[Other Fandoms] Through the Stars: A Scifi club

[ReKoil]

*Keeps forgetting to reply....* 😅

Have you ever enjoyed games, books, TV or movies that featured robots in the plot or as characters, or is robot sci-fi something you don't like to read/watch/play?

I've seen a decent chunk in the form of movies or TV-series I think, but recalling all of them is another matter =P
*wonders if RoboCop counts* I feel like it does.
Additionally there's I, Robot and Chappie.
And ofc the Terminator movies.

And although not always focused on them, Stargate had the Replicators as a hostile faction/opponent, which were robots that devoured pretty much every material they could find to make more of themselves. There were even evolved/humanoid ones which were capable of independent thought at some point.

As for games... Mass Effect has the Geth... and potentially the Reapers, though those are a machine/organic hybrid.
Clank from Rachet and Clank. Clank is just a likeable little robot.
The Novus from Universe At War, Earth Assault. Their creators were wiped out by the Hierarchy, which is the 'bad/evil' faction of the game. This faction of machines joins in the defense of Earth to get vengeance on the Hierarchy.
I think some of the units from the C&C Universe might be robots too, but it's hard to remember which units are actually unmanned. The King Oni from RA3 is definitely a robot though:

Spoiler:

Have you ever used any robot devices before? If not, would you be interested in doing so in the event that you could, or do you dislike the idea?

I have a Roomba. Other than that I don't have any. I'm not bothered by the idea of small convenience robots like these.

Would you say that in our world the development of robot technology is something ultimately with good or bad implications? They can improve or even save lives, they could also replace people, or be used for darker purposes.

Pretty much depends on how they end up being used. It has the potential to go either way.

Also would you guys in future enjoy posts that now and then contain news stories like this related to astronomy, or other breakthroughs in science and technology?

The Jupiter photo's look nice, though I'm not sure where the moons are supposed to be.
I wouldn't mind more things like these.

 

[Megan]

I don't mind seeing other things going on, either. Afaik, a little while ago one of the oldest probes that humans sent to space has left the solar system. Until then it also still kept sending data back home. Though, they did need to turn off a lot of systems just so it could remain operational.

 

[VisionofMilotic]

I have some questions dealing with the sky and space that I thought might be worthwhile discuss topics.



Have you ever witnessed any interesting displays or occurrences in the sky? It could be the aurora bourealis, an eclipse, supermoon, meteor shower, u.f.o you name it.

I watched the conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn during the winter of 2020 that people nicknamed the Star of Bethlehem.

I also saw a daytime moon one afternoon in spring when my dad and I were walking back from a rock quarry in our town on his birthday. I don't know if there is a name for this, because it's not considered anything super rare, but it's still cool to see the sun and the moon in the sky at the same time in broad daylight.

What is your favorite planet? Might be an exoplanet, or one in our own solar systems, whatever pops into your mind.

As a kid I was drawn to Saturn the most with those 7 iconic icy rings. Nowadays though I am more interested in Jupiter, and would say that it's probably my favorite planet.

It might not have a ring system as large as Saturn. Jupiter's rings are fewer and fainter, mostly dust leftover from meteor impacts, but it has rings nonetheless, and an epic old song by Train to it's name! It's also a striking planet in it's own way, more than twice as big as all the other planets in our solar system combined. All those cloud bands and swirls in it's atmosphere remind me of gold marble, and it's even cooler knowing that the whirling stripes are traveling in opposite directions and at different speeds. That great red spot is hard to forget too.

Jupiter seemed like a character as soon it arrived on the scene. It's believed to have built a planet core by accumulating lots of pebbles around it. You normally don't get a great big gas giant like Jupiter by pebble accretion though, or so I heard on the Discovery Channel, instead lots of little earth-size planets usually end up developing alongside each other, but it seems that as Jupiter grew it's gravitational pull starved out everything nearby attempting to also grow, shaking other objects up and down, and pushing them out of the disc, so that only it could access the pebbles, and that's how it got the lion's share and got so fat.

I find Jupiter interesting because of how strongly it's gravitational influence is exerted throughout the solar system, it can be destructive, as we see with some of it's moons, particularly the volcanism on io, but it also can be beneficial. It's gravity did save planet earth from a mile-wide comet, breaking it into pieces and making it collide with it's own atmosphere instead, so that it was the one hit the force of 300 million atomic bombs, and not us.

Will and should humanity colonize space?

I think we probably will do so on some level, setting up a Mars colony at least seems likely. I don't know about interstellar space travel and having colonization advance to the point of Dune or Star Trek though, I see that maybe we'd attain something in the universe of Blade Runner at most.

However, I personally don't believe that our goal should be to colonize other planets actually, but rather to take care of the beautiful planet that we have. If well cared for, the Earth could potentially sustain life for another 7 billion years before the sun reaches the end of it's life span, that's plenty long. I feel like everything has it's time, and I don't believe that human beings as a species should necessarily continue on after earth is gone. Not that I think humanity will last anywhere near that long, we'd be lucky to get out of the 21st century at the rate we are contributing to the climate crisis, in addition to the growing threat of nuclear war on the horizon. However, i think that's all the more reason that we shouldn't colonize space, if we don't first learn to act responsibly here on earth.

 

[moon]

oo how am I not part of this? Sci-fi is probably my favorite broad genre. Especially space stuff. my PC username is partially because of Doctor Who ;)

other favorites are The Expanse (both the show and the books although I'm still on book 3), Star Trek & Star Wars (although tbh I'd call Star Wars fantasy more than scifi in many ways ahah), Iron Man in mostly every iteration, and of course some of my favorite movies: Contact and Interstellar.

 

[Megan]

I recently finished the main story of Pokemon Violett and I really liked the techy side of the endgame. In general: I like that GF is leaning more and more into these scifi-y themes.

 

[moon]

Yeah,

Spoiler:

time travel

will always be fun in my book if done tastefully. In the ScaVio case it didn't mess around with logic too much or try to make paradoxes beyond the pokemon afaik? It was fine.

 

[moon]

Have you ever witnessed any interesting displays or occurrences in the sky? It could be the aurora bourealis, an eclipse, supermoon, meteor shower, u.f.o you name it.
I got up at 4 am on a winter's night to try to spot a blood supermoon. Has got to have been 2015 or 2016 or so. The moment I groggily stumbled into my living room and looked out the window I immediately saw it and it felt so unnatural and scary, awe-inspiring though it was. It was large and really rust red and photos didn't do justice to the sensation of standing there and watching that heavenly body look spectacular like I'd never seen it before.

 

[VisionofMilotic]

oo how am I not part of this? Sci-fi is probably my favorite broad genre. Especially space stuff. my PC username is partially because of Doctor Who ;)

other favorites are The Expanse (both the show and the books although I'm still on book 3), Star Trek & Star Wars (although tbh I'd call Star Wars fantasy more than scifi in many ways ahah), Iron Man in mostly every iteration, and of course some of my favorite movies: Contact and Interstellar.

I was hoping that the doctor would regenerate here! What a valuable addition to my crew, we need your expertise. I have recorded your name, but have a feeling that it's going to change :)

I have never watched/read The Expanse before, but now that you have mentioned it I want to check it out. The synopsis has gotten my attention, and I'm currently on a scifi/horror/fantasy binge-- when am I ever not? So I think a little season 1 is in order for me.

I recently finished the main story of Pokemon Violett and I really liked the techy side of the endgame. In general: I like that GF is leaning more and more into these scifi-y themes.

Sounds exciting! I haven't gotten Scarvio yet, but Violet is the game that i'll be playing, and my cartridge is in the mail.

The Violet cover legendary Miraidon was already the more tempting pokemon to me. Though when I realized that the theme of Scarlet and Violet would deal with the past and future respectively I felt torn because I love history as well as sci-fi. Once i saw all the paradox pokemon I made up my mind to play Violet though, I really wanted to use the different "iron" pokemon in battle.

 

[moon]

The first book in the Expanse series is called Leviathan Wakes and is basically scifi/horror with a lot of cute character interaction that makes it feel very unique. Could be right up your alley then!

I enjoyed the book immensely even after having watched the whole tv show, and the show is very very good, also with a unique gritty yet sweet feel, so it's def a good idea to start with the visual version of the story too :)

 

[VisionofMilotic]

Scifi club topic of the moment Time Travel.



Do you fancy time travel themes in fiction?

My answers

Spoiler:

Yeah, I think it can be fun, so long as the story is really about the journey through time, Inuyasha being a good example, or if it's not the main theme, then I would at least want the character or device that can manipulate time established as part of the world relatively early into the plot, like Heroes. I'm not a fan of time travel if it comes out of nowhere at the end to resolve drama. The Prisoner of Azkaban is about as far as I am willing to accept, because at least some clues were left to indicate the time-turner's existence for awhile before it was revealed, and there were some restrictions placed on it's use at first, but even this could still be argued to be a little deus ex machina.

As for other time travel content that makes me happy I would count the Terminator franchise, at least the first four movies. I also liked the Back to the Future ride at Universal Studios, and thought the first movie was pretty cool, though I haven't seen the sequels. There are many good original Twilight Zone episodes on time travel, and Outer Limits too. I grew up playing the game Where in Time is Carmen Sandiego/The Great Chase Through Time, and thought it was a really cool way to teach kids about history, by playing as a secret agent who must time across many eras and countries to track down a criminal genius and her henchmen hiding in different periods of history, the parts that stood out to me most were the Vinland Vikings, Roman Empire and Heian Japan.

I also liked the Pokemon movie Celebi 4ever, which does incorporate the time travel theme nicely. One of these days I'm going to get around to writing a fanfic about Sam's journey back to his own time, and a couple of stops he makes too far back into the past along the way.

If you had the power to travel through time would you visit another time like the past or future, if you would then what would you do with that opportunity?

Spoiler:

Of course, I would time travel! I would go to the past, and try to correct mistakes of my life, knowing things I know now that I didn't know at the time, and see if I could create an alternate timeline.

I would want to be a better student and stay focused on my dreams and goals, and set myself up for a good career. I would try to keep in touch with some good friends that i lost contact with. It would be nice for my future self to spend some time with my grandfather, because i was so young when i died that I don't remember him well, but I have heard so many wonderful stories about him and seen pictures of us together, and it makes me wish that I had more clear memories of him. I might not reveal who I am, as a time traveler, but I might just try to strike up a conversation with him as a stranger.

If I could only go back in time once though and was just able to do one thing then I would save my mother from being hit by a truck when I was 13, an event which disabled her. I would stop her from going to the part of town where the accident happened.

It's tempting to want to go further back in time and do things like try to stop President Kennedy's assassination, or solve some of history's great mysteries, but I'd try to stick with events that happened during my lifetime, and are smaller in scope, rather than try to make my goals too ambitious and get myself killed, especially if I went went outside of modern times, and back to an ancient or prehistoric time. I'd be curious to see how a lot of world events really played out, and if it happened way that archeologists or historians think, but it would harder to predict the ways that my presence could disrupt the space time continum, and I'm sure I would screw things up.

 

[VisionofMilotic]

There was a conjuction of Venus and Saturn recently. I got a clear as crystal view on 23rd. I had a good time staring up at the night sky in general, my eyes wandered for a good half of an hour. The constellation of Orion caught my eye. I would know the belt anywhere.

I was wondering if any other voyagers on this expedition can recognize certain stars and constellations or planets in the sky? Navigation skills are always good to have when you're flying a space ship. That's a topic question for you.



I also want to speak about the big news in the astronomy community. The Green Comet is here! Scientists didn't discover it until last March because this is a comet that is only visible once every 50,000 years. It reached it's closest point to the sun on the 12th of this month, and will make a close approach to earth on February 1st, coming within roughly 26 million miles of us, before it leaves the solar system. It may never return, and if it does then it won't be in our lifetimes, that's for sure.

So if you are on the Nothern Hemisphere and want to try to see it then tomorrow is the time, after sunset. The Green Comet will be near the North Star. If the skies are dark in your area then you might be able to see a fading patch of light in the sky with just the naked eye, and that's your comet. If you have binoculars or telescopes though you'll have the best view of course, and could see the comet's tail and the colorful green glow.

If you are in a position where you can't see anything then the virtual telescope project has you covered with a live stream. The live feed is scheduled to begin 11 p.m Eastern Standard Time on February 1 or 8 p.m. Pacific.

https://www.virtualtelescope.eu/202...with-the-earth-online-observation-2-feb-2023/

 

[ReKoil]

Apparently I'm pretty behind on answering the prompts >=O

Have you ever witnessed any interesting displays or occurrences in the sky? It could be the aurora bourealis, an eclipse, supermoon, meteor shower, u.f.o you name it.

Not that I can remember.

What is your favorite planet? Might be an exoplanet, or one in our own solar systems, whatever pops into your mind.

How about Earth? The poor planet has been putting up with our abuse of it for quite a while now... gotta show it some love! =D
I don't know what else to go with for actual planets.

As for fictional planets... Gallifrey would be appealing, but more-so because of it's inhabitants.
How about Cybertron? A metallic planet that was manufactured, with nothing but sentient robotic life on it. Sounds pretty cool.

Will and should humanity colonize space?

Probably, though it would probably be better to keep humanity's greed and more violent urges contained to this one =P


Do you fancy time travel themes in fiction?

Doctor Who is one of my favorite sci fi series =D
Though it's usually more than 'just' time travel.

If you had the power to travel through time would you visit another time like the past or future, if you would then what would you do with that opportunity?

I'd probably take a gander in the future, to see what exciting things I'll never get to witness before the end of my life =D

Can you recognize certain stars and constellations or planets in the sky?

Nope. I've never really payed too much attention to that sort of stuff tbh.

 

[VisionofMilotic]

TOPIC: Multiverse

Do you think there could be parallel worlds coexisting with ours, alternate universes where different version of ourselves can exist, and outcomes that didn't happen in our world could be realized there?

My thoughts in spoiler tags!

Spoiler:

Possibly. Space is so vast and strange, and we have so much still to learn about the cosmos that I wouldn't rule out that "our universe" could just really be one of many. Just like there were other planets and galaxies that people of the past couldn't detect at first, we too might just be seeing the tip of the iceberg in our observable universe.

So I could buy an alternate version of our universe where there's another earth that developed very differently from the one we know by going down another course of events than we did. I think the eternal inflation theory is an interesting model for how we could exist in a multivese. The theory with eternal inflation is that when there there's rapid cosmic expansion, like there appears to have been near the time of The Big Bang, some parts of space-time that moved faster than other parts form bubbles that become different universes.

What would you like a parallel world to be like?

Spoiler:

I think it would be wonderful to have a parallel world where the billions of hectares forest that have been lost over the millenia were still intact, and some of the different species of this planet that have gone instinct in recent history like Irish elk, Tasmanian tigers, Quagga, Steller's sea cow and Dodo birds would still roam the world, perhaps, perhaps we also wouldn't be the only human species either but there could be Neanderthals civilizations and other types of people who coexist with us, and perhaps life forms who went evolved differently, some humans that adapted to live underwater in cities at an age when land resources were scarce, and have the ability to see in low lights, fish tails or webbed feet. There could also be creatures that exist only myth in are world that live in the parallel world, creatures like Phoenixes, perhaps they could be kind of desert bird like a hawk that developed wings that reflect the sun's light to blind it's prey, giving the illusion of feathers lit on fire as they soar through the air.

Is there any scfi/fantasy/horror content that you find interesting that has a theme of parallel worlds, higher dimensions or alternate realities?

Spoiler:

I started reading His Dark Materials recently. I really liked Northern Lights, I thought the concep of everyone having a human soul (Daemon) personified as an animal was great, and think the politics and world-building feel authentic and the book is full of charismatic and exciting characters, my favorite being Iorek the panserbjørn, and the whole race of bears in fact.

 

[moon]

I heard a theory that said that you, in the life you are aware of, is immortal for as long as possible. You might have died a thousand times already, just like you have seen or heard of thousands of people dying in the world around you during the time you have been alive - but you won't know that, because the only reality you notice is the one in which you survive.

Why? Because when you die, in this theory, we assume that it means the end of your consciousness for that instance. So you are only aware of the route in which you survive any given moment. The others, you just can't know. The day you finally do die, is the day when there simply was no possibility left for you to live on. Possibly of old age, or from completely hopeless situations. Meanwhile, others in their surviving timeline have watched you die already, earlier, in other ways. Anything that could have gone wrong likely has, over there. But you haven't been aware.

Just like when you die in a video game, you reload your last save or respawn with an Extra Life moments before you perished, so that things can play out slightly differently. So that you can live.

I thought that sounded pretty cool. It's called quantum immortality and relies on the many worlds theory. https://youtu.be/n7RHv_MIIT0