Can you give me some examples of the state of humanity in the far future in fiction?
What’re some fictional reasons various authors have given for the birth of the universe?
I’m not sure what you’re asking, but The Dune series takes place at least 10,000 years in the future(probably a lot more, since the date for the first book is given as 10,000 years after a certain event, but we don’t know when that event is to take place in our future).
Olaf Stapleton’s Last and First Men is a history of Mankind from 1930 until millions and millions of years into the future, where the Human race goes through about 17 different changes and nearly is wiped out a number of times.
I don’t want to give away the ending, but Stephen Baxter’s Evolution spans 500 million years of human evolution, from the time of the dinosaurs to some 450+ million years in the future from now. Certainly an interesting read.
Zev Steinhardt
Yes, Last and First Men is certainly one of the most ambitious SF ideas ever, and Stapledon makes it work! You have to admire a book that tosses off everything from apes to now in the first chapter.
You might also look at Poul Andersen’s Tau Zero, in which a ramscoop spacecraft has a little accident and can only keep accelerating, or Michael Moorcock’s Dancers at the End of Time trilogy, which really is set at the end of time.
Define “far future.” 500 years? A million?
In Jack Chalker’s Well of Souls series, the majority of the universe as we know it is a mathematical construct created as a sort of mental exercise by some immensely powerful beings.
In Tolkien’s The Silmarillion, the universe as depicted was the LARP version of an immensely complex, long and beautiful song created by the gods (they all sat around and grooved on this one song for a long time, then, when they were done, the main god hit the Start button and the live-action version started playing).
Asimov’s Foundation books are around the year 11,000 if IIRC.
If you’re going to talk about Olaf Stapledon, Star Maker has a much more ambitious timescale than Last and First Men …
ISTR that Arthur Clarke’s The City and the Stars is set at least a couple of hundred million years into the future. And Stephen Baxter is always good for some cosmic immensities, too.
FTR, based on the timeline in the Dune Encyclopedia, the events in first book take place a little over 20,000 years into the future.
1000+ years, I suppose.
What’s the deal with Dune? Isn’t it some sort of feudal society (this is going from my distant recollection of reading one of the books).
Yes. It is modeled on a feudal society. There was an emperor and a court and the planets, usually one and sometimes more, were essentially fiefdoms of various families.
To answer both of your questions, read Asimov’s “The Last Question”. 
Yes, you should read “The Last Question.”
Your second question is addressed interestingly in Hogan’s “Thrice Upon a Time.” It’s a novel about a scientific team that discovers that certain nuclear processes create particles that travel back in time, and develops a method to send messages back to themselves at earlier points in the story. Hence the title, as each time they tell themselves the future the story has to reset to play out a new future based on that knowledge. At one point, someone calculates what would happen in ‘The Big Crunch’ at the end of the universe. It turns out all matter and energy would be turned into these time-reversed particles and would go back to the Big Bang, where they would convert back to matter and energy. Thus the universe’s end is the cause of its beginning, and the cycle is completely closed.
Nope. *Dune *starts in the year 10,191 of the Empire, which was founded after the battle of Corrin, which will occur (IIRC) 25,000 years from now.
The Mote in God’s Eye by Niven and Pournelle takes place a bit over 1000 years from now. It’s a pretty interesting setting and a good book, as is the sequel. FTL travel is only possible along certain “tram lines” between stars, which sometimes end within the star, making travel difficult at best. Ship shields work by storing energy and dissipating it later, but they can be burned through or overloaded, in which case the ship explodes violently. Other that those two things, the science is pretty hard.
Now that I think of it, I may be off by about 10,00 years.
More like 10,000 years–
:smack:
–so *Dune *takes place more than 25,000 years from now.
I should probably go to bed now.
One of my favorite books. Diaspar would be an amazing city to see. It is set at least a billion years in the future as the city itself is over a billion years old.
Umm, the exact answer is 24,387 years. Or a little over 20,000 years.
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If you’re going to talk about Olaf Stapledon, Star Maker has a much more ambitious timescale than Last and First Men …
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I’ve heard that, but I’ve only read the Last and First men. I have Star Maker here, but I’ve got to finish another project before I start that.
I really liked Last and First Men, even if it had a few problems.
According to Vernor Vinge’s calculations, the Singularity will hit in around 2030, which means the far future begins in about 25 years. Be sure and bring a towel and an interstellar toothbrush!