Arthur C. Clarke, inventor of satellite, visionary in technology, dead at 90
By Ryan Block 
posted Mar 18th 2008 5:55PM
posted Mar 18th 2008 5:55PM
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
Arthur, you'll be dearly missed.
Wonder if they'll send send his body/ashes up into orbit? Always sad when one of these great visionaries dies.
No they won't....they don't want the Navy to shoot it down.
J/K...I hope I can be that old when I die.
A true Master of Sci Fi. Can't wait for movies coming out base on his books.
I don't believe in God but I'm very interested in her.
Arthur C. Clarke
damn, it would have been cool if they made 2061 before he died, Tom Hanks wanted to but never got around to it
Death... the final frontier
Actually, he did once mention sending DNA from his hair into space (to be discovered by alien races... dunno if it was meant to be a joke or not.
Very sad. Truly one of the great ones.
You know I honestly thought that he had passed years ago.
I used to watch the reruns of his "Mysterious World"(?) show from the 1970s on A&E, and he looked pretty old at that time.
Man, that is way tragic. I always had a bit of a fantasy to one day meet him.
-Scott
Tragic? He was 90. He had a good life.
He was my favorite writer all through high school. Childhood's End was my favorite of his works.
I was just about to post a comment about childhoods end. I always thought it should be an actual movie, and not some adaptation based on it.
Great books, great thinker!
I was lucky enough to meet him whilst having a cup of tea in the Imperial Hotel in Colombo, Sri Lanka back in 98. He was, as you can imagine, quite frail then but was obviously still as sharp as a hawk in that he spotted I was reading a Sci-Fi book - specifically something by Bruce Sterling.
Ended up sharing a cup of tea with him and talking about modern Science Fiction, cost of milk at home etc. I chickened out of asking for his autograph though - something I regret to this very day.
I think I will watch some Space Odyssey tonight.
Of course on the day of Vista SP1, gosh, it never seems like Microsoft's day.
Clarke was an amazing person, may he rest in peace.
May he rest in peace.
Arthur's television work was very dear to me, I used to watch his documentaries on The Discovery channel as a little man and I am convinced he has a big part in my current interests.
You will be missed.
90 or 91?
Truly, one of the most visionary person of our times.
He was probably too smart to believe in God, but amen nonetheless.
Blasphemer!
Now perhaps he knows whether there's a God.
Too smart?
Belief? Re-read The Nine Million Names Of God.
requiescat in pace
So, the headline says he was 90, the text says 91. Which is it?
Other news outlets are saying 90. Wikipedia has his birthday as "16 December 1917," so that'd make him 90.
CRAP!
A great shame. He will be missed!
Rest well smart guy.
My hero, both when I was younger and today. I'm not sure where he was on the whole death issue, but wherever he is, or isn't, I hope he is at peace.
One of the best british visionaries ever and not afraid to think of the unknown.
would have been nice to have met him
Look guys, I can see you're really upset about this. I honestly think you ought to sit down calmly, take a stress pill, and think things over.
i fail to understand the point of your comment. perhaps you are ignorant of his contributions to both literature and science? or just a dick?
It's a quote from one of his books, prick.
C'mon, m. Serious?
Oh M,
I thought we talked about letting your ignorance pwn you?
Your like a 3rd testicle. Fun to point and laugh at but ultimately useless....
best analogy ever. pwned
let's talk about the importance of quotation marks first, and then i'll concede to being pwned. it was a poorly chosen passage, under the circumstances.
Okay, I admit that I should have used quotation marks.
A very sad day indeed. My childhood reading consisted of novels from the greats: Carl Sagan, Robert A. Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, and of course Arthur C. Clarke. Ah, maybe it's time to dust off some of his classics again: the crazy alien spaceship in "Rendezvous with Rama" or the Space Elevator in "The Fountains of Paradise". Brings back great memories of carefree summer days.
Speaking of RAMA, wan't there going to be a series of movies coming up soon?
u serious, ive always wanted to see what RAMA would look like on the big screen, it was an amazing series !
Rendezvous with Rama (2009)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0134933/
yup, Morgan Freeman is going to play the captain, because he said like 8 years ago he wanted it to be turned into a movie, and so hes making it himself.
http://www.revelationsent.com/site/index.html
sad to see Arthur C. clarke go, i only just discovered his books.
The octospiders were pretty badass. I wanna see them on the big screen.
Well said hp540. He will be sorely missed.
That's terrible. I've been re-reading all of his books the last few weeks. I just finished today. That is a little creepy.
What a great scientific mind and storyteller he was. A rare combination.
You should have kept reading. Perhaps by finishing his works, you finished him.
jeebus. that was kind of mean, i just finished reading the Odyssey series, Rendezvous with Rama, Songs of distant planet earth, and a couple others like a week ago
A fitting end to an extraordinary individual. Thank you Arthur C. Clarke for everything you accomplished in your life. I didn't know you, but I wish I had gotten to meet one of the most significant inventors that made this modern technological day that I live in. May you rest in peace.
GOODNIGHT, SWEET PRINCE
Very sad, but wow, at the bottom of the wikipedia article, it says he died on March 19. He even died in the future!
Mr. Clarke lived in Sri Lanka. Local time it probably was the 19th.
His writings definitely impacted me during my teen years. I'm quite saddened to see him move on.
He lived in Sri Lanka.
He lived in Sri Lanka, so maybe it was already the 19th there when he died. Either way, I've read so many of his books (maybe all of them?) and his writing entertained and provoked a lot of thought. He'll be missed but not forgotten.
Someone else will catch this, but if it was 5:30pm in the US when the news came, then it was already the 19th in Sri Lanka (or possibly even in Britain)
a great loss to the world
A very tragic day for humanity indeed, we have lost one of our greatest visionaries.
IMDB lists the "Rendezvous With Rama" movie as being released next year.
Arthur,
you will be missed. Your books insipred me to become a better geek and better man!
we will all miss you!
I'm going to pop 2001 into the HD-DVD tonight in his honor.
That'll be a fitting memorial, considering that HD DVD is dead too.
Too bad Kubrick's ending to the movie didn't do the book justice. It was just way too freaky.
RIP.
:(
Rendezvous With Rama - my personal favorite - set the standard for me when I was a kid on how a good Sci Fi story should be told. Compared all I read to those books. And I loved his voice. You'll be remembered.
He'll be missed. It's interesting timing for me; I just finished reading 2010: Odyssey Two, and started 2061. 2010 was a very good.
I knew him. I remember as a kid he used to go to the same Swimming pool on the week, he swam too. His grand daughter was in my class.
Too bad and too sad.
One of my favorite writers.
He'll be missed.
RIP your inventions have revolutionized global communication.
Now where is picture with US spy satellite and alien on it?
A favorite quote:
"One of the great tragedies of mankind is that morality has been hijacked by religion." -Arthur C. Clarke
Arthur certainly did contribute much to technology, literature, and sci-fi.
I too, don't like legalistic religion, although the word "religion" in and of itself can have more than one definition depending on who you're talking to. But I'll add my own quote (stunted by considerations of his passing), that the greatest tragedy of them all among mankind is that too many fail to recognize and accept Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Savior.
God blessed Arthur with much intelligence. Here's to hoping that Arthur knew and accepted Christ.
We can be fairly certain that he didn't "Accept Christ" as you hoped. Among his dying wishes were, quote:
"Absolutely no religious rites of any kind, relating to any religious faith, should be associated with my funeral."
-h
RIP. You will be missed. "ALL THESE WORLDS ARE YOURS EXCEPT EUROPA. ATTEMPT NO LANDINGS THERE."
apeguero - that was AWESOME ^^^
"The City and the Stars" was the first novel of his I read. It was great.
So long Mr Clarke. Maybe you'll travel to the stars now.
Arthur C Clarke's Mysterious World has just been reissued on DVD in the UK:
http://www.retrotogo.com/2008/02/dvd-review-arth.html
- fitting tribute to the man.
Baawwahahahwwwww :'(
My god ! It's full of stars !
:)
Rest in peace good sir, if not for your foresight who knows where I'd be...
Oddly enough, my EM theory class just talked about the concept of Arthur's Solar Sails from "The Wind from the Sun" My Prof will be really upset... he makes reference to Arthur's foresight on a regular basis...
Arthur C. Clarke died - I thought that he will be with us forever, ticking off the inventions, which he thought up many years ago. I feel so sorry, like when Heinlein and Asimov died. Maybe I just wanted them to see what the future is really like...because they deserved to see it. Rest in peace!
I used to live in Sri Lanka and he used to visit my International High School all the time. I must say it was an honour to meet him and talk to him. I was 13 then. Now I'm 19.
He will be missed.
Rest in Peace.
was he lurking by the gate, wearing an overcoat?
May he be ejected from a spacecraft by a scheming artificial intelligence such that he assumes a lengthy orbit around the sun, freezing him such that he can be recovered and thawed 993 years hence.
Ever since I read Future Imperfect, I wanted to play ping pong against him. Shame I won't get the chance.
I met Arthur C. Clarke in 1980 at his home in Colombo, lovely man, signed one of his books and wrote to me a couple of times. An impressive and kind man!
I don't think it's entirely appropriate to use infamous in reference to 2001: A Space Odyssey, it doesn't exactly mean incredibly famous, it means having a bad reputation.
Wow. I kind of feel bad. I read "The Trigger" and found it to be one of my favorites, but I never knew that there was anything more about Arthur C. Clarke. It's now that I know there is. Wow.
Very sad to see him go. I think I'll definitly look up on his other works. He will be remembered.
One of my favourite authors.
I remember after a long flight from Sri Lanka to the UK, on a bus to the terminal, talking to a chap about how awful the weather was. The next day I opened my paper to see a large photo of the same man and a review of his latest book.
If I had realised, I doubt that I could have spoken to him at all.
An era has ended. 2001-ASO was a turning point for me. I always thought I would have plenty of time to visit Sri Lanka and perhaps to meet the man behind the legend. A pioneer of science and science fiction alike. May he rest in peace.
Few people have ever ignited my love of science and technology like this one man. Thank you for all the work you have done.
He influenced generations of scientists, including myself. I read The Fountains of Paradise as a kid, and now I'm 2 years from my Ph.D. focusing on nanotechnology and ultra-high strength lightweight materials. His mind will be missed but his vision and legacy will never be forgotten.
"I read The Fountains of Paradise as a kid,"—That's the one with Beanstalks, right?
"and now I'm 2 years from my Ph.D. focusing on nanotechnology and ultra-high strength lightweight materials."—Ooh. Keep at it; we *really* need some better way to get to orbit.
I find that he pwned even if I don't read alot. :< The 2001 Odissey was good. Rest well, my friend. :E
Such a mixed bag. I respect him for his visions and his writing. But... if the things about his personal life are true, it's hard for me to say something truly positive.
Still, I'm sure we'll all remember the greatness of his vision, and appreciate his writing for a long time.
The things you have heard are lies. All the charges were dropped
Good to know. Thanks :-)
one of my true heros. May your soul rest in space!
"There is always a last time for everything." - The Nine Billion Names of God
That line would always give me chills. His work influenced the direction I took in school and eventually in life. He will be dearly missed.
a real bummer.
My favorite author. Tons of great books besides 2001. Read Rendevous with RAMA!(but don't read the next 3 in the series - Gentry Lee screwed it up).
He will be missed!
I got to meet him when I was a child. One of the several ways he blew me away was by pulling about three books out of his bag and saying that that was his day's reading and that he usually tried to read at least two books per day, you know, to keep up to date!
He was a legend. I read most of his books as a kid. In his honour, I will re-read some of the best ones. May you rest in piece.