going to be on a few program items at Boskone again this year. The highly preliminary schedule I received a couple of days ago includes a Saturday afternoon talk on “Spooky Action at a Distance,” which will be a sort of popular-audience explanation of the EPR Paradox and Bell’s Theorem. “Weird Quantum Phenomena” was… Continue reading SF and the History of Science<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,37,29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1044","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-pop_culture","category-sf","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1044","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1044"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1044\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1044"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1044"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1044"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}