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In planetary science, planetary differentiation is the process by which the chemical elements of a planetary body accumulate in different areas of that body, due to their physical or chemical behavior (e.g. density and chemical affinities). The process of planetary differentiation is mediated by partial melting with heat from radioactive ...
The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction mentions two caveats as to the usage of the term. First, while the setting may be in an alien world, if "the nature or description of this world has little bearing on the story being told," as in A Case of Conscience, then the book is not a planetary romance.
Terraforming is well represented in contemporary literature, usually in the form of science fiction, as well as in popular culture. [1] [2] While many stories involving interstellar travel feature planets already suited to habitation by humans and supporting their own indigenous life, some authors prefer to address the unlikeliness of such a concept by instead detailing the means by which ...
Sad Planets describes Solaris as an "enigma", calling some of the book's most moving passages those that describe the planet itself, with no human presence. [2] Green Planets states that Solaris "resists both physical and epistemic human penetration", describing it as "an impervious mirror surface". Ironically, the planet itself appears to ...
Science fiction bibliographers E. F. Bleiler and Richard Bleiler, in the 1998 reference work Science-Fiction: The Gernsback Years, list various imaginary constituents of the pre-modern "science-fiction Solar System". Among these are planets between Venus and Earth, planets on the inside of a hollow Earth, and a planet "behind the Earth". [16]
Delany himself has said, "Science fiction is not ‘about the future.’ Science fiction is in dialogue with the present…[the science fiction writer] indulge[s] in a significant distortion of the present that sets up a rich and complex dialogue with the reader’s here and now."
H. G. Wells's The War of the Worlds, depicting Martians invading Earth, is one of the most influential works of science fiction. [1] Mars, the fourth planet from the Sun, has appeared as a setting in works of fiction since at least the mid-1600s. Trends in the planet's portrayal have largely been influenced by advances in planetary science.
Other purposes for Mercury in modern science fiction include as a base for studying the Sun, as in the 1980 novel Sundiver by David Brin where humans attempt to determine whether there is extraterrestrial life inside the Sun. [2] [3] [16] Similarly, the planet is used as a solar power station in the 2005 novel Mercury, part of Ben Bova's Grand ...