Minimal
stressed for motivation and achievement2003-04-25
“Organic gook”
Perhaps the thing I find most interesting about reading sci-fi is the distilled insight the books offer into the current bounds of scientific knowledge and theory. Titan, by Stephen Baxter, was no exception to this when I read it about 4 years ago. It went into quite a lot of detail about the surface chemistry of Saturn’s biggest moon, describing a gloopy hydrocarbon slush dotted with pools of methane and so forth. It was a pretty good read, provided you ignore the frankly ridiculous final chapter.
Anyway, it turns out that quite a lot of the speculation it contained is actually correct. Well, the latest findings back it up, at least. Not quite the same thing, I suppose, but the Cassini-Huygens probe should confirm the suspicions sometime next year. Makes a nice change from the old canals of Mars stuff, but what I'm really waiting for is a mission to Europa...
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