Detcon 1 is the name of this year's North American Science Fiction Convention. Detcon will blossom in my old home town, Detroit, Michigan, from Thursday, 17 July, through Sunday the 20th. I've agreed to participate in a bunch of programming.

Physics, Mechanics, & Logistics of Flying Cars

Fri 10:00 AM -- Mackinac East
What would it be like if we DID have flying cars? What are the physical, technical, logistical, legal, and cultural factors we would need to consider? Are flying cars like cars or are they like planes? What will really make cars fly?

Bill Higgins (moderator), Mel. White, Erik Kauppi, Emmy Jackson

The Science of Hal Clement's Iceworld

Fri 12:00 PM -- Mackinac East
In Hal Clement's 1951 novel Iceworld, characters who breathe hot gaseous sulfur confront the mysteries of Earth, to them an unbelievably frigid planet. Among other things, the legendary master of hard SF foresaw robotic interplanetary exploration in a unique way. And now that astronomers know about thousands of extrasolar planets, does the homeworld of the sulfur-breathers lurk among them? Join Bill Higgins in exploring the chemistry, physics, and astronomy behind the classic story.

Bill Higgins

Where's my D@m! Flying Car?

Sat 12:00 PM -- Ambassador Salon 1
Science fiction vs. science reality: where did the future go wrong? We may have flying cars, but they're not the anti-grav vehicles that we really want! Humans have been experiencing long-term space flight for years now, but there are no colonies yet in orbit or on the moon. And where's my hoverboard?

Jonathan Stars (moderator), Douglas Johnson, Ian Randal Strock, Cindy A. Matthews (Cynthianna), Bill Higgins, Dr. Charles Dezelah, Dr. Nicolle Zellner

Annals of Michifandom

Sat 1:00 PM -- Nicolet B
From the Slan Shack and the propeller beanie to Detcon1, Michigan fans have contributed mightily to fannish history and lore. Join us for some rollicking multimedia time travel through fandom Michigan-style.

Dick Smith (moderator), Cy Chauvin, Tammy Coxen, Gregg T. Trend, Chad Childers, Rich Lynch, Leah A. Zeldes, Tullio Proni, Amy Ranger, Denice Brown, Pat Sims, Roger Sims, Todd R. Johnson, Fred Prophet, Bill Higgins, Tracy Lunquist

[I don't think Dick Smith has ever lived in Michigan, but he married into Michifandom, and he is greatly concerned with preserving fannish history. So he's a good MC for a two-hour review of the Wolverine State's many-faceted involvement with fandom. Should be fun.]

The Personal Replicator

Sun 11:00 AM -- Ambassador Salon 1
With the introduction of 3-D printers, we're well on our way to Star Trek's replicator. Before long, we'll have access to the alchemist's dream: the ability to manipulate molecules. What are the implications for the world economy? Do we face the possibility of wiping out poverty? What about intellectual property? We will have to answer these questions, and many more, much sooner than you think.

Jonathan Stars (moderator), Joshua Kronengold, Mel. White, Mike Substelny, Bill Higgins

William H.Patterson, Jr. passed away last week. I will miss him. Nobody alive knew more about Robert Heinlein. He was a kind man.

I valued Bill's friendship-- though we didn't know one another well-- and was grateful for the warm encouragement he gave to my own research. In addition, he was always generous in sharing his hard-earned knowledge.

Before I met him, he'd already co-authored The Martian Named Smith: Critical Perspectives on Robert A. Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land with Andrew Thornton. In 2010, Bill published Volume 1 of his much-anticipated biography of Heinlein, Learning Curve.

Here's more about Bill.

Here's an obituary at Tor.com.

If you'd like to see Bill in action, here's video and audio of a talk about Heinlein he gave at the Cato Institute in 2010.



Adding to the sadness is the realization that Bill died just before his new book was to be published. Robert A. Heinlein, Vol 2: In Dialogue with His Century Volume 2: The Man Who Learned Better, known to some as ISBN 978-0765319616, can be ordered from Amazon, to be published on 3 June. I want to read it.

Bill Patterson labored long and hard to make good books.

I would like to borrow a baritone ukulele for a brief performance late Saturday night at Boskone. (My travel plans to Boston make it impractical to bring my own uke.)

If you know anyone who might be willing to loan me a baritone uke, please spread the word.

I could manage with another kind of uke, but I am best at playing a baritone.

If no uke at all is available, I'll cope.

Please contact me through higgins at fnal dot gov, or find me at-con (here's my schedule), or reach me through Boskone's programming people.

Edited to add: A kind family has come through with a uke. All is well. (Except for the part where a giant snowstorm headed for Boston threatens to delay my flight Thursday afternoon.)

I wrote a comment on wcg's blog I thought might be worth sharing here.

He was talking about software called Astrogator, whose manufacturer made the following claim:

In 1953, Robert A. Heinlein published a book named Starman Jones. Aside from being one of Heinlein's better juvenile novels, it coined the word astrogator, meaning a person who navigates a spaceship.

This did not ring true for me; I had the impression it was a pretty standard word in Golden Age stories. A bit of googling and n-gram plotting turns up the 1938 story "The Degenerates" by John Russell Fearn:

We took off right on time two days later, and it was certainly a joy to be the chief astrogator of the Stardust.

Willy Ley mentions "astrogator" in the first version of Rockets, 1944, connecting it to the astronomer R. S. Richardson. Now Richardson wrote lots of science articles for Astounding Science Fiction in those days, so I wouldn't be surprised if we found him using the word now and then.

I can push "astrogation" even further back. David Lasser, an editor working for Hugo Gernsback on Science Wonder Stories and other SF magazines, joined with other writers and enthusiasts to found the American Interplanetary Society, from which the AIAA is descended. And in 1931 he published one of the first American nonfiction books about the new science of spaceflight, Conquest of Space.

Just as two-dimensional navigation on the earth's surface gave way to avigation* when men attempted to travel through the air, so in interplanetary travel we must develop an exact science of three-dimensional astrogation through the heavens.

Okay, having demonstrated that I can find multiple citations predating Starman Jones, now I will peek at the answer in the back of the book: the OED SF jargon site.** Yup, their earliest citations for both "astrogation" and "astrogator" point to Lasser's book. Guess I missed the latter; Google Books failed to detect its presence.

Heinlein's Starman Jones does have the virtue of being about an astrogator, and its control-room scenes are most memorable. But "astrogator" was a venerable word, by SF standards, by the time this novel appeared.




* No, Mr. Lasser, actually it didn't; most aviators wound up still calling it "navigation." So did most astronauts.

** Basis for the book Brave New Words: The Oxford Dictionary of Science Fiction, edited by Jeff Prucher.

Duckon 22 has been kind enough to invite me to be Science Guest of Honor next weekend, 28 through 30 June, in Wheeling, Illinois.

Here's the current draft of the Duckon program.

My events (in addition to Opening Ceremonies and Closing Ceremonies):

8 PM Friday: Classic SF/Fantasy/Horror

What makes War of the Worlds memorable? Our panelists will share their lists of famous and not so known pieces of literature they would definitely keep on their shelves and pass down to the future generations. Even though these “treasures” were written more than forty years ago or older, they are still enjoyable today and beyond.

10 AM Saturday: Curiosity’s Journey Continues: NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory Rover

The Mars rover Curiosity brought a sophisticated toolbox of instruments to study the surface of the Red Planet—including one that can fire a laser pulse to vaporize a rock, then capture its spectrum.
Join Bill Higgins to review what Curiosity has taught us during 11 months of exploring a region in Gale Crater where water once flowed.

(Curiosity keeps exploring; I keep talking about her.)

10 AM Sunday: Vandals of the Void: Damaging Meteors from Chelyabinsk to Chicago

A window-shattering shock wave injured 1400 Russians, and startled the world, a few months ago. Meteoric violence is rare, but it can be devastating—and meteors have assaulted Chicagoland at least twice. Bill Higgins reviews the Chelyabinsk blast, reveals our local impacts, and examines whether we can fight back against our asteroidal foes.

(This is a new talk I cooked up out of fascination with the Chelyabinsk incident.)

11 AM Sunday: Beauty of Science

Many times science and art often intertwine. There is a natural beauty everywhere from geological formations in Mammoth Cave, to streaming light emissions of the Northern Lights. Some art has to be discovered and science will be the tool to reveal them. Join our panelists as they share some examples of how they see beauty in scientific discoveries.

Times may well change; this schedule is not final, so check with Duckon once the con begins for the latest schedule.

Needless to say, I'm very much looking forward to the weekend!

Today is the 50th anniversary of the launch of the first woman to orbit the earth, Valentina Tereshkova, aboard Vostok 6.

I wrote an answer to James Nicoll, who in his blog inquired:

"Does there exist a non-monster-driven SF movie suitable for viewing on the anniversary of Valentina Tereshkova's flight?"

I think the choice is clear: Космический Рейс (Cosmic Voyage), directed by Vasili Zhuravlev in 1936.

A technically-competent woman, an elderly male genius, and a space-obsessed boy stowaway, all loyal to the Party, undertake the first flight to the Moon as part of a massive Soviet spaceflight program-- and have non-monster-driven adventures.

The film's technical advisor? Different elderly male genius. Fine special effects. Plausible space suits. Portrays lunar exploration as part of a massive government-sponsored effort with many launches, including unwomanned* precursors to the first piloted landing attempt.

Silent, because not many theaters in the Soviet Union were equipped to show talkies in 1936.

In their most dire danger, the cosmonauts' salvation is brought about by something that will be particularly appreciated by James. Those who do not care about SPOILERS may advance the slider to 1:02:58 for a hint.

Can there be a more appropriate choice?

Useful program notes. Thorough fan site (in French). DVD Savant review by Glenn Erickson. Good review by Scott Ashlin.

Edited (30 May 2014) to add: Someone has been kind enough to make English translations of the title cards. Because in space, no one can hear you speak Russian.


* For you, Valentina. Happy fiftieth!

Want to see a movie with us?

My wife K was fortunate enough, in the month of her birthday, to receive a number of free passes from the Hollywood Blvd (that's how they spell it, "Blvd") restaurant-theater over in Woodridge, Illinois, on 75th Street just east of Interstate 355. We're allowed to bring up to six friends.

We're planning to see Star Trek: Into Darkness, in two glorious dimensions,* arriving on Thursday, 23 May at 6:30 for a showing that starts fifteen minutes later.

The "free" passes are not exactly free. They're free admissions to see a film-- but each theatergoer is required to order at least one drink or food item. Here's the menu.

We are also required to have everyone assembled at the time we purchase the tickets-- so we will not wait long for latecomers.

If you are:

1. Available for a 6:30 Thursday rendezvous at the theater, and
2. Willing to purchase food or drink,

please contact me at higgins a t fnal d o t gov. If we haven't run out of passes yet, we'll count you in. And together we'll head (I can't resist saying this) literally Into Darkness to see the movie.

The address:
Hollywood Blvd
1001 W. 75th St.
Woodridge, IL
Link to Google Map
Hollywood Blvd's site

* The same number of dimensions in which the original Star Trek: Nothing After The Colon was broadcast.

I'll be at Capricon 33 in Wheeling, Illinois this weekend, having attended thirty-two Capricons previously.

Science Reporting Sucks Rocks
Friday, 02-08-2013
11:30 am to 1:00 pm
Botanic Garden A

Correlation is not causation! Every day, the news butchers articles about health, climate change, and technological advancements. Science literacy continues to suffer in the US. Why does this happen? How can we prevent it?

Dr. Lisa Freitag
Bill Higgins (Moderator)
W. A. (Bill) Thomasson
Dr. Michael Unger

Nerdvana: Big Bang Theory's Impact on the Perception of Fandom
Friday, 02-08-2013
1:00 pm to 2:30 pm
Birch A

Love it or leave it, everyone seems to be watching the Big Bang Theory. The shows fan community reaches beyond whom we would expect to be interested. Are they laughing at us or with us?

Jerry Gilio (Moderator)
Liz Gilio
Bill Higgins
Mary Anne Mohanraj

Curiosity on Mars Slideshow
Friday, 02-08-2013
4:00 pm to 5:30 pm
River AB
Curiosity is on Mars and there's more out there than Marvin the Martian. Come feed your curiosity with the latest from Curiosity.

Bill Higgins

Higgins and Silver Talk
[This really could have used a better title...]
Friday, 02-08-2013
7:00 pm to 8:30 pm
Bill Higgins and Steven Silver discovered a joint affection for Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, a collection explaining the background of common sayings. In this wide-ranging discussion, the two use randomly selected entries to guide their conversation.

Bill Higgins
Steven H Silver

AI Vision: Early AI vs. Current Technology
Saturday, 02-09-2013
1:00 pm to 2:30 pm
Botanic Garden A
Humankind has been dreaming of thinking machines for centuries. History, philosophy, mechanics, computing, and human imagination feed this dream. What has been and what will be?

Peter de Jong
James Dobbs (Moderator)
Bill Higgins

Riverworlds: The Latest on Mars and Titan
Saturday, 02-09-2013
4:00 pm to 5:30 pm
Botanic Garden A

Dried river beds on Mars? A mini Nile on Titan? Interesting. We want to learn more.

Bill Higgins
Jeffrey Liss
Jim Plaxco (Moderator)

The program schedule for Immortal Confusion, next weekend's SF convention in Dearborn, Michigan, is available.

Thrill to Confusion's stellar lineup of guests! See James Nicoll and Charlie Stross in the same hotel!

Here's a list of events I have been asked to participate in, all on Saturday, 19 January. Which turns out to be kind of a busy day.

Science Advice For Show Business
2:00p Saturday
Huron Room
What does that science advisor for your favorite show do, and how do we popularize science and include better science in every form of mass media?
Bill Higgins (Moderator), Jennifer Ouellette, Karl Schroeder

Will The Real Fan GoH...
5:00p Saturday
Fairlane Room
Fan Guest of Honour Introduction/Induction is a traditional ConFusion event wherein all the previous ConFusion Fan GoHs who are in attendance welcome the new Fan GoH to the club.
James Davis Nicoll, Jeff Beeler (Moderator), Leah Zeldes Smith

[I suppose if they've invited a Canadian again, he gets to be "Fan Guest of Honour." I was merely "Fan Guest of Honor." In other news, it will be nice to see Leah attend a Confusion again.]

Mars: Before One Small Step for Man
7:00p Saturday
Allen Park Room
Discuss past and current Mars missions with members of the Curiosity, Pathfinder, and Opportunity mission teams, and talk about potential future manned missions with our visionary panelists.
Bill Higgins, Geoff Landis (Moderator), Karl Schroeder, Nilton Renno

[Dr. Renno is a collaborator on Curiosity's REMS "weather station," Dr. Landis participated in the Mars Pathfinder and Mars Exploration Rover missions, and Karl Schroeder is a very sharp hard-SF writer.]

Physics Of The Buffyverse
8:00p Saturday
Huron Room
How does the Hellmouth complement String Theory? Our Science GoH Jennifer Ouellette wrote a book trying to answer that question and many more. Come for a live discussion and bring your most vexing questions.
Bill Higgins, Connie Trembley, Jennifer Ouellette (Moderator)

Here's a puzzle for the Doctor Who scholars.

I had a kind of indirect exposure to The Doctor very, very early in the history of the show. Allow me to explain.

My dad was born in a small town in Scotland. He moved to Rochester, New York when he was about 11. By the Sixties, he was living in Detroit.

Kindly relatives in the Auld Country, when they were finished reading the Sunday tabloids, would bundle them up and mail them across the Atlantic to my grandfather in Rochester. He enjoyed reading about football and other news of Scotland.

When he was finished, Grandpa would bundle up the tabloids and mail them to my father in Detroit.

When my father was finished, I got to read them. I cared nothing for football, then or now, but I loved comic strips.

Thus I became a fan of the comics in the Sunday Post. I understand Oor Wullie still sits on his bucket every Sunday, and The Broons are still going out to the But 'n Ben. Puzzling out the Scots dialect was a challenge for my grade-school reading skills, but Li'l Abner and Pogo had prepared me to succeed.

The Sunday Mail also carried comics; I believe I first encountered Andy Capp there.

There's a memory that's bugging me. I recall that the Mail ran a comic strip, for only a few weeks, that featured a dumpy-looking scientist with unruly black hair, and strange-looking robots. I was intrigued. Eventually I came to understand that this strip was a parody of a TV show called Doctor Who, to which the papers occasionally referred, and that the robots were Daleks. I can't recall whether they were called Daleks in the strip.

Unlike, say, Supercar --to which I was addicted around this time-- Doctor Who was not one of the shows seen in the U.K. that was available on our screens in the U.S. I probably didn't see the real thing until the mid-1970s.

Wikipedia tells me that the Daleks were introduced in December of 1963, and that they became quite popular.

So: What was the parody comic strip I read in the Sunday Mail? Who drew it? When did it appear?

Surely every detail of Doctor Who, and the ephemera surrounding it, has been documented somewhere on the Web. Someone must know the answers to these questions.