Dena De Clute
Author
Mars in Science-Fiction
If you’re like me, whenever you read or watch sci-fi, you tend to have a healthy cynicism for off-world settings. Sure, artistic license is allowed. Otherwise, it would be a documentary. And I love being taken to incredible new places through the author’s brilliant imagination. But the intuitive leap I’m expected to take from modern science to their fictional setting can’t be an impassable chasm.
Ultimately, the setting in good science-fiction writing must be believable.
Writing an Off-World Setting
As an author, I know this takes weeks – if not months – of research on climate, geography, vegetation, animals, atmosphere, cosmic radiation, precipitation, and more. Not only that, I have to strike the right balance between painting a vivid picture versus drowning the reader in details. Not only is it boring, but I’ve got my word count to think of. Reducing pages of text to a few paragraphs is brutal but necessary to keep the plot flowing.
So let me do you sci-fi authors a solid and pass on what I recently learned about Mars.
My daughter is a fourth-grader with ADHD. This means two things: 1) She had to do a science fair project this year; and 2) Her attention span is about twenty minutes. That would be sufficient if she were interested in researching how to make slime, or how to make a battery from a lemon. But ever since she was a toddler, my daughter has been interested in outer space. And she’s an honor-roll student in GT.
So, what was her science fair topic? How to make a 3-D printed ice house on Mars. Sigh…
Which meant I spent far more time than was strictly necessary reading articles by NASA, SpaceX, and SEArch (Space Exploration Architecture) and printing them out for her. I wanted her to spend her twenty minutes every day learning rather than getting sucked down the internet rabbit hole of research. So now I’m officially as smart as a fourth-grader. And I’m passing some of that knowledge to you.
What’s the Problem with Living on Mars?
1. The biggest problem with living on Mars is cosmic radiation. The atmosphere on Mars is very thin, so it gets up to 20 rads per year. (People on Earth are exposed to an average of less than 1 rad per year.) Being exposed to Martian radiation for a sustained amount of time can cause cancer, acute radiation sickness, or death.
2. That’s the bad news. The good news is, ice is an effective barrier to cosmic radiation. Water is a hydrogen-rich material that’s excellent at shielding galactic cosmic rays.
(Here’s NASA’s article that explains these two points more fully.)
3. And Yes – Mars does have water! Settlers can harvest water from underground aquifers and lava tubes stemming from Martian volcanoes. They can also get water from hydrated minerals with water chemically bonded to them.
4. Mars is cold enough to sustain ice. The average temperature on Mars is -81 degrees Fahrenheit, and it can get as cold as -220 degrees. Mars currently has a slab of ice that’s as big as Texas and California combined.
This means that living on Mars is not always going to be science-fiction! And with NASA and SpaceX already working toward putting humans on Mars, we might need those ice houses sooner than you think.
We Can Live on Mars
Now, get to work and write an amazing story that takes place on Mars! You’re welcome.
3 Points Define a Plane
Time is Another Dimension
If you’ve ever experienced déjà-vu, you might’ve questioned whether our consciousness is really tethered to one space and time. The Matrix explains premonitions as glitches in our computer code (love it!). Some cultures believe it’s a spiritual by-product of reincarnation.
Others think déjà-vu is the memory of an experience we had in a future dimension. I know people who can even recall what’ll happen next (to a small degree). Native Americans called this spiritwalking, where our consciousness leaves our body and returns with the knowledge of its travels. Not necessarily to another time, just to another place.
If this is true, then where do our spirits go?
More Than One Universe?
Despite the fact that I took Physics 101 three times (in my defense, it was only offered at 8 am, and it was my first semester of college), I’ve become intrigued by the multiverse theory favored by theoretical physicists. There are actually nine recognized types of multiverse, three perfect sets of three (you might notice, I have a thing for the number 3).
This being so, our consciousness could – theoretically – travel to a parallel universe. One that’s very similar to ours, yet further along the timeline. Whatever we experienced there would be a memory once we returned to our own spacetime. The possibilities this opens up for sci-fi writers are endless!
My kids just read SAL AND GABI BREAK THE UNIVERSE, a middle grade novel by Carlos Hernandez, where Sal visits one of infinite parallel worlds to heal Gabi’s baby brother. In Spider Man: Into the Spider-Verse, webslingers from many dimensions – including a woman, finally! – meet on Earth due to a disruption in the spacetime continuum. And in DARK MATTER by Blake Crouch, the protagonist must confront multiple versions of himself from parallel worlds to get back to his wife and son.
The Crossroads in Space
What I imagined for The Wrath of Nike is an interpretation of several scientifically-accepted ideas, without more than a passing glance at the laws of string theory. Not only do I not understand it enough to avoid getting lynched by the scientific community, it’s just the setting for my plot. My main character, Grace, is targeted by a dark spirit who drags her to parallel worlds to re-experience the moment of her death.
Hence the connection to déjà-vu. You’re welcome!
If I were less concerned about spoilers, I’d go into more detail about the relationship between DNA molecules, membrane theory, and maps…
Until then, I guess you’ll just have to read my next book.