UP News
 
   
   
   
   
Editor-in-Chief:
James Stankowicz
Assistant Editor:
Steven Hochman
Layout Director:
George CB Ling
Online Editor:
Steven Hochman
Staff Writers:
Victor Albert
Brady Nash
Eric Swanson
Faculty Advisor:
Dr. Amlan Biswas

 
   
Arthur C. Clarke
by Larry Camarota



The world has just lost a futurist. Sir Arthur Charles Clarke. Born December 16, 1917, died March 19, 2008. You have probably heard of him. You may have read one of his books. You have definitely heard the theme to his movie. There is no doubt that he has helped to shape our vision of the future.

Arthur C. Clarke was born in England, but lived most of his life in Sri Lanka. During WWII, Clarke served in the Royal Air Force as a RADAR specialist. After the war, he earned his degree in mathematics and physics. His career as a science fiction writer took off after the war, and he soon became known as one of the 'Big Three’ of science fiction. In 1973 he penned Clarke’s law, which is that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Think about this the next time you get on a computer. As a science fiction writer, he was best known for his work 2001: A Space Odyssey.



Most of Clarke’s contributions to the world have been in the area of space. He proposed the idea of geostationary telecommunication satellites in 1945, 10 years before they were developed. As a result, geostationary orbits are now called Clarke orbits. He was the CBS correspondent for the Apollo missions, and the command module of Apollo 13 was named 'Odyssey' in his honor. In 2001, the Mars Odyssey mission was also named in his honor. Clarke's name is attached to two writing awards, an asteroid, and a dinosaur (Serendipaceratops Arthurcclarkei).