Why

[james_davis_nicoll]

Do SF authors make up new elements? The elements don't seem to be in Seaborg's island of stability, either.

Actually, what I really mean is why would the sort of person who can't be bothered to look at a table of elements or think about the general decline in half-lives as atomic mass increases past a certain point bother with SF? What's the attraction for them?

Comments

[poeticalpanther.livejournal.com]

Science doesn't know everything! That's why everything they do is all theories!

Elitist.

[nihilistic-kid.livejournal.com]

They like spaceships and stuff.

[the-flea-king.livejournal.com]

They have some kind of artificial stigma associated with writing fantasy?

Okay, maybe not artificial.

[blpurdom.livejournal.com]

Is it someone who usually writes Fantasy but also can't be bothered to research vampire and/or werewolf lore?

[carloshasanax.livejournal.com]

Fsck if I know. They like shiny but can't be bothered to learn why shiny.

Also, three, two, one... "Oh, I must support those masterful people who keep on getting it wrong! how the haters pile on them! I will defend them to the last ounce of my bean burrito!"

bothering w/ SF

[twoeleven.livejournal.com]

Presumably, the same sort of SF author who can't be bothered with celestial mechanics (or any other sort of Newtonian motion), what we know about nearby stars (and what it implies for planets and life around them), or any of the other things that sort frequently screws up.

[abidemi.livejournal.com]

They're attracted to science fiction as a style rather than a set of ideas?

I can't make fun--in my heart of hearts, I know that's how I got into it as a wee little one.

Whoosh! Spaceships! Pew pew pew!

[naitsirk.livejournal.com]

Why, in fact, *should* science fiction be rooted in hard science?

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

Because the border between soft SF and "future fantasy" is incredibly blurred anyway, many SFnal tropes are now mainstream so you get more SF written by non-experts/non-enthusiasts in scientific fields, modern sciences advance much more quickly than Joe Layman can readily keep up given the generally crappy job education systems do teaching science, Google-fu has replaced research skills and interview skills, and the public keeps buying the stuff by the bushel.

-- Steve's probably missed some points, plus there's still a kitchen sink he hasn't thrown in somewhere around here.

[seawasp]

"What's the attraction"?

Frickin' lasers, exploding spaceships, and hawt alien wimmen. Duh.

[thesaucernews.livejournal.com]

Science is hard, and physics is restrictive.

On the other hand, unobtanium is quick and terribly convenient.

Though what bothers me more than new elements is the trope of indescribably alien colors, particularly as seen through normal human eyes. It's a symptom of the same problem, I guess.

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

When I was a child, new elements were announced as having been created pretty frequently. It became, I think, a STFNAL trope among people who lived through that period. New element with interesting properties! Let's get the adventure moving!

[martinl-00.livejournal.com]

Getting the science right pleases what percentage of the intended audience, roughly? I suspect the effort to reward ratio is very poor.

[roseembolism.livejournal.com]

The thing that bugs me in various stories is the discovery of new elements that can't be analyzed, or quote, "completely unknown element". Star Trek is most guilty of this, but I've seen lazy writers do it for ages. One of the better ones was the guy who gave a fractional atomic weight.

[gareth-rees.livejournal.com]

Because science fiction is a literary genre, not a branch of scientific study! The conventions of the genre allow writers to introduce magical elements into their stories as long as the magic is described in a science-y sort of way.

Actually

[(Anonymous)]

The existence of the "Island of Stability" remains an open question. Physicists have been trying to reach it for almost forty years now, without success. There's a heated debate as to whether this is because the theory is wrong (apparently it's very sensitive, so maybe) or whether our technology's just not there -- either because we haven't figured out the right sequence of slamming nuclei together, or because we just don't have enough energy.

(There has also been an interesting secondary effort devoted to looking for superheavies in nature -- after all, if they're really stable, any created by natural processes would stick around. But nobody has found any.)


Doug M.

[wdstarr.livejournal.com]

Do SF authors make up new elements?

(1)Because they can.
(2)Because Plotzmium-489 sounds real cool.
(3)Do you really need any more reasons than that?

Seriously, Richard Wadholm somehow made it work in "Green Tea" (Asimov's Oct-Nov 1999, Dozios' Year's Best 17, Mammoth Book of Best New SF 13th).

(By the way, did you notice that your graph is made of Legos?)

[icecreamempress.livejournal.com]

Sturgeon's Law. (And Sullivan's Corollary: "Sturgeon was an optimist.")

Hey, people write historical novels without doing a lick of research and include howling anachronisms on the second page. And reputable publishing houses publish said books.

Also, Krakatoa: East of Java. Basically, lazy artists get shit wrong because they can't be arsed to look it up. This is why editors drink.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

Alexander Jablokov's unobtaniums in Carve the Sky actually were specified as being Island of Stability elements, for what it's worth.

I think this is just another case of an SF trope being frozen in amber way back when the science of the time didn't render it too implausible. Nowadays people throw fictional elements around everywhere because they know from reading other science fiction (or watching Star Trek shows) that it's OK.

This is a joke!

[liddle-oldman.livejournal.com]

You have a problem with Upsidasium?