Dying Planet

Markley Robert Markley

Description

For more than a century, Mars has been at the center of debates about humanity's place in the cosmos. Focusing on perceptions of the red planet in scientific works and science fiction, Dying Planet analyzes the ways Mars has served as a screen onto which humankind has projected both its hopes for the future and its fears of ecological devastation on Earth. Robert Markley draws on planetary astronomy, the history and cultural study of science, science fiction, literary and cultural criticism, ecology, and astrobiology to offer a cross-disciplinary investigation of the cultural and scientific dynamics that have kept Mars on front pages since the 1800s.Markley interweaves chapters on science and science fiction, enabling him to illuminate each arena and to explore the ways their concerns overlap and influence one another. He tracks all the major scientific developments, from observations through primitive telescopes in the seventeenth century to data returned by the rovers that landed on Mars in 2004. Markley describes how major science fiction writers-H. G. Wells, Kim Stanley Robinson, Philip K. Dick, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Ray Bradbury, Robert Heinlein, and Judith Merril-responded to new theories and new controversies. He also considers representations of Mars in film, on the radio, and in the popular press. In its comprehensive study of both science and science fiction, Dying Planet reveals how changing conceptions of Mars have had crucial consequences for understanding ecology on Earth.

Sujets

• Science-fiction
• Astronomy
• Science fiction
• Popular culture

Informations

• Publié par: Duke University Press
• Date de parution: 08 septembre 2005
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780822387275
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

DYING PLANET  ≥5≥ 

DYING D U K E U N I V E R S I T Y P R E S S

D U R H A M & L O N D O N

2 0 0 5

P Ma L rs in Scie A nce and the N Imaginati E on T

R O B E R T M A R K L E Y

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∫2005 Duke University Press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper$ Designed by Rebecca Giménez Typeset in Minion by Keystone Typesetting, Inc. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data appear on the last printed page of this book.

FOR THE MARTIANS: Michelle, Helen, Harrison, Jeanne, Dan, & Jeannette

there is no if . . . ‘‘ ’’

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments ix ≤

Introduction 1 ≤

O N E ‘‘A Situation in Many Respects Similar to Our Own’’: Mars and the Limits of Analogy 31 ≤

T W O Lowell and the Canal Controversy: Mars at the Limits of Vision 61 ≤

T H R E E ‘‘Di√erent Beyond the Most Bizarre Imaginings of Nightmare’’: Mars in Science Fiction, 1880–1913 115 ≤

F O U R Lichens on Mars: Planetary Science and the Limits of Knowledge 150 ≤

F I V E Mars at the Limits of Imagination: The Dying Planet from Burroughs to Dick 182 ≤

S I X The Missions to Mars: Mariner, Viking, and the Reinvention of a World 230 ≤

S E V E N Transforming Mars, Transforming ‘‘Man’’: Science Fiction in the Space Age 269 ≤

E I G H T Mars at the Turn of a New Century 303 ≤

N I N E Falling into Theory: Terraformation and Eco-Econom- ics in Kim Stanley Robinson’s Martian Trilogy 355 ≤

Epilogue: 2005 385 ≤

Notes 389 ≤

Works Cited 405 ≤

Index 435 ≤

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Writing any book is a long and involved process, and writing a book that encompasses more than one discipline extends and complicates that pro- cess. Simple thanks are often insu≈cient. That said, I owe sincere debts of gratitude to a number of friends and colleagues. My initial interest in Mars was triggered by conversations with Molly Rothenberg, and the earliest versions of some of the key ideas in this book were developed in dialogue with her. A multimedia version of aspects of my argument in this book can be found on thedvdromRed Planet: Scientific and Cultural Encounters with Mars,in 2001 by the published University of Pennsylvania Press. My coauthors in that four-year collab- oration really do deserve more thanks than I can give them here: Har- rison Higgs, Michelle Kendrick, Helen Burgess, Jeanne Hamming, Dan Tripp, and Jeannette Okinczyc.Red Planet includes excerpts of video interviews with planetary scientists, cultural critics, and science-fiction authors. For their insights and their patient responses to various ques- tions about Mars, I am deeply indebted to Richard Zare, Je√ Moore, Kim Stanley Robinson, Chris McKay, Molly Rothenberg (again), Katherine Hayles, Philip James, Robert Zubrin, Carol Stoker, Frederick Turner, Henry Giclas, and Martyn Fogg. I owe thanks as well to other scientists with whom I have discussed Mars over the years, particularly John Bar- row, Matt Golombek, Robert Craddock, Michael Meyer, Kevin Zahnle, Marc Buie, and especially Earl Scime. All are absolved from any respon- sibility for the interpretations advanced in this study. At the Lowell Observatory, I benefited from the expertise, helpfulness, and genial good humor of Antoinette Beiser and Marty Hecht. Much of the research for this book was carried out while I held the Jackson Chair