Used for questions on the science fiction genre itself, including its tropes and conventions.
2
votes
0answers
68 views
Cloning- many sizes, just before clone war
A book read 1973 and I've been looking for the name since.
It opens with a young boy sitting at his desk watching words appear on a sheet of paper in front of him. It is from his uncle who has been ...
4
votes
2answers
97 views
Novel with rising sea levels and humans live on rafts and communicate with whales?
The novel is set in the future when the seas have risen and is about people having to adapt. By the end of the novel humans are living on raft colonies and can communicate with whales who travel with ...
4
votes
1answer
113 views
What are the SciFi children's books from the 80s about a professor who used his smoking pipe to teleport himself, a girl and a boy to other worlds?
I cant remember the name of these books but they are old SciFi children's books from the 80s about a professor who used his smoking pipe to teleport himself, a girl (I think his niece or grand ...
3
votes
1answer
178 views
British sci fi book from the 70s or early featuring a colony returning to a deserted Earth
I read a book as a kid in the 70s. I think the book was written then, but could have been late sixties.
It is about a colony on a distant planet that for some reason need to go back to earth. Due to ...
4
votes
2answers
179 views
Science fiction novel about benevolent aliens landing on Earth
I read this when I was a child (late 90's to early 00's - your cue to feel old) so my memory of the details is a bit hazy, but the story concerned an alien race making contact with humans.
The main ...
0
votes
0answers
115 views
Identify this 80s novel in which the Earth is abandoned and quarantined, but some people remain
I am trying to find a book I had in 80s that I recently realized I have lost. It was about a war that happened on Earth, forcing people to abandon it. Once abandoned, a no-go zone was established ...
3
votes
1answer
99 views
Help finding a Sci-Fi novel whose story is about a man finding a ring on an ancient planet that heals him
Does anyone know the name of a Sci-Fi novel that involves a furturistic man who has been modified with enhancements and travels to an ancient highly advanced deserted world where he finds a ring ...
3
votes
1answer
158 views
Looking for a story where people download their consciousnesses into bodies
I have been looking for a story where people download themselves into clones (somewhat like Ghost in the Shell) for travel through space and a poor girl finds one in the river (she doesn't know what ...
5
votes
1answer
153 views
ID of Golden Age SF short story about teleportation across the galaxy using alien teleport booths
In this story, two male astronauts are on Mars and find a booth-like structure. One gets in and disappears. IIRC the second one follows him and is transported to a distant planet inhabited by ...
3
votes
1answer
103 views
ID of Golden Age SF story about a colonized planet of telepathic plant life
All I remember about this story (possibly a novel or novella, possibly by Poul Anderson) is that the butterflies on this planet are plants. The author uses a clever latinate word based on "phyto" to ...
5
votes
1answer
97 views
ID of Golden Age SF short story about robots on a farm after the collapse
Several types of robot work on an automated farm. One by one they realize there have been no communications from the City for some time, and the humans may be gone. They stop working, decide after a ...
3
votes
0answers
118 views
sci-fi short story about a car that endlessly drives itself
When I was in middle school I read a short story about a self-driving car that becomes self aware and locks a family inside. It drives the same circuit endlessly and stops at the same service station ...
2
votes
0answers
98 views
Sci-Fi book, 1980s, Twins psychic powers
I think it was from the 1980s. Main characters were twins, man and woman, where the woman had psychic powers and embraced the community of others with talents. Whereas the man was the opposite and ...
1
vote
0answers
147 views
Identify a science fiction movie with a radioactive planet
This is a short fragment I remember from I movie I saw some time ago (20-30 years)
A spaceship lands (don't know if its on Earth or not), humans step out and they walk thru a kind of forest. There is ...
3
votes
1answer
98 views
Teen sci fi novel about time travel
Searching for a time travel novel I read when I was a teenager in middle school, circa 1995, about a kid or young man who finds some kind of a marble or pebble or pearl or something that gives him the ...
4
votes
1answer
149 views
Looking for a series of books about a young man who is promoted to captain of a starship on his first trip
Things I remember:
There are only a few inhabited worlds
Travel between planets takes months
There is an alien species, that travel in space without ships, which resembles giant blobs.
The ...
6
votes
1answer
120 views
A book about a girl with a computer in her head
I'm trying to find the name of a book I read about 15 years ago. The cover had a picture of a girl standing in front of a bunch of rockets. The story was about a girl who finds out that a computer ...
2
votes
2answers
220 views
TV show about a woman only one man can see
Ok so I have memory as a kid sitting down every weekend with my parents to watch a sci fi programme on terrestrial tv but I can't think of what it was called and neither can they.
One episode is ...
2
votes
0answers
110 views
Cannot remember the name of this book
I read a book back in the 80's about an alien virus that jumps from person to person on a cruise ship (or may have been a luxury space ship). The book was really well written up until the last two ...
1
vote
0answers
68 views
Title of a book about a mysterious light in the sky from the late 90s?
I vaguely remember a book and it has been driving me crazy for years. It had these things:
A mysteroious light in the sky(maybe healing people)
Religous overtones/themes(not a religious book to my ...
5
votes
1answer
177 views
80's Animated movie: Old man joins mission to save a boy stranded on hostile world
A guy on a space ship picks up a distress call, a boy is stranded on a planet with a hostile environment, he & his crew go to the rescue, stopping on the way to pick up an old man who comes with ...
1
vote
0answers
147 views
Does an illustration of Tochee from the Commonwealth Saga exist?
One specific creature from the Commonwealth Saga has caught my interest -- Tochee. My imagination is really bad, and I can not hold all the descriptive details in mind at once. I have tried to find ...
3
votes
0answers
110 views
Short story: Primitive savannah man taken into a tower city and made sophisticated.
I read a short story about 30 years ago about a hunter-gatherer man living on an African-type plain or savannah where these strange tower structures rose into the clouds. He went to sleep beside one ...
4
votes
1answer
126 views
Book about wish fulfilment using subatomic particles?
I have memories of what I think was a full novel, but might have been a short-story/novella.
A scientist has discovered either a new sub-atomic particle, or a way to isolate a known particle, and a ...
5
votes
4answers
704 views
Sci-fi movie - semi-naked lady in box full of needles
Memory is hazy on this one as I watched it as a kid in early 80's. Scene I remember is a semi-naked woman in a transparent box or cube that has needles inside it , it closes in around her and draws ...
5
votes
0answers
331 views
Scifi novel from 90's with AI, robots, and a holodeck-like room
Can't recall what any of the title would be or who the author was. But the book involved the main character meeting a rich genius with a private island. He has an AI as his central computer, and it ...
9
votes
1answer
206 views
Searching for 60s-70s Science fiction novel about interstellar agent with artificial hand
I am seeking a 1960-70s pulp-sf novel. I read it in the early to mid-1970s and it was older then, so guessing it is from 1950s-1960s. It was about a Galactic agent/military officer with an artificial ...
10
votes
1answer
224 views
ID this 90's stop motion film about little people
It was a sci-fi/fantasy movie probably from the 90's, and I believe it was a stop motion film.
Little people from outer space are trying to find way back home guided by this small computer cube.
At ...
7
votes
1answer
238 views
What work of scifi broke the mold of zombies being undead voodoo minions and depicted them as mindless maneaters?
In the beginning, IIRC, zombies were undead creatures created and controlled by voodoo priests or priestesses. What work of scifi was the first to break that tradition by depicting zombies as ...
8
votes
4answers
479 views
Why do alien cultures tend to have one language, one religion etc
What are some common logical reasons given within any sci-fi universe for the lack of cultural diversity within a single alien race?
Examples of what I mean:
Star Trek: Vulcans come from Vulcan and ...
8
votes
4answers
433 views
What was the first SciFi work that theorized that Homo Sapiens were seeded on Earth by intelligent aliens?
What was the first SciFi work that theorized that Homo Sapiens were seeded on Earth by intelligent aliens (as opposed to all the other Earth species which evolved separately)?
The earliest one I can ...
1
vote
0answers
45 views
What is the average duration time of a sci-fi radio play(drama) nowadays and how long it was in the 60's and 70's? [closed]
What is the average duration time of a sci-fi radio play (drama) nowadays? How long were the radio plays in the 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s?
I mean, are/were they 10 minutes, or 20, or even 30?
0
votes
2answers
131 views
What is the name of this sci fi actor?
I forget the name of an actor who was in some moderately succesful sci fi / fantasy films of late 1980s / early 1990s. I think his name is Michael D something which sounds French or Flemish. This ...
1
vote
0answers
99 views
Cyberpunk with “spiritual” elements = science fantasy? [closed]
I am working on a story that incorporates spiritual elements (the soul, non-physical beings, God, etc) in a cyberpunk setting.
Does this make it "science fantasy"?
1
vote
1answer
227 views
Looking for title of 1980s sci-fi horror genetic experiment film
I recall seeing a film in the 80s that was a sci-fi horror film vaguely to do with genetic experimentation. There was a small creature that had tentacles that escaped and went around causing carnage. ...
1
vote
1answer
182 views
What are Science fiction stories that feature characters with Downs Syndrome or other special needs? [closed]
The title says it all, I hope.
I'm interested in movies, comics, TV-series, but most strongly written material.
To give some background, I recently noticed that people with special needs don't ...
13
votes
6answers
529 views
What was the first sci-fi work that had an intelligent virus/bacteria?
What's the earliest example of an intelligent virus/bacteria? There have been a number of comic-book characters (e.g. Sublime, Hlavac, Despotellis), television versions (e.g. the black oil from the ...
7
votes
2answers
214 views
What was the first SciFi work that had a “biologically different” intelligent race?
What was the first SciFi work that had a an intelligent race that was biologically significantly different from humans?
Not simply "non humanoid", but, say, non-vertebrate (non-humanoid vertebrates ...
5
votes
4answers
409 views
What is the earliest example in sci-fi or fantasy FILM containing a family link between Hero and Villain?
I can think of the obvious Star Wars but after that I am stumped. Anyone else have an earlier example?
Edited due to question being deemed too broad.
15
votes
2answers
589 views
What would the sky look like standing inside a Dyson Sphere?
I am working on a roleplaying campaign guide set inside a Dyson Sphere. It's a solid shell around a star like our own and is 300 million kilometers across centered on the star. The atmosphere hugs ...
4
votes
1answer
444 views
Mid 90's made for TV Sci-fi movie on Nickelodeon
I'm looking for for the name of a made for TV movie (live action) that was shown on the Nickelodeon channel some time during the mid 90's (some time between 94 and 98).
What I remember:
*The movie ...
4
votes
0answers
150 views
Book with dwindling crew entering codes to prevent destruction - computer problems
When i was younger i found a book from an author i had not heard of before but cant remember its name or the author,
The scene is a spaceship on a mission in deep space, the crew (i think there were ...
7
votes
1answer
225 views
Looking for identification of SF story where humans are the “ancient evil”
Unique short SF story where aliens being invaded by other aliens, went looking for allies (to help save their galactic empire).
While being chased by the antagonistic aliens, they encountered a ...
3
votes
1answer
128 views
First SciFi book/movie that has species ethics deliberately built based on game theory
What was the first SciFi book/movie that has a species or other large group whose ethics is deliberately built based on game theory?
Doesn't have to use the word "Game Theory", as long as the concept ...
60
votes
11answers
4k views
Why aren't alien planets as varied in climate as the Earth?
The Earth in all of its varieties has wide ranging climates. At the top level it has tropical, dry, temperate, continental, and polar climates. And yet often the planets depicted in science fiction ...
1
vote
0answers
217 views
Good Super Hero Novels? [closed]
I've been very interested in reading a Super Hero novel over the past few months. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find squat that isn't a graphic novel or something like Kick-Ass or Super (a ...
6
votes
1answer
298 views
Book featuring quantum mechanics used almost like magic?
Can anyone help identify a sci-fi book where the main character uses quantum mechanics to an effect like magic? At one point he bends probability so that he becomes "invisible" as he is sneaking ...
3
votes
2answers
688 views
What was the name of this anthology TV series from the eighties?
I remember several science fiction, horror, suspense and mystery episodes from an anthology TV series in the eighties. Here are some episodes (with spoilers, sorry)
a) Two policemen get kind of lost ...
3
votes
1answer
350 views
Sci-fi based 'game show' similar to Crystal maze?
I watched a few episodes of a British show with my Dad once, where the contestants would take on the role of scavengers aboard a space ship hunting down clues or items or performing tasks. I forget ...
8
votes
2answers
301 views
Do replicators ultimately lead to a money free state?
In all the two settings I've seen with some form or matter-matter or energy-matter converters (replicators) they both have either no money system (federation in star trek) or some other form of ...
