Arthur C. Clarke Is Dead At 90

Many readers are sending in word that Arthur C. Clarke has died in Sri Lanka. He wrote over 100 books including 2001: A Space Odyssey and Rendezvous With Rama, and popularized the ideas of geosynchronous communications satellites and space elevators.

Mortality

It can only be attributable to human error.

Not Just the Fiction

The biggest addition to society that Clarke, and all other science fiction writers, have added is not in the works of fiction themselves, but the spark of imagination infused in those reading it. Some will take that spark and build their lives around it turning fiction to fact.

The world will miss him.

Re:Not Just the Fiction

A good point. A lot of ideas he conceived/incubated/popularized have done much for humanity. Aside from his watershed prose, his ideas are a testament to human ingenuity and imagination.

God speed, Mr. Clarke.

Now this is someone

Who actually has done a lot to promote science. Ok, so he did a lot of Sci-Fi. But most scientists I know were drawn to it *because* of some of the sci-fi they had seen. A sad passing, not just for the cause of geeks and entertainment, but nerd and science.

Farewell

Off to that big old Monolith in the Sky, I suppose

All These Novels...

...Are Yours. Except for 2001 - attempt no more sequels there.

RIP, ACC.

Don't worry

in a few years, perhaps longer, he will be reborn to lead the xenu empire on its glorious crusade.

sorry, couldn't resist.

This one hurts!

I see a notice of passing of this or that "famous" person every day. But this one hurts...
Bon Voyage, Sir Arthur! Many of us will truly miss you...

Coverage from several news sources

Coverage from several sources

AP/Washington Post [washingtonpost.com]

BBC [bbc.co.uk]

LA Times [latimes.com]

Bloomberg [bloomberg.com]

National Post [nationalpost.com]

90th Birthday Reflections

Here is a video from ACC [youtube.com] made in December 2007 in which he reflects upon his life and how he will be remembered.

His Kipling quote at the end should help bring closure to all his fans.

RIP

I hope wherever he's gone, it's full of stars.

Condolences and fond memories

My deepest condolences to his family, friends, and fans. He was one of the first writers I experienced that changed the way I thought and felt about the world in a drastic way.

I can still remember hollowness in my chest from "Childhood's End," the wonder and fear from the "Odysseys", and the rompy fun from "Rama."

Though we can all take some solace from the immortal parts of him that live on in all of his books and in us, his readers, I for one will surely miss him.

Thank you Sir Clarke and peace on your eternal rest.

Will I dream? Of course you will.

His long lasting legacy is that he taught many computer sciences (and electrical engineers) how to dream.

many of those dreams became a relaity.

And we are still pursuing some of them.

--dmg

If there is anything beyond this life....

...it had better have stars and monoliths. I was a fan of many of his books - Islands in the Sky, 2001, 2010, Rendezvous with Rama. They were brilliant, detailed, imaginative and really achieved what they set out to. Some of his other stuff - Cradle, 2061, Imperial Earth, and the later Rama books - didn't really appeal to me in the same way.

In terms of his factual writings, I have many of his articles that were written for Wireless World, including the letter and two follow-up articles on geostationary satellites. Those three in particular can be found on the web - many people have scanned them in. They're well worth reading. He was a highly skilled writer on technical stuff. Technical writers today should pay attention to them and learn.

Thinking not just of Clarke but all of Discovery..

...I shed a tear - and then I felt...ashamed...why?

Why is it that when one cries at a movie involving war heroes or romance it is socially acceptable, but when I become choked-up not just about the passing of one of our greats - as I have today - but at the whole of scientific discovery I feel somehow, I'm not sure...I guess just ashamed.

This happens to me now and then. Like when I saw a documentary on mitochondrial eve, and I became full of such emotion about the interconnectedness of us all that I had to leave the room lest my wife see me weep (not that she would ridicule me, just because).

Why should I not be proud of my tears? Why, even in this day, surrounded by so much intellect and accepting cultures should I still not disclose this little secret to anyone except the pseudo-anonymous like-minds on this website?...

Why should we not all weep at the stars?

Daisy, Daisy/Give me your answer do

StarChild, are you now speeding amoung the stars
finding your great connexion
with the majesty that lies buried in mens' hearts
watching and waiting to see if those you left behind
will understand your message before it's too late

arthur c clarks should have been done in threes
a backup seer always ready
to disarm warmongering nukes from Mercury or even Imperial Earth
leading us across a bridge to the heavens and a rendezvous with destiny
counting the nine billion names of god as they are one and none

now we carbon based bipeds must confront childhood's end
with a memory in our hearts
of one who changed the world with intelligence, nobility and grace
rest in peace, arthur c clarke, you will be forgotten all too soon
but not for a little while yet

He was really a futurist...

... he even died tomorrow!

The article states he died on wednesday, but it's still tuesday!
(I know, I know... it's due to the time zones...)

What the machine might do

Clarke is part of a select group of people who really thought about what the machine might do, and what is might do to societal norms, and how things might go down differently given the use of the machines. It is not just space opera. It is not just a plot device. It is a deep thought of the long term impact of the industrial revelation. At the time when thes Clarke and other were writing the full effects of the industrial revolution and the possibilities were just becoming fully apparent. We know has machines and the learned techniques to build cylindrical shells big enough to construct a machine that would take a person to the moon. We were beginning to develop machines that would allow us to build a autonomous programing computing machine, that we would someday, we thought, lead to machines that would help us in our daily lives.

They got so much wrong, but the issues they got right. We don't have flying cars, but we are different people due to technology. We do not get our food from cubes, but the fast food is just presented manner meant to imitate the food it replaces. We had pocket calculators long before the cleaning work was autonomously taken over by machine, but the roomba exists. Children are being trained in ware fare using video games. The basis of our interactions are being changed by rapid instantaneous communication. Our basic functions, such as sex, have been changed by the picture phone and internet. No longer must anyone settle for the person next door, when one can surf for an attractive specimen in the morning, text during class, and set up the date for the evening at a bus stop midway between the two of you. In fact, we never have to settle when everything can be custom made to out specifications.

There are two things that disappoint me about many so-called intellectuals. The first is that they don't seem to read enough history. The second is that don't seem to read enough science fiction. To me this strikes me as a person who knows not where they came from, and who knows not where they are going. All they know is what is happening at the moment, their immediate desires, and all they care about is what they must do to fulfill those desires.

Clarke's writing clearly defines him as a different sort of person. The Foundation series clearly identifies him as a man who knew history. His life defines him as a man who knew where he as the rest of us were likely going. I wonder what the world would be like if our leaders were like this. People of history and vision, rather than people who apparently do not even both to hold a book correctly [about.com], and proudly states that they never read, or that they read the cliff notes versions. I am reminded of John F. Kennedy, the person who pushed the nation to space, for better or worse. It is claimed in Thirteen Days that JFK had read the Guns of August, did understand that many conflicts start because leaders assume they know what the other party is thinking, and then constructs inflexible plans based on those assumptions. As he knew history, he could do something different in his attempt to achieve a result. Again, history and vision of the future. Something we are sorely lacking, and something that is all too often ridiculed by those who are justing looking at how to swindle their first million by the time they are 25.

Re:shame.

True

'Islands in the Sky' Blew me away when I first read it as a child, I still consider it to be one of the most prophetic of all SF books. I recently spent rather a lot of money of a 1952 paperback edition of same.

Re:shame.

his earlier works were total classics. RIP.

It's understandable that, as he got older, his energy to write faded, but it's a real shame that he let other people put his name on shoddy products that he essentially had nothing to do with. They say that the apalling sequels to Rendevous with Rama [amazon.com] (an excellent work and a science-fiction classic) were basically entirely Gentry Lee's doing in spite of the prominent appearance of both names on the covers. When the sequels are so bad they can only tarnish the perception of the original (see Star Wars).

This news is sad, but I hope that younger generations today will go back to the early works, ignoring all of the later publication, and see just how visionary a writer Clarke was.

He's not dead you earthing fools

He's just been absorbed by the monolith.

Re:Loved this quote by him.

i prefer his third law 'Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.'

the sci fi show stargate seems to be based on it. loved that they referred to him in show when mentioning how to create a sun.

it's a great loss but he's left behind so many books and fired the imagination of so many people that i can only ask the question are there writers writing today who will have such an impact?

Huh.

My understanding was that he wrote sections of the book alongside the movie, making the script/book a joint effort, although the book was actually finished and polished later. Well, the only two people who know for certain are now working on a prequel (not available on Earth), from the Monolith's perspective.

Re:From TFA

the destination was changed to Jupiter for the sake of a shorter running time.

Actually, the reason Jupiter was used in the movie was because special effects at the time were too crude too give a realistic image of the rings around Saturn.

Re:Link for the uninformed.

Indeed. I remember an interview of his where he discussed his ideas around satellites. The amusing thing to him was in fact how wrong he had been. He had imagined them as (relatively) enourmous, crewed space stations. A limitation of the technology at the time he was envisaging them, where you only had unreliable vacuum tubes (or whatever they would have been) which needed constant replacing, and hence a human crew. Also a salutory lesson out there for all the people who like to predict what the future holds technology wise. It is just impossible to know what is going to come along out of the blue and knock your world view on its head.