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So as we haven't quite started our sci-fi group reads, now would be the best time to talk about what came before and inspired early science fiction. The earliest example would have to be Gilgamesh (travelling in space). That also happens to be the earliest example of literature.

According to Wikipedia there is an old Indian epic called the Ramayana that features space and under sea travel as well as advanced weaponry.

These are classic epics that have lasted millenia, but I do wonder how much they actually influenced authors more directly associated with science fiction.

What are some other examples of early fiction with sci-fi elements or fiction that influenced science fiction authors to come.

Ramayan, I'm afraid, is mythology, but cannot come under SF - I'd put it under fantasy, because the weapons are not based on principles of science or even pseudo-science.

I kind of feel the same about The Epic of Gilgamesh. What are some more current examples then, say from the 16th, 17th or 18th century?

I think before Mary Shelley and subsequent authors, the line between SF and Fantasy was not so clear - it was more speculative fiction, and it was only after 18th century that there was a clear demarcation between the two, which is why Frankenstein is considered the first proper SF work, rather than any works before, though they contain elements of SF. I don't think any work before that laid emphasis on science the way Shelley and later novelists did.

That definitely makes sense. But there is other stories that predate Frankenstein (or at least Wells and Verne) that feature similar themes or story elements as what sci-fi would have later; stories of time travel (though very few and unexplained) and automatons, but like you said without any scientific side to it, just simply a fantastical story element.

Look what I found - http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17...

"Story about traveling back in time, which predated "The Time Machine," by H.G. Wells some seven years."

I also managed to find an online version of it to read:

Rip Van Winkle was written - what - 70 years before The Time Machine? There's lots of time travel stories before H.G. Wells, but he was the first to have a character build a machine to do it.

Kelly wrote: "Rip Van Winkle was written - what - 70 years before The Time Machine? There's lots of time travel stories before H.G. Wells, but he was the first to have a character build a machine to do it."

I see. Captivating stuff!

I read Heart of a Dog written in 1925 by Mikhail Bulgakov. The story there is similar to that of Frankenstein.

Jonathan Swift sends his protagonist to unknown lands by the most acceptable awailable current technology in Gullivers Travels to Lilliput and Brobdingnag
A world so different that it allows him to criticise the government and ruling classes.
The last example I have found of such hidden criticism are in Fleet of Worlds by Larry niven & Edward M. Lerner

Leif wrote: "Jonathan Swift sends his protagonist to unknown lands by the most acceptable awailable current technology in Gullivers Travels to Lilliput and Brobdingnag
A world so different that it allows him to..."

Good S.F. is the exploration of what-if. It allows the author the freedom to create a context where ideas can be explored, outside of the constraints of our own society and culture and political system.

I always thought Ambrose Bierce's "The Damned Thing" was about an alien. It's very short & free on Project Gutenberg, if you're not familiar with it.

I am a fan of Bierce's fiction, but I haven't yet read that story. There's a fantastic Masters of Horror episode based on it too.

I'm rather upset with one of Bierce's books right now. I can't find it. (Yes, it's the book's fault!) It's a nice old book of his short stories from my grandfather who was also a newspaperman & revered Bierce. Grandpa co-owned, published, & edited The Long Islander which was started by Walt Whitman. I've never cared much for poetry, but always loved Bierce's writing.

I don't know how folks in this group feel about comic books & their relation to SF or the pulp stories of the Golden Age, but I think they go hand in hand a lot of ways. This feeling came to a head recently when I read Gladiator by Philip Wylie.

Published in 1930, this is a story of angst, a coming of age story. An experiment created by his biologist father, Hugo Danner is as strong as the Hulk & quite intelligent with only his conscience as a guide. Through some interesting pseudoscience, his father has made him nigh on indestructible. Only his good Christian conscience keeps him on the straight & narrow. He suffers terribly when he strays & takes on incredible responsibilities. I can see the early seeds of almost every comic super hero in this book.

A friend of mine reviewed "Gladiator" saying it was progenitor of Superman & Doc Savage. Dan's review (A different Dan than our moderator here.) is here:
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
I found the book for free on Gutenberg.org here:


If you can spare a couple of hours to read it, I think it's well worth it. The hero is a WASP, of course. He gets around sexually more than I expected, too. More than he would have if this had been published in the 50's, I think.

E.E. Doc Smith's Lensman & Skylark series were published from the late 30's through the early 50's, I believe. John W. Campbell Jr's Arcott, Morie, & Wade series was in the 50's. The characters share much in common with Hugo Danner, without the super powers & frank sex that Wylie describes.

Campbell was especially influential as an editor. He was loved by some, hated by others. Harry Harrison lampooned him in the early 70's by writing Star Smashers of the Galaxy Rangers. Basically, it is one of Campbell's books (Islands of Space, if I recall correctly, the 2d of the Arcott, Morrey, & Wade books.) rewritten to make fun of Campbell's attitudes on race, religion, & sex.

Anyway, the development & attitudes of the hero is kind of an interesting line to trace through the years.

Dan wrote: "So as we haven't quite started our sci-fi group reads, now would be the best time to talk about what came before and inspired early science fiction. The earliest example would have to be Gilgamesh ..."

I don't really see a problem including these. They were based on what science existed at the time, even if we wouldn't consider it science. It's all they had. Mythology was a way for people to understand the world around them, based on observation, just as science is for us today.

Lucian's True History is a pretty early example of science fiction. It's a little strange and rambling, but it does discuss space travel.

Edgar Allan Poe is better known as an early pioneer of the macabre and detective / mystery genres.

But he also wrote some great science fiction short stories ...

The Unparalleled Adventure of One Hans Pfaall (written in 1835) is quite memorable, about a man who travels to the moon in a balloon ... He meets the alien inhabitants there.

I was looking for pictures of steampunk horses, as one does, and came across this interesting discussion of .

They are talking about the stories of the character "Frank Reade". And they are forgotten perhaps because they were published in cheap magazines as written by "Noname", or perhaps because they aren't very good to us today. Anyhow, some wonderful images of steam men and steam horses and other inventions.

The first "Frank Reade" stories are really by Harry Enton, staring with "The Steam Man of the Plains" in 1896.

The dialog is written phonetically for some characters, such as this Irishman: "I can philosophize and so forth, but that bates me. Now, I moind that I was jist as much surprised whin I was tould about a Sthame Mon that thraveled over the counthry out west and--" "What?" cried Frank Reade, surprise ringing in his voice. "The Steam Man was my invention.". Oh boy! Don't want to see how he wrote the black character's voice. (But it was perhaps progressive that there was a major black character.)

But soon after, the "Frank Reade" stories were taken over by the very prolific Luis Senares, and it is he who is discussed in that article linked above as being the "American Jules Verne".

PS: The first Steam Man in the wild west was much earlier: The Huge Hunter, Or, the Steam Man of the Prairies by Edward S. Ellis from 1868.

Wow! That's great just for the old pics. Thanks, Ed.

Many of the Frank Reade stories are on Project Gutenberg for .

The pictures of the machines, that is. Don't look at the pictures of the characters too closely, esp. that of the 'negress.' But yes, it's an interesting article, esp. the last few pix; ty for sharing.

I've finally looked at the opening of this thread and realized something. There couldn't have been 'science fiction' before there was science! I need more research on the details, but I do know that in history and popular science books I keep running across bits of the story. For example, very few people used to have a sense that careful observation was key, much less that experiments with a control would disprove a lot of theories. And of course we all know that what passed for science in the old days was called Natural Philosophy (at least in Europe).

The most specific piece of the story that I recall is from a biography of Maria Sibylla Merian (The Girl Who Drew Butterflies: How Maria Merian's Art Changed Science) which pointed out that her work was special because she included the complete life cycle and the habitat and food of each insect or other critter that she drew. She did this from life, because she kept the subjects in her room, alive, to study over time... she wasn't just a gas & pin collector. She lived 2 April 1647 � 13 January 1717, so maybe about then would possibly be the first chance for (Western?) scientific speculative fiction to get written.

So, before there was real science, there was myth, fantasy, and speculative fiction? I dunno; I'd just as soon we call it all, old & new, fantasy & horror & SF, *speculative fiction*, but I can see why some ppl draw the line at Shelley's monsters, too... but that wasn't until a century after Merian....

Well, there's one way to look at it. Just a thought.

Interesting thoughts on proto-SF. It's a fine line between it & fantasy, but I find that trend went well into the middle of the 20th century. Doc Smith's Lensmen were pretty much magical & Campbell's Morey, Wade, & Arcott were too, IMO.

I must be misunderstanding something about no fiction before "Robinson Crusoe". People didn't really think the Illiad, Chaucer's tales, Shakespeare's plays & such were true, did they? I'm sure Voltaire's "Micromegas" was fiction - proto-SF at that - & it was published in 1753.

Dan wrote: " the spaceship occupants have no trouble breathing through the open windows all the way to the neighboring star the ship reached in a few days."

Here we may discover limits of contemporary science affecting SF. If no one expects vacuum between stellar bodies of that stars are fuelled by nuclear fusion on 'scientific' level than things that are known to be wrong now can still be considered scientific in the past

All interesting; too much for me to unpack right now except for thoughts I've had for awhile related to Oleksandr's comment. I'm bringing the discussion up past 1920 for examples.

A lot of those pulp stories about a swampy Venus were written *after* the author could have known better. Science fiction, or fantasy, or dismissable as trash? Then there's The Martian Chronicles which didn't take contemporary scientific understandings into account, yet it's considered a science fiction classic by a whole lot of ppl (not me, but never mind).

Do we evaluate every single title on a case-by-case basis to check if the author should have not made any mistakes or taken any liberties with science? Well heck, then we have to throw out anything that has anything to do with FTL or TT. But we do have to allow those stories from the mid 20th century that refer to PSI because the authors were exposed to scientific thought about the real possibility of ESP etc.

So clearly we're not going to judge only & strictly on how scientifically accurate something was at the time it was written (much less how accurate it is now understood to be).

[ I think that I subconsciously judge something as science fiction if the author intended it to be based on developing possibilities of science and technology... which isn't helpful I know because it does leave out stuff like alternate history (unless there's a TT machine or tech involved ie multiple universes...).... Anyway, Frankenstein is the perfect first candidate with all that anatomy & electricity, imo.

And I've actually been pretty happy with how my definition, vague as it is, and how well it helps me understands others. I'm sure it's no help to this discussion though! ]

Re first fiction and first modern novel - two entirely different things.
One short and easy explanation is here:

Cheryl wrote: "A lot of those pulp stories about a swampy Venus were written *after* the author could have known better. Science fiction, or fantasy, or dismissable as trash? Then there's The Martian Chronicles which didn't take contemporary scientific understandings into account"

A great point! Because my personal definition of SF is rather fuzzy, I allow for Jungle Venus if it creates a good story, especially in action/adventure type of SF, for they are good for escapism

Cheryl wrote: "Re first fiction and first modern novel - two entirely different things.
One short and easy explanation is here:
"

Interesting. Thanks. I knew I was missing something.

I remember a mention of 'too much reading of trashy novels' (paraphrasing from memory) in Pride and Prejudice, 1813... I wondered what it was that the characters were reading....

Jim wrote: "Cheryl wrote: "Re first fiction and first modern novel - two entirely different things.
One short and easy explanation is here:
"

Interesting. Thanks..."

Michel Foucault wrote "The Order of Things" about the origins of the human sciences:



By his definition across three fields (linguistics, biology, and economics) science does not exist until the nineteenth century. "Frankenstein" is at the cusp of the birth of science. "Robinson Crusoe" is the natural history or "collection" phase.

Dan wrote: "I wish I could agree with Foucault. It would bolster my argument. There is a mountain of evidence to the contrary though:"

Usually the argument will be "they were natural philosophers, not scientists". Yes, they did what we call science nowadays, but the distinction is that Natural Philosophers tried to understand the mind of the creator through the study of the natural world, while Scientists limit themselves with just understanding of the natural world. Here is an essay on this:

Cheryl wrote: "...very few people used to have a sense that careful observation was key, much less that experiments with a control would disprove a lot of theories..."

Agreed. Individual geniuses may have come up with that idea many times in the distant past, but it was fairly recent that it became a widespread idea. I consider Galileo as particularly important. I've seen others trace the idea back to ancient Greece. (For example: Uncommon Sense: The Heretical Nature of Science.)

Cheryl wrote: "Re first fiction and first modern novel - two entirely different things."

Indeed. Don Quixote is sometimes called the first modern novel, but it definitely isn't the first fiction. One of the ideas in that book is that Don Quixote's brain is going soft from having read too many works of fiction. The fiction that he was reading simply wouldn't be considered "modern novels".

If you want to get nit-picky and stick to the distinction between a "novel" and other "works of fiction" that was applied above, then most of the science fiction published and advertised as "novels" today are not novels either. (There are different definitions. No matter which one you pick, you will find examples of things being called novels which don't obey those rules.)

And I'm glad. While novels are great, I'm glad to read a variety of other types of story. (I've even enjoyed some things called by some "non-fiction novels".)

Gregg wrote: "By [Foucault's] definition across three fields (linguistics, biology, and economics) science does not exist until the nineteenth century...."

I think Foucault was talking specifically about "human sciences", in other words, science applied to human activities. I'm not certain, though, because like many philosophers, I simply don't understand him.

First off, Foucault was speaking of three specific fields: linguistics, biology, and economics. He felt the hard sciences had already reached these stages. But yes, he did follow the distinction of the natural history, natural philosophers, etc. from science. In biology and many "sciences" the early work was focused on collections of materials and facts rather than the science of these artifacts. Galileo would be a collector of planetary facts, Copernicus explained solar mechanics.

Secondly, I would say few or only some scientists are interested in the Creator such as Jesuit scientists. Most scientists do not believe in a Prime Mover or a clockwork universe anymore. To paraphrase Hawkings "there is no room for God in the equation".

Gregg wrote: "...Galileo would be a collector of planetary facts, Copernicus explained solar mechanics...."

I'm no expert on the history of science. But I largely agree with you about that with respect to planetary motions. It was largely "stamp collecting", i.e. gathering lots of observations. He did make and test some predictions based on those observations, such as predicting what locations you could find the satellites of Jupiter on a given day.

But in other areas he was clearly doing experiments to test hypotheses, and that is the basis of science. One example is in the under-appreciated Discourse on Floating Bodies.

As for "there is no room for God in the equation", there are many scientists who find room for God.

I think Gregg's saying that few scientists involve God in the scientific aspects of their worldview. Certainly very few regard God to be a satisfactory explanation for natural events.

re: God(s) and science. When I wrote about the distinction between natural philosophers and scientists I haven't planned that the discussion will shift to 'do some (and how many) scientists believe in God?', but that scientist don't use Deus velt as the primary cause in their field. It is perfectly fine to believe in God and assume that nuclear fission doesn't require (active) God's intervention to occur.

Statistically, Americans lie by 50% on their religious beliefs - 50% downward. That makes your 51% many actually 25.5% few or some.

The stats are more aligned in other than Muslim countries.



I think Oleksandr has a valid point. If you support the Prime Mover then God needs to be in the nuclear or at least Big Bang equation, otherwise, what's the point of having Him, or She or It around??? Answer: So we have Christmas gifts....

Interesting that your Dirty Dozen of "believing" scientist were mainly atheists and agnostics or lived in eras of religious oppression....

Some of them were quoted for their statements against religious belief. Only a few of them were active religious worshippers.

Newton who was not referenced wrote far more theology than science in his life but then again England was suffering another bout with the bubonic plague. There is a great SF time traveling short story from the 70s (I think) about the cause of it...just a little mathematics!

Synopsis of Newton's Gift:



It was an early Omni story and is contained is this interesting little book:

Oscar Scott Card is to SF what Harry Connick. Jr. is to jazz: Great artist but just a little wacky in real life.

I just try to remember that they are just flawed humans not Demigods.

Dan wrote: "At the risk of dispelling atheistic wishful thinking by the interjection of facts in this discussion, ...."

US or American scientists, not scientists in general. The US is lagging way behind the rest of the 1st world in throwing away the myths of religion. Generally, the better educated a country, the less religion there is.

Dan wrote: "I found some unexpected backing for Cheryl's position when she defined proto science fiction to include anything written before 1920...."

Cheryl was not trying to create a definition. She was inviting people to vote on a poll. I believe she was copy/pasting from some templates that we have and was not as precise as possible. (She is away at the moment, otherwise she may have responded herself.)

We recently stopped doing separate group reads for "before 1900" and "1900-1920" and have combined them into one read for "before 1920". This decision was an attempt to increase participation. We felt that there were not enough books that the group wanted to read for the years 1900-1920. Reducing the number of time periods from 7 to 6 also works nicely to give us two complete rotations per year.

The poll is still open, but not for much longer. You can vote if you haven't yet done so, and can change your vote if you wish. The poll is expected to close on Sept 6.

Please do not vote for any book unless you plan to read and discuss it with the group.

Dan wrote: "At the risk of dispelling atheistic wishful thinking by the interjection of facts in this discussion, according to a 2009 Pew Research Center survey half as many scientists believe in a Creator as the general public."

That was a little patronising but I'll bite!

I had looked at that poll as well, but:

Firstly, it's not that relevant to the question of how many scientists view God as part of their naturalistic worldview. I'm not sure quite how we got here but I think it started with the idea that many scientists were "seeking to understand the mind of the Creator" or somehow otherwise motivated in their science by God. I've known a few religious scientists and they tended to keep the research and spiritual sides of their lives very much distinct, at least in practice.

Secondly, the 51% figure refers to scientists that believe in "some form of deity or higher power". That doesn't have to mean a creator. Only 33% actually said they believe in God.

Thirdly, the poll covered only the US, which is more religious than say Western European countries:

That said, some of the other results of the poll are quite surprising. Only 9% of scientists identify as conservative and 6% as republican - I thought it'd be low but not that low!

Thank you.

Yes, I was using the label "proto SF" because that's the term that's been established in this group as a matter of 'good enough' convenience. Yes, I was using a revised template.

This is a very interesting, and civil, discussion. I think we're getting a little far OT when we talk about the religious views of scientists around the world, but I'll let the other mods decide if & when the conversation needs to be reined in.

(And yes, I still have limited access to a computer and will for the rest of Sept.)

The religious discussion is a bit off-topic. And it has the potential to get out of hand. In general let's try to stay away from religion and politics except as they are explored in science fiction.

Here are some proto-sf;
Other Worlds by Cyrano De Bergerac (Not with a long proboscis of a nose.)
The Golden Ass by Lacan(?)
The Blazing World by Margaret Cavendish
Utopia by Thomas More
The Future Eve by Villiers D’lisle Adam
Erewhon and Erewhon Revisited by Samuel Butler
Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift
Voyage to Arcturus by David Lindsey

That’s about it it so far.

Atlantis: The Antediluvian World I feel like this book fits the bill.