Abstract
The idea of other worlds and realities beyond what we can see in the sky has always stimulated the public imagination. In this way, space has had an important place in popular culture since early times, before the beginning of the space race. Representations of this can be found in many forms of arts, including cinema, plastic arts, music and literature.Whether popular culture inspires scientists in their work or technological developments expand the limits of writers and artists’ imagination, there is an undeniable interplay between both fields. From the astonishingly correct predictions in Jules Verne’s novel From the Earth to the Moon, to the early visions of space depicted in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, this chapter presents a compilation of “predictions” of science fiction that came true in the space industry.
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Notes
- 1.
The Oxford dictionary is made available by Oxford University Press on the website https://en.oxforddictionaries.com.
- 2.
The whole interview is available in YouTube at the following link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5F4WvaiyQTw.
- 3.
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The film launch sequence referred to here can be watched on YouTube at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8gu1p939a4.
- 12.
A video of the launch of Explorer 1 is available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:1958-02-03_First_US_Satellite_Launched.ogv. In the clip, the lift-off moment referred to in the text takes place in the minute 1:13.
- 13.
Taylor Red N. (2013). Konstantin Tsiolkovsky: Russian Father of Rocketry. SPACE.com. [ONLINE] Available at: https://www.space.com/19994-konstantin-tsiolkovsky.html.
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Taylor Red N. (2013). Hermann Oberth: German Father of Rocketry. SPACE.com. [ONLINE] Available at: https://www.space.com/20063-hermann-oberth.html.
- 16.
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- 17.
Clips of the space station depicted in 2001: A Space Odyssey are available on YouTube at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEo9ZzT5Hos (outer view of the station) and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vG6CjOFlo7A (inner view of the station).
- 18.
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Estébanez Camarena, M. (2020). Predictions of Science Fiction That Came True. In: Froehlich, A. (eds) Outer Space and Popular Culture. Southern Space Studies. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-22656-5_12
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