Research Blues

[eviladam]

I need some good online sources that cover a lot of sea lore. It's a small part of my novel I've yet to find the materials to accuratelly research but I want to get it as accurate to ancient legends as possible.

[Josh]

Sea lore? As in mythology, sea gods and monsters, perhaps?

http://www.pantheon.org/
One of my favorite myth and lore sites in general.

This next one, you might have to do a bit of digging to see if there's anything that'll work for you, but I'll throw it up anyways

http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/folktexts.html

Oh, and here's a short list of superstitions for fishermen.
http://www.oldsuperstitions.com/fisherman.html

[HouseWren]

The following books are available online, mostly used:

Folklore and the Sea (The American Maritime Library, Vol 6) by Horace Beck, November 1973
ISBN-10: 0913372366
ISBN-13: 9780913372364
Collection of legends, songs, superstitions, and stories both true and apocryphal which includes spectral ships, mermaids and mermen, pirates, sea language, sea monsters, navigation and weather lore, names on sea and shore and much more.

There are multiple copies of this at various prices--some quite resonable.

Seafaring Lore and Legend : A Miscellany of Maritime Myth, Superstition, Fable, and Fact
ISBN-10: 0071435433
List Price:$17.12

The Devil and the Deep: A Guide to Nautical Myths & Superstitions
ISBN-10: 1574090275
List Price:$ 6.85

[eviladam]

Thanks. I did some intensive research tonight, like hours and hours got away from me before I realised kinda research, and I found a celtic god that works perfectlly for what I had in mind. Those crazy celts attribute  lot to one god. like dominion over the sea, weather, and the underworld, and magic.

[Dom]

en.wikipedia.org is good too.  Do a search for 'mythology' or '[insert culture here] mythology' and you'll come up with articles and links back and forth.

pantheon.org is a favorite of mine too, but I've heard that a lot of the articles are unsourced, and it's true that it's hard to find other sources (at least online) about some of their info, so dunno how reliable it is.  But it gives fuel for the imaginary fire.

[Josh]

It's also funny about both pantheon and wikipedia. A lot of the more obscure mythology names and creatures in wikipedia are sourced directly from pantheon, from what I've seen when cross-referencing.

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

Every time I see this thread title, I find myself mentally putting together a list of blues musicians to start listening to.

[eviladam]

Now I have a great idea for a sci fi novel, but I'm not smart enough to write it. The science is crucail to the idea I have. If it's not bone hard scientific fact it needs to be at least believable, and my scientific education is mostlly in biology and anatomy. Introduction to Chemistry and Physics beyond biology.

I'm affraid I just don't understand qauntum mechanics, and physics and that kind of thing. I can say things that sound smart like string theory, and e=mc sqaured, but I probablly sound like an idiot.

So I either need a really smart co author, or an easy way to get the info I need to sound smart, because spending months at the library is not my idea of fun.

[Blaze]

I love research, but what you need is a real life physicist to help you.  If you want me to, I can put you in touch with a physicist friend of mine.

He is absolutely brilliant, but sometimes he just answers question with, "That is impossible."

For example, I asked him what would really happen if you could step out of time, and turn a bullet around once it had left the muzzle of a gun.

He explained all the reasons that that simply could never happen, and then said I could write it any way I wanted because it isn't science it is fantasy.

I guess that is how physicist think.  Although he loves Star Trek, especially the Heisenberg compensators on the transporter.  (Heisenberg principal is the one which precludes the functioning of the transporter.)

[eviladam]

Well I can kind of see the bullet thing. The problem with that, assuming you could step out of time ala Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and turn a bullet, or a knife around is momentum. The object would probablly either keep going backwards or start tumbelling uncontrollablly.

That might actually be pretty helpful if you could put me in touch.

[Blaze]

If you message me with your email I will forward it to him and ask him if he would contact you directly.

He was my hubby's dorm mate at college long long ago!  We stay in touch, and he is such a great guy.  Brilliant, too.

[Yeratel]

I'm affraid I just don't understand qauntum mechanics, and physics and that kind of thing. I can say things that sound smart like string theory, and e=mc sqaured, but I probablly sound like an idiot.

Other than Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke, the vast majority of science fiction writers have little or no science background. The truth is, it's the characters and plot that make good science fiction, the pseudo-scientific plot elements are just things the characters use: positronic brains, neural implants, trans-warp drives, time travel portals, "The Three Laws of Robotics", etc.  As long as the technology is consistent within the story world you create, it's fine. I don't expect Steven Hawking ever read a piece of science fiction and said to himself, "Why didn't I think of that!"

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

The truth is, it's the characters and plot that make good science fiction, the pseudo-scientific plot elements are just things the characters use: positronic brains, neural implants, trans-warp drives, time travel portals, "The Three Laws of Robotics", etc.  As long as the technology is consistent within the story world you create, it's fine. I don't expect Steven Hawking ever read a piece of science fiction and said to himself, "Why didn't I think of that!"

I disagree, deeply and profoundly.

Yes, you need good characters, but if good characters are all it takes to tell your story, then it does not need to be SF.  Good SF also needs ideas, the best of it are things that could not happen in a contemporary mundane setting and human reactions that also could not happen.  Sometimes even the plots could not happen.

I would offer as recentish examples Ted Chiang's collection Stories of Your Life and Others, most of Greg Egan's work in particular the collection Axiomatic and the novels Permutation City and Diaspora, and Charles Stross' Accelerando.  All of whom are scientifically literate.

[Blaze]

If it doesn't have science in it, it is space opera or fantasy.  Even if the science is outdated, it has to have sciencein order to be science fiction. 

Personally, I can't stand authors who insult me by not doing their homework.  Even movies that have what I call "idiot plots" turn me off.  (Unless they are designed that way in order to be hilarious.)  If I can think of a solution before the so called scientists in the story, or a better solution, I figure the author did think it through enough.

[redneckwitch18]

*singing* Ohhh, I got them researching blues... can't find nothing but q's...
 
Um, sorry bout that. Got a lil' carried away. I have such a hard time with my research because my mind finds something interesting and goes off on a tangent. Which means I don't get back to my original research until hours later when I'm tired and blurry-eyed.