See also
- "The Fermi Paradox Is Our Business Model", 2010 Charlie Jane Anders story in which aliens arriving at post-nuclear holocaust Earth are surprised that some humans have developed the technology to survive
"Rescue Party" is a science fiction short story by English writer Arthur C. Clarke, first published in Astounding Science Fiction in May 1946. It was the first story that he sold, though not the first one published. It was republished in Clarke's second collection, Reach for Tomorrow (1956), and also appears in The Collected Stories of Arthur C. Clarke (2001).
Aliens, aware that the Sun will explode very soon, arrive to save as many humans and as much of their culture as possible. Normally the galactic civilizations conduct surveys of planets every million years for new species, but the human race did not exist the last time the Earth was checked – nearly four hundred thousand years before. However, radio signals had been detected at a planet 200 light years away, indicating intelligent life had arisen.
To the aliens' surprise, the planet seems to be empty of intelligent life, except for the remnants of a civilization. While the aliens explore the old cities, it is revealed that it is typical for species to take thousands of years to go from radio transmission to space travel.
During their exploration of the Earth, the aliens find a communication tower transmitting what is unfolding into what looks like empty space. They follow the beam and find an enormous fleet of ships. The aliens, equipped with faster-than-light ships, are amazed that humans have dared to cross interstellar space in sublight ships only 200 years after inventing radio. Humans do not possess faster-than-light ships, but have built generational starships in the hope that their descendants will one day find a new home.
The aliens jokingly wonder if they should be worried for themselves, given the humans' rapid advancement and apparent determination. The last sentence states that, twenty years later, the comment is no longer funny.
Arthur C. Clarke spoke of "Rescue Party" in a foreword to the story, republished in The Sentinel, a book of short stories, in 1983:
"Rescue Party," written in March 1945, while I was still in the Royal Air Force, was the first story I sold to the legendary John W. Campbell, Jr., editor of Astounding Science Fiction . It was not, however, the first of my stories he published; "Loophole" (April 1946) beat it by a month.
I don't believe I've reread it since its original appearance, and I refuse to do so now — for fear of discovering how little I have improved in almost four decades. Those who claim that it's their favorite story get a cooler and cooler reception over the passing years.
The Fermi paradox is the discrepancy between the lack of conclusive evidence of advanced extraterrestrial life and the apparently high likelihood of its existence. As a 2015 article put it, "If life is so easy, someone from somewhere must have come calling by now."
Katherine Anne MacLean was an American science fiction author best known for her short fiction of the 1950s which examined the impact of technological advances on individuals and society.
Childhood's End is a 1953 science fiction novel by the British author Arthur C. Clarke. The story follows the peaceful alien invasion of Earth by the mysterious Overlords, whose arrival begins decades of apparent utopia under indirect alien rule, at the cost of human identity and culture.
Strata is a 1981 science fiction comedy novel by Terry Pratchett. It is one of Pratchett's first novels and one of the few purely science fiction novels he wrote, along with The Dark Side of the Sun.
The concept of self-replicating spacecraft, as envisioned by mathematician John von Neumann, has been described by futurists and has been discussed across a wide breadth of hard science fiction novels and stories. Self-replicating probes are sometimes referred to as von Neumann probes. Self-replicating spacecraft would in some ways either mimic or echo the features of living organisms or viruses.
The Songs of Distant Earth is a 1986 science fiction novel by British writer Arthur C. Clarke, based upon his 1958 short story of the same title. Of all of his novels, Clarke stated that this was his favourite. Prior to the publishing of the novel, Clarke also wrote a short step outline with the same title, published in Omni magazine and anthologised in The Sentinel in 1983.
The Voyage of the Space Beagle (1950) is a science fiction novel by Canadian-American writer A. E. van Vogt. An example of space opera subgenre, the novel is a "fix-up" compilation of four previously published stories:
Against the Fall of Night is a science fiction novel by British writer Arthur C. Clarke. Originally appearing as a novella in the November 1948 issue of the magazine Startling Stories, it was revised and expanded in 1951 and published in book form in 1953 by Gnome Press. It was later expanded and revised again and published in 1956 as The City and the Stars. A later edition includes another of Clarke's early works and is titled The Lion of Comarre and Against the Fall of Night. In 1990, with Clarke's approval, Gregory Benford wrote a sequel titled Beyond the Fall of Night, which continues the story arc of the 1953 novel. It is generally printed with the original novel as a single volume.
The Sands of Mars is a science fiction novel by English writer Arthur C. Clarke. While he was already popular as a short story writer and as a magazine contributor, The Sands of Mars was also a prelude to Clarke's becoming one of the world's foremost writers of science fiction novels. The story was published in 1951, before humans had achieved space flight. It is set principally on the planet Mars, which has been settled by humans and is used essentially as a research establishment. The story setting is that Mars has been surveyed but not fully explored on the ground. The Sands of Mars was Clarke's first published novel.
First contact is a common science fiction theme about the first meeting between humans and extraterrestrial life, or of any sentient species' first encounter with another one, given they are from different planets or natural satellites. The theme commonly explores topics including xenophobia, transcendentalism, and basic linguistics by adapting the anthropological idea of first contact to extraterrestrial cultures.
An interstellar war is a hypothetical space war between combatants from different planetary systems. The concept provides a common plot device in science fiction, especially in the space opera subgenre. In contrast, the term intergalactic war refers to war between combatants from different galaxies, and interplanetary war refers to war between combatants from different planets of the same planetary system.
"The Star" is a science fiction short story by English writer Arthur C. Clarke. It appeared in the science fiction magazine Infinity Science Fiction in 1955 and won the Hugo Award in 1956. It is collected in Clarke's 1958 book of short stories The Other Side of the Sky, and it was reprinted in the January 1965 issue of Short Story International as the lead-off story.
The Last Theorem is a 2008 science fiction novel by Arthur C. Clarke and Frederik Pohl. It was first published in the United Kingdom by HarperVoyager in July 2008, and in the United States by Del Rey Books in August 2008. The book is about a young Sri Lankan mathematician who finds a short proof of Fermat's Last Theorem, while an alien invasion of Earth is in progress.
"History Lesson" is a science fiction short story by British writer Arthur C. Clarke, first published in 1949 in the magazine Startling Stories.
The Excalibur Alternative is a science fiction novel by American writer David Weber, published by Baen Books in 2002. It is one of several novels based on the premise of David Drake's 1986 novel Ranks of Bronze. This novel is based on the short story "Sir George and the Dragon", which appeared in the 2001 anthology Foreign Legions.
The Viagens Interplanetarias series is a sequence of science fiction stories by L. Sprague de Camp, begun in the late 1940s and written under the influence of contemporary space opera and sword and planet stories, particularly Edgar Rice Burroughs's Martian novels. Set in the future in the 21st and 22nd centuries, the series is named for the quasi-public Terran agency portrayed as monopolizing interstellar travel, the Brazilian-dominated Viagens Interplanetarias. It is also known as the Krishna series, as the majority of the stories belong to a sequence set on a fictional planet of that name. While de Camp started out as a science fiction writer and his early reputation was based on his short stories in the genre, the Viagens tales represent his only extended science fiction series.
Collision Course is a science fiction novel by American author Robert Silverberg, first published in hardcover in 1961 by Avalon Books and reprinted in paperback as an Ace Double later that year. Ace reissued it as a stand-alone volume in 1977 and 1982; a Tor paperback appeared in 1988. An Italian translation was also published in 1961, and a German translation later appeared. Silverberg planned the novel as a serial for Astounding Science Fiction, but John W. Campbell rejected the work and Silverberg eventually sold a shorter version to Amazing Stories, where it appeared in 1959.
Ancient astronauts have been addressed frequently in science fiction and horror fiction. Occurrences in the genres include:
Arthur C. Clarke (1917-2008) wrote a considerable number of short stories in the science fiction genre.
"The Fermi Paradox Is Our Business Model" is a science fiction short story by American writer Charlie Jane Anders. It was first published in the online magazine Tor.com August 11, 2010.