 Stanislaw Lem (1966) |
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Genre: Science-Fiction, Futurology/Cybernetic |
| Period: 1946-2005 |
| Nationality: Polish (born in Lemberg) |
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Stanisław Lem (12 September 1921 – 27 March 2006) was a writer of science fiction , futurology and cybernetics . His books have been translated into 41 languages and have sold over 27 million copies. He is known as the author of the 1961 novel Solaris, which has been made into a feature film three times (1968, 1972, 2002). Almost 40 years ago, it was said that Lem was "the most widely read science fiction writer in the world" (Theodor Sturgeon , 1976)
His works explore philosophical themes;
- speculation on technology,
- the nature of intelligence
- the impossibility of mutual communication and understanding
- despair about human limitations
- and humanity's place in the universe.
Some of his stories are presented as fiction, but others are in the form of essays or philosophical books. Translations of his works are difficult due to passages with elaborate neologisms, alien or robotic poetry, and puns.
Multiple translated versions of his works exist.
His foresight in terms of technological developments (and their accompanying pitfalls) are a feat of his logical and scientific approach.
Examples of his futurological Predictions[]
His predictions were bar any unreasonable enthusiasm, leading not to the unrealistic and unfeasible visions so commonly described in Science-Fiction. Rather, they are clearcut extensions of logical thought to the limit of what can be prognosed with a certain degree of probability.
Nature and Face of War (Fiasco, 1987)[]
Chapter 5 - Beta Harpyiae
"War is not an absolutely closed set of conflicts with destruction as the resultant."
Chapter 11 - Show of Strength
The ... System as ... War Zone
"The starting situation ... was when multifront war, waged on the surface of the planet, became tantamount to total annihilation."
"... the reason that the adversaries have already achieved—in the realm of 'biological weaponry, too—the power to wipe out the entire biosphere, just as previously 'that could be accomplished by an exchange of nuclear blows. Consequently, no one now 'will be the first to use either type of arms."
"As for the cryptomilitary macro-alternative—i.e., bringing down pseudonatural elemental 'disasters upon the enemy through climate or seismic tampering—such things may have 'taken place, but could provide no strategic solution, because anyone who is himself able to 'act cryptomilitarily will recognize similar actions taken against him by the enemy."
"In the distant past, local wars had become global 'wars, and they in turn were followed by a race to invent improved weapons on land, sea, 'and in the air. The atom bomb put an end to the great conventional wars. From then on, the 'cold-war race had three components: instruments of destruction, instruments providing 'linkage between them, and instruments directed against the first two."
"Each of these stages had its limit or barrier. Every time the antagonists came to a barrier, a 'temporary balance of forces would ensue. Then one of the sides would attempt to break the 'barrier."
"... a situation in which each side was 'able to locate and destroy the enemy's devices, those serving to deal the first blow and also 'those for retaliating after an attack. Toward the end of this phase, ballistic missiles of 'global range placed deep in the planet's crust, and mobile launchers on land or launchers 'hidden underwater (whether on submarine units or set on the ocean floor), all became 'vulnerable to destruction."
"... the war 'sphere would impose on the antagonists methods of combat unprecedented in their history."
"A did unto B as A would rather not have been done 'unto, ...—and was paid in the same coin."
"First there was the uncrossable threshold of the head-on collision of forces on the planet: 'the power of the payloads, ballistic accuracy, and the potential consequence of both—a 'fatal nuclear winter—meant the inevitable cessation of war."
"... the clash, unleashed at any point whatever in the sphere, would 'have set off a battle royal, like a prairie fire spreading to the surface of the planet itself, which would have led to a global exchange of blows of the greatest power—i.e., to 'extinction. "
"This model of the war sphere was a gross oversimplification. Every phase of its growth 'might be accompanied by incursions, infiltrations, terrorist acts, and maneuvers that, like 'feints, were designed to lead the deceived enemy into an error that would be highly costly 'for him or even self-destructive."
"In the dictionary of our concepts there was no expression for the 'war-sphere ..., for it was neither war nor peace but a permanent conflict 'that bound together the enemies and drained their resources."
"... a war of attrition, in 'which the side that lost was the one weaker in raw materials, energy, or inventions?"
"To this 'conventional question came an unconventional answer. The inhabitants of the planet did 'not possess unlimited reserves of minerals or inexhaustible sources of energy. Although 'this limited the duration of the conflict, it promised victory to no one."
"There the war could sometimes turn "hot." It 'might also, in the future, make unpredictable jumps into the heart of the war-sphere. No 'one versed in post-Clausewitzian strategy could really expect a victorious conclusion to the 'conflict. Yet the professional strategists found themselves in the forced position of a player 'who cannot leave the table because he has thrown all his capital into the game. It was 'precisely in this that the enemies mirrored each other. The once-important question of who 'began the arms race lost all significance. Peaceful or aggressive intentions of the warring 'sides could no longer be distinguished in the conflict. The game boded ill for all the 'participants, and the only victory possible would be Pyrrhic."
Space Debris (Dialogs, 1952)[]
For example, in 1952 he described the problem of 'space garbage ' at a time when only few objects were actually able to travel to space and remain there.
Meanwhile, as of 2014 millions of objects have been transferred into space, and orbiting Planet Earth (especially in the Low-Earth-Orbit ), with several thousands of them posing a potential hazard and costly menace for space travel.
He rightly predicted that this could lead to a catastrophy. Due to a collision of one object with another, fragments would be produced by the hundreds, each travelling uncontrolled and fast, colliding with other objects, creating a cascade that would eventually render space travel unfeasibly dangerous due to the hugely increased danger of collision (now known as Kessler-Syndrome ).
All superpowers have recently demonstrated their ability to create such a cataclysm.
One of Russias satellites got hit by debris created by the Chinese maneuver (2013)
Meanwhile the Russians, after a temporal hold to the development of such capabilities, have renewed their efforts
Several smaller states, lacking the superior resource base of the three superpowers, attempt to develop their own capacities. Acting as detriment to the enemies actions, all sides will refrain from being the first to launch a strike, since it would surely destroy their own satellites in the process. Noone stands to gain from such a catastrophy.
This is one of the developments Stanislaw Lem foresaw.
Virtual Reality and its implications (1961 )[]
Long before the movie 'The Matrix ' was developed by the Wachowskis , Lem dealt with the implications of a illusion so real that it would serve a brain in a vat as a total substitute for reality.
Autoevolutionary technology (The Invincible, 1964 )[]
In this story lies the first realistic proposition for autoevolutionary self-replication.
The capabilities of independent, swarming devices against a single, heavily armoured machine have been demonstrated in this novel.
Currently the US is developing a primitive start in that direction, by deploying drones underwater .
The capabilities are clear, a single undetected surveillance drone would be able to determine the position of an Russian or Chinese blue water navy flotilla or even an aircraft carrier, allowing precision strikes.
The technology suffers some delay, mainly because the delicate apperature of a drone is harder to be made resilient to the pressures of an underwater environment as was currently expected. Development into a self-sustaining and automatic repairing device would be probable, since then the machine could be assured to actually function when activated. But since this kind of resilient automata has not officially been revealed, its deterrence against the other superpowers remains questionable.
It certainly is an indicator for the moving away from highly protected, massive but slow armaments to a lighter, more sneaky design.
Climate change and its consequences (Fiasco, 1987)[]
Chapter 1 - Birnam Wood
"But even this was not certain, because man—undertaking 'the deflection of the course of rivers to irrigate areas of drought, or warming the polar 'regions—paid for the improvement of some territories with the abandonment of others, 'thereby upsetting the climatic equilibrium of the biosphere, which had been adjusted so 'painstakingly (though with seeming indifference) by the efforts of natural evolution. "
Chapter 5 - Beta Harpyie
" The first thing a society did upon entering an era of technological acceleration was to 'disturb the living environment. Later it might wish to rescue that environment, but 'conservation measures would prove insufficient."
Chapter 3 - The Survivor
"Technologies would arise to save the environment: committed to adapting the 'technosphere, without trauma, to the biosphere. This task could be but would not have to 'be accomplished—in which latter case a civilization, in a series of costly crises, would 'fluctuate demographically. It could decline and regenerate itself many times, paying for 'this self-destructive inertia with billions of lives.'"
Chapter 10 - The Attack
"Invariably it (the curve of accelerated innovation / discoveries) would bend at the critical point, for if technologies for saving or 'replacing the biosphere did not come to the rescue of the technologies of expansion, the 'given civilization would enter a crisis to end all crises, i.e., extinction."
On 27. March 2006 Stanislaw Lem died at the age of 84 in a hospital in Cracow after prolonged sickness. With him we lose one of the most reputable and best SF-Authors.
Who was Stanislaw Lem?[]
He was a polish author of exacting SF-literature and at the same time the biggest castigator of the genre. His books, written with lots of humour but also tragic, with much technical knowledge about cybernetics and astronautics, sold 45 million books worldwide.
Lem about Lem: "As one knows, Lem has is a know-it-all, one only needs to shake him, and logarithms and formulas come flying out..."
Stanislaw Lem smoking
The complete Stanislaw Lem Index (Monograph)[]
An Index of all
Names , Character , Locations , Latin phrases , philosophical and logical concepts ever mentioned in Stanislaw Lem 's books . Also translated Interviews , Articles and Pieces written about him.
Resources[]
Lem on Telepolis (German Articles)
More Articles by Lem published in the magazine Telepolis
| Title | Published | Deals with |
|---|---|---|
| Fiasco | 1987 | Hard Sci-Fi, Impossibility of Contact with Aliens, Arms-Race, Microminiaturized Weaponry |
| Memoirs found in a Bathtub | Military Intelligence, Secrecy and Surveillance, Bildungsroman, Depression-formation | |
| Solaris | Impossibility of Contact with Aliens | |
| Return from the Stars | Twin-Paradox, Impossibility to adapt to 'alien' Humanity | |
| Peace on Earth | Arms-Race, Neurobiology, Microminiaturized Weaponry | |
| The Invincible | Nuclear Weaponry, Microminiaturized Weaponry, Autoevolutionary Self-Replication, Neurobiology, Impossibility of Contact with Aliens | |
| The Futurological Congress | Futurology, Neurobiology, Phantomatik, Chemistry | |
| Ijon Tichy | Time-Travel, Bioengineering | |