4th Article: Timeline Cosmic Future

When I was scanning the internet for my next posting, I came across this crazy webpage that spans the far future of our Earth, the Sun, the galaxy, and the universe...for millions & millions of years. The reason this is science fiction related is because, while based on scientific papers, it is also uses a timeline from a science fiction novel, "Star Maker," by Olaf Stapeldon. The timeline says that the it consists of "default predictions of the very distant future," but I thought it was really neat to see what scientists are predicting the world to be like in millions of years. It's really hard to explain the specifics, but definitely check out this site.

http://www.magicdragon.com/UltimateSF/timelineCF.html

Ashley

4th Article

The first article is by Jerry Oltion, an acclaimed SF writer, dealing with the aspects of writing a good science fiction story. We have discussed in class before, but I really enjoyed the examples he uses. Oltion's article is from the current issue of The Writer. In the article he lays out what he considers to be the six basic rules of science fiction writing. Throughout the article he emphasizes the need to tell a story instead of explaining the science behind it. His examples are great. He writes a basic paragraph and follows it with his own brand of SF translation. Oltion lists the following as the six key ingredients to good science fiction writing: pick a contemporary theme, use the right language, think scientifically, add speculation, tell a story, and choose the right subgenre. I think that this is a must read article. It is not only informative, but it is also beneficial to aspiring SF writers as well as a great guide to critiquing SF writing.

The second article is by Lev Grossman, Time magazine's book critic. I included this because I found it more amusing than informative to the topics being discussed.