How Andy Weir Crowdsourced 'the Martian' Science
His fictional story, which is about astronaut Mark Watney's struggle to survive on Mars after being stranded there, has sold hundreds of thousands of copies and counting, and Hollywood recently turned it into a blockbuster movie. But Weir's hit sci-fi book didn't start out so glamorously: The story began as a series of self-published chapters on a personal blog. His few readers loved the story for its attention to scientific accuracy. And that exhaustive research for the book is actually what drove the story forward, he wrote during a recent Reddit "ask me anything": My research created interesting plot points. Like when I researched potatoes and found out how much water he'd (Watney) need in the soil. Then I realized he'd have to make water. And that let [sic] to one of the coolest plots in the book. Weir is a self-described space nerd but says chemistry is not his area of expertise. So his science-minded readers offered their feedback. "Chemists actually pointed out some problems in
Business Insider tells the innovative stories you want to know
Explore this link on the map →related reading
- Andy Weir - Wikipediaen.wikipedia.org
- The Martian Chronicles - Wikipediaen.wikipedia.org
- The Last Questionusers.ece.cmu.edu
- The Cook and the Chef: Musk's Secret Sauce — Wait But Whywaitbutwhy.com
- Cargo Cult Sciencecalteches.library.caltech.edu
- Book Reviews · Gwern.netgwern.net
- Developing creative identitymichaelnotebook.com
- On Really Trying · Gwern.netgwern.net
- Project Hail Mary - Wikipediaen.wikipedia.org
- A Short History of My Last Six Years — Wait But Whywaitbutwhy.com
- I Graduated from the Library: An Interview with Ray Bradbury - Public Libraries Onlinepubliclibrariesonline.org
- The War of the Worlds | Project Gutenberggutenberg.org