It was in a collection of short stories by different authors, which I read in the mid 80's.  The crew of the ship keep complaining about how the Captain is rude to them and the only 'person' he says 'please' and 'thank you' to is the ship's computer.   Eventually they decide on mutiny and murder the Captain after forcing him to make recordings of the voice commands necessary to steer the ship. It is not until after they kill the Captain, that they realise the commands he recorded lacked the 'please' and 'thank you', which were crucial to make them work.  Thus the crew of the ship drift through space contemplating the irony.
124180
The crew mutinies on a spaceship whose captain controls it with verbal orders. They test whether they can control the ship with recordings of the captain's voice with an order to increase orbital speed (currently orbiting a planet). It works, so they force the captain to record all the possible orders they may need, and execute him. Only then do they realize that the ship obeys only orders couched in polite language, and only the test recording was like this, but the other recordings are not. They will die once the ship's faster orbit somehow causes it to run out of fuel, or something like that. I seem to remember the ship's &quot;computer&quot; following the captain around on robotic legs. I read the story circa 1980, but it might have been published much earlier.
29349
I may have encountered this short story in Asimov's Science Fiction magazine. Human explorers encounter an alien spacecraft. Aliens are cautiously friendly, but then tell the humans about an ancient, brilliant and cruel race of beings that conquered and destroyed every civilization they encountered. They were finally defeated and destroyed, or so it was thought, but their home world was never found. It turns out that this powerful, vicious race was in fact, Earthlings.
82936
And thereby makes clear in 4 words what the whole story was about.  In a 60's or 70's era anthology I think.  I’ve always remembered it as being an example of good or clever writing.  I've never read another story with the same effect. If I gave any more clues it would spoil the story. I only read it once yet I can still remember it… but what was the story?  EDIT: The aliens were hiding some important information on the human race and the hero spent the whole story trying to find out what it was.
72354
I've read this book about 15 years ago, but I think it's older than that.  In the story people use some sort consciousness transfer technology to travel to distant solar systems. So basically an alien from planet A would want to visit Earth, and you would like to visit the planet A, by mutual agreement you'd transfer your mind into the alien's body and alien's mind would be transferred into your body.  So the main character decides to travel and swaps bodies with an alien. However, he/she isn't able to return back to his/her own body and instead is transferred to another alien's body and so on. As the story progresses the protagonist jumps from body to body until he/she slowly loses his/her own identity.  Also the story is written in a funny/light tone.   I've read this story in Russian but I am sure that it was translated. The story was a part of collection of short sci-fi stories.
23414
Plot Summary/Details  The sharpest memory I have of this one is that it was unusually dense reading. Much more difficult going than most of the sci-fi stuff I'd read by that time (I was 10 or 11, I think).  What I remember in terms of plot is that there is a starship, sent either to explore, or colonize, a distant star system.  I don't remember the names of any of the characters, but I think maybe they discover they are clones?  In any case, something happens to the computer system that the onboard AI becomes sentient and develops a measure of omniscience and omnipotence.  It effectively becomes a god of sorts.  The next part I can remember, and I'm not sure this is the same book or not, is that the ship has forcibly settled the crew on a hostile planet.  All sorts of nasty indigenous life forms live here, and guards are post on the wall outside the settlement to destroy them as they try to enter.  I remember there is a female character standing watch, and she goes over the bestiary in her mind.  One particularly nasty creature paralyzes you, and then burrows up your spine into your brain (or something like that) if it gets a hold of you.  That's all I can recall.  Not a lot of detail, unfortunately, but I'm having a tough time remembering much about this one.  I never finished the book(s), as they were mostly "over my head" at that age.
116829
I think this was a classic "golden oldie" hard sci-fi novel or novella published at least several decades ago.   I recollect:   An accident or crew mutiny causes the ship's ramjet or similar engine to not "turn off" or something. So the ships continues accelerating towards c. As the outside universe "speeds up" they steer the ship to edge of galaxies and/or the universe itself to lower the gas density to something that their ramjet and (energy?) shielding can handle. The universe experiences a big crunch, but apparently their ship is outside the area of effect and spirals both the contraction and then the new big bang; slowing down in some fashion (new physics? crew fixed the ramjet? temporary deceleration?) in the new universe enough for a couple of the remaining crew to escape pod from the ship to a conveniently habitable planet.   But I don't recall the name of the book.
7143
I'm a huge fan of SF from the golden age of SF, so this could be a fairly old book.  It was a story about a "generation" starship or sublight starship.  I believe most of the story was about their journey and some of the problems and difficulties.  I believe that something strange is observed along the way which later turns out to be them being passed by an FTL starship which was developed, on their long voyage, after they left Earth.  When they arrived at their destination they were amazed and, I believe, disheartened to be greeted by people from Earth.
31954
There's a book that I read several years ago that I'd like to find.  However, I cannot remember enough about it to find it myself.  Neither the title nor author remain in my mind, nor any keyword or phrase that's unique enough for the Grand Google to nail for me.  Hence my desperate plea here.  In the book, there is an interstellar civilization composed of several power blocks.  The entire civilization did not fill the galaxy, but it did span several stellar systems.  Maybe 10s or 100s.  I seem to remember that one of the civilizations was a decentralized group referred to as the Brotherhood and they seemed to have been keen on preserving old learning and political ideals.  A derelict alien spacecraft from outside all of this had been discovered and at least two of the power blocks sent ships to recover it.  I don't recall if they knew at the time about the power the alien ship had, but they must have had some clue since there was some urgency in capturing this ship.  One of the ships sent to capture the Alien craft was commanded by somebody who was rather shaken up, to say the least.  He had had some big trauma in his past (like... the last ship he captained was annihilated with all hands.) so he was kinda bummed out about things and wasn't really putting his heart into getting this done.  He was assisted by the ship's AI who had a lot of soul-to-soul chats with the captain, and at one point almost relieved him of command because he was just not getting the job done.  I think the ship's name was Boaz.  These were the "good guys".  There was at least one other ship sent from the "bad guys."  The alien craft had some remarkable powers.  The interior volume was apparently infinite and the operators could see and manipulate anything in the universe.  There might have been some example given where all the rats somewhere were found and disposed of.  Whoever had control was tempted by the ole absolute power corrupts absolutely problem, but nobody but nobody could stop them because of their power.  They could eat and multiply within the ship and become real bad-asses.  But alas... (or hurray, depending upon which side you're one) everything fails eventually, and whoever controlled the ship would eventually succumb to some horrible end.  Whereupon the ship became derelict again until some other lucky race found it and repeated the cycle.  The ship had an AI that was real interested in taking the power for itself, but there was some mechanical, spring-loaded, mechanism outside of its control that needed to be worked in order to execute power.  The AI apparently never figured out how to "work the spring" and this made him crazy angry.  The ending is equally foggy for me.  I'm pretty sure the good guys got the ship.  They agonized over what to do with it.  Apparently it was indestructable and nobody wanted to taste the temptation of all that power.  In the end they dumped it on the surface of a neutron star.  There it sat forever more, probably with the crazy AI really pissed off about being there.  If you've read this book, you'll recognize it immediately from these clues.  I'm looking forward to finding out the name of this book.  Thanks!
80466
The plot is about:   A spaceship travelling through the universe Earth is a rogue planet whose inhabitants have been cut off and don't realise that their true purpose is to be part of the spaceship   The reason earth was in turmoil (wars etc.) was that they didn't realise that their true role was to fit into the ship  The ship contained 3 or 4 beings that made the thing work Planets throughout the universe are populated with the various beings which are components of the space craft   I seem to remember like an eye shaped being Each of them fulfil their role Humans are part of that as well.  There are loads of planets with humans on but earth has gotten overlooked so it never realised that's what they were designed for The story concludes with the ships picking up someone from Earth   and with the "human" realising that this is what they should really be doing  Humans have a different name that explains their role in the ship.   I probably read it around 30 years ago in English in a sci-fi collection book.
68043
The story is basically told from an alien's point of view. Essentially they observed us from far off, deemed us as violent and a danger to the universe, and set course (asteroid or something) to kill us. They kept observing and saw all the art and beauty we created and realized we were actually not so bad, but by then they couldn't stop it. So it was sort of also an apology letter to Earth in the end.  First read it like a year ago online and I can't find any trace of it anymore, nor can I recall the site it was on. Anyone know what short story this is?
77662
I remember reading it in mid-to-late 90s.  It was a hardcover with a huge starship drawn on the cover.  The plot was about humans making first contact with a new alien species, when aliens suddenly attack and quite easily destroy the entire fleet.  Only one survivor is taken prisoner to the aliens' homeworld, where he is being prodded, tested, and evaluated.  The survivor happens to be a son of some important general who sends an elite force of commandos to rescue him.  In the meantime humans are preparing for the inevitable invasion.  The ending seemed open, as if this book was part of a set.  Seems like I may be missing closure to this story.
94049
This is a short story I recall reading somewhere about an unmanned ship's computer.  The story begins with a computer's component receiving an unusual signal, but the computer doesn't understand why it is unusual. By attempting to understand the reason for its confusion, gradually it realizes that its core is badly damaged. It attempts to send a drone to install the only remaining replacement core, but the drone and the core hurtles through a hole in the side of the ship, which the computer failed to notice as well (due to the damage). The computer is now stranded drifting through space, with the realization that it is irrevocably damaged and cannot repair itself.
119449
I read a story in a sci-fi short story collection (about 35 years ago) in which the POV character is fleeing invading aliens with his child in his arms (I think the wife is dead).  He knows he's about to be caught and killed by these rapacious, violent aliens who just want to destroy. Finally, the alien emerges from the trees and the story describes how the hero looks - feline, with a tail.  The hero confronts the killer - man!  It was a cool story that blew my 8th grade mind.  BTW, its not Frenzy.
115275
I read a short story in an anthology around 1998 (the book could have been older than that) which went like this - A human space exploration scientific crew is exploring an alient planet (peaceful planet, as I recall) when they run into an alien spaceship (from a different planet which also happened to be there) - the aliens were telepaths.   The alien commander and first officer discuss the earthlings after a meeting and realize that the human crew are the descendants of a species (Banthu/Klanthu/Zantha, something like that) which had tried to violently take over the galaxy some 20/30/50,000 years ago and which had been beaten back by the combined might of the rest of the galaxy. They had supposedly been eliminated but they somehow managed to survive and are back in space only a few thousand years after they were completely beaten (which is something the aliens are amazed by).   The alien commander kills the human explorers via telepathy but realizes that there is no information available to locate their home planet and speculate that they will be meeting again soon given the past history of the humans.  I vaguely think there was also a fantasy short by L Sprague de Camp in the same anthology, but can't be 100% sure. Any thoughts/ideas? Thanks!
29595
My memory about this story is rather short. I only remember the following points :-  The story was in a collection of stories.  In this, a robot/AI of some sort traps 2 people on a spaceship and sends them off.  On the ship, they realise that they are travelling in space unaided and try to scour the ship for any life-saving-essentials they can find.  The AI admits to some other people what it has done and assures them that the 2 men have all the essentials that they need.  The 2 men suddenly find a sort of cabinet that they claimed wasn't there before. In that, they find beans and milk.  The AI/robot was named &quot;The Brain&quot;.
7876
In about 1966 or so, a stand-in teacher at our primary school spent the afternoon reading short stories to us. There was a wide genre, but I was particularly fond a one which was science fiction/mystery.  It involved a group of people who were talking about mysteries, and another man from outside the group bet the he could tell a story, and one of them would disappear and the others would not notice. The final line was something like "he kicked over the stool and walked from the room".
8087
It's a short story that I read in a book at some point in the 1990's. It was the French translation, so it might have been older. I believe it was a short story by Isaac Asimov, set in the early days of the Galactic Empire from Foundation, but I may be wrong.  The story had someone sent to visit an asteroid colony, might have been a mining colony, for some reason. The visitor is a sort of official and soon realizes that there's something wrong when he interacts with the local officials, and he's told the guy in charge of maintaining the plumbing is on strike.  Short explanation ensues and the visitor learns that no one in the colony would make direct contact with the plumber because he is unclean thus outcast, since he also deals with waste and the dead. Visitor offers to go negotiate on behalf of the colonists because he's not bound by their caste system, to which the colony official happily agree. The negotiations go well and the plumber resumes his work.  However, when the visitor tries to go back to the colony, he finds the way blocked and he is directed, through automated doors and voices coming out of speakers, back to his shuttle and asked to leave the colony because, since he was in contact with the plumber, he's become unclean too thus the colony officials cannot get in contact with him anymore.