Book Description
A thoughtful, clear and utterly fascinating reference, this book is absolutely vital to writers who want to put extraterrestrial life-forms in their novels and stories.
Author : Stanley Schmidt
Publisher :
Page : 248 pages
File Size : 43,77 MB
Release : 1995
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN :
A thoughtful, clear and utterly fascinating reference, this book is absolutely vital to writers who want to put extraterrestrial life-forms in their novels and stories.
Author : Stanley Schmidt
Publisher : Penguin
Page : 240 pages
File Size : 18,68 MB
Release : 2011-05-30
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 1599634945
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy." - Hamlet, William Shakespeare Stanley Schmidt guides you toward a better understanding of our universe to create beings who will live in your science fiction. Aliens and Alien Societies explains science to help you make your fiction plausible. You'll avoid bringing characters from solar systems unlikely to support life. Discover the galaxy's vastness and imagine the technology needed to cross it. Put biochemistry on your side to put viable creatures on your pages. Learn how engineering shapes life and why this suggests that intelligent inhabitants of other planets might have similarities to humans. Develop well-founded cultures and logical languages. Introduce aliens to people or other aliens. Portray them as individuals, true to their species. In this book, possibilities abound and lines between knowledge and conjecture blur enthrallingly. Aliens and Alien Societies is thoughtful, clear and utterly fascinating. It is filled with facts to help you write believable fictions about the things in heaven and earth.
Author : Don Lincoln
Publisher : JHU Press
Page : 279 pages
File Size : 17,3 MB
Release : 2013-10-15
Category : Science
ISBN : 1421410737
Are alien civilizations really possible? If extraterrestrials exist, where are they? How likely is it that somewhere in the universe an Earth-like planet supports an advanced culture? Why do so many people claim to have encountered Aliens? In this gripping exploration, scientist Don Lincoln exposes and explains the truths about the belief in and the search for life on other planets. In the first half of Alien Universe, Lincoln looks to Western civilization's collective image of Aliens, showing how our perceptions of extraterrestrials have evolved over time. The roots of this belief can be traced as far back as our earliest recognition of other planets in the universe—the idea of them supporting life was a natural progression of thinking that has fascinated us ever since. Our captivation with Aliens has, however, led to mixed results. The world was fooled in the nineteenth century during the Great Moon Hoax of 1835, and many people misunderstood Orson Welles's 1938 radio broadcast, The War of the Worlds, leading to significant anxiety among some listeners. Our continuing interest in Aliens is reflected in entertainment successes such as E.T., The X-Files, and Star Trek. The second half of the book explores the scientific possibility of whether advanced Alien civilizations do exist. For many years, researchers have sought to answer Enrico Fermi’s great paradox—if there are so many planets in the universe and there is a high probability that many of those can support life, then why have we not actually encountered any Aliens? Lincoln describes how modern science teaches us what is possible and what is not in our search for extraterrestrial civilizations. Whether you are drawn to the psychological belief in Aliens, the history of our interest in life on other planets, or the scientific possibility of Alien existence, Alien Universe is sure to hold you spellbound.
Author : Douglas A. Vakoch
Publisher : Berghahn Books
Page : 262 pages
File Size : 43,23 MB
Release : 2011-09-01
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 0857452126
Astronomers around the world are pointing their telescopes toward the heavens, searching for signs of intelligent life. If they make contact with an advanced alien civilization, how will humankind respond? In thinking about first contact, the contributors to this volume present new empirical and theoretical research on the societal dimensions of the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). Archaeologists and astronomers explore the likelihood that extraterrestrial intelligence exists, using scientific insights to estimate such elusive factors as the longevity of technological societies. Sociologists present the latest findings of novel surveys, tapping into the public’s attitudes about life beyond Earth to show how religion and education influence beliefs about extraterrestrials. Scholars from such diverse disciplines as mathematics, chemistry, journalism, and religious studies offer innovative solutions for bridging the cultural gap between human and extraterrestrial civilizations, while recognizing the tremendous challenges of communicating at interstellar distances. At a time when new planets are being discovered around other stars at an unprecedented rate, this collection provides a much needed guide to the human impact of discovering we are not alone in the universe.
Author : Bryan Appleyard
Publisher :
Page : 358 pages
File Size : 41,94 MB
Release : 2005
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
ISBN :
A 'cultural history' of the alien phenomenon, this book looks at our fascination with all things alien, as well as explaining what this says about us in the post-religious age.
Author : Jim Al-Khalili
Publisher : Picador USA
Page : 242 pages
File Size : 17,2 MB
Release : 2017-05-09
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
ISBN : 1250109639
Originally published in Great Britain by Profile Books Ltd, 2016.
Author : Michael Michaud
Publisher : Springer Science & Business Media
Page : 472 pages
File Size : 46,17 MB
Release : 2010-05-05
Category : Science
ISBN : 0387686185
This book describes a wide variety of speculations by many authors about the consequences for humanity of coming into contact with extraterrestrial intelligence. The assumptions underlying those speculations are examined, and some conclusions are drawn. The book emphasizes the consequences of contact rather than the search, and takes account of popular views. As necessary background, the book also includes brief summaries of the history of thinking about extraterrestrial intelligence, searches for life and for signals, contrasting paradigms of how contact might take place, and the paradox that those paradigms allegedly create.
Author : Michael M. Levy
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Page : 432 pages
File Size : 34,41 MB
Release : 2019-03-22
Category : Social Science
ISBN :
An indispensable resource, this book provides wide coverage on aliens in fiction and popular culture. The wide impact that the imagined alien has had upon Western culture has not been surveyed before; in many cases the essays in Aliens in Popular Culture are the first written on the topic. The book is a compendium of short entries on notable uses of aliens in popular culture across different media and platforms by almost 90 researchers in the field. It covers science fiction from the late nineteenth century into the twenty-first century, including books, films, television, comics, games, and even advertisements. Individual essays point to the ways in which the imagined alien can be seen as a reflection of different fears and tensions within society, above all in the Anglo-American world. The book additionally provides an overview for context and suggestions for further reading. All varieties of readers will find it to be a comprehensive reference about the extra-terrestrial in popular culture.
Author : Jodi Dean
Publisher : Cornell University Press
Page : 262 pages
File Size : 38,7 MB
Release : 1998
Category : Body, Mind & Spirit
ISBN : 9780801484681
Discusses the social and political implications of widespread belief in unidentified flying objects, extraterrestrials, and government cover-ups, and considers what they reveal in a culture of mass media and conflicting evidence.
Author : Tim Lebbon
Publisher : Titan Books (US, CA)
Page : 337 pages
File Size : 34,26 MB
Release : 2014-01-28
Category : Fiction
ISBN : 1781162697
THE FIRST IN AN ALL NEW, OFFICIAL TRILOGY SET IN THE ALIEN UNIVERSE! Featuring the iconic Ellen Ripley in a terrifying new adventure that bridges the gap between Alien and Aliens. Officially sanctioned and true to the Alien cannon, Alien: Out of the Shadows expands upon the well-loved mythos and is a must for all Alien fans.