Science fiction writers invent... To infinity and beyond! The “godfather” of science fiction, Jules Verne, was born

No matter what I write, no matter what I invent, all this will always be below the actual capabilities of a person. The time will come when science will outstrip imagination.

Jules Verne

Jules Verne is considered not only one of the founders of science fiction, but also a writer who, like no one else, knew how to predict the future. There are few authors who would do as much to popularize science and progress as the great Frenchman. Today, in the 21st century, we can judge how often he was right - or wrong.

From a cannon to the moon

Verne sent three travelers to the Moon - the same number were on the crew of each Apollo. The Columbiad projectile was aluminum - and it was aluminum alloys that were used to create the Apollo lander.

Young Jules Verne

One of Verne's boldest prophecies is space travel. Of course, the Frenchman was not the first author to send his heroes to the celestial spheres. But before him, literary astronauts flew only miraculously. For example, in the middle of the 17th century, the English priest Francis Godwin wrote the utopia “Man on the Moon”, the hero of which went to the satellite with the help of fantastic birds. Except that Cyrano de Bergerac flew to the Moon not only on horseback, but also with the help of a primitive analogue of a rocket. However, writers did not think about the scientific basis for space flight until the 19th century.

The first who seriously undertook to send a man into space without the help of “devilishness” was precisely Jules Verne - he naturally relied on the power of the human mind. However, in the sixties of the last century, people could only dream of space exploration, and science had not yet seriously addressed this issue. The French writer had to fantasize solely at his own peril and risk. Verne decided that the best way to send a man into space would be a giant cannon, the projectile of which would serve as a passenger module.

One of the main problems of the “lunar cannon” project is connected with the projectile. Verne himself understood perfectly well that the astronauts would experience serious overloads at the moment of the shot. This can be seen from the fact that the heroes of the novel “From the Earth to the Moon” tried to protect themselves with the help of soft wall coverings and mattresses. Needless to say, all this in reality would not have saved a person who decided to repeat the feat of the members of the “Cannon Club”.

However, even if the travelers managed to ensure safety, two more practically insoluble problems would remain. Firstly, a gun capable of launching a projectile of such mass into space must be simply fantastic in length. Secondly, even today it is impossible to provide a cannon projectile with a starting speed that allows it to overcome the gravity of the Earth. Finally, the writer did not take into account air resistance - although against the background of other problems with the idea of a space gun, this already seems like a trifle.

At the same time, it is impossible to overestimate the influence that Verne’s novels had on the origin and development of astronautics. The French writer predicted not only the journey to the Moon, but also some of its details - for example, the dimensions of the “passenger module”, the number of crew members and the approximate cost of the project. Verne became one of the main inspirations of the space age. Konstantin Tsiolkovsky spoke about him:

The desire for space travel was instilled in me by the famous dreamer J. Verne. He awakened the brain in this direction.

Ironically, it was Tsiolkovsky at the beginning of the 20th century who finally substantiated the incompatibility of Verne’s idea with manned astronautics.

The ISS crew delivered Jules Verne's manuscripts into orbit

Bringing Fantasy to Life: Space Gun

Almost a hundred years after the release of Man on the Moon, the space gun project has found new life. In 1961, the US and Canadian departments of defense launched the joint HARP project. His goal was to create guns that would allow scientific and military satellites to be launched into low orbit. It was assumed that the “supergun” would significantly reduce the cost of launching satellites - to only a few hundred dollars per kilogram of useful weight.

By 1967, a team led by ballistic weapons specialist Gerald Bull had created a dozen prototypes of a space gun and learned to launch projectiles to an altitude of 180 kilometers - despite the fact that in the United States, space flight is considered to be beyond 100 kilometers. However, political differences between the United States and Canada led to the closure of the project. Now the HARP cannon is abandoned and overgrown with rust.

This failure did not put an end to the idea of a space gun. Until the end of the 20th century, several more attempts were made to create it. But so far no one has managed to launch a cannon shell into Earth orbit.

Submarine

In fact, Jules Verne most often anticipated not the emergence of new technologies, but the direction of development of existing ones. This can be most clearly demonstrated by the example of the famous Nautilus.

The first projects and even working prototypes of underwater vessels appeared long before Verne himself was born. Moreover, by the time he began work on 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, the first mechanical submarine, which was christened the Diver, had already been launched in France, and Verne was collecting information about it before he began writing the novel.

But what was the “Diver”? A crew of 12 people could hardly fit on board the ship; it could dive no more than 10 meters and reach a speed of only 4 knots underwater.

Against this background, the characteristics and capabilities of the Nautilus looked absolutely incredible. Comfortable as an ocean liner, and perfectly suited for long expeditions, the submarine had a diving depth of several kilometers and a top speed of 50 knots.

Fantastic! And so far. As happened more than once with Verne, he overestimated the capabilities of not only contemporary but also future technologies. Even nuclear submarines of the 21st century are not able to compete in speed with the Nautilus and repeat the maneuvers that it performed playfully.

Nor can they go without refueling and replenishing supplies for as long as the Nautilus could. And, of course, today’s submarines can never be handled by one person - and Nemo continued to sail on the Nautilus even after he lost his entire crew. On the other hand, the ship did not have an air regeneration system; to replenish its supply, Captain Nemo needed to rise to the surface every five days.

Despite all this, one cannot help but admit that Verne foresaw the general trends in the development of submarines with amazing accuracy. The ability of submarines to make long autonomous journeys, large-scale battles between them, exploration of the depths of the sea with their help, and even a trip under the ice to the Pole (the North Pole, of course, not the South Pole - Verne was wrong here) - all this has become a reality. True, only in the second half of the 20th century with the advent of technologies that Verne had never even dreamed of - in particular, nuclear energy. The world's first nuclear submarine was symbolically dubbed the Nautilus.

In 2006, Exomos created a working submarine that is as close as possible to the literary Nautilus, at least in terms of appearance. The ship is used to entertain tourists visiting Dubai.

Bringing Fantasy to Life: Floating City

In the novel “The Floating Island,” the French novelist made a prediction that has not yet come true, but very soon may come true. The action of this book took place on an artificial island, on which the richest people on Earth tried to create a man-made paradise for themselves.

The Seasteading Institute organization is ready to implement this idea these days. It intends to create not just one, but several floating city-states by 2014. They will have sovereignty and live by their own liberal laws, which should make them extremely attractive for business. One of the sponsors of the project is the founder of the PayPal payment system, Peter Thiel, known for his libertarian views.

Aircrafts

To talk about the conquest of the air element, Verne came up with Robur the conqueror. This unrecognized genius is somewhat reminiscent of Nemo, but devoid of romance and nobility. First, Robur created the Albatross aircraft, which rose into the air using propellers. Although outwardly the Albatross looked more like an ordinary ship, it can rightfully be considered the “grandfather” of helicopters.

And in the novel “Lord of the World,” Robur developed an absolutely incredible vehicle. His "Terrible" was a universal machine: it moved with equal ease through the air, land, water and even under water - and at the same time it could move at a speed of about 200 miles per hour (this sounds funny these days, but Verne believed that such The car will become invisible to the human eye). This universal machine remained the writer’s invention. Is science lagging behind Verne? It's not just that. Such a station wagon is simply impractical and unprofitable.

Attempts have been made to create a hybrid aircraft and submarine. And, oddly enough, successful ones. In the 1930s, Soviet designers tried to “teach” a seaplane how to scuba dive, but the project was not completed. But in the USA in 1968, at the New York industrial exhibition, a prototype of the Aeroship flying submarine was demonstrated. This technical wonder has never found practical application.

Hitler and weapons of mass destruction

Jules Verne passed away in 1905 and did not see the horror of the world wars. But he, like many of his contemporaries, sensed the approaching era of large-scale conflicts and the emergence of new destructive types of weapons. And, of course, the French science fiction writer tried to predict what they would turn out to be like.

Verne paid serious attention to the theme of war and weapons in the novel “Five Hundred Million Begums.” He made the main villain of the book the German professor Schulze, an obsessive nationalist with a thirst for world domination. Schulze invented a giant cannon capable of hitting a target many kilometers away, and developed poisonous gas projectiles for it. Thus, Verne anticipated the advent of chemical weapons. And in the novel “Flag of the Motherland,” the Frenchman even depicted the “Fulgurator Rock” super-shell, capable of destroying any building within a radius of thousands of square meters - the analogy with a nuclear bomb literally suggests itself.

At the same time, Vern preferred to look into the future with optimism. The dangerous inventions in his books, as a rule, ruined their own creators - just as the insidious Schulze died from a freezing bomb. In reality, alas, anyone suffered from weapons of mass destruction, but not their creators.

The gas created by Professor Schulze could instantly freeze all living things. But Hitler's predecessor was let down by the unreliability of his inventions.

The appearance of the 20th century

At the dawn of his career, in 1863, the then little-known Jules Verne wrote the novel Paris in the Twentieth Century, in which he tried to predict what the world would look like a century later. Unfortunately, perhaps Verne’s most prophetic work not only did not receive recognition during the writer’s lifetime, but also saw the light only at the end of that very 20th century.

The first reader of “Paris in the 20th Century” - the future publisher of “Extraordinary Journeys” - Pierre-Jules Etzel rejected the manuscript. Partly due to purely literary shortcomings - the writer was still inexperienced - and partly because Etzel considered Verne’s forecasts too incredible and pessimistic. The editor was confident that readers would find the book completely implausible. The novel was first published only in 1994, when readers could already appreciate the visionary insight of the science fiction writer.

In the Paris of “tomorrow,” skyscrapers rose, people traveled on high-speed electric trains, and criminals were executed by electric shock. Banks used computers that instantly performed complex arithmetic operations. Of course, when describing the 20th century, the writer was based on the achievements of his contemporaries. For example, the entire planet is entangled in a global information network, but it is based on an ordinary telegraph.

But even without wars, the world of the 20th century looks pretty gloomy. We are accustomed to believe that Verne was inspired by scientific and technological progress and glorified it. And “Paris in the 20th Century” shows us a society where high technology is combined with a miserable life. People only care about progress and profit. Culture has been consigned to the dustbin of history, music, literature and painting have been forgotten. Here, fortunately, Verne greatly exaggerated the colors.

Among other things, Paris in the 20th Century anticipated the “theory of containment” developed by the American diplomat George Kennan only in the 1940s. Verne assumed that with the advent of weapons capable of destroying the entire planet in several countries, wars would come to an end. As we know, the science fiction writer was in a hurry here: there are plenty of local armed conflicts today.

* * *

Jules Verne has many more predictions to his name. Both those that came true (like electric bullets from “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea” and video communication in “The Day of an American Journalist in 2889”), and those that did not come true (charging from atmospheric electricity described in “Robourg the Conqueror”). The writer never relied solely on his imagination - he closely followed the advanced achievements of science and regularly consulted with scientists. This approach, coupled with his own insight and talent, allowed him to make so many incredible and often accurate predictions.

Of course, many of his predictions now seem naive. But few prophets in history managed to predict so accurately how technical thought and progress would develop.

Contemporaries of Verne

Albert Robida: Visionary Artist

If a Frenchman of the late 19th - early 20th centuries were asked who most convincingly describes the future, then the name “Albert Robida” would be mentioned along with the name “Jules Verne”. This writer and artist also made amazing guesses about the technologies of the future, and he was credited with an almost supernatural gift of foresight.

Robida predicted that not a single home of the future would be complete without a “telephonoscope,” which would broadcast the latest news 24 hours a day. He described devices that resemble prototypes of modern communicators. Along with Verne, Robida was one of the first to talk about chemical weapons and super-powerful bombs, which, despite their small size, would have incredible destructive power. In his drawings and books, Robida often depicted flying cars that would replace ground transport. That prediction hasn't come true—yet. Let's hope that over time it will come true.

Thomas Edison: The Word of a Scientist

Not only science fiction writers tried to predict in which direction scientific thought would develop. In 1911, the outstanding inventor Thomas Edison, a contemporary of Verne, was asked to tell how he saw the world a hundred years later.

Of course, he gave the most accurate forecast as far as his area was concerned. Steam, he said, was on its last days, and in the future all equipment, in particular high-speed trains, will run exclusively on electricity. And the main means of transportation will be “giant flying machines capable of moving at a speed of two hundred miles per hour.”

Edison believed that in the 21st century all houses and their interior decoration would be made of steel, which would then be given a resemblance to certain materials. The books, according to the inventor, will be made of ultra-light nickel. So in one volume a couple of centimeters thick and weighing several hundred grams, more than forty thousand pages can fit - for example, the entire Encyclopedia Britannica.

Finally, Edison prophesied the invention of... the philosopher's stone. He believed that humanity would learn to easily turn iron into gold, which would become so cheap that we could even make taxis and ocean liners from it.

Alas, the imagination of even such outstanding people as Edison is greatly limited by the framework of their contemporary world. Even the forecasts of science fiction writers who wrote only fifteen to twenty years ago are already difficult to perceive without a condescending smile. Against this background, Edison's foresight looks impressive.

A number of amazing prophecies of Jules Verne became public knowledge in his unpublished work “Paris in the 20th Century,” the existence of which became known several years ago. The manuscript of the novel was found by chance by the writer's great-grandson, and this event became a sensation.

By the power of imagination, J. Verne takes readers of the novel, written in 1863, to Paris in 1960 and describes in detail such things that no one would have guessed were invented in the first half of the 19th century: cars move along the city streets (though in J. Verne they do not run on gasoline, but on hydrogen - to preserve the cleanliness of the environment), criminals are executed using the electric chair, and piles of documents are transmitted through a device very reminiscent of a modern fax machine. Probably, these predictions seemed too fantastic to the publisher Etzel, or maybe he considered the novel too gloomy - one way or another, the manuscript was returned to the author and was eventually lost among his papers for a century and a half.

In 1863, the famous French writer Jules Verne published the first novel in the “Extraordinary Journeys” series, “Five Weeks in a Balloon,” in the Journal for Education and Leisure. The success of the novel inspired the writer; he decided to continue to work in this “key”, accompanying the romantic adventures of his heroes with increasingly skillful descriptions of incredible, but nevertheless carefully thought out scientific miracles born of his imagination. The cycle was continued by the novels “Journey to the Center of the Earth” (1864), “From the Earth to the Moon” (1865), “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea” (1869), “The Mysterious Island” (1874), etc.

In total, Jules Verne wrote about 70 novels. In them, he predicted many scientific discoveries and inventions in a variety of fields, including submarines, scuba gear, television and space flight. Jules Verne foresaw the practical use of electric motors, electric heating devices, electric lamps, loudspeakers, transmitting images over a distance, and electrical protection of buildings.

The remarkable works of the French writer had an important cognitive and educational effect for many generations of people. Thus, one of the phrases expressed by the science fiction writer in the novel “Around the Moon” regarding the fall of a projectile on the lunar surface contained the idea of jet propulsion in emptiness, an idea later developed in the theories of K.E. Tsiolkovsky. It is not surprising that the founder of astronautics repeated more than once: “The desire for space travel was instilled in me by Jules Verne. He awakened the brain in this direction.”

TRIP TO THE MOON

Space flight in details very close to reality was first described by J. Verne in his essays “From the Earth to the Moon” (1865) and “Around the Moon” (1870). This famous duology is an outstanding example of “seeing through time.” It was created 100 years before manned flight around the Moon was put into practice. But what is most striking is the amazing similarity between the fictional flight (J. Verne’s flight of the Columbiad projectile) and the real one (meaning the lunar odyssey of the Apollo 8 spacecraft, which in 1968 made the first manned flight around the Moon ).

Both spacecraft - both literary and real - had a crew of three people. Both launched in December from the Florida peninsula, both entered lunar orbit (Apollo, however, made eight full orbits around the Moon, while its fantastic “predecessor” made only one).

Apollo, having flown around the Moon, returned to the opposite course with the help of rocket engines. The crew of the Columbiana solved this problem in a similar way, using the reactive power of... signal flares. Thus, both ships, using rocket engines, switched to a return trajectory to splash down again in December in the same area of the Pacific Ocean, and the distance between the splashdown points is only 4 km! The dimensions and weight of the two spacecraft are also almost the same: the height of the Columbiada projectile is 3.65 m, weight is 5,547 kg; the height of the Apollo capsule is 3.60 m, weight is 5,621 kg.

The great science fiction writer foresaw everything! Even the names of the French writer’s heroes - Barbicane, Nicole and Ardan - are consonant with the names of American astronauts - Borman, Lovell and Anders...

The desire for space travel was instilled in me by the famous dreamer J. Verne. He stimulated the brain to work in this direction. Desires appeared. It arose behind desires.

The desire for space travel was instilled in me by the famous dreamer J. Verne. He awakened the brain in this direction. Desires appeared. Behind the desires, the activity of the mind arose. Of course, it would not have led to anything if it had not received help from science.

In addition, it seems to me, probably falsely, that the basic ideas and love for the eternal striving there - towards the sun, towards liberation from the chains of gravity - were embedded in me almost from birth. At least, I remember very well that my favorite dream in very early childhood, even before books, was a vague consciousness of an environment without gravity, where movements in all directions are completely free and limitless and where everyone is better off than a bird in the air. I still cannot understand where such desires came from. And there are no such fairy tales, but I vaguely believed, and felt, and desired just such an environment without the fetters of gravity.

Perhaps the remnants of an atrophied mechanism, exhausted aspirations, when our ancestors still lived in water and the weight was balanced by it - the reason for such dreams and desires.

Of course, it would not have led to anything if it had not received help from science.

I have never claimed to have a complete solution to this issue. First inevitably come: thought, fantasy, fairy tale. Behind them comes scientific calculation. And in the end, execution crowns thought. My works about space travel belong to the middle phase of creativity. More than anyone else, I understand the abyss that separates an idea from its implementation, since during my life I not only thought and calculated, but also executed, also working with my hands. However, it is impossible not to have an idea: execution is preceded by thought, precise calculation is preceded by fantasy.

This is what I wrote to M. Filippov, editor of Scientific Review, before sending him my notebook (published in 1903): “I have developed some aspects of the question of lifting into space using a jet device similar to a rocket. Mathematical conclusions, based on scientific data and tested many times, indicate the possibility of using such instruments to rise into celestial space and, perhaps, establish settlements outside the earth's atmosphere. Hundreds of years will probably pass before the thoughts I have expressed will find application, and people will use them to spread not only across the face of the earth, but throughout the face of the entire Universe.

Almost all the energy of the Sun is currently lost, useless for humanity, because the Earth receives 2 (more precisely 2.23) billion times less than the Sun emits.

What’s strange about the idea of using this energy! What is strange in the idea of mastering the boundless space surrounding the globe..."

Everyone knows how unimaginably large and limitless the Universe is.

Everyone knows that the entire solar system with hundreds of its planets is a point in the Milky Way. And the Milky Way itself is a point in relation to the ethereal island. The latter is a point in the world.

If people penetrate the solar system, manage it like a mistress in a house: will then the secrets of the universe be revealed? Not at all! Just as examining some pebble or shell will not reveal the secrets of the ocean... Even if humanity had taken possession of another Sun, explored the entire Milky Way, these billions of Suns, these hundreds of billions of planets, then we would have said the same thing. And these billions are a point, and they would not expose all the secrets of the sky.

How long ago was the time when lifting into the air was considered a blasphemous attempt and was punishable by execution, when reasoning about the rotation of the Earth was punishable by burning. Are people now destined to fall into mistakes of the same kind!

A number of amazing prophecies of Jules Verne became public knowledge in his unpublished work “Paris in the 20th Century,” the existence of which became known in the mid-90s. The manuscript of the novel was found by chance by the writer's great-grandson, and this event became a sensation.

Ahead of time

Probably, these predictions seemed too fantastic to the publisher Etzel, or maybe he considered the novel too gloomy - one way or another, the manuscript was returned to the author and was eventually lost among his papers for a century and a half.

In 1863, the famous French writer Jules Verne published the first novel in the “Extraordinary Travels” series, “Five Weeks in a Balloon,” in the Journal for Education and Leisure. The success of the novel inspired the writer; he decided to continue to work in this “key,” accompanying the romantic adventures of his heroes with increasingly skillful descriptions of incredible, but nevertheless carefully thought out scientific miracles born of his imagination. The cycle continued with novels:

"Journeys to the Center of the Earth" (1864)
"From the Earth to the Moon" (1865)
"20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" (1869)
"The Mysterious Island" (1874), etc.

Electric motors
Electric heating devices
Electric lamps
Loudspeakers
Transmitting images over a distance
Electrical protection of buildings

Incredible similarities between fiction and reality

The remarkable works of the French writer had an important cognitive and educational effect for many generations of people. Thus, one of the phrases expressed by the science fiction writer in the novel “Around the Moon” regarding the fall of a projectile on the lunar surface contained the idea of jet propulsion in emptiness, an idea later developed in the theories of K. E. Tsiolkovsky. It is not surprising that the founder of astronautics repeated more than once:

“The desire for space travel was instilled in me by Jules Verne. He awakened the brain in this direction.”

Space flight in details very close to reality was first described by J. Verne in the essays “From the Earth to the Moon” (1865) and “Around the Moon” (1870). This famous duology is an outstanding example of “seeing through time.” It was created 100 years before manned flight around the Moon was put into practice.

But what is most striking is the amazing similarity between the fictional flight (J. Verne’s flight of the Columbiad projectile) and the real one (meaning the lunar odyssey of the Apollo 8 spacecraft, which in 1968 made the first manned flight around the Moon ).

Both spacecraft - both literary and real - had a crew of three people. Both launched in December from the island of Florida, both entered lunar orbit (Apollo, however, made eight full orbits around the Moon, while its fantastic “predecessor” made only one).

Apollo, having flown around the Moon, returned to the opposite course with the help of rocket engines. The crew of the Columbiana solved this problem in a similar way, using rocket power... signal flares. Thus, both ships, with the help of rocket engines, switched to a return trajectory, so that again in December they would splash down in the same area of the Pacific Ocean, and the distance between the splashdown points was only 4 kilometers! The dimensions and weight of the two spacecraft are also almost the same: the height of the Columbiada projectile is 3.65 m, weight is 5,547 kg; The height of the Apollo capsule is 3.60 m, weight is 5,621 kg.

The great science fiction writer foresaw everything! Even the names of the French writer's heroes - Barbicane, Nicole and Ardan - are consonant with the names of American astronauts - Borman, Lovell and Anders...

No matter how fantastic all this sounds, this was Jules Verne, or rather his predictions.

Based on materials from the site iksinfo.ru

In 1863, the famous French writer Jules Verne published the first novel in the “Extraordinary Journeys” series, “Five Weeks in a Balloon,” in the Journal for Education and Leisure. The success of the novel inspired the writer; he decided to continue to work in this “key,” accompanying the romantic adventures of his heroes with increasingly skillful descriptions of incredible, but nevertheless carefully thought out scientific miracles born of his imagination. The cycle continued with novels:

"Journeys to the Center of the Earth" (1864)
"From the Earth to the Moon" (1865)
"20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" (1869)
"The Mysterious Island" (1874), etc.

Electric motors
Electric heating devices
Electric lamps
Loudspeakers
Transmitting images over a distance
Electrical protection of buildings

Incredible similarities between fiction and reality

The remarkable works of the French writer had an important cognitive and educational effect for many generations of people. Thus, one of the phrases expressed by the science fiction writer in the novel “Around the Moon” regarding the fall of a projectile on the lunar surface contained the idea of jet propulsion in emptiness, an idea later developed in the theories of K. E. Tsiolkovsky. It is not surprising that the founder of astronautics repeated more than once:

“The desire for space travel was instilled in me by Jules Verne. He awakened the brain in this direction.”

Apollo, having flown around the Moon, returned to the opposite course with the help of rocket engines. The crew of the Columbiana solved this problem in a similar way, using rocket power... signal flares. Thus, both ships, with the help of rocket engines, switched to a return trajectory, so that again in December they would splash down in the same area of the Pacific Ocean, and the distance between the splashdown points was only 4 kilometers! The dimensions and mass of the two spacecraft are also almost the same: the height of the Columbiada projectile is 3.65 m, weight is 5,547 kg; the height of the Apollo capsule is 3.60 m, weight – 5,621 kg.

The great science fiction writer foresaw everything! Even the names of the heroes of the French writer - Barbicane, Nicole and Ardan - are consonant with the names of the American astronauts - Borman, Lovell and Anders...

No matter how fantastic all this sounds, this was Jules Verne, or rather his predictions.