Project Hail Mary

Yes, the book explains that Erid's atmosphere and magnetic field are thick / strong enough that no radiation, including light, gets to the surface, hence why his species is blind. Rocky's ship is basically the first extra-planetary vessel the Eridians made period.

Presumably (though the book doesn't go into it) the Eridians employed heavy telepresence robots for the construction of their ship (as they'd be blind in vacuum), but it doesn't particularly hold up that no one noticed all the ship construction crew dying once it was pressurized and Eridians were on it, nor that Rocky _exclusively_ stayed in engineering for decades once the rest of his crew died.

It's just a setup for how biology could severely alter which branches of physics a species concentrates on - don't worry about the details.

Oh yeah, since you mentioned magnetic fields, in case you didn't know, the Earth's magnetic field (which direction is magnetic north) has flipped hundreds of times - Geomagnetic reversal - Wikipedia - though the effect is probably caused by the outer liquid core, not the solid center. We're possibly 'overdue' for a flip - the Earth hasn't kept its magnetic polarity this long in 10 million years - though on the long term scale, there doesn't appear to be any regularity in how often that field flips.

It's very likely the Earth's magnetic field is highly variable during those flips (some areas get much stronger fields, some much weaker), though the correlation to mass species extinctions is very murky. It is safe to say a lot of current human tech will be fucked during the transition - a coronal mass ejection started (much fewer compared to current human wiring) telegraph lines on fire back in the 19th century with a stable magnetic field - Carrington Event - Wikipedia

Wombat said:

Yes, the book explains that Erid's atmosphere and magnetic field are thick / strong enough that no radiation, including light, gets to the surface, hence why his species is blind. Rocky's ship is basically the first extra-planetary vessel the Eridians made period.

Presumably (though the book doesn't go into it) the Eridians employed heavy telepresence robots for the construction of their ship (as they'd be blind in vacuum), but it doesn't particularly hold up that no one noticed all the ship construction crew dying once it was pressurized and Eridians were on it, nor that Rocky _exclusively_ stayed in engineering for decades once the rest of his crew died.

It's just a setup for how biology could severely alter which branches of physics a species concentrates on - don't worry about the details.

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A ship in low orbit =! interstellar travel in terms of radiation. Erid has an even stronger magnetic field than Earth, so we can presume that protective bubble extends out pretty far and would have mitigated most of the harmful radiation to Eridians working on the space elevator/ship.

they may have blind-compatable thermometers.

Deathwing said:

If no light gets to the surface, why would the Eridians give a shit about the astrophage? How would they even know about it?

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They would have still noticed changes to temperature and environment. Plus Eridians knew about light and radiation even though they can’t see them. Humans can’t innately see sound waves but we know sound waves exist because we can use technology to see them

That isn't inaccurate, but I don't think you'd find anyone saying this movie wasn't Sci-fi besides yourself

Honestly your take comes across as those types of people who only accept a certain type of Fantasy novel. Like there are certain "purists" who only accept a LOTR style fantasy setting and reject any fantasy setting that deviates from that.

Guurn said:

I'd say that simply putting something in space doesn't make it sci-fi any more than putting a story on a boat makes it a pirate tale. .

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I would agree with you if the story was about office politics or family relationships where the setting was only a backdrop

This movie literally about stoping a sun from dying and meeting and interacting with alien life forms.

The entire movie is our hero using science to solve problems, physics and chemistry are crucial parts of the story

Examples that might fit what your saying could be Apollo 13 or space cowboys, while they are in space I would agree they are not sci Fi

Any movie with muppet aliens is going to be weak scifi.

Bald Brah said:

Any movie with muppet aliens is going to be weak scifi.

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oh ya ? Alien(s) was weak sci-fi? Mostly puppets !!


Me reading this thread

Bald Brah said:

Any movie with muppet aliens is going to be weak scifi.

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wtf?

Nester said:

oh ya ? Alien(s) was weak sci-fi? Mostly puppets !!


Me reading this thread
View attachment 636317

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sci fi : technology is important to the story, there is no magic, but the science isn't explored in depth or really align with what we understand of the universe. FTL, everyone looking human, everyone speaks English, everyone breaths oxygen, etc. Star Trek, Project Hail Mary, Gravity, Interstellar, The Matrix, Babylon 5, on and on.

hard sci fi: very rare, the science is based on our current understanding of physics and 1 thing may be exaggerated but thats it. It is very conscientious of following the exacting rules of the world it sets up and takes the time to work out the science. Extremely rare frankly - Primer, The Martian, 2001, Moon, Expanse, Contact, Blindsight. The Martian setup of martian dust storms is unrealistic but everything else is plausible from that one exaggeration. The Expanse imo also counts, "protomolecule" is exaggerated but everything else follows known science rules. The "one unrealistic thing" is important to let the story have an imaginative new angle. There are a few that take zero science liberties but its really rare. For example Apollo 13 is hard sci fi because its all real lol

space opera: science/tech is in the background but is more concerned with galactic drama, relationships, humanities place in the galaxy, etc and there might be magic. Star Wars, Dune, Riddick, Fifth Element, Guardians of the Galaxy, BSG, Foundation, etc.

you could easily have sub genres of all this stuff but i'd mostly categorize space stuff into one of those 3 buckets. hard sci fi is very debatable, i could see arguments for Martian not being hard sci fi (movie especially) but I think it counts.

My only real gripe is when the "rules" are too flexible. The cop is an ace... unless the scene needs him to be incompetent. The Klingon needs to be honorable... unless the scene needs "just this one time". Or the technology can do the thing... but everyone forgets it exists when they actually need it. That kind of bullshit.

What I do like is when the idea of a future technology gets people asking questions about the implications of it. I've had MANY arguments over transporter technology in Star Trek, for example. My take is that no-one who has been transported is alive, only their clones since the technology literally destroys you and builds a copy at a different location. And then the number of people who say, "So what? I would do it." just blows my fucking mind. Anyhow, Sci-Fi (moreso than Fantasy since it's at least theoretically possible) has always fascinated me for that reason, whereas Fantasy is just fun escapism.

Rabbit_Games said:

My take is that no-one who has been transported is alive, only their clones since the technology literally destroys you and builds a copy at a different location.

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I mean they kind of explored that idea when they split kirk into evil kirk and good kirk.

The Enemy Within (Star Trek: The Original Series)

first aired on October 6, 1966

They also had Bones, a doctor, talking about how much he hated being Transported... but always got transported. I kind of remember it being brought up that they could do all kinds of stuff with the technology like remove genetic problems, or heal people with data from a previous transport, etc. but they don't for "ethical" reasons. Just one of those things you're expected to run with, but would NEVER be a reality because someone like Elon Musk would become immortal regardless of everyone else's "We just don't do that" bullshit.