# Sci Fi with solar-system counterfactuals

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-with-solar-system-counterfactuals/674871>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [November 27, 2013, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-with-solar-system-counterfactuals/674871 "2013-11-27T01:29:19Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 3

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**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:** [November 29, 2013, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-with-solar-system-counterfactuals/674871/41 "2013-11-29T03:22:45Z")

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> [@panache45](#):
>
> The \*Twilight Zone \*episode, “The Lonely,” takes place on an asteroid that’s something like 9 million miles from Earth. Only 9 million miles? Shouldn’t we have discovered it by now? And oh yeah, the asteroid apparently has the same gravity as Earth and a totally breathable atmosphere.

See post #12. This wasn’t the only TZ episode that suggested that you could have an earth gravity, earth atmosphere, and earth temperature asteroid. I know why they did it – it allowed for an interesting episode based on human interactions, and without having to worry about special effects. But, even when I was a kid, I knew this was absurd, and it always bothered me.

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**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\
**Post date:** [November 29, 2013, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-with-solar-system-counterfactuals/674871/42 "2013-11-29T03:35:23Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> Quoth **Lumpy** :
> 
> Interestingly enough, in the first book of the trilogy the native inhabitants of Mars add the -andra suffix to the outer planets’ names, perhaps in the misapprehension that they are “andra”- lands, or solid planets. But the more well informed Oyéresu know better.

OK, my turn to nitpick: “handra”, not “andra”. It’s aspirated in the uncompounded form. And incidentally I found the sequence where Ransom is learning the language to be fascinating-- Watching an astute mind at work always is.

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**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\
**Post date:** [November 29, 2013, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sci-fi-with-solar-system-counterfactuals/674871/43 "2013-11-29T21:45:35Z")

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Asimov’s very funny “Victory Unintentional” assumes an alien-inhabited Jupiter, and Bradbury’s “The Long Rain” and “All Summer in a Day” give us a Venus with breathable atmosphere, but uncomfortably warm and with torrential rains. And of course Bradbury’s _The Martian Chronicles,_ as noted above, describes Mars as being human-habitable.

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