# Time-Dilation in Science Fiction stories? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [January 24, 2010, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236 "2010-01-24T16:06:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/21 "2010-01-25T02:12:44Z")
It is not the sort of story you are talking about, but _Common Time_ by James Blish is an amazing time dilation story. ---
**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:** [January 25, 2010, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/22 "2010-01-25T02:18:00Z")
The thing is, I don’t think he knew that he was violating relativity. The whole book reads like a textbook on relativity, except it’s an incorrect textbook. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/23 "2010-01-25T02:37:56Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > The thing is, I don’t think he knew that he was violating relativity. The whole book reads like a textbook on relativity, except it’s an incorrect textbook. You may be right - it’s been a while since I read it (maybe I should read it again). The suggestion in MC that somebody ought to just try cranking up the engine hard to see if just maybe you could go FTL showed he definitely didn’t understand relativity in the 1940s, but I thought that by the time he wrote TftS he might have learned more about it. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/24 "2010-01-25T03:06:19Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > The song "['39"](http://www.google.com/url?q=http://popup.lala.com/popup/432627060773628316&ei=QXJcS8vwIo20tgfMspyhAg&sa=X&oi=music_play_track&resnum=1&ct=result&cd=2&ved=0CAoQ0wQoADAA&usg=AFQjCNGPM4w1vg1HIMbR68YyObx4kH76zA) by Queen is all about time dilation and pretty much covers exactly what you’re talking about. Came in here to mention this song. '39 was written by Brian May, Queen’s guitarist. He had studied astrophysics in college, and had begun to work on his PhD in astrophysics when Queen became a successful band (causing him to leave his studies). He returned to scholarship a few years ago, and was awarded his PhD in 2008. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/25 "2010-01-25T03:41:32Z")
In the _Giants of Ganymede_, the crew of the starship _Shaperion_ experience twenty years ship time in a voyage that lasts for millions of years by Earth time, because their broken engine can’t slow down properly ( they were fleeing a supernova, and couldn’t finish fixing it ). ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/26 "2010-01-25T04:03:16Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > _Tau Zero_, by Poul Anderson. They watch universes rise and fall. I was gonna post that. [Wiki](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tau_Zero) on _Tau Zero_ – the very title comes from the formula for calculating time contraction. I remember vividly two characters talking over some point for a minute or two. Several times they felt a slight quiver as they passed through a galaxy and were tugged this way and that, their 100,000 year passage being reduced to the blink of an eye, subjective time. ---
**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:** [January 25, 2010, 5:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/27 "2010-01-25T05:24:48Z")
> [@](#): > > '39 was written by Brian May, Queen’s guitarist. He had studied astrophysics in college, and had begun to work on his PhD in astrophysics when Queen became a successful band (causing him to leave his studies). He returned to scholarship a few years ago, and was awarded his PhD in 2008. Yet more proof, as if any were needed, that Queen is awesome. ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/28 "2010-01-25T05:41:15Z")
Ursula LeGuin explored this theme a number of times in her Hainish Universe novels, most notably in _Rocannon’s World_. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/29 "2010-01-25T05:48:11Z")
Playing in Amazon found some. [Tyrannosaur Faire, by Steve Carper](http://www.amazon.com/Tyrannosaur-Faire-Steve-Carper/dp/0979856507/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1264397564&sr=8-2) > [@](#): > > On the other hand, I’m absolutely thrilled to say that “Forever, With Diamond” struck me as perhaps the finest, most exciting and most innovative short sci-fi story that I’ve ever been privileged to read. (And that’s mighty high praise indeed since I’m including the very gods of sci-fi writing such as Isaac Asimov, Arthur C Clarke, RA Heinlein) The amount of science that Steve Carper managed to stuff into this story and still keep it sensible is almost breathtaking - relativistic space travel on an asteroid, teleportation, quantum nanotechnology, virtual reality, time dilation, molecular genetics and the deceleration of the aging process, polymer based artificial organ replacements and more. And, if you can believe it, all of this was placed into the context of an obsessive love story. Now, that’s some piece of brilliant writing! [The Time Travelers Academy by Reginald Williams](http://www.amazon.com/Time-Travelers-Academy-Reginald-Williams/dp/1847289266/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1264397692&sr=1-1) > [@](#): > > Dark, Complex, and Fun, this novel takes you on a journey that not only creates time travel but explains how it is possible. It is fiction, fantasy and physics all rolled into one. I loved it. [The Time Tourist by Tom Pierce](http://www.amazon.com/Time-Tourist-Tom-Pierce/dp/1435718909/ref=sr_1_20?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1264397840&sr=1-20) [Starman’s Quest and Other Works by Robert Silverberg](http://www.amazon.com/Starmans-Silverberg-Halcyon-Classics-ebook/dp/B0032Z74KE/ref=sr_1_15?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1264397840&sr=1-15) [Dilation effect, by Douglas R Mason](http://www.amazon.com/Dilation-effect-Douglas-R-Mason/dp/B0006WH10E/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1264398245&sr=1-4) The last three come up in a search but don’t have explanatory text that puts them directly in the time dilation genre. But what else would Dilation Effect mean? ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 7:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/30 "2010-01-25T07:53:07Z")
L. Sprague de Camp’s [Viagens Interplanetarias](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viagens_Interplanetarias) stories all involved sub-light interstellar travel with the corresponding time dilation effects. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 8:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/31 "2010-01-25T08:16:23Z")
> [@TurboNuke](#): > > In the Hyperion trilogy by Dan Simmons, one of the people who made the Shrike pilgrimage was involved in a story that involved time dilation. More specifically, it’s about a young man who, due to time dilation effects, ends up visiting a backwater planet every 7 years (I think). He has an affair with a teenage girl, and each time he comes back she’s seven years older, while he’s basically the same age. It’s very poignant. The Hyperion/Endymion series (4 books, not 3) features quite a lot of time dilation, along with plenty of other time-related _mishugas_. Note, however, that the time-dilation is a side effect of FASTER-than-light travel, so the story doesn’t exactly stick to relativistic physics in this regard. ---
**Author:** ![Damfino](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Damfino](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damfino)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 1:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/32 "2010-01-25T13:02:40Z")
I’d like to mention _The Songs of Distant Earth_ by Arthur C. Clarke. It concerns a world seeded by STL spaceship several hundred years before the time of the story, which has developed a small but thriving population. Then it is visited by one of the last colony ships to leave Earth, a sleeper ship with hyperdrive, manned by a crew generations junior to them. During their stay there, romances and friendships develop, with the knowledge that when the starship crew leave and by the time they arrive at their ultimate destination, all those that they knew on this planet would have been dead for centuries. ---
**Author:** ![K364](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k364/32/5_2.png) [@K364](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/K364)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/33 "2010-01-25T14:32:50Z")
What did Heinlein get wrong in “Time For The Stars”? ---
**Author:** ![Walker\_in\_Eternity](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/46a35a/32.png) [@Walker\_in\_Eternity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walker_in_Eternity)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/34 "2010-01-25T14:50:11Z")
Any of Alastair Reynolds’ “Revelation Space” novels cover relativistic travel very well, plus he used to work for ESA. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/35 "2010-01-25T15:42:00Z")
I coulda SWORN that I posted in this thread earlier. Anyway, F. M. Busby wrote several novels which had time dilation as an essential part of the plot. ---
**Author:** ![Silverstreak\_Wonder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Silverstreak\_Wonder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silverstreak_Wonder)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2010, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/36 "2010-01-25T15:53:26Z")
I wonder if anyone has thought of a situation where the time traveler returns to earth just BEFORE he left, and the repercussions of that kind of time dilation? ---
**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:** [January 25, 2010, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/37 "2010-01-25T16:04:20Z")
I think it was Ursula K. LeGuin (as **Aspidistra** has already noted) who use such time dilation to “explain” prophecies in one of her works – because of the time dilation, a certain person would be coming in 200 years or something. It was a cute way to give a scientific explanation of such a common trope – something leGuin would be very tuned in to. Poul Anderson also used the combination of time dilation and telepathy (as in Heinlein’s _Time for the Stars_) to chilling effect in his short story **Kyrie**. ---
**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:** [January 25, 2010, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/38 "2010-01-25T16:14:28Z")
> [@K364](#): > > What did Heinlein get wrong in “Time For The Stars”? Other than telepathy being instantaneous, nothing that I know of. It and _The Forever War_ are two of my favorite time-dilation stories. Fans of the latter should definitely read the title story of Haldeman’s _A Separate War and Other Stories_ (2006); it’s Marygay’s first-person account of her time apart from Mandella towards the end of the war. ---
**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:** [January 25, 2010, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/39 "2010-01-25T16:24:40Z")
> [@](#): > > Other than telepathy being instantaneous, nothing that I know of. That wasn’t “wrong” – Heinlein was claiming that telepathy was some new, unknown science – one of the Conceptual Breakthroughs that are scattered through his work, and not, for instance, an electro-magnetic phenomenon limited by the speed of light. The whole point of using telepaths rather than radio or light signals was that they weren’t limited by **c** – it was a conscious choice my Heinlein, not an error. The same holds true for Anderson’s **Kyrie** – the story doesn’t work if the telepathy is limited by the constraints of relativity. ---
**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:** [January 25, 2010, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236/40 "2010-01-25T16:25:52Z")
In the original **Superman** comic, [Terra-Man](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra-Man) was a villain who used alien technology but designed it so that they looked like they came from the Old West. It was revealed that he had been taken by aliens as a child and when he grew up and returned to Earth, over a century had passed due to time dilation. Of course, **[Mr. Tomkins in Wonderland](http://boomeria.org/physicslectures/secondsemester/relativity/tompkins.html)** gets time dilation 100% right, most notably in the scene where a young man meets an old woman who calls him “grandfather.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/time-dilation-in-science-fiction-stories/526236.md?page=3)