Kim Stanley Robinson comes back to discuss Aurora, his novel of a generational starship, in which generations of humans are born, live, and die onboard without ever seeing a planet. We discuss the generational starship as a science fiction genre, whether humans will ever be able to travel to the stars, and what it would mean for science fiction if we can't. We also take a detour into the question of "hard," scientific science fiction vs. "soft," humanist science fiction.

Here's a link to Stan's article for Boing Boing, arguing that we won't ever reach the stars:

https://boingboing.net/2015/11/16/our-generation-ships-will-sink.html

Thanks to Nick Gaskill for suggesting an episode on Aurora!

180. Aurora -- Kim Stanley Robinson