# Sci-Fi Heads, please **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [July 21, 2000, 7:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330 "2000-07-21T07:55:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Homer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/df788c/32.png) [@Homer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Homer)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 7:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/1 "2000-07-21T07:55:23Z")
This is a plea to all sci fi readers out there. I love reading stories wherein people discover that Earth is not our ‘home’, that we’re some alien castoffs, or a great, long dead race with a forgotten past. Stories where mankind has lived and traveled the stars, and somehow we’ve forgotten it, by force or disaster. Stories where mankind still roams the stars, unknown to us ‘earthlings’ who’ve forgotten our heritage. Stories like that. They’re incredible if done right, and mindblowing of done great. Please, suggest short and long fiction like this. I’ve already read… uh. Yeah. Forgot it’s name. Carry on. –Tim ---
**Author:** ![SPOOFE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c5a1d2/32.png) [@SPOOFE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SPOOFE)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 9:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/2 "2000-07-21T09:03:44Z")
I believe you’re thinking of “Star Wars” 😃 Y’know, “a long time ago” when humans traveled the stars in a galaxy “far, far away”? ---
**Author:** ![Bear\_Nenno](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bear_nenno/32/3358_2.png) [@Bear\_Nenno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bear_Nenno)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 9:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/3 "2000-07-21T09:23:08Z")
Those weren’t humans SPOOF… they just resembled us. Well, some of them did anyway. Homer, if I read more (read: at all) I would be glad to help you. Too bad I cannot. I agree with you about the idea of humans coming from somewhere else. As long as it is done well, and not like that crappy Mission to Mars movie. There are many theories about humans originating on some other planet. What with Incas and ancient Egyptians and the pyramids and past _advanced_ civilizations… Atlantis… it is plausable. I love to think about it sometimes. There is probably an awesome book on the subject, but until someone makes a badass movie about it, I will just have to see it in my own imagination. . . ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 12:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/4 "2000-07-21T12:03:18Z")
Longtime SF reader here. You might try these: H Beam Pipers paratime stories. They’re set in a universe witha multitude of “earths” that people moved to after destroying their home planet. Some of the earths remember their origin and some don’t. Larry Niven - Protector. Reveals out origins on the other side of the galaxy. Humans are really a larval stage and now our cousins want to get us back on track. Try those at first. It’s a good start. ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/5 "2000-07-21T12:43:31Z")
Kurt Vonnegut’s SIRENS OF TITAN ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/6 "2000-07-21T13:18:53Z")
You might want to look up Zenna Henderson’s “The People” series. In that not EVERYONE comes from the stars, but some people do. There were two volumes of this published by the mid-70s, and I think they’ve since been collercted in one volume, possibly by NEFSA. These stories were also the basis for a not-too-satisfying TV movie that starred William Shatner back in the 70s. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/7 "2000-07-21T13:43:20Z")
James P. Hogan’s “Inherit the Stars” ---
**Author:** ![barton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@barton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/barton)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/8 "2000-07-21T13:49:00Z")
F.M. Busby’s “The Demu Trilogy” is a classic example. May be too pulp for some people’s tastes, however - though I think the first part of it, “To Cage A Man”, deserves membership in the sci-fi canon. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/9 "2000-07-21T14:14:13Z")
Barton: Agree strongly with putting “Cage a Man” in the Canon. Aside from the short story “The Learning of Eeshta”, though, the rest of his Demu stuff falls FAR short of that first piece. Does the Demu stuff belong here, though? IIRC there was nothing about humans being a “lost race”. Oh, God. I just realized that “Battlestar Galactica” fits in this category. Forget I ever said that. ---
**Author:** ![Apollyon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/apollyon/32/4238_2.png) [@Apollyon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apollyon)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/10 "2000-07-21T14:16:02Z")
Orson Scott Card… umm… 5 (?) book series, _Memory of Earth_. Didn’t think too much of the last one but the first couple are well worth reading. In a similar, but odd, vein, _The Genesis Quest_, Donald Moffitt. Nice guy aliens re-create humans on a distant world from instructions in a message beamed into space… ---
**Author:** ![Balance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Balance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balance)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/11 "2000-07-21T14:24:43Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Mjollnir \* > James P. Hogan’s “Inherit the Stars” “Inherit the Stars” is complete within itself, but to get the full effect, you need to read the sequels: “Gentle Giants of Ganymede” and “The Giants’ Star”. I believe all three are available in an omnibus edition. ---
**Author:** ![Fiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e274bd/32.png) [@Fiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiver)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/12 "2000-07-21T15:50:03Z")
First, a disclaimer: while many of these stories are terrific, there are inherent logical problems with suggesting humans aren’t originally from Earth. The strong morphological similarities of fossil hominid species to _homo sapiens_ and our obvious genetic kinship to chimpanzees and other primates make the proposition dubious from the get-go. The better stories along these lines will attempt to address these problems. That said, you may want to pick up David Brin’s “Uplift” books. They’re set hundreds of years in our future, when Earth has become part of an intergalactic community of hundreds of intelligent species. It’s never stated explicitly that humans aren’t from Earth; in fact the premis is probably consistent with us being a terrestrial species. But it’s widely assumed by most of the aliens that humans could never have become sentient beings on our own, and that some alien species came to Earth in the distant past and tinkered with our genes and “uplift” is into intelligence. Naturally, none of the **humans** in the book believe this. It makes for an amusing story element whenever there’s human/alien interaction. ---
**Author:** ![Narile](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/71c47a/32.png) [@Narile](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Narile)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/13 "2000-07-21T15:50:47Z")
David Webers Dahak series (Mutineers’ Moon, Heirs of Empire…) Mankind is decended from a group of mutineers who revolted and fled from their ship, which happens to be rather…large. Good space opera. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/14 "2000-07-21T17:21:11Z")
Larry Niven played with the concept with “Protector”; which is also a subplot in “The Ringword Engineers.” Ursula K. LeGuin’s “Hainish” novels (of which “The Left Hand of Darkness” is one) use the concept, though often in the background. One of the better short fiction versions was “Men Without Bones” by Gerald Kersh. Hard to find, but worth the effort. ---
**Author:** ![Phobos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Phobos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Phobos)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/15 "2000-07-21T19:35:42Z")
doesn’t quite fit the bill, but Asimov’s Foundation trilogy depicts humans across the galaxy with a forgotten past ---
**Author:** ![Kamino\_Neko](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kamino_neko/32/34_2.png) [@Kamino\_Neko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kamino_Neko)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/16 "2000-07-21T22:07:17Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Phobos \* > \*\*doesn’t quite fit the bill, but Asimov’s Foundation trilogy depicts humans across the galaxy with a forgotten past \*\* Sidenote - there’s 7 Foundation books (I was only able to get through 1-6…7 (Forward the Foundation, IIRC) didn’t interest me.). Then there’s the Empire novels, which form a prelude to Foundation. By the 5th book of Foundation, they’d gotten tied in with his Robot books as well. ---
**Author:** ![Homer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/df788c/32.png) [@Homer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Homer)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2000, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/17 "2000-07-21T23:59:21Z")
Since I’m downstairs now (right by the bookcase), and it’s no longer 3 am, I can provide a list of stuff I’ve already read so you’ll have a jumping off point. I’ve own and have read: Pyramids, by Pratchett (funny, obviously) The Mote in God’s Eye by Niven and Pournelle (good) Hugo Winners V. I, II, and III, edited by Asimov Robots of Dawn, by Asimov Mindbridge by Haldeman The Elric Saga p. I and II, by Moorcock (really good, but fantasy) The Complete Robot, by Asimov Rama II, by Clarke and Lee Starchild Trilogy by Pohl and Williamson Sentinel by Clarke 2001, 2010, 2061, and 3001 by Clarke (favorite series so far) Missing Man by MacLean (blah) The Martian Chronicals by Bradbury Galactic Empires v. I and II, edited by Aldiss (includes Lord of A Thousand Sons, by Anderson, Big Ancestor, by Wallace, and Star Plunderer, by Anderson) Across the Sea of Suns by Beneford The Ophiuchi Hotline by Varley Eon by Bear Orn by Anthony Year’s Best Sci-Fi, sixth collection, edited by Dozois (not exactly Sci-Fi, I was kind of puzzled by this) The Complete Book of Swords by Saberhagen (EXCELLENT!) The Lost Swords, The First Triad by Saberhagen (also excellent. I wish I had the second and third triads) and every single Conan book written. I have but have not read: Dune, by Herbert Dune Messiah, Herbert God Emperor of Dune, Herbert Children of Dune, Herbert Dune Encyclopedia, by McNelly Dragonriders of Pern, by McCaffrey DragonsDawn, by McCaffrey The Harper Hall of Pern, by McCaffrey Moreta: DragonLady of Pern by McCaffrey Earthclan, by Brin Three Hainish Novels by Le Guin Four Lords of the Diamond by Chalker The Ozark Trilogy by Elgin I tried to read Dune, but ugh. I just couldn’t push my way through it. Loved the game, though. 😉 –Tim ---
**Author:** ![Homer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/df788c/32.png) [@Homer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Homer)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2000, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/18 "2000-07-22T06:20:20Z")
Okay, I’ve started reading Earthclan. I’m on page 133. It has a really great premise, but it’s like “Get on with the damn story, already!” sometimes. I’ll probably read the Hainish book later. –Tim ---
**Author:** ![SPOOFE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c5a1d2/32.png) [@SPOOFE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SPOOFE)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2000, 10:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/19 "2000-07-22T10:14:34Z")
I’m surprised nobody’s brought this up yet… _Dianetics_ by L. Ron Hubbard. ---
**Author:** ![MysterEcks](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f475e1/32.png) [@MysterEcks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MysterEcks)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2000, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330/20 "2000-07-22T19:32:39Z")
As I recall, in Larry Niven’s _Known Space_stories, and the _Man-Kzin Wars_stories by other writers derived from them, a war in the very distant past had wiped out all sentient beings in the galaxy. Humans evolved from food yeast invented by one of the extinct races. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-heads-please/26330.md?page=2)