Practicing Science Fiction

Practicing Science Fiction
Author: Karen Hellekson
Publisher: McFarland
Total Pages: 227
Release: 2014-01-10
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 078645783X

Drawn from the Science Fiction Research Association conference held in Lawrence, Kansas, in 2008, the essays in this volume address intersections among the reading, writing, and teaching of science fiction. Part 1 studies the teaching of SF, placing analytical and pedagogical research next to each other to reveal how SF can be both an object of study as well as a teaching tool for other disciplines. Part 2 examines SF as a genre of mediation between the sciences and the humanities, using close readings and analyses of the literary-scientific nexus. Part 3 examines SF in the media, using specific television programs, graphic novels, and films as examples of how SF successfully transcends the medium of transmission. Finally, Part 4 features close readings of SF texts by women, including Joanna Russ, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Octavia E. Butler.

The Practice Effect

The Practice Effect
Author: David Brin
Publisher: Spectra
Total Pages: 287
Release: 2009-12-23
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0307575020

From one of the most critically acclaimed and well-loved authors of contemporary science fiction, a highly imaginative and exciting story as only David Brin can write . . . “High spirits and inventiveness . . . Dennis's adventures, which can only be called rollicking, are legion.”—Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine Physicist Dennis Nuel was the first human to probe the strange realms called anomaly worlds—alternate universes where the laws of science were unpredictably changed. But the world Dennis discovered seemed almost like our own—with one perplexing difference. To his astonishment, he was hailed as a wizard and found himself fighting beside a beautiful woman with strange powers against a mysterious warlord as he struggled to solve the riddle of this baffling world. “A delightful, often very witty story, with the underlying thoughtfulness we expect from David Brin.”—Poul Anderson

Latin American Science Fiction

Latin American Science Fiction
Author: M. Ginway
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 368
Release: 2012-12-05
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1137312777

Combining work by critics from Latin America, the USA, and Europe, Latin American Science Fiction: Theory and Practice is the first anthology of articles in English to examine science fiction in all of Latin America, from Mexico and the Caribbean to Brazil and the Southern Cone. Using a variety of sophisticated theoretical approaches, the book explores not merely the development of a science fiction tradition in the region, but more importantly, the intricate ways in which this tradition has engaged with the most important cultural and literary debates of recent year.

Scientific Method in Practice

Scientific Method in Practice
Author: Hugh G. Gauch
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 458
Release: 2003
Genre: Science
ISBN: 9780521017084

As the gateway to scientific thinking, an understanding of the scientific method is essential for success and productivity in science. This book is the first synthesis of the practice and the philosophy of the scientific method. It will enable scientists to be better scientists by offering them a deeper understanding of the underpinnings of the scientific method, thereby leading to more productive research and experimentation. It will also give scientists a more accurate perspective on the rationality of the scientific approach and its role in society. Beginning with a discussion of today's 'science wars' and science's presuppositions, the book then explores deductive and inductive logic, probability, statistics, and parsimony, and concludes with an examination of science's powers and limits, and a look at science education. Topics relevant to a variety of disciplines are treated, and clarifying figures, case studies, and chapter summaries enhance the pedagogy. This adeptly executed, comprehensive, yet pragmatic work yields a new synergy suitable for scientists and instructors, and graduate students and advanced undergraduates.

Doctor Who in Time and Space

Doctor Who in Time and Space
Author: Gillian I. Leitch
Publisher: McFarland
Total Pages: 299
Release: 2013-03-20
Genre: Performing Arts
ISBN: 0786465492

This collection of fresh essays addresses a broad range of topics in the BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who, both old (1963-1989) and new (2005-present). The book begins with the fan: There are essays on how the show is viewed and identified with, fan interactions with each other, reactions to changes, the wilderness years when it wasn't in production. Essays then look at the ways in which the stories are told (e.g., their timeliness, their use of time travel as a device, etc.). After discussing the stories and devices and themes, the essays turn to looking at the Doctor's female companions and how they evolve, are used, and changed by their journey with the Doctor.

The Science Fiction Handbook

The Science Fiction Handbook
Author: Nick Hubble
Publisher: A&C Black
Total Pages: 192
Release: 2013-11-28
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 147253896X

As we move through the 21st century, the importance of science fiction to the study of English Literature is becoming increasingly apparent. The Science Fiction Handbook provides a comprehensive guide to the genre and how to study it for students new to the field. In particular, it provides detailed entries on major writers in the SF field who might be encountered on university-level English Literature courses, ranging from H.G. Wells and Philip K. Dick, to Doris Lessing and Geoff Ryman. Other features include an historical timeline, sections on key writers, critics and critical terms, and case studies of both literary and critical works. In the later sections of the book, the changing nature of the science fiction canon and its growing role in relation to the wider categories of English Literature are discussed in depth introducing the reader to the latest critical thinking on the field.

Strange Practice

Strange Practice
Author: Vivian Shaw
Publisher: Orbit
Total Pages: 297
Release: 2017-07-25
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0316434612

The first book in a delightfully witty fantasy series in which Dr. Greta Helsing, doctor to the undead, must defend London from both supernatural ailments and a bloodthirsty cult. Greta Helsing inherited her family's highly specialized and highly peculiar medical practice. In her consulting rooms, Dr. Helsing treats the undead for a host of ills: vocal strain in banshees, arthritis in barrow-wights, and entropy in mummies. Although she barely makes ends meet, this is just the quiet, supernatural-adjacent life Greta's been groomed for since childhood. Until a sect of murderous monks emerges, killing human and undead Londoners alike. As terror takes hold of the city, Greta must use her unusual skills to stop the cult if she hopes to save her practice and her life. Praise for the Dr. Greta Helsing Novels: "An exceptional and delightful debut, in the tradition of Good Omens and A Night in the Lonesome October."―Elizabeth Bear, Hugo-award winning author "Shaw balances an agile mystery with a pitch-perfect, droll narrative and cast of lovable misfit characters. These are not your mother's Dracula or demons."―Shelf Awareness Dr. Greta Helsing Novels Strange Practice Dreadful Company Grave Importance

Science Fact and Science Fiction

Science Fact and Science Fiction
Author: Brian M. Stableford
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 758
Release: 2006
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0415974607

Publisher description

The EXODUS Incident

The EXODUS Incident
Author: Peter Schattschneider
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 182
Release: 2021-05-21
Genre: Science
ISBN: 3030700194

In the near future, Earth is suffering from climate change, famines, and fundamentalism. A global nuclear war is imminent. Interstellar probes from the Breakthrough Starshot project initiated by J. Milner and S. Hawking have discovered a habitable planet in the stellar system Proxima Centauri, just in time for the exodus of the elites. On board the EXODUS starship, the crew starts to experience strange things. The voyage to Atlantis, the new home for mankind, enters a mysterious and disquieting territory, where conspiracy theories about what is real and what is virtual emerge. THE EXODUS INCIDENT is a novel about an interstellar journey, which connects science to virtual realities and epistemology. In the guise of a final investigative report, a scientific treatise discusses the physics and mathematics behind the story: the starship, the fusion thruster, the target planet, and the journey, addressing anomalous effects which involve relativistic speed and deep space environments.