Wednesday, November 6, 2013

DC SF

Ever been to a museum in DC?

The Museum of Natural History. The Museum of American History. The Air and Space Museum. There's others, but I forget.

And they're pretty cool. At least the few I've been to. Dinosaur bones. Mercury spacecraft. Dorothy's ruby slippers. Bunch of other old stuff.

There's a group that wants to build a Science Fiction Museum in DC. They're looking to sponge off visitors to the other museums, such as the Air and Space Museum.

But, is DC the right place for a Science Fiction Museum?

Other museums (or museum-like things) have a tie-in to where they're located. The Pro Football Hall of Fame (that's kinda like a museum) is in Canton, Ohio because that's where the NFL was founded. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (it's a museum) is in Cleveland, Ohio, because, well, the only real competition it had for hosting it was Detroit, and not even burned-out rockers would go to Detroit. The Baseball Hall of Fame is in Cooperstown, New York, because somebody thought baseball was invented there by Abner Doubleday. It wasn't, and it wasn't him anyway. But at the time, they didn't know better.

And, of course, the other DC museums I mentioned are in DC because that's where the money James Smithson left the U.S. ended up. His bones ended up there, too, after Alexander Graham Bell went to Italy and got them. (Look it up.)

Anyway, museums should be where the thing they're museuming about has a connection.

The fiction part, that makes perfect sense in DC. After all, if you like your insurance, you can keep it, right? Not much more fiction than that. It's the science part that doesn't fit. Because science uses math. (Look it up.) And nobody in DC know a darn thing about math.

So, I don't think DC is a good location for a Science Fiction Museum. I think a better place would be The Moon. Or maybe L5. Or Vulcan. Or Tatooine.

What do you think? Is DC a good place for the Science Fiction Museum? Or what is the right place?

19 comments:

  1. Of course it should be built in Area 51.

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  2. Richland, Washington just to tick off the PC progs.

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  3. But there is no specific place connected with science fiction. And since D.C. has both NASA and NOAA - both engaging in highly fictional science - it's as good a place as any.

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  4. Barsoom seems appropriate.

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  5. Wherever it was they filmed the "moon landings" would be a appropriate. :-)

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  6. Don't go there, DamnCat!

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  7. Houston, close to Mission Control.

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  8. Probably in either Rosewell, NM, or wherever the 911 "fire can't melt steel" truther headquarters are.

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  9. Butler, Missouri

    birthplace of Robert A. Heinlein

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  10. Climate change is fiction that pretends to be Science!, all in the service of expanding government, the Evil Headquarters of which is located in DC. Sounds like a perfect fit to me.

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  11. Seconding jw - Butler, MO.

    @10 - before or after we nuke it?

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  12. Harvey:

    "Before or after we nuke it?"

    While we nuke it. Make for one heckuva grand opening, don't cha think?

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  13. Butler now, a branch on the unnuked portion of the moon when we get a base established. we need the earth based portion as The Moon is Harsh Mistress.

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  14. Put it in a large barge, a'la Google, and float it off the west coast.

    Visitors could be 'beamed'/transported out to it from the sets of Star Trek, in Hollywood, Ca.

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  15. Seattle. Paul Allen has stuff already and we'll just need the gubbermint to seize it. They are really good at takings. And as a good liberal he would never complain .

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  16. Upon further consideration I would put in a fictional place.

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  17. Since it will be a private museum, it should be wherever the owners want it to be.

    Unlike the National African American history and culture museum (under construction on the Mall in DC) and the American Indian museum.

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  18. Metropolis, IL is where it should be. They've already got the Superman theme thing going on there so why not add the Museum of Science Fiction there?

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