What do you think?
Rate this book
آواتار: نگاهی علمی به فیلم علمی تخیلی اواتار
فیلم سینمایی اواتار ساخته جیمز کامرون نقطه اوجی در تاریخ فیلمهای علمی تخیلی بهشمار میرود. دقت علمی ارائهشده در این فیلم و ریشهداشتن موضوعات و ایدهها در واقعیت علمی باعث شده است تا به بستری مناسب برای ترویج علم بدل شود. بههمین دلیل استفن بکستر، یکی از برجستهترین نویسندههای علمیـتخیلی معاصر که فعالیتهای علمی و مهندسی را در سابقه خود دارد بهسراغ این فیلم رفته و به بهانه آن به کاوش در دنیای علم اطراف آن پرداخته است. چقدر از آنچه در فیلم میبینید ریشه در واقعیت دارد؟ چه مقدار از آن تاکنون تحقق یافته است؟ وضعیت ما در مواجهه با موضوعاتی مانند محیطزیست، سفرهای فضایی، مواجهه با بیگانهها و ساختار و ریختشناسی آنها چیست؟ و آگاهی ما از مغز چگونه در حال تغییر است.
- GenresScience FictionReference
368 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2010
37 people are currently reading
284 people want to read
About the author
Stephen Baxter
403 books2,605 followersStephen Baxter is a trained engineer with degrees from Cambridge (mathematics) and Southampton Universities (doctorate in aeroengineering research). Baxter is the winner of the British Science Fiction Award and the Locus Award, as well as being a nominee for an Arthur C. Clarke Award, most recently for Manifold: Time. His novel Voyage won the Sidewise Award for Best Alternate History Novel of the Year; he also won the John W. Campbell Award and the Philip K. Dick Award for his novel The Time Ships. He is currently working on his next novel, a collaboration with Sir Arthur C. Clarke. Mr. Baxter lives in Prestwood, England.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
November 29, 2022
Der bekannte Physiker und SF-Autor Stephen Baxter folgt in diesem Sachbuch den Überlegungen von James Cameron und seinem Team zur wissenschaftlichen Grundlage für seinen Filem AVATAR. Es ist erstaunlich, was Baxter alles aus dem Film lesen kann. Angefangen von der Erde in der Klimakrise, wie er es aus Jake Sullys Erzählung extrahiert hat, bis zur Geologie des Mondes Pandora. Er erklärt, wie die VENTURE STAR vom Solystem in das Alpha Centauri System zum Mond Pandora gekommen ist (durch einen Antimaterie-Antrieb), er erklärt die gesamte Technologie (auch wenn man noch nicht weiß, wie man eine solche Menge Antimaterie herstellen kann, aber unmöglich ist das nicht, nur unwahrscheinlich). Für jeden magischen Moment im Film hat er eine wissenschaftliche Erklärung, wie das Element Unobatanium, ein Hochtemperatur-Supraleiter, das auf Pandora reichlich vorkommt. Wenn man sich die Eigenschaften eines solchen Hochtemperatur-Supraleiters vorstellt, dann kann man verstehen, dass die RDA keine Kosten und Mühe scheut, an das Material heranzukommen. Damit kann man erklären, dass ganze Berge in der Luft schweben, wie gesagt; nicht unmöglich aber unwahrscheinlich.
Ein tolles Buch, das die (damals) neuesten wissenschaftlichen Erkenntnisse (Stand: 2012) anhand des Films illustriert, Baxter macht das auch für Laien nachvollziehbar...
Ein tolles Buch, das die (damals) neuesten wissenschaftlichen Erkenntnisse (Stand: 2012) anhand des Films illustriert, Baxter macht das auch für Laien nachvollziehbar...
October 26, 2022
i’m gonna get the bad stuff out of the way first for this one. as usual, the fact that it will take me longer to talk about the bad than the good does not mean there was more bad than good. however, my frustrations with this book are… pronounced. none of them are exactly surprising, and they reflect a lot of my frustrations with the franchise as a whole.
an uncritical acceptance of the malthusian myth of “overpopulation” is reflected in several iterations of this franchise whenever earth is mentioned, but seeing it parroted by someone writing about science from a real-world perspective makes me facepalm even harder.
the careless depletion of our planet’s resources, mass murder of our animal cohabitants, and widespread destruction of its natural beauties (including those essential to the maintenance of life as we know it!!) addressed both by the avatar franchise as a whole and this book in particular are very real. but they have a known cause and it isn’t “overpopulation,” it’s capitalism.
baxter talks about carrying capacity, ignoring completely the fact that the agriculture industry in the united states alone could feed the entire world and have enough left over to feed nearly half of them again. instead, over 10% of that country alone experiences food insecurity, and any food (whether in the form of raw materials or finished product) that cannot be easily profited off of is discarded in unthinkable quantities. we don’t have a math problem, we have a political problem.
one of the more insidious manifestations (and i’m not blaming baxter himself for this, it’s a trap basically every liberal falls into with this kind of thing) is the use of “we” language when discussing the kind of wide-scale environmental destruction. “we’re” destroying the forests, “we’re” destroying the oceans. no, we are not. capitalism is. the vast majority of the world’s most politically powerful nations are organized according to the principle that profit is more important than people or the planet. that is not an “us” problem. this is victim blaming on a massive scale.
this also ties in to my other biggest frustration with the book: it’s far, far too willing to give the benefit of the doubt to the same exact kinds of organizations that the film rightly villainizes. i get the impression that the author thinks rda is an “evil corporation,” which–while strictly true–doesn’t distinguish them from any other corporation. the book takes it for granted that the further exploration of space will be driven by capitalist profit-seeking, and expresses hope that the real corporations driving this hypothetical future exploration will be more responsible than rda.
which, you know. they won’t. they’ll be exactly as responsible as they’re forced to be, and even that will only be when they think they realistically might get caught doing otherwise.
that would be bad enough but the same benefit of the doubt is extended to private military forces like the ones employed by rda, and once again the author expresses hope that the ones used by companies for hypothetical future space exploration/ exploitation won’t be cartoonishly evil, because apparently he hasn’t read a single article about civilian contractors in the real world? i would hope even a liberal would know better than to write something as nervous laughter-inducing as, “don’t call them ‘mercenaries,’ however. nowadays they are known by terms like ‘private military contractors’ (pmcs).”
phew. now, while i might have difficulty convincing you of this at this point, i actually liked this book quite a bit!! i think the central thrust of the book is largely summed up by its final paragraph: “avatar was wonderful, and reality is pretty wonderful too. and, to me, the more we understand it, the more wonderful it becomes.” that is exactly the spirit that the majority of the book is written in. it loosely follows the structure of the movie and uses it as a sort of framing narrative for 101-level discussions of the various real-world scientific discoveries and questions that are depicted in the film. this requires bringing basically every major scientific discipline to bear in one form or another.
the book is intended for general audiences, so the science in it isn’t too dense or hard to follow. i really did enjoy the vast majority of it, which isn’t all that surprising because i’ve always loved learning about science when it’s approachable. i know y’all might think i’ve always been a wimpy liberal arts and social sciences nerd, but i actually took more than 4 years’ worth of science classes in high school.
as far as i can tell the science in here is for the most part pretty great and well-researched. i mean, okay, even there i have to nitpick the tiniest bits. at one point platelets are bizarrely referred to as a type of white blood cell. they aren’t white blood cells! they aren’t cells at all! but that’s the only blatant factual error i noticed, and it’s a pretty minor one. i also rolled my eyes a little at there being several pages devoted to “the fermi paradox,” as i happen to agree with the view that the fermi paradox is a) not actually a valid paradox, and b) not, strictly speaking, science, but this is hardly an uncontroversial position so i can’t hold it against baxter for not sharing it, and he clearly knows way more about science than i do.
what’s really exciting to me, though, and i imagine is exciting to baxter himself, is that the intervening years have rendered some of this information outdated! given the film’s plot there is, of course, a section devoted to the exciting discoveries of exoplanets (planets outside of our solar system) that was just starting to explode when this book was published. and the discussion of the science in this section (as far as it had gotten in 2011 anyway) is fantastic! but what’s really exciting is that we’ve come much further since then. in 2011 the exoplanets we had discovered numbered in the hundreds, today it’s in the thousands. and the book specifically mentions that despite them being the closest stars to our own sun, no exoplanets had yet been detected around any of the stars of the trinary alpha centauri system, today there are three confirmed exoplanets around proxima centauri (the closest of the three to our sun), and a candidate exoplanet around both of the other two, more sun-like stars of the system.
as previously alluded to, i really did enjoy how baxter used a rough outline of the film’s plot to discuss a variety of scientific concepts that would hopefully excite fans of the film, especially since he could refer to aspects of the film like some sort of massively overpriced visual aid. major topics like space travel, astronomy (especially the search for exoplanets), the origins of life and evolution, what alien life might look like, the potential perils of first contact, cloning and genetic research, and the human brain and the nature of consciousness are all covered with a multidisciplinary approach to give the reader an introduction to all of them. helpfully, there’s a chapter-by-chapter suggested reading list if readers found themselves particularly hooked by any of these specific questions.
all my frustrations aside, this is a damn impressive bit of nonfiction writing, and exactly the sort of book i would’ve gobbled up as a high schooler.
***
check out part 1 of my megareview of the avatar franchise on my blog 24,000 miles to the moon! https://24000milestothemoon.blogspot....
an uncritical acceptance of the malthusian myth of “overpopulation” is reflected in several iterations of this franchise whenever earth is mentioned, but seeing it parroted by someone writing about science from a real-world perspective makes me facepalm even harder.
the careless depletion of our planet’s resources, mass murder of our animal cohabitants, and widespread destruction of its natural beauties (including those essential to the maintenance of life as we know it!!) addressed both by the avatar franchise as a whole and this book in particular are very real. but they have a known cause and it isn’t “overpopulation,” it’s capitalism.
baxter talks about carrying capacity, ignoring completely the fact that the agriculture industry in the united states alone could feed the entire world and have enough left over to feed nearly half of them again. instead, over 10% of that country alone experiences food insecurity, and any food (whether in the form of raw materials or finished product) that cannot be easily profited off of is discarded in unthinkable quantities. we don’t have a math problem, we have a political problem.
one of the more insidious manifestations (and i’m not blaming baxter himself for this, it’s a trap basically every liberal falls into with this kind of thing) is the use of “we” language when discussing the kind of wide-scale environmental destruction. “we’re” destroying the forests, “we’re” destroying the oceans. no, we are not. capitalism is. the vast majority of the world’s most politically powerful nations are organized according to the principle that profit is more important than people or the planet. that is not an “us” problem. this is victim blaming on a massive scale.
this also ties in to my other biggest frustration with the book: it’s far, far too willing to give the benefit of the doubt to the same exact kinds of organizations that the film rightly villainizes. i get the impression that the author thinks rda is an “evil corporation,” which–while strictly true–doesn’t distinguish them from any other corporation. the book takes it for granted that the further exploration of space will be driven by capitalist profit-seeking, and expresses hope that the real corporations driving this hypothetical future exploration will be more responsible than rda.
which, you know. they won’t. they’ll be exactly as responsible as they’re forced to be, and even that will only be when they think they realistically might get caught doing otherwise.
that would be bad enough but the same benefit of the doubt is extended to private military forces like the ones employed by rda, and once again the author expresses hope that the ones used by companies for hypothetical future space exploration/ exploitation won’t be cartoonishly evil, because apparently he hasn’t read a single article about civilian contractors in the real world? i would hope even a liberal would know better than to write something as nervous laughter-inducing as, “don’t call them ‘mercenaries,’ however. nowadays they are known by terms like ‘private military contractors’ (pmcs).”
phew. now, while i might have difficulty convincing you of this at this point, i actually liked this book quite a bit!! i think the central thrust of the book is largely summed up by its final paragraph: “avatar was wonderful, and reality is pretty wonderful too. and, to me, the more we understand it, the more wonderful it becomes.” that is exactly the spirit that the majority of the book is written in. it loosely follows the structure of the movie and uses it as a sort of framing narrative for 101-level discussions of the various real-world scientific discoveries and questions that are depicted in the film. this requires bringing basically every major scientific discipline to bear in one form or another.
the book is intended for general audiences, so the science in it isn’t too dense or hard to follow. i really did enjoy the vast majority of it, which isn’t all that surprising because i’ve always loved learning about science when it’s approachable. i know y’all might think i’ve always been a wimpy liberal arts and social sciences nerd, but i actually took more than 4 years’ worth of science classes in high school.
as far as i can tell the science in here is for the most part pretty great and well-researched. i mean, okay, even there i have to nitpick the tiniest bits. at one point platelets are bizarrely referred to as a type of white blood cell. they aren’t white blood cells! they aren’t cells at all! but that’s the only blatant factual error i noticed, and it’s a pretty minor one. i also rolled my eyes a little at there being several pages devoted to “the fermi paradox,” as i happen to agree with the view that the fermi paradox is a) not actually a valid paradox, and b) not, strictly speaking, science, but this is hardly an uncontroversial position so i can’t hold it against baxter for not sharing it, and he clearly knows way more about science than i do.
what’s really exciting to me, though, and i imagine is exciting to baxter himself, is that the intervening years have rendered some of this information outdated! given the film’s plot there is, of course, a section devoted to the exciting discoveries of exoplanets (planets outside of our solar system) that was just starting to explode when this book was published. and the discussion of the science in this section (as far as it had gotten in 2011 anyway) is fantastic! but what’s really exciting is that we’ve come much further since then. in 2011 the exoplanets we had discovered numbered in the hundreds, today it’s in the thousands. and the book specifically mentions that despite them being the closest stars to our own sun, no exoplanets had yet been detected around any of the stars of the trinary alpha centauri system, today there are three confirmed exoplanets around proxima centauri (the closest of the three to our sun), and a candidate exoplanet around both of the other two, more sun-like stars of the system.
as previously alluded to, i really did enjoy how baxter used a rough outline of the film’s plot to discuss a variety of scientific concepts that would hopefully excite fans of the film, especially since he could refer to aspects of the film like some sort of massively overpriced visual aid. major topics like space travel, astronomy (especially the search for exoplanets), the origins of life and evolution, what alien life might look like, the potential perils of first contact, cloning and genetic research, and the human brain and the nature of consciousness are all covered with a multidisciplinary approach to give the reader an introduction to all of them. helpfully, there’s a chapter-by-chapter suggested reading list if readers found themselves particularly hooked by any of these specific questions.
all my frustrations aside, this is a damn impressive bit of nonfiction writing, and exactly the sort of book i would’ve gobbled up as a high schooler.
***
check out part 1 of my megareview of the avatar franchise on my blog 24,000 miles to the moon! https://24000milestothemoon.blogspot....
February 25, 2023
‘*‘ Meine Meinung ‘*‘
Häufig frage ich mich bei Filmen, woher die Inspiration für fremde Welten kommt und in diesem Buch werden ein paar Geheimnisse gelüftet.
Es war spannend zu lesen, wie viel Realismus in „Avatar“ steckt. Zum Beispiel wurden die Pflanzen von der Unterwasserwelt angeregt. Und nachdem ich das gelesen hatte, kamen mir sofort Anemonen in den Sinn, die sich zurückziehen, wenn sie sich in Gefahr wähnen. Es existiert sogar eine Online-Enzyklopädie, „Pandorapedia“, in der man noch mehr Details über die Fauna und Flora erfährt.
Als es beispielsweise um Geschwindigkeiten und Gewichte bei unterschiedlichen Schwerkräften ging, war es dann nicht so einfach, den Ausführungen zu folgen. Da habe ich häufig Abschnitte zwei Mal gelesen, um wenigstens die Fakten zu verstehen, ohne den wissenschaftlichen Hintergrund wirklich nachvollziehen zu können. Aber spannend war es auf jeden Fall.
Ich will jetzt gar nicht auf jedes Kapitel und die beleuchtete Punkte eingehen. Das würde den Rahmen sprengen und ich gebe zu, ich kann vieles auch gar nicht mit eigenen Worten wiedergeben. Dafür waren es zu spezifische Themen und wissenschaftliche Betrachtungen.
Aber zwei Dinge sind klar: es ist kein Buch, das man mal eben so vor dem Einschlafen liest (ich habe 2 Monate für 336 Seiten gebraucht) und es ist der Hammer, wie gut recherchiert wurde und wie viel Realismus in den Film eingeflossen ist. Okay, manches wurde ein bisschen aufgepeppt oder zurechtgerückt, aber immer auf Fakten basierend. Man muss sich auf das Buch einlassen wollen und auf herausfordernde Lektüre gefasst sein. Kein Buch für jedermann, aber von mir auf jeden Fall 5 pandoranische Sterne.
‘*‘ Klappentext ‘*‘
James Camerons »AVATAR - Aufbruch nach Pandora« ist der weltweit erfolgreichste Film aller Zeiten. Der Planet Pandora, auf dem die geheimnisvollen Na’vi leben, ist alles andere als eine Fantasiewelt: Vieles von dem, was wir im Kino gesehen haben, hat Vorbilder in der Realität, von der interstellaren Raumfahrt über die Flora und Fauna des Planeten bis hin zu dem neuronalen Netzwerk, das den ganzen Planeten umspannt. Stephen Baxter, Science-Fiction-Autor und Wissenschaftler, zeigt uns in diesem so faszinierenden wie spannenden Buch, dass wir dem Aufbruch nach Pandora näher sind, als wir glauben.
Häufig frage ich mich bei Filmen, woher die Inspiration für fremde Welten kommt und in diesem Buch werden ein paar Geheimnisse gelüftet.
Es war spannend zu lesen, wie viel Realismus in „Avatar“ steckt. Zum Beispiel wurden die Pflanzen von der Unterwasserwelt angeregt. Und nachdem ich das gelesen hatte, kamen mir sofort Anemonen in den Sinn, die sich zurückziehen, wenn sie sich in Gefahr wähnen. Es existiert sogar eine Online-Enzyklopädie, „Pandorapedia“, in der man noch mehr Details über die Fauna und Flora erfährt.
Als es beispielsweise um Geschwindigkeiten und Gewichte bei unterschiedlichen Schwerkräften ging, war es dann nicht so einfach, den Ausführungen zu folgen. Da habe ich häufig Abschnitte zwei Mal gelesen, um wenigstens die Fakten zu verstehen, ohne den wissenschaftlichen Hintergrund wirklich nachvollziehen zu können. Aber spannend war es auf jeden Fall.
Ich will jetzt gar nicht auf jedes Kapitel und die beleuchtete Punkte eingehen. Das würde den Rahmen sprengen und ich gebe zu, ich kann vieles auch gar nicht mit eigenen Worten wiedergeben. Dafür waren es zu spezifische Themen und wissenschaftliche Betrachtungen.
Aber zwei Dinge sind klar: es ist kein Buch, das man mal eben so vor dem Einschlafen liest (ich habe 2 Monate für 336 Seiten gebraucht) und es ist der Hammer, wie gut recherchiert wurde und wie viel Realismus in den Film eingeflossen ist. Okay, manches wurde ein bisschen aufgepeppt oder zurechtgerückt, aber immer auf Fakten basierend. Man muss sich auf das Buch einlassen wollen und auf herausfordernde Lektüre gefasst sein. Kein Buch für jedermann, aber von mir auf jeden Fall 5 pandoranische Sterne.
‘*‘ Klappentext ‘*‘
James Camerons »AVATAR - Aufbruch nach Pandora« ist der weltweit erfolgreichste Film aller Zeiten. Der Planet Pandora, auf dem die geheimnisvollen Na’vi leben, ist alles andere als eine Fantasiewelt: Vieles von dem, was wir im Kino gesehen haben, hat Vorbilder in der Realität, von der interstellaren Raumfahrt über die Flora und Fauna des Planeten bis hin zu dem neuronalen Netzwerk, das den ganzen Planeten umspannt. Stephen Baxter, Science-Fiction-Autor und Wissenschaftler, zeigt uns in diesem so faszinierenden wie spannenden Buch, dass wir dem Aufbruch nach Pandora näher sind, als wir glauben.
June 8, 2016
Science fiction authors the world over will be thanking Baxter for this handy tome on the SF of James Cameron’s Avatar. Not specific simply to the film, Baxter’s book covers everything a modern writer of speculative space adventures might need to tell a convincing tale: quantum entanglement, relativity, eco-apocalypse, time dilation, super conductors, military tech, blue shift, red shift… And all in handy, easy-to-digest chunks. Baxter did it, so you didn’t have to type the words into Wikipedia. This is a dense wallop of edification for your research shelf.
The book does tackle those specific parts of Avatar which are not common to SF in general. Particularly engrossing is the exhaustive exploration of Cameron’s fictionalised Alpha Centauri system, from planetary formation right the way down to the way Pandora’s complicated magnetic fields affect its life and weather. It’s here that Baxter becomes coy. Granted full access to cast and crew, he never outright says “well, this is obviously nonsense”, even about flying mountains, although he does drop hints.
For Avatar fans, there is plenty of detail mined from Cameron’s backstory and universe, much of it unseen on screen. Avatar, flaws aside, is more rather than less rooted in actual science; this book reveals just how deeply.
Less engaging is Baxter’s non-fiction style. He’s a tremendous talent when writing stories, Baxter, and to his credit he conveys complicated concepts clearly here, but he lacks journalistic flair, and that just occasionally makes the book stilted.
The book does tackle those specific parts of Avatar which are not common to SF in general. Particularly engrossing is the exhaustive exploration of Cameron’s fictionalised Alpha Centauri system, from planetary formation right the way down to the way Pandora’s complicated magnetic fields affect its life and weather. It’s here that Baxter becomes coy. Granted full access to cast and crew, he never outright says “well, this is obviously nonsense”, even about flying mountains, although he does drop hints.
For Avatar fans, there is plenty of detail mined from Cameron’s backstory and universe, much of it unseen on screen. Avatar, flaws aside, is more rather than less rooted in actual science; this book reveals just how deeply.
Less engaging is Baxter’s non-fiction style. He’s a tremendous talent when writing stories, Baxter, and to his credit he conveys complicated concepts clearly here, but he lacks journalistic flair, and that just occasionally makes the book stilted.
June 11, 2020
This book granted so much knowledge through nonfiction, reality, mind and body, Mother Nature and astrophysics. I enjoyed reading it. Praise to Stephen Baxter. As an Avatar fan, I recommend this book to anyone who are science fiction finatics, passionate on engineering/biology science and/or those who are both!
July 7, 2023
"Maybe it doesn't have to be the way Jake Sully bleakly summarized it to Eywa. Maybe there is a way for us to keep to Earth green, without giving up our civilisation and all the be efits it brings: by using the resources of space."
This book is a great insight into many things that are similar between Pandora and Earth, more importantly it teaches and gives us new ideas on how to better protect our planet from becoming like the Earth that is mentioned in the Avatar movie and how we could use outside resources from our planet to help our planet survive. It also talks about the possibility of their being other life forms out there and what could happen should we encounter them.
This book is a great insight into many things that are similar between Pandora and Earth, more importantly it teaches and gives us new ideas on how to better protect our planet from becoming like the Earth that is mentioned in the Avatar movie and how we could use outside resources from our planet to help our planet survive. It also talks about the possibility of their being other life forms out there and what could happen should we encounter them.
August 28, 2023
Stephen Baxter adeptly illustrates how the creators of Avatar studied science to insure everything aspects makes sense to the viewer. The science is gentle read and makes this book very enjoyable.
A short bio of james cameron is intersperse in the book. This helps to understand what deeper story is a telling to the movie viewer i.e. colonization is fraught with with dangers just based upon our worlds history. Moreover, in analogy, we need not to rush alien contact (SETi,Project Ozma) since the NA'VI could be us and the RDA could be the aliens.
Good solid read in which author's makes complex technical points in an easy-to-grasp manner.
A short bio of james cameron is intersperse in the book. This helps to understand what deeper story is a telling to the movie viewer i.e. colonization is fraught with with dangers just based upon our worlds history. Moreover, in analogy, we need not to rush alien contact (SETi,Project Ozma) since the NA'VI could be us and the RDA could be the aliens.
Good solid read in which author's makes complex technical points in an easy-to-grasp manner.
April 29, 2023
Foi ótimo ver o trabalho de realismo que ebtrou no filme e como foi baseado em conceitos reais. O autor parecia viajar algumas vezes para fugir de temas espirituais e talvez reduzí-los. Mas foi uma boa leitura.
August 22, 2018
I highlighted like 50 percent of the book. Constant interesting information.
June 15, 2023
Konnte gut folgen, trotz das ich von Wissenschaft nur eine geringe Ahnung habe. Als großer Avatar Fan fand ich das Buch super.
June 10, 2024
“Avatar was wonderful, and reality is pretty wonderful too. And, to me, the more we understand it, the more wonderful it becomes.”
June 24, 2012
This is one of those books that does what it says on the tin, so to speak. In the tradition of the very successful The Science of Discworld, we have here a book that takes a fictional creation and looks at the scientific rationale behind it: in this case, the film Avatar. Written with director James Cameron’s blessing, and correspondingly an appropriately positive quote on the front cover, it examines, as you might expect, the planet of Pandora, the landscape, the flora and the fauna.
But it takes a wider view too. There’s musings on Earth in the mid-22nd century, in decline and with global warming increasingly important, the importance of corporate multinationals such as the Resources Development Administration (RDA) in the future and how to travel interstellar distances, with a discussion of space travel, time and relativity along the journey.
On Pandora itself, the book looks at the science of creating avatars and biological weapons, the evolutionary and sociological mechanics of the Na’vi tribe itself, the ecosystems the planet fosters and the issues of mining. A connection to the imaginary mineral ‘unobtainium’ leads to an analysis of tar sands mining and the effects of extracting such resources. The war between the company and the native tribes leads to an analysis of the weapons used. The last part of the book looks at the transmigration of Jake Sully as he accepts his non-human future and the potential of a green singularity for all life.
Mixing scientific facts with space exploration history, extrapolated to the Avatar universe and using the odd sprinkling of SF fiction to illustrate its points, this is a surprisingly entertaining book.
Though I’m not convinced that the target readership is big enough to make this book a best seller (but what do I know?), for fans of the film who want to look at the background behind the film using real science, this will be an interesting read.
Though there is science here, and that may initially put some readers off, it is written in such an accessible way that the book rarely lectures and mainly entertains. Thirty five short chapters mean that a topic or idea rarely becomes boring. Eight pages of colour images from the production drawings of the film help readers in understanding, or perhaps just reminding, what the spaceships, machinery and characters of the film look like.
Must admit, I wasn’t that sure about the book when I first picked it up. It is a tribute to the writing of scientist and fiction writer Stephen Baxter that the book quickly held my attention. Reminiscent of Arthur C Clarke’s non-fiction books, written to inform and popularise science (Profiles of the Future, for example), this is an appropriately accessible book that allows cinema-lovers to examine the real science that underpins the Avatar story.
But it takes a wider view too. There’s musings on Earth in the mid-22nd century, in decline and with global warming increasingly important, the importance of corporate multinationals such as the Resources Development Administration (RDA) in the future and how to travel interstellar distances, with a discussion of space travel, time and relativity along the journey.
On Pandora itself, the book looks at the science of creating avatars and biological weapons, the evolutionary and sociological mechanics of the Na’vi tribe itself, the ecosystems the planet fosters and the issues of mining. A connection to the imaginary mineral ‘unobtainium’ leads to an analysis of tar sands mining and the effects of extracting such resources. The war between the company and the native tribes leads to an analysis of the weapons used. The last part of the book looks at the transmigration of Jake Sully as he accepts his non-human future and the potential of a green singularity for all life.
Mixing scientific facts with space exploration history, extrapolated to the Avatar universe and using the odd sprinkling of SF fiction to illustrate its points, this is a surprisingly entertaining book.
Though I’m not convinced that the target readership is big enough to make this book a best seller (but what do I know?), for fans of the film who want to look at the background behind the film using real science, this will be an interesting read.
Though there is science here, and that may initially put some readers off, it is written in such an accessible way that the book rarely lectures and mainly entertains. Thirty five short chapters mean that a topic or idea rarely becomes boring. Eight pages of colour images from the production drawings of the film help readers in understanding, or perhaps just reminding, what the spaceships, machinery and characters of the film look like.
Must admit, I wasn’t that sure about the book when I first picked it up. It is a tribute to the writing of scientist and fiction writer Stephen Baxter that the book quickly held my attention. Reminiscent of Arthur C Clarke’s non-fiction books, written to inform and popularise science (Profiles of the Future, for example), this is an appropriately accessible book that allows cinema-lovers to examine the real science that underpins the Avatar story.
June 30, 2012
This a clever bonding between explaining the science behind the movie and how to relates to our world .. right now.
A chapter will start describing a scene from the movie then we start exploring the concepts behind the scene and suddenly we are talking about the war in Afghanistan and the rise of PMC's (*evil chuckle* you will have to read about it!!)
We focus on aircraft used in the movie and how humans wage war on Na'vi using them and how they are not really products of imagination.
Flowers and plants have very real counterparts in the oceans and coral reefs on our world. When chapters describe the lushness of Pandora and then compare it to die-back of coral reefs and destruction of forest environments, we are confronted with the ramifications to our world if it is not stopped.
Did you know there is an entire book devoted to the Flora and Fauna of Pandora, called Pandorapedia.! Look it up
We explore the meaning of life and how some people believe that humans are alone in the universe.. Using fossils to track life's evolutionary progress, we then jump to Pandora and compare what would have to be in their environment for 6 legged invertebrates to evolve.
Na'vi are compared to hunter/gatherers of the Middle Stone age or the Forest dwellers of South America.. but their connection to their environment is more highly evolved than ours - are we are more advanced culture?
It shows that the universe is full of surprises!
But there are questions - like where did the scientists get the genetic material required to produce the Avatars - different propositions are explored.
I enjoyed this departure from true fiction and totally embraced the solid facts that we are going to have start changing the way we live on this planet if we wish any kind of future for our children.
A chapter will start describing a scene from the movie then we start exploring the concepts behind the scene and suddenly we are talking about the war in Afghanistan and the rise of PMC's (*evil chuckle* you will have to read about it!!)
We focus on aircraft used in the movie and how humans wage war on Na'vi using them and how they are not really products of imagination.
Flowers and plants have very real counterparts in the oceans and coral reefs on our world. When chapters describe the lushness of Pandora and then compare it to die-back of coral reefs and destruction of forest environments, we are confronted with the ramifications to our world if it is not stopped.
Did you know there is an entire book devoted to the Flora and Fauna of Pandora, called Pandorapedia.! Look it up
We explore the meaning of life and how some people believe that humans are alone in the universe.. Using fossils to track life's evolutionary progress, we then jump to Pandora and compare what would have to be in their environment for 6 legged invertebrates to evolve.
Na'vi are compared to hunter/gatherers of the Middle Stone age or the Forest dwellers of South America.. but their connection to their environment is more highly evolved than ours - are we are more advanced culture?
It shows that the universe is full of surprises!
But there are questions - like where did the scientists get the genetic material required to produce the Avatars - different propositions are explored.
I enjoyed this departure from true fiction and totally embraced the solid facts that we are going to have start changing the way we live on this planet if we wish any kind of future for our children.
March 25, 2017
criticism often heard of the movie is the 'yes, but...' sense, as in 'yes it is beautiful, but the story is (whatever you choose of simple, cliche, stupid, seen before...)' to which I would argue more the 'yes' sense. as in, 'yes it is beautiful' full stop. this book actually just a random pick at the library, sort of a nonfiction speculative science around the fictional world, the environments, the creatures, the tech, the possibilities, of the movie, moves quickly, basic, coherent, in many ways reflecting the sort of imaginative portrayal I would have really loved as a teen, now less so, but still fun if not amazing...
May 25, 2013
The premise of this book is to look at the world of Avatar and to see if the science in the film is feasible.
IT is split into several sections, and within those sections there are chapters on different aspects, for example space travel, the habitable zone from a star, the possibility of alien life forms and the whole environment that the film creates.
The science is not very deep, Baxter writes with some authority, but this is only an overview of known technology and speculation of what might be one day. The general conclusion is that almost all is plausible, but not for a while yet.
IT is split into several sections, and within those sections there are chapters on different aspects, for example space travel, the habitable zone from a star, the possibility of alien life forms and the whole environment that the film creates.
The science is not very deep, Baxter writes with some authority, but this is only an overview of known technology and speculation of what might be one day. The general conclusion is that almost all is plausible, but not for a while yet.
July 20, 2012
Not just a good reflection on the movie, but very thorough, in-depth info and references to the many layers that James Cameron put into this masterpiece.
January 30, 2013
Enjoyed it even though it was a bit political in parts =)
January 17, 2016
Should've never read this. Just reminded me of how much I loved the movie and am impatiently waiting for the long overdue sequels. Good companion piece to with the blu-ray movie.
April 20, 2017
Interesting on a first glance but for some reason this book fell flat for me. The content in the first couple of chapters was quite dry and tedious to plow through - maybe because I already have a rudimentary understanding of the physics behind space and planet exploration? I felt like it wasn't so much the science of avatar, but more of science and oh, this is the Avatar story element I use to springboard my whole chapter off. The author's way of ending every single chapter with a short snappy statement or rhetorical question also got old very quickly.
It did get more interesting towards the last few chapters, where Baxter touches upon mind transfer and genetic engineering - however, the analysis he gave felt a little shallow, and quite a few of the resolutions he gave to certain topics like six-legged organisms or how Pandora was designed in general was "creative license", though I guess that's a fair point.
Overall, it was a great attempt to cover a whole range of topics, but this book just didn't really do it for me.
It did get more interesting towards the last few chapters, where Baxter touches upon mind transfer and genetic engineering - however, the analysis he gave felt a little shallow, and quite a few of the resolutions he gave to certain topics like six-legged organisms or how Pandora was designed in general was "creative license", though I guess that's a fair point.
Overall, it was a great attempt to cover a whole range of topics, but this book just didn't really do it for me.
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews