Fictional planets of the Solar System
Counter-Earth—a planet diametrically opposite Earth in its orbit around the Sun—was originally proposed by the ancient Greek philosopher Philolaus in the fifth century BCE (albeit in a pre-heliocentric framework), and has appeared in fiction since at least the late 1800s.
Some stories depict so-called rogue planets that do not orbit any star entering the Solar System from without, typically on a collision course with Earth.
[3][10] In Paul Capon's 1950 novel The Other Side of the Sun and its sequels in the Antigeos trilogy, there are two societies on Antigeos—one of which is utopian—separated by extreme tides caused by the planet's moons.
[3][13] In Edgar Wallace's 1929 novel Planetoid 127, both individuals and events are identical between the two worlds, though with a slight and variable time difference in either direction that enables the inhabitants to gain foreknowledge by communicating with the other planet.
[16][20] An early science fiction work that mentions this explanation for the origin of the asteroids is Robert Cromie's 1895 novel The Crack of Doom, which describes the release of energy stored in atomic nuclei a few thousand years ago as the culprit.
[16][19][24][25] Interplanetary warfare with Mars causes the destruction of Bodia—and indirectly, the end of civilization on Mars—in Harl Vincent's 1930 short story "Before the Asteroids".
[20][26] An internal disaster resulting in the explosion of the planetary core is responsible in John Francis Kalland's 1932 short story "The Sages of Eros".
[20][28] Following the invention of the atomic bomb in 1945, stories of this planetary destruction became increasingly common, encouraged by the advent of a plausible-seeming means of disintegration.
[3] Robert A. Heinlein's 1948 novel Space Cadet thus states that the fifth planet was destroyed as a result of nuclear war, and in Ray Bradbury's 1948 short story "Asleep in Armageddon" (a.k.a.
[18][20][29] Several works of the 1950s reused the idea to warn of the dangers of nuclear weapons, including Lord Dunsany's 1954 Joseph Jorkens short story "The Gods of Clay" and James Blish's 1957 novel The Frozen Year (a.k.a.
[18] The planet's destruction by Martians is also mentioned in Heinlein's 1961 novel Stranger in a Strange Land, and implied to have been caused using supernatural powers.
[18][20][31] The 1977 novel Inherit the Stars, the first in James P. Hogan's Giants series, revisits the theme of the fifth planet—here called "Minerva"—being destroyed by war fought with advanced weapons.
[18][20][31] In Raymond Z. Gallun's 1950 short story "A Step Farther Out", valuables from the destroyed civilization are recovered,[30] and in Harry Harrison's 1969 novel Plague Ship, an ancient virus is found in the asteroid remnants.
[7] Paul Preuss's 1985 short story "Small Bodies", where fossils are found on an asteroid, is a late example of the destroyed planet theme;[29][32] it has otherwise largely been relegated to deliberately retro works such as the 1989 tabletop role-playing game Space: 1889.
[3][7][33] Larry Niven's 1975 short story "The Borderland of Sol" describes four additional planets in the outer reaches of the Solar System.
[7] Very distant gas giants appear in Niven and Jerry Pournelle's 1977 novel Lucifer's Hammer, where its gravitational influence alters the trajectory of a comet and puts it on a collision course with Earth, and in Peter Watts' 2006 novel Blindsight.
[42] So-called rogue planets, those that do not orbit the Sun nor any other star, occasionally turn up in the Solar System in works of fiction.
[3][43][44] A rogue planet that enters the Solar System without threatening impact with other celestial objects appears in Ross Rocklynne's 1938 short story "The Men and the Mirror".
