Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by martyb on Wednesday February 13 2019, @01:22AM   Printer-friendly
from the cell-ular-automaton dept.

March: We Are Legion (We Are Bob) (Bobiverse #1) by Dennis Taylor

Discuss The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A. Heinlein in the comments below.

Fiasco was translated into English in 1988 by Michael Kandel:

Fiasco (Polish: Fiasko) is a science fiction novel by Polish author Stanisław Lem, first published in a German translation in 1986. The book, published in Poland the following year, is a further elaboration of Lem's skepticism: in Lem's opinion, the difficulty in communication with alien civilizations is cultural disparity rather than spatial distance. The failure to communicate with an alien civilization is the main theme of the book.

Previously: Announcement postMars, Ho!FoundationThe Three-Body ProblemSnow Crash


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 2) by HiThere on Thursday February 14 2019, @06:27AM (1 child)

    by HiThere (866) Subscriber Badge on Thursday February 14 2019, @06:27AM (#800901) Journal

    I'm not better and smarter than Heinlein. I could never have written those stories, and they're excellent fantasy.

    Heinlein wasn't a technologist. In his stories the technology is always background material. The foreground is human interaction. I could never do that part, and that's the important part in building a story that grips you. I read the book three times before I started noticing that it was fantasy, so I've got to admit I rather liked it. I don't particularly like it anymore, but I've changed, and the book isn't new to me anymore either.

    The story was engrossing, and I liked the characters. Heinlein is usually about duty vs. liberty, or some similar choices. This was true all the way back to the 1940's. I suppose "All you Zombies" could be considered an exception, so I guess always is really too strong, but just barely. If you don't like that kind of political argument, you won't like Heinlein. I can't say the mix of languages made sense or didn't. It certainly never bothered me. I'm not sure that using the moon as a "Botany Bay" would make economic sense without some sort of sky-hook, and that wasn't included in the story. (Even then I find it dubious, but that was a matter that hadn't previously obtruded into my notice.)

    As to the date...no. You're missing the point. There was good reason to know at the time that the proposed mechanism for AI wouldn't develop as simply as the story supposed. Heinlein ignored that not because he couldn't know, but because it was a fictitious engine...i.e., it was there to move the story forwards. He needed it to be plausible enough that not many people would care. I.e., he was intentionally writing fantasy. Contrast this to "Mission of Gravity" where it still wouldn't work that way, but the author did his best to make things plausible. That's not fantasy, even though we now know it wouldn't work that way. Because he made it as accurate as he could. Heinlein wasn't interested in that, he was interested in the human interactions...and for that he needed a computer with a human living inside it as software, so that's what he wrote.

    Personally, I usually prefer good fantasy over careful science fiction, but this is partially because there's so little science fiction written (despite what it says on the label). Science fiction takes a long time to write, and a lot more effort, and it has to skimp on human interactions, because you've only got so may words allowed. There's been some really interesting science fiction written, but none that's really been popular, because it's intellectual rather than gripping. The closest to an exception that I can think of is "Masters of the Metropolis" Authors: Lin Carter and Randall Garrett Date: 1956-01-00. That was published in Astounding, and was a spoof of Hugo Gernsback, and I think in particular of "Ralph 124C41+". But it was science fiction of a weird sort, too.

    --
    Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   2  
  • (Score: 2) by deimtee on Friday February 15 2019, @04:13AM

    by deimtee (3272) on Friday February 15 2019, @04:13AM (#801390) Journal

    The story was engrossing, and I liked the characters. Heinlein is usually about duty vs. liberty, or some similar choices. This was true all the way back to the 1940's. I suppose "All you Zombies" could be considered an exception, so I guess always is really too strong, but just barely. If you don't like that kind of political argument, you won't like Heinlein. I can't say the mix of languages made sense or didn't. It certainly never bothered me. I'm not sure that using the moon as a "Botany Bay" would make economic sense without some sort of sky-hook, and that wasn't included in the story. (Even then I find it dubious, but that was a matter that hadn't previously obtruded into my notice.)

    Given when he wrote it and the rapid advances in rocketry, it was expected that the cost of getting to the moon would be much lower than it currently is. But even with that, while it may not have made economic sense to ship criminals and dissidents to the moon it it is much more politically acceptable than a bullet in the head and a mass grave.

    Your comparison to Botany Bay is apt and is the reason for all the aussie slang. Which do you think would cost less, and which was actually used : a quick hanging and burial or a 12000 mile ocean cruise and maintaining a garrison at the destination?

    --
    If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.