He Who Shrank is a science fiction novella by Henry Hasse, [1] printed as the featured story in the August 1936 issue of Amazing Stories magazine (illustrated on the cover and in its interior pages by Leo Morey). It is about a man who is forever shrinking through worlds nested within a universe with apparently endless levels of scale. It was reprinted [2] in the 1946 collection Adventures in Time and Space , edited by Raymond J. Healy and J. Francis McComas, and in Isaac Asimov's anthology of 1930s science fiction Before the Golden Age .
A world-celebrated professor reveals to his assistant, the tale's narrator, that he has discovered that the visible universe at the largest scales corresponds to the microscopic universe at the smallest observed scales, the relations between the universe's planets, suns, and star clusters being identical to the relations of electrons, atomic nuclei, and molecules. Rather than explore the universe at their own scale, the professor intends to explore the worlds endlessly nested within matter itself which, he argues by induction, must go on to ever smaller levels, and claims to have invented a substance that, once applied, will cause an individual to perpetually shrink. His assistant thinks he's insane, but the professor, surprising the assistant, injects him with the substance, temporarily paralyzing the assistant and dooming him to eternally shrink ever smaller, through successively smaller worlds, each a subatomic particle of the previous one (the injected substance, "Shrinx", has engineered secondary properties, such as oxygenating the blood and protecting against heat loss in space). The professor will monitor the assistant's fate through a device that receives his sense of sight and sound, and intends to eventually follow suit and set himself shrinking as well, although they would never meet again due to the infinitesimal chance of tracing the same path through the subatomic worlds.
The assistant, sent as an involuntary scout, shrinks further and further, through the peril of being attacked by a microorganism, down to various worlds, inhabited by various beings who, at their time scales, have seen him approach for years or centuries, including intelligent gaseous beings, cave people, space-faring birdlike beings who flee to their moon to escape self-replicating machines who have overrun their planet and will likely go on spreading through the universe at that scale, and others the narrator mentions only in passing, of widely varying forms. One race of intangible beings teaches the narrator skills for controlling matter with thought. Though it lies within the power of some advanced races to halt his shrinking or grant him release from life (for he finds he has become immortal), none will interfere.
The narrator eventually finds his way down to a blue planet, where he is examined by scientists who underestimate his intelligence due to communication difficulties (he has become so accustomed to communicating by thought transference with more advanced races he has forgotten how to even attempt to speak vocally to leave some record for them, and they are too primitive to register his thoughts). He tires of them and escapes, making his way out of the city, subduing those who bar his way with waves of angry thought that render them unconscious. He makes his way to an isolated house outside the city, where a man is listening to a broadcast about the alien who touched down in Lake Erie, near Cleveland. He finds the individual has a more imaginative, receptive mind than the others encountered, and asks to dictate to the man his story. It is at this point revealed that the narrator is not from Earth, but from a world that is at an inconceivable level above us, and that he has reached our world.
In the epilogue, the writer, a renowned writer of both "serious books" and "scores of short stories and books of the widely popular type of literature known as science fiction" gives a press interview announcing the publication of the story above for free, which he wrote in his own hand while under a voluntarily induced trance. He asserts that the story is true, but grants that it may be received by many as fiction.
Carl Sagan in 1978 wrote that the story "presents an entrancing cosmological speculation which is being seriously revived today". [3]
The story makes reference to the then-recent proposal that the universe is expanding, based on the discovery that distant astronomic bodies appeared to be receding.
The idea of a fractal universe, with atoms or subatomic particles of one scale corresponding to the stars of another scale, had been employed in other science fiction works, such as "Out of the Sub-Universe" (1928) by Roman Frederick Starzl.
Carl Edward Sagan was an American astronomer, planetary scientist and science communicator. His best known scientific contribution is his research on the possibility of extraterrestrial life, including experimental demonstration of the production of amino acids from basic chemicals by exposure to light. He assembled the first physical messages sent into space, the Pioneer plaque and the Voyager Golden Record, which were universal messages that could potentially be understood by any extraterrestrial intelligence that might find them. He argued in favor of the hypothesis, which has since been accepted, that the high surface temperatures of Venus are the result of the greenhouse effect.
The Incredible Shrinking Man is a 1957 American science fiction film directed by Jack Arnold, based on Richard Matheson's 1956 novel, The Shrinking Man. The film stars Grant Williams as Scott and Randy Stuart as Scott's wife, Louise. While relaxing on a boat, Scott is enveloped by a strange fog. Months later, he discovers that he appears to be shrinking. By the time Scott has reached the height of a small boy, his condition becomes known to the public. When he learns there is no cure for his condition, he lashes out at his wife. As Scott shrinks to the point where he can fit into a dollhouse, he has a battle with his family cat, leaving him lost and alone in his basement, where he is now smaller than the average insect.
The cosmos is an alternative name for the universe or its nature or order. Usage of the word cosmos implies viewing the universe as a complex and orderly system or entity.
Alien invasion or space invasion is a common feature in science fiction stories and films, in which extraterrestrial lifeforms invade Earth to exterminate and supplant human life, enslave it, harvest people for food, steal the planet's resources, or destroy the planet altogether. It can be considered as a science-fiction subgenre of the invasion literature, expanded by H. G. Wells's seminal alien invasion novel The War of the Worlds, and is a type of 'first contact' science fiction.
Star Maker is a science fiction novel by British writer Olaf Stapledon, published in 1937. Continuing the theme of the author's previous book, Last and First Men (1930)—which narrated a history of the human species over two billion years—it describes a history of life in the universe, dwarfing the scale of the earlier work. Star Maker tackles philosophical themes such as the essence of life, of birth, decay and death, and the relationship between creation and creator. A pervading theme is that of progressive unity within and between different civilisations.
Fantastic Voyage is a 1966 American science fiction adventure film directed by Richard Fleischer and written by Harry Kleiner, based on a story by Otto Klement and Jerome Bixby. The film is about a submarine crew who is shrunk to microscopic size and venture into the body of an injured scientist to repair damage to his brain. In adapting the story for his script, Kleiner abandoned all but the concept of miniaturization and added a Cold War element. The film starred Stephen Boyd, Raquel Welch, Edmond O'Brien, Donald Pleasence, and Arthur Kennedy.
Nicholas Julian Zapata Sagan is an American novelist and screenwriter. He is the author of the science fiction novels Idlewild, Edenborn, and Everfree, and has also written scripts for episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Voyager. He is the son of astronomer Carl Sagan and artist and writer Linda Salzman.
The First Men in the Moon by the English author H. G. Wells is a scientific romance, originally serialised in The Strand Magazine and The Cosmopolitan from November 1900 to June 1901 and published in hardcover in 1901. Wells called it one of his "fantastic stories". The novel recounts a journey to the Moon by the two protagonists: a businessman narrator, Mr. Bedford; and an eccentric scientist, Mr. Cavor. Bedford and Cavor discover that the Moon is inhabited by a sophisticated extraterrestrial civilisation of insect-like creatures they call "Selenites". The inspiration seems to come from the famous 1865 book by Jules Verne, From the Earth to the Moon, and the opera by Jacques Offenbach from 1875. Verne's novel also uses the word "Selenites" to describe inhabitants of the Moon.
The use of nanotechnology in fiction has attracted scholarly attention. The first use of the distinguishing concepts of nanotechnology was "There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom", a talk given by physicist Richard Feynman in 1959. K. Eric Drexler's 1986 book Engines of Creation introduced the general public to the concept of nanotechnology. Since then, nanotechnology has been used frequently in a diverse range of fiction, often as a justification for unusual or far-fetched occurrences featured in speculative fiction.
As She Climbed Across the Table is a 1997 science fiction novel by the American writer Jonathan Lethem. It is a satirical story set on the fictional campus of Beauchamp University in Northern California. Particle physicist Alice Coombs rooms with narrator Philip Engstrand, an anthropologist researching conflicts between and within disciplines. Their relationship drives the romantic aspect of this story. The novel deals thematically with many of the philosophical issues pertaining to modern quantum physics, as well as human interaction with artificial intelligence.
Roman Frederick Starzl (1899–1976) was an American writer. He, and earlier, his father, owned the Le Mars Globe-Post newspaper of Le Mars, Iowa. Roman Frederick was also the father of physician Thomas E. Starzl. His writing is largely forgotten now, but he was called a "master" by the pioneer of space opera E. E. Smith. Starzl's Interplanetary Flying Patrol, in The Hornets of Space, may have influenced Smith's Galactic Patrol. There is an extensive interview with Thomas Starzl about his father in Eric Leif Davin's Pioneers of Wonder.
In science fiction, a shrink ray is any device which uses energy to reduce the physical size of matter. Many are also capable of enlarging items as well. A growth ray typically only has the ability to enlarge.
The Atom is a superhero appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. The character was created by editor and co-plotter Julius Schwartz, writer Gardner Fox and penciler Gil Kane. The Atom was one of the first superheroes of the Silver Age of Comic Books and debuted in Showcase #34.
Old Man's War is a military science fiction novel by American writer John Scalzi, published in 2005. His debut novel was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 2006.
"Herbert West–Reanimator" is a horror short story by American writer H. P. Lovecraft. It was written between October 1921 and June 1922. It was first serialized in February through July 1922 in the amateur publication Home Brew. The story was the basis of the 1985 horror film Re-Animator and its sequels, in addition to numerous other adaptations in various media.
Andrew Fraknoi is a retired professor of astronomy recognized for his lifetime of work using everyday language to make astronomy more accessible and popular for both students and the general public. In 2017 Fraknoi retired from his position as Chair of the Department of Astronomy at Foothill College. In retirement he continues to teach through the Fromm Institute for Lifelong Learning and the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at San Francisco State University, to give public lectures, and to add to his body of written work. He is the recipient of numerous awards and honors in his field.
The Shrinking Man is a science fiction novel by American writer Richard Matheson, published in 1956. It has been adapted into a motion picture twice, called The Incredible Shrinking Man in 1957 and The Incredible Shrinking Woman in 1981, both by Universal Pictures. The novel was retitled The Incredible Shrinking Man in some later editions.
The Symphony of Science is a music project created by Washington-based electronic musician John D. Boswell. The project seeks to "spread scientific knowledge and philosophy through musical remixes." Boswell uses pitch-corrected audio and video samples from television programs featuring popular educators and scientists. The audio and video clips are mixed into digital mashups and scored with Boswell's original compositions. Two of Boswell's music videos, "A Glorious Dawn" and "We are All Connected", feature appearances from Carl Sagan, Richard Feynman, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Bill Nye, and Stephen Hawking. The audio and video is sampled from popular science television shows including Cosmos, The Universe, The Eyes of Nye, The Elegant Universe, and Stephen Hawking's Universe.
The War of the Worlds is a science fiction novel by English author H. G. Wells. It was written between 1895 and 1897, and serialised in Pearson's Magazine in the UK and Cosmopolitan magazine in the US in 1897. The full novel was first published in hardcover in 1898 by William Heinemann. The War of the Worlds is one of the earliest stories to detail a conflict between humankind and an extraterrestrial race. The novel is the first-person narrative of an unnamed protagonist in Surrey and his younger brother who escapes to Tillingham in Essex as London and Southern England are invaded by Martians. It is one of the most commented-on works in the science fiction canon.
"The Command" is a science fiction story by American writer L. Sprague de Camp. An early treatment of the concept of uplift, it was the first in his Johnny Black series. It was first published in the magazine Astounding Science-Fiction for October, 1938, and first appeared in book form in the hardcover anthology Modern Masterpieces of Science Fiction. It later appeared in the paperback anthology Doorway Into Time and the subsequent de Camp collection The Best of L. Sprague de Camp. The story has also been translated into German.