# Aspects of  Sci Fi



## bazz cargo (May 15, 2014)

I couldn't help noticing the Fantasy Thread was becoming clogged up by Sci Fi geeks who were just mooching around and listlessly kicking pebbles.

So...

Here is a nice place, a few Star Wars posters, coffee machine, doughnut dispenser, battered sofa, a BIG stack of comic books.


Why write Sci Fi? What kind of story? Who inspires you? What is your favourite book? Film? TV show? What do you predict for our future? Favourite line?


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## escorial (May 15, 2014)

I like The Big Bang Theory..an i'm not a fan of si/fi.


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## Schrody (May 15, 2014)

Ooooh, a thread made just for me  I like SF, always have, even since I was little I liked watching SF, and was fascinated by stars, distant worlds and aliens species. Since I started reading about theoretical physics, my awe is even bigger. I'm always between fantasy/supernatural and SF. It would be cool to mix that two genres, but you need to be a master to do it. Some of my WIP's are soft science, but I tend to research more so it won't be a mindless soft SF. I started writing my first Hard SF this year, it's not easy, but I'm enjoying new experiences. 

EDIT: Also, my 1000th post and 7th green thingie. Woo hoo! :champagne:


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## Bishop (May 15, 2014)

I wrote this in another thread:



> Why? Because I look at the stars every night outside my window and wonder what else there is. Imagine. This blue and green orb is a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of a percentage point of our universe. Our entire solar system is only a drop in the ocean compared to the size of just our galaxy. The very scope of that intrigues me, even without the thoughts of pulsar stars, aquatic planets, binary systems, quasars, black holes, nebulae, and other spacial bodies and objects that we can't even imagine yet. If there's life on Earth, it's statistically probable that there's life in one of the other 8.8 BILLION proposed inhabitable worlds--and those are just worlds that would support carbon-based life. There could be non-corporeal life forms, space-dwelling life forms, forms of life that can't even be quantified by our minds. God itself could exist as a part of the fabric of the universe, flipping the lightswitch of life on and off wherever it pleases and watching for eons.
> 
> And there's the reverse scope. I know exactly what a computer does, and how it does it. I know how a CPU's multitude of transistors process 1's and 0's at unfathomable speeds to make naked girls appear on the screen for budding teenagers to gawk at. I know how the network cable plugged into my router at home sends billions of those 1's and 0's from central servers all across the world, only to be translated into a radio signal for my computer to receive through two walls to let me play Planetside 2 with someone in Seoul at real-time speeds. But, like Kevin Flynn, I can only imagine what those bits look like on a microscopic level. Tiny electrical signals that carry the whole of human knowledge span the globe in nanoseconds, and I can barely scratch the surface of understanding it.
> 
> ...



That's my why. 

I write science fiction adventure. My books center around a salvage ship with seven fantastically unique crew members from many different races. They inadvertently get caught up in intergalactic conflicts and espionage in search of a lost ship, survive a massive rebellion while on vacation, and stumble into a three thousand year old fleet at the whim of an assassin. And that's just books one two and three!


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## Guy Faukes (May 16, 2014)

I like my sci fi focused on dazzling visual effects and centered around concepts of a potential future (Star Trek reboots were pretty good for what they were) and/or draw relevance on social or political issues (Ghost in the Shell, BSG). 

I guess I'm writing more about fantasy, but with other worlds being involved, I guess it's sci fi as well.


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## T.S.Bowman (May 16, 2014)

Bishop said:


> I wrote this in another thread:



Bishop, when I am reading your first (and yeah, I'm still working on it, lol) I can see the passion you have put into it. That's why, even though I am not a big Sci Fi fan, I am still very interested in the story and its denizens.

I just hope that level of passion shows up in my work as well.


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## Bishop (May 16, 2014)

T.S.Bowman said:


> Bishop, when I am reading your first (and yeah, I'm still working on it, lol) I can see the passion you have put into it. That's why, even though I am not a big Sci Fi fan, I am still very interested in the story and its denizens.
> 
> I just hope that level of passion shows up in my work as well.



Aw, shucks, there you go again. And that's the first book, that's the one that needs work by the way  I'm really appreciative of your critique and what you're saying. Your passion shows in your work as well, don't think that it doesn't.


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## Schrody (May 16, 2014)

Bishop said:


> I wrote this in another thread:
> 
> _I love my life. I love St. Louis, it's a great town, I love my suburb, I love my office job, and I love my wife. _



Did she made you to write this?  

Yeah, I'm stupid, I thought you wrote wife twice, but it's actually life and wife. You probably realized by now I'm not a writer, but fugitive from mental hospital. Nice knowing y'all.


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## Bishop (May 16, 2014)

Schrody said:


> Did she made you to write this?



Hah! No, I'm just hopelessly in love is all.


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## T.S.Bowman (May 16, 2014)

Bishop said:


> Hah! No, I'm just hopelessly in love is all.



There are definitely worse states of mind to be in when yer married. That's for damn sure.


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## Schrody (May 16, 2014)

Bishop said:


> Hah! No, I'm just hopelessly in love is all.



That's great! I wish I could be satisfied with my town/country. And now, to the muffin baking. I'm gonna use brownies recipe and you can't do anything about it. Muahahah!


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## Bard_Daniel (May 17, 2014)

I like Phillip K. Dick, Dune, Alas Babylon, 1984, and many others.

Sci-Fi can be very good, it just needs to, in my opinion, remain in the literary fiction sector for me to enjoy it. So I'd try to write something the same.


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## bazz cargo (Jun 1, 2014)

Cool. How about reviewing a few classic books?


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## Cran (Jun 1, 2014)

Hard SF is a challenge for writers - and even for some readers - because it explores the possibilities drawn from the leading science of the day. The challenge arises because, as many hard SF writers know, the science of the day will likely become dated, if not disproved. The most enduring original hard SF stories tended to become foundations or milestones for other genres or sub-genres; examples include Frankenstein (Mary Shelley)(Horror) and War of the Worlds (HG Wells)(Space Opera/Soft (sociological) SF), both from the late 19th Century. 

Space Opera, or SF Adventure, is more often traditional adventure updated with modern and speculative technologies, and often shifted onto larger stages; popular examples are Star Wars (a blend of Robin Hood-style renegades against tyranny and the Knight rescues the Princess adventure stories), Serenity (and the Firefly series) and a whole range of Alien Visitation/Invasion or Approaching Armageddon stories from the original Day the Earth Stood Still, through ET and Starman, to the recent and planned crop of similar stories. The advantage, for writers and readers, is that they can take previously explored ideas - faster than light space travel, functional AIs (robots, etc), localised manipulation of gravity, etc - for granted, and can focus instead on the adventure without the need to refer to the science of the day.  

Soft (sociological) SF tends to explore cultural or political changes, or possible social outcomes of evolutionary change (mutants, etc), whether or not brought about by the science of the day; its foundations can be found in War of the Worlds and The Time Machine (HG Wells), 1984 (George Orwell), Fahrenheit 451 (Ray Bradbury), and just about anything by Kurt Vonnegut. The stories were by no means "soft"; they were often hard and gruesome and damning indictments on societies, but they get that label because they are more based on the so-called "soft" sciences. 

Speculative Fiction is something of a catch-all for stories which fall outside of the standard Science Fiction or Fantasy sub-genres, often because they happily embrace or blend these genres and even step outside to collect others. Where else can you get dragons and orbiting spaceships on the same page? (Thank you, Anne McCaffrey) Or alien blue samurai-style warriors using wormhole technology to invade a Middle-Earth-style kingdom? (Thank you, Raymond Feist)


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## BobtailCon (Jun 1, 2014)

There hasn't been enough Sci-Fi in the Fantasy/Sci-Fi/Horror Section


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## InstituteMan (Jun 1, 2014)

I like sci-fi that holds a mirror up to us. I like sci-fi that is political. 

By stripping away the limitations of our current time and place, I think that a talented science fiction author can tell us as much, and often more, about ourselves than 'traditional' literature can, IMHO. Fahrenheit 451, Brave New World, 1984, and Slaughterhouse Five are great examples. Oh, and War of the Worlds and Frankenstein, too. I have pushed the lesser known Lord of Light (by Roger Zelazny) around here and on my friends and family as well. Alas, my taste in science fiction makes it hard for me to write what is my favorite genre to read, as every attempt I make comes up short of those standards.

I like aliens too. Aliens are intrinsically cool.


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## bazz cargo (Jun 1, 2014)

> There hasn't been enough Sci-Fi in the Fantasy/Sci-Fi/Horror Section


Probably 'cos' Sci Fi writers are more likely to take their work seriously and post it inside the workshop.


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## Bishop (Jun 1, 2014)

> There hasn't been enough Sci-Fi in the Fantasy/Sci-Fi/Horror Section



I generally post mine in the workshop, but I'm paranoid about people stealing my ideas. It's also why I post very little of my own work on this site.


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## BobtailCon (Jun 2, 2014)

Bishop said:


> I generally post mine in the workshop, but I'm paranoid about people stealing my ideas. It's also why I post very little of my own work on this site.



Same, that's why people can often find me in the Writer's Lounge.


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## Schrody (Jun 2, 2014)

For you SF writers, do you research about existing/possible technologies or you just write what ever first come to your mind?


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## Cran (Jun 2, 2014)

Schrody said:


> For you SF writers, do you research about existing/possible technologies or you just write what ever first come to your mind?


For my SF stories, I always research the science of some aspect of the story. For example, in _Retribution_, it was about the processes involved in experiencing empirical pain (sometimes called sympathy pains); in _Decayed_, it was the search for a radioactive isotope used in medicine or similar with a half life of ten years or some workable fraction of ten years - it turned out to be rhodium 101 - and the search for a nebula that lies between us and the near edge of the galaxy.


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## Kyle R (Jun 2, 2014)

Schrody said:


> For you SF writers, do you research about existing/possible technologies or you just write what ever first come to your mind?



I write whatever my imagination comes up with, then search online for technical jargon I can use to inject some semblance of plausibility.


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## Cran (Jun 2, 2014)

KyleColorado said:


> I write whatever my imagination comes up with, then search online for technical jargon I can use to inject some semblance of plausibility.


Your forte, then, would be SF Adventure, where the story has priority over the exploration of the science of the day.


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## Tyler Danann (Jun 2, 2014)

bazz cargo said:


> I couldn't help noticing the Fantasy Thread was becoming clogged up by Sci Fi geeks who were just mooching around and listlessly kicking pebbles.
> 
> So...
> 
> ...



I was raised on Sci-Fi as well as fantasy so I include both in my works.

Blakes 7, Mad Max, Firefly, Conan, Flash Gordon etc.

Star Wars was more for kids though, but Blade Runner - now that was a whole other level.


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## Bishop (Jun 2, 2014)

Schrody said:


> For you SF writers, do you research about existing/possible technologies or you just write what ever first come to your mind?



Generally, when it comes to big tech (warp engines, O2 and H2O generators...) I just leave out details. When it comes to spacial bodies, star classifications, planet types, I do research. Basically, if it exists and I can research it, I do, if not, I make it up!


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## Schrody (Jun 2, 2014)

Cran said:


> For my SF stories, I always research the science of some aspect of the story. For example, in _Retribution_, it was about the processes involved in experiencing empirical pain (sometimes called sympathy pains); in _Decayed_, it was the search for a radioactive isotope used in medicine or similar with a half life of ten years or some workable fraction of ten years - it turned out to be rhodium 101 - and the search for a nebula that lies between us and the near edge of the galaxy.



How are you holding up with that? I recently started researching, I really like writing about real science, but I find it limiting sometimes. I have a great idea, I have the science to back it up, it's just hard sometimes to incorporate science with fiction. I'm talking about hard SF, of course.


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## Schrody (Jun 2, 2014)

Bishop said:


> Generally, when it comes to big tech (warp engines, O2 and H2O generators...) I just leave out details. When it comes to spacial bodies, star classifications, planet types, I do research. Basically, if it exists and I can research it, I do, if not, I make it up!



I use that approach too (sometimes), I'm more into hard science these days.


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## Cran (Jun 2, 2014)

Schrody said:


> How are you holding up with that?


Not sure I understand the question; I'm a semi-retired research writer, so the research for me is simply part of what I do, and enjoy. Those two stories/episodes/chapters are done for now; however, the next three - _Timing, Trial, _and_ Race_ - are yet to be researched, let alone written. 

The real challenge for me is to make each episode interesting and readable within the limits I had placed on the first: avoid as much as possible the usual SF cliches and tropes (which immediately rules out those million-to-one chance encounters with anything even remotely exciting or dangerous, or the ship or one of the crew suddenly going rogue and killing off the characters one by one, or the lack of reliable redundant or back-up systems in a multi-million dollar vehicle that lives depend on, or artificial gravity simply because it's more comfortable for everybody, etc). Other than wondering if it was possible, I'm not sure why I felt the need to do that; I love those things in every story I've read or watched over the years. 

I didn't step completely out of the comfort zone, however. The small cast of characters do include a walking (and talking) encyclopaedia - who can explain any science that needs to be - and a make-or-fix-anything engineer - who can translate Modern geek into English.


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## Bishop (Jun 2, 2014)

Cran said:


> ...or artificial gravity simply because it's more comfortable for everybody, etc)



Hey, I use that! Though, to be fair, I write space operas.


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## Cran (Jun 2, 2014)

I love space opera/sf adventures - the first novel I read was a space opera, and I was hooked from that moment on.


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## Schrody (Jun 2, 2014)

Cran said:


> Not sure I understand the question; I'm a semi-retired research writer, so the research for me is simply part of what I do, and enjoy. Those two stories/episodes/chapters are done for now; however, the next three - _Timing, Trial, _and_ Race_ - are yet to be researched, let alone written.
> 
> The real challenge for me is to make each episode interesting and readable within the limits I had placed on the first: avoid as much as possible the usual SF cliches and tropes (which immediately rules out those million-to-one chance encounters with anything even remotely exciting or dangerous, or the ship or one of the crew suddenly going rogue and killing off the characters one by one, or the lack of reliable redundant or back-up systems in a multi-million dollar vehicle that lives depend on, or artificial gravity simply because it's more comfortable for everybody, etc). Other than wondering if it was possible, I'm not sure why I felt the need to do that; I love those things in every story I've read or watched over the years.
> 
> I didn't step completely out of the comfort zone, however. The small cast of characters do include a walking (and talking) encyclopaedia - who can explain any science that needs to be - and a make-or-fix-anything engineer - who can translate Modern geek into English.



I meant how are you dealing with science, is it messing up your stories, you get lost in the facts and are obsessed everything needs to be accurate? If something I imagined proves impossible/nonexistent, then I have to remove that idea and replace it with another, and sometimes it means collapse of the story and a new approach. I know it doesn't have to be that way, I just want everything to be plausible as much as it can be. There's no turning back, I think soft SF died when I discovered Hard SF, I now know why it's called hard


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## bazz cargo (Jun 2, 2014)

http://www.dendarii.com/

Modern Space Opera. 

I also like the way Heinlein has used the same or very similar 'universes' to set some of his books. I'd also love to reinvent Adam Selene.

For those who like a bit of mad fun there is Harry Harrison, his  Stainless Steel Rat series and Bill The Galactic Hero are as mad as HHGTTG.


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## Bishop (Jun 2, 2014)

bazz cargo said:


> Harry Harrison...



One of my favorites! I'm in the middle of the Deathworld trilogy.


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## bazz cargo (Jun 2, 2014)

I missed out on Shrody's party. Congrats on the 1000+ post, Epic!!!! A big luau on the 2000?  

HH. Yeah, always admired his easy to read style. Have you tried Pohl Anderson?


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## Bishop (Jun 2, 2014)

bazz cargo said:


> Have you tried Pohl Anderson?



I have not, but he's on my list!


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## Cran (Jun 2, 2014)

Schrody said:


> I meant how are you dealing with science, is it messing up your stories, you get lost in the facts and are obsessed everything needs to be accurate?


Not so far, but then I haven't been looking too far beyond the fringes of modern science, and it has helped that I have a foothold in science to begin with. 



> If something I imagined proves impossible/nonexistent, then I have to remove that idea and replace it with another, and sometimes it means collapse of the story and a new approach. I know it doesn't have to be that way, I just want everything to be plausible as much as it can be. There's no turning back, I think soft SF died when I discovered Hard SF, I now know why it's called hard


It's hard for me to imagine anything that has proved to be impossible in science - improbable, certainly; but not impossible. There are hypotheses favoured by some hairy boffins that cover just about anything that can be imagined; the trick is to track down the research that has been done, and see how the arguments against can be loop-holed.


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## Schrody (Jun 3, 2014)

bazz cargo said:


> I missed out on Shrody's party. Congrats on the 1000+ post, Epic!!!! A big luau on the 2000?



LOL, thanks. Sure, if anyone shows up :sniff:



Cran said:


> Not so far, but then I haven't been looking too far beyond the fringes of modern science, and it has helped that I have a foothold in science to begin with.
> 
> It's hard for me to imagine anything that has proved to be impossible in science - improbable, certainly; but not impossible. There are hypotheses favoured by some hairy boffins that cover just about anything that can be imagined; the trick is to track down the research that has been done, and see how the arguments against can be loop-holed.



Not that much impossible, but not correct, e.g., I wanna write there was an devastating earthquake at the particular day, but then I research and find out there was no such earthquake, or I want to write about some planet but he isn't where I imagined... I'm nit picking, right?


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## Tyler Danann (Jun 3, 2014)

Hard Sci-Fi isn't really my thing, I think the issue with it is that it's very theoretical and doesn't really apply to practicality of other worlds and possibilities. It works to a fashion, but the rules of Hard Sci-Fi are always being questioned and revised also, making what is factual in fact infactual in the next decade or so.


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## bazz cargo (Jun 5, 2014)

> making what is factual in fact infactual in the next decade or so.


Yeah, sometimes Sci fi doesn't age well. Sometimes it gets things right.

Please rescue from obscurity!
Pohl Anderson wrote a short book called The High Crusade, basically an alien invasion during the middle ages. It was made into a film and I have a rare VHS copy. It has been released as a DVD but the sound track has been butchered. What used to be an alien doing a wicked  impression of a very profane Sean Connery is now a load of wibbling noises and a set of child friendly subtitles, it loses all its humour. 

I also recommend The Makeshift Spaceship by the same author.


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## Bishop (Jun 5, 2014)

bazz cargo said:


> Yeah, sometimes Sci fi doesn't age well. Sometimes it gets things right.
> 
> Please rescue from obscurity!
> Pohl Anderson wrote a short book called The High Crusade, basically an alien invasion during the middle ages. It was made into a film and I have a rare VHS copy. It has been released as a DVD but the sound track has been butchered. What used to be an alien doing a wicked  impression of a very profane Sean Connery is now a load of wibbling noises and a set of child friendly subtitles, it loses all its humour.
> ...



No! I love it when sci-fi gets proven wrong! It makes those books/shows/movies all the more special, because now WE KNOW. 

And I'll definitely check those out, it sounds awesome!


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## bazz cargo (Jun 7, 2014)

Memory is a funny old thing. I swear Harry Harrison wrote a spoof of Glory  Road, but no, it was Alan Dean Foster. _Glory Lane,_ Punk rock meets sword and sandals.


On a slightly different tack. I have been slow to adopt the Blu Ray but that is now being made obsolete by data streaming. How long until 'life network?'


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## movieman (Jun 8, 2014)

InstituteMan said:


> I like aliens too. Aliens are intrinsically cool.



The problem I have with SF 'aliens' is that most aren't. Be it TV or novels, the vast majority are just humans with bits of rubber stuck to their heads.

This is one reason my main SF story world doesn't have any, and my secondary SF story world has very few.


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## bazz cargo (Jun 8, 2014)

> Be it TV or novels, the vast majority are just humans with bits of rubber stuck to their heads.


Don't forget robots and computers with personalities. 

TV budgets have had more of an effect on aliens than any other influence. Now how is that for a headline.


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## midnightpoet (Jun 8, 2014)

Not much of a sifi fan, but i do watch with my wife as she's a trekkie; a lot of it is not bad, but a lot really does not make me want to suspend my disbelief.  One of my main objections is time travel.  It makes no sense to me.  That first new trek movie made me want to turn off the tv.  This is probably a bad example, should read some of the better stuff.


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## InstituteMan (Jun 8, 2014)

movieman said:


> The problem I have with SF 'aliens' is that most aren't. Be it TV or novels, the vast majority are just humans with bits of rubber stuck to their heads.
> 
> This is one reason my main SF story world doesn't have any, and my secondary SF story world has very few.



True, but that is precisely what makes many SF aliens so *awesome*. The aliens are almost always a reflection of ourselves and our hopes and fears. This can be highly intentional (say, Star Trek) or apparently unintentional (say, anything in the highly entertaining non-factual show Ancient Aliens), but what makes aliens so fun is that they are some aspect of us without the baggage of all the rest of us.

And they are often delightfully cheesy. That is fun, too.


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## bazz cargo (Jun 8, 2014)

> impossible in science





> often delightfully cheesy.


I see a new story emerging.


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