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"Science fiction operates a little bit like science itself, in principle. You've got thousands of people exploring ideas, putting forth their own hypotheses. Most of them are dead wrong; a few stand the test of time; everything looks kind of quaint in hind"
- Peter Watts
 |
| Rogue Planet | ||
| A planet without a sun, it wanders through galactic space. |
| "...Blue giant suns aren't supposed to have planets. But this one does."
"That is recorded, like most news," said the machine, unimpressed. "Your tentative explanation of the phenomenon was later verified. While the star was condensing, a nucleus still surrounded by an extensive nebular envelope, a swarm of rogue planets chanced by. Losing energy to friction with the nebula, they were captured. "Sunless planets are common. They are estimated to number a thousand or more times the stars. That is, nonluminous bodies, ranging in size from superjovian to asteroidal, are believed to occupy interstellar space in an amount greater by three orders of magnitude than the nuclear-reacting self-luminous bodies called stars. Nevertheless, astronomical distances are such that the probability of an object like this passing near a star is vanishingly small. Indeed, explorers have not come upon many rogues even in mid-space. An actual capture must be so rare that the case you found may well be unique in the galaxy. |
| From Satan's World,
by Poul Anderson. Published by Doubleday in 1967 Additional resources -
|
See also rogue world from George R.R. Martin's 1977 novel Dying of the Light as well as the wandering worlds from When Worlds Collide (1934) by Edwin Balmer (w/P. Wylie).
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- A Rogue Planet - Right In Our Neighborhood
| WINE Spacecraft To Extract Water From Asteroids |
| Japanese Swordsmiths Take On Asteroids |
| Saturn's Rings To Vanish, Let's Mine Them While We Can |
| Negative Matter Fluid Theorized In New Paper |
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Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
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'... a tiny, rocket-powered projectile, drove towards the mysterious bulk.'
