Alpha
Centauri in fiction
From
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
As
one of the brightest stars in Earth's night sky, and the closest known star
system to the Sun, the Alpha Centauri system plays an important role in many
fictional works of literature, popular culture, television, and film.
Alpha
Centauri, a double star system with the binary designation Alpha Centauri AB,
is the brightest visible object in the southern constellation Centaurus. Its
component stars are Alpha Centauri A (the primary—somewhat larger and brighter than
the Sun) and Alpha Centauri B (the secondary—slightly smaller and dimmer).
These stars are of spectral classes G2V (as is the Sun) and K1V respectively;
in the former case there is an obvious model and potential for planets capable
of supporting complex biospheres, and in the latter, as it turns out, an even
stronger probability of a stable habitable zone that is well suited for
life.[1] Alpha Centauri C (Proxima Centauri—a late-discovered red dwarf, and
the closest known star to the Solar System) appears to be gravitationally bound
to the AB system although at a considerable distance. The collection of three
stars together is called Alpha Centauri AB-C.
Alpha
Centauri is commonly referred to as Rigil Kentaurus[2] (Arabic: Rijl
Qantūris[3]), meaning foot of the centaur—compare Rigel in Orion—and also as
Toliman (Arabic: Zulmān), or the ostriches.[3]
General
uses of Alpha Centauri
Many
stars may be referred to in fictional works for their metaphorical or
mythological associations, or else as bright points of light in the sky of the
Earth, but not as locations in space or the centers of planetary systems.
However,
because Alpha Centauri is only visible from the remote south, it lacks the rich
historical net of metaphorical, mythological, and sky-gazing associations,
predating the scientific era, which have commonly propelled purely artistic
references in the Western tradition to stars such as Aldebaran and Sirius that
blaze brightly in northern skies. Although it makes plentiful appearances in
science fiction, Alpha Centauri is rarely if ever used in a general sense.
Sky position: RA 14h 29.8m, Dec -62° 40.8'
Common designations: Proxima Centauri, HIP 70890, Gliese
Alpha Centauri A is a yellow main-sequence star in the constellation Centaurus. At 4.4 light years away, it is the 4th brightest star in the Earth's sky, where it shines at an apparent visual magnitude of -0.01. Alpha Centauri A is the primary component of a multiple-star system. The star's age is estimated to be 9.2 billion years but is certainly no less than 8.1 billion years and no greater than 10.2 billion years. The iron abundance of Alpha Centauri A is +0.2 (158.5% of the Sun). It is moving through the Galaxy at a speed of 31.9 km/s relative to the Sun. Its projected Galactic orbit carries it between 23,700 and 33,700 light years from the center of the Galaxy. It will come closest to the Sun 28,000 years from now when it will brighten to magnitude -0.66 from a distance of 3.3 light years.
Sky position: RA 14h 39.7m, Dec -60° 50.4'
Common designations: Alpha Centauri A, Rigel Kentaurus, HIP 71683, HD 128620, HR 5459, Gliese 559 A
Alpha Centauri B is an orange dwarf star in the constellation Centaurus. At 4.4 light years away, it is the 21st brightest star in the Earth's sky, where it shines at an apparent visual magnitude of 1.35. Alpha Centauri B is the secondary component of a multiple-star system. The iron abundance of Alpha Centauri B is +0.21 (162.2% of the Sun). It is moving through the Galaxy at a speed of 30.2 km/s relative to the Sun. Alpha Centauri B has one confirmed planet known to date (July 2013).
Sky position: RA 14h 39.7m, Dec -60° 50.4'
Common designations: Alpha Centauri B, HIP 71681, HD 128621, HR 5460, Gliese 559 B
Far Centaurus (1944), short story by A. E.
van Vogt published in the collection Destination: Universe! (1952). A crew of
Terran explorers who have been hibernating through a centuries-long voyage to
Alpha Centauri discover on arrival that their technology has been radically superseded;
humanity has arrived at the Alphan planet Pelham via superluminal travel long
before them, and has long forgotten about them and their primitive mission
(compare Comics: Guardians of the Galaxy below). The travelers must overcome
their childlike naïveté to cope with the near Godlike human civilization that
has evolved in their absence—a good example of the "quasimessianic ...
transcendental omnipotence" with which van Vogt often furnishes his
protagonists in order to generate a sense of wonder in his tales.[4]
Revolt on Alpha C (1955), juvenile and debut
novel by Robert Silverberg. (In this case, "Alpha C" is an
abbreviation of Alpha Centauri, treated as a single star, and does not refer to
Proxima Centauri as the C component of the trinary system.) In the novel, when
Space Patrol cadet Larry Stark visits the dinosaur planet Alpha C IV on a final
training cruise before he receives his commission, its human colonists are on
the verge of declaring a war of independence from Earth. Young Stark must
balance his loyalty against his ideals and decide which side to support in this
morally ambiguous confrontation.
Clans of the Alphane Moon (1964), novel by
Philip K. Dick. War between Earth and the insectoid-dominated planet Alpha II
ended over a decade ago. The novel's plot revolves around an attempt by Earth
to reassert authority over its former colony on the habitable second moon Alpha
III M2 of Alpha Centauri's giant[note 1] third planet, called the
"Alphane" moon from Dick's invented adjective form of Alpha Centauri,
which he treats as a single star. The moon M2, once a psychiatric asylum, is
inhabited by descendants of the original inmates who now populate
tongue-in-cheek "Clans": Pares (paranoids), who form the statesman
class; Manses (manics), who form the warrior caste; Skitzes (poets) and so on.
In his novel The Blue World (1966) Jack Vance pursued a similar humorous
conceit, where the castes evolved from the criminal métiers of prisoners aboard
a crashed "Ship of Space": Swindlers (fishermen) who cozen fish into
their nets, Bezzlers who form a priestly class, and so on.[6]
The Man-Kzin Wars (1966), Known Space novel
by Larry Niven. Wunderland is a planet circling Alpha Centauri, and the
location of the first extra-solar colony in the human history of Known Space. A
salubrious world with a gravity 60% of Earth normal, it was invaded and its
population enslaved for almost half a century by the Kzinti during the first
Man-Kzin War. Alpha Centaurian men and women endured, or waged guerrilla warfare
from remote and desolate bases, until the liberation.[7]
"Like Banquo's Ghost" (1968),
short story by Larry Niven published in the collection The Shape of Space
(1969). This ironic tale provides a twist on the more common "leapfrogged
slowship" theme (compare Literature: Far Centaurus and Comics: Guardians
of the Galaxy in this article). The variation goes like this: A group of elite
scientists and reporters gathers to hear a radio transmission from the
Snarkhunter #3 robotic space probe as it finally arrives, after a 30-year
interstellar voyage, at the planet Centaura of Alpha Centauri A. Among the
invited guests is the strangely enthusiastic "Butch"—who is none
other than the recently arrived (via faster-than-light ship) ambassador from
... Alpha Centauri.[8]
The Centauri Device (1975), novel by M.
John Harrison. The native Centaurians (humanoid aliens able to interbreed with
humans) have been eradicated in a genocidal attack serving as an instrument of
Earth's expanding colonization of the galaxy. The novel's protagonist John
Truck, half-Centaurian on his mother's side, is "the last of the
Centaurians," and as such the only person able to operate the
"device" of the book's title: a sentient bomb which might just hold the
key to settling a vicious space war. According to The Encyclopedia of Science
Fiction, "... The Centauri Device is a significantly disgruntled space
opera ... and one which demonstrates Harrison's persistent discomfort with the
escapist conventions of this sort of science fiction. Unsurprisingly, the
doomsday device of the title duly blows up the Galaxy."[9]
Downbelow Station (1981) and other
Alliance-Union universe works, novels by C. J. Cherryh. Alpha Centauri is the
site of Beta Station, the second space station founded by an Earth Company
expedition from Sol. Unlike the rest of the stations founded before the
discovery of Pell's World in the Tau Ceti system, it is not part of the
"Great Circle" chain of stations (which extends from Sol to Tau Ceti
with Barnard's Star as its first stop). Beta Station was established in 2039
but mysteriously abandoned around 2160. Because it lies on no important trade
routes, and apparently has no special resources of note, the system will not be
recolonized for at least the next 300 years.
Voyage from Yesteryear (1982), novel by
James P. Hogan. An automated genetic Ark flees imminent nuclear catastrophe on
the Earth, and locates a habitable planet in orbit around Alpha Centauri.
Hundreds of human ova are programmed from the DNA databanks, then birthed and
raised in untrammeled innocence by robotic nannies. As these "natural
humans" grow to maturity, they organize the polity of their colony world
Chiron[note 2] as a classless pastoral anarchy. When a resurgent and covetous
Earth comes calling, the Chironians "governed according to [a] kind of
Trickster Libertarianism ... effortlessly face down and flummox the attempt by
Earth to re-establish control."[11] Instead of seizing power, the invaders
are happily assimilated.
Neuromancer (1984), novel by William
Gibson. The newly integrated AI Wintermute/Neuromancer has transcended Earthly
concerns, and is looking for "its own kind" to talk to. It scans
mountains of old records, and finds a series of transmissions recorded over a
period of eight years back in the nineteen-seventies that subtly indicate the
presence of a peer intelligence "in the [Alpha] Centauri system." The
two AIs are in communication, and their search for other advanced intelligences
proceeds apace.[12]
Footfall (1985), novel by Larry Niven and
Jerry Pournelle. The book depicts the arrival in the Solar System of an alien
species called the Fithp, man-sized "elephants" with multiple
trunks,[13] that have voyaged from Alpha Centauri in a large spacecraft driven
by a Bussard ramjet. The aliens are intent on taking over the Earth, but in a
particular way: Herd creatures, their traditional mode of warfare is to fight
until it beomes evident which antagonist is dominant; then fighting ceases and
the losers are assimilated into the winning herd. The Fithp expect their
contact with humans to proceed along these lines, and are confused by human
attempts at peaceful contact.
Foundation and Earth (1986), Foundation
series novel by Isaac Asimov. The marine world Alpha orbiting Alpha Centauri A
(see graphic) is the final home of the last human refugees from some dying,
radioactive world. The survivors, encountered here by Foundation councillor
Golan Trevize, dwell in seeming Polynesian simplicity on Alpha's only land
mass, a Jamaica-sized island called by them "New Earth," and the old
product of a charitable terraforming project by imperial engineers under the
emperor Kandar V. Could their moribund homeworld be the long-lost "Old
Earth," the supposed cradle of humanity?
The Songs of Distant Earth (1986), novel by
Arthur C. Clarke. Scientists in the 1960s discover that the neutrino (νe)
emissions from the Sun are far less than predicted by theory;[note 3] it is
soon confirmed that the Sun will go nova around the year 3600 CE. Humankind
embarks on a massive project to send robot-tended human and other mammalian
embryos to habitable worlds orbiting nearby stars. The first destination is
Pasadena, a planet of Alpha Centauri A rendered nearly uninhabitable by the
variable proximity of Alpha Centauri B (The first seedship left the Solar
System in 2553, heading toward the Sun's near twin, Alpha Centauri A). The
colony there does surprisingly well.[14]
Starfire (1990–2002), series of novels by
David Weber and Steve White based on the Starfire board wargame (1979–1980) by
Stephen V. Cole. The Alpha Centauri system plays a key role in the Terran
Federation because it is the location of a large number of warp-point
junctions, including one that tunnels directly into the Solar System; it is the
headquarters and principal shipyard of the Terran Federation Navy. In the
second novel in the series, In Death Ground, the Arachnid race discovers an
unmapped warp point opening near Alpha Centauri, by means of which they mount a
massive invasion of Terran space.
Harvest of Stars (1994), novel by Poul
Anderson. The planet Demeter of Alpha Centauri is marginally habitable, but the
Fireball Corporation sends a colony ship full of refugees anyway.
"Everybody knew that in a thousand years the planet, Demeter, would
collide with another. But those thousand years could be lived in, and perhaps
during them the descendants of the colonists would find a means of
surviving.[15]
The Sparrow (1996), novel by Mary Doria
Russell. In 2019 the SETI program detects radio broadcasts from the planet
Rakhat in the Alpha Centauri system. The Catholic Jesuit order sends an
unauthorized expedition to the planet, and their incomprehension of its radical
differences from human culture lead to tragedy.[17] The protagonist and sole
survivor Father Emilio Sandoz returns to Earth shattered and disfigured, and
his revelations devastate the order, leaving him personally to initiate the
painful process of physical and spiritual healing. In a sequel, Children of
God, Sandoz is forced to return to Rakhat, and discovers that he is not in fact
the only survivor of the original expedition.
Factoring Humanity (1998), novel by Robert
J. Sawyer. SETI astronomers detect an artificial signal from Alpha Centauri A,
the first inkling of a ten-year flood of cryptic data that protagonist Heather
Davis devotes herself to deciphering. She finally succeeds, and discovers in
the data plans for an extra-dimensional vehicle that could enable contact with
the "Centaurs." Meanwhile, a single cryptic message is received from
Epsilon Eridani, easier to translate but much more alarming: "It couldn't
be plainer: biological life, based on carbon, being supplanted by silicon-based
artificial intelligence ..."[18] And it turns out that the collective
unconscious "overminds" of Earth and Alpha Centauri are already in
contact. Is humanity on the threshold of an era of limitless exploration—or of
extinction?
Centauri Dawn (2000), first novel of a
trilogy by Michael Ely based on the 1999 computer game Sid Meier's Alpha
Centauri. The trilogy describes the struggles of the colonists on Chiron—a
habitable world[note 2] in the Alpha Centauri system, after their colony ship
Unity suffers major damage and the survivors are forced to land on the planet in
lifeboats. Subsequent novels in the trilogy are Dragon Sun (2001) and Twilight
of the Mind (2002).
Film
and television
Lost in Space (1965–1968), television
series created by Irwin Allen and variously directed. The astronaut family of
Professor John Robinson, accompanied by their pilot Major Donald West and a
robot, strikes out from an overpopulated Earth in the spacecraft Jupiter 2. The
crew is frozen in suspended animation for the five-and-a-half year voyage to a
known habitable planet of Alpha Centauri, on which they are to found a colony.
The ship is lost in space due to sabotage by an enemy agent, Dr. Zachary Smith,
who is trapped aboard the ship at launch. Hurtling on into deep space, the
Jupiter 2 crash lands on an unknown planet. Although remote, this lost world
soon becomes a stopping-off point for practically every space-travelling alien
or monster in the galaxy, each episode seeing the arrival of some new
visitor.[21] (See Lost in Space, the film, below.)
"Metamorphosis" (1967), episode
of Star Trek: The Original Series written by Gene L. Coon, as part of the film,
television, and print franchise originated by Gene Roddenberry. Zefram
Cochrane, the inventor of the warp drive, lived in the Alpha Centauri system
for some years before his mysterious disappearance in 2119. He is discovered
alive and living in obscurity with the Companion (an ethereal presence of pure
energy) by the crew of the Enterprise, who agree not to reveal his whereabouts.
"The Curse of Peladon" (1972) and
"The Monster of Peladon" (1974), serials written by Brian Hayles and
directed by Lennie Mayne for the television series Doctor Who. Alpha Centauri
is home to a race of six-armed chameleon caterpillars. Timid and prone to
panic, they are still loyal and dutiful members of the Galactic Federation. The
members of this species lack individual names in the show.
"The Golden Man" (1981), episode
of Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (season 2) written by Calvin Clements Sr.
and Stephen McPherson and directed by Vincent McEveety. Under the command of
Admiral Asimov, the spaceship Searcher enters the asteroid belt of the Alpha
Centauri system and becomes trapped on a planetoid by a lethal magnetic storm.
The crew comes upon Velis, one of the golden people, humanoids who possess
alchemical faculties and age in reverse. Velis reveals that his companion,
Relos, can use special powers to help the ship escape destruction if the crew
is willing to rescue him from the prison planet Iris VII orbiting Alpha
Centauri.[22][23]
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1994), in the
episode "Past Tense, Part 1" the crew of the starship USS Defiant
were transported back in time to the year 2024 on Earth. Chief Miles O'Brien
discovered that the nearest interstellar activity to Earth involved the
Romulans at Alpha Centauri.
Babylon 5 (1993), it was established that
Alpha Centauri (renamed Proxima Centauri in the show's continuum) is a colony
of the Earth Alliance, the governing body of humanity. Interstellar travel is
achieved via the use of jumpgates, wherein ships are able to enter a separate
dimension where distances between heavenly bodies is shorter compared to
"normal" space. The planet Proxima Centauri 3 was featured in the
season 4 episode "No Surrender, No Retreat" in which the protagonists
battle a fleet of Earthforce ships during the Earth civil war arc of the show.
Lost in Space (1998), film inspired by the
television series, written by Akiva Goldsman and directed by Stephen Hopkins.
In the year 2058, Earth will soon be uninhabitable due the irreversible effects
of global pollution. Professor John Robinson will lead his family to the
habitable planet Alpha Prime of Alpha Centauri to prepare it for colonization
by building a hypergate in the system. This time the Jupiter 2 is equipped with
a hyperdrive that allows faster-than-light travel. Again, they become lost in
space. (See Lost in Space, the television series, above.)
Transformers (2007), film written by
Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman, and directed by Michael Bay. Optimus Prime,
leader of the benevolent Autobots, narrates the collapse of the Transformers'
home world, Cybertron. It was destroyed by war between the Autobots and the
malevolent Decepticons, led by Megatron in his quest to get hold of the
AllSpark. The Autobots want to find the AllSpark so they can use it to rebuild
Cybertron and end the war, while the Decepticons want to use it to defeat the
Autobots and take over the universe. Cybertron originally orbited Alpha
Centauri, but was thrown out of orbit in the war and sent wandering through the
galaxy. Cybertron has a metallic surface; the atmosphere is breathable by
carbon-based life, but liquid water is rare enough on the planet that its
existence is in doubt (see Comics: The Transformers below).
Avatar (2009), film written and directed by
James Cameron. The film is set in 2154, when Earth's RDA Corporation is mining
a precious mineral called unobtanium on Pandora, a lush habitable moon of the
gas giant Polyphemus in the Alpha Centauri A system (see graphic).[note 1][24]
Pandora, whose atmosphere is poisonous to humans, is inhabited by the Na'vi,
10-foot-tall blue-skinned intelligent humanoids[25] who live in harmony with
nature. The film's title Avatar refers to the genetically engineered
Na'vi-human hybrid bodies used by a team of researchers to interact with the
natives.[26] The expansion of the mining colony threatens the continued
existence of a local tribe of the Na'vi, and sympathetic humans use their
Avatars to lead them in a revolt against the corporate security forces.
"Tomorrow is Yesterday" (1967),
episode of Star Trek: The Original Series written by D. C. Fontana, as part of
the film, television, and print franchise originated by Gene Roddenberry. When
captured by Air Police Colonel Fellini (portrayed by Ed Peck), Kirk is asked
who he is; Kirk responds, "I'm a little green man from Alpha Centauri, a
beautiful place, you should see it some time!"
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