Turning away from politics for a while... (everyone, wipe your feet and shower first... now, have a tall drink and settle in for something different... science fiction!)
Let's start with a way cool look at the physics and paradoxes of time travel, in the newly released Time Travel: A History, by science historian James Gleick (author of The Information: A History, A Theory, A Flood). As usual, Gleick offers a delightful intellectual and verbal feast that is a pleasure to read. See an excerpt in Nautilus Magazine.
This chapter of Time Travel does not mention the array of sneaky means by which we sci fi authors try to weasel our way around causality and temporal protection. One is the universe branching point. When Spock accidentally lures a vengeful Romulan to go back in time and destroy Planet Vulcan (in J.J. Abrams's Star Trek flick) many fans consoled themselves that this is just a branching-off of a newborn parallel reality... that the older timeline still stands, where Shatner-Kirk and all the rest remain, along the original timeline, like a trellis for the new one to grow alongside.
Let's start with a way cool look at the physics and paradoxes of time travel, in the newly released Time Travel: A History, by science historian James Gleick (author of The Information: A History, A Theory, A Flood). As usual, Gleick offers a delightful intellectual and verbal feast that is a pleasure to read. See an excerpt in Nautilus Magazine.
This chapter of Time Travel does not mention the array of sneaky means by which we sci fi authors try to weasel our way around causality and temporal protection. One is the universe branching point. When Spock accidentally lures a vengeful Romulan to go back in time and destroy Planet Vulcan (in J.J. Abrams's Star Trek flick) many fans consoled themselves that this is just a branching-off of a newborn parallel reality... that the older timeline still stands, where Shatner-Kirk and all the rest remain, along the original timeline, like a trellis for the new one to grow alongside.
Well, well, that's an artistic representation of one of many ways
that physicists (at least a few) think that paradoxes might be resolved. Speaking as both
a physicist and a science fiction author, I must say that this very loose
partnership is one of the most fun that our unique and marvelous civilization
offers, during a unique and marvelous... time.
A topic covered in extensive depth by the recently released Now: The Physics of Time, by Richard A. Muller, professor and experimental physicist at UC Berkeley. What is now? "Now is at the boundary, the shock front, the new time that is coming from nothing, the leading edge of time," writes Muller, as he delves into the history, philosophy, paradoxes and science behind our current understanding of time, offering testable theories (using data from LIGO) that might be able to shed light upon the nature and flow of time.
We often talk about how science fiction has inspired scientists, but this article by Ben Narasin, The Importance of Science Fiction to Entrepreneurship, discusses how hard SF has influenced many tech startups and tech entrepreneurs from Reid to Thiel to Bezos to Musk; the article mentions works such as Stephenson’s Diamond Age and Barnes’s Mother of Storms.
A topic covered in extensive depth by the recently released Now: The Physics of Time, by Richard A. Muller, professor and experimental physicist at UC Berkeley. What is now? "Now is at the boundary, the shock front, the new time that is coming from nothing, the leading edge of time," writes Muller, as he delves into the history, philosophy, paradoxes and science behind our current understanding of time, offering testable theories (using data from LIGO) that might be able to shed light upon the nature and flow of time.
We often talk about how science fiction has inspired scientists, but this article by Ben Narasin, The Importance of Science Fiction to Entrepreneurship, discusses how hard SF has influenced many tech startups and tech entrepreneurs from Reid to Thiel to Bezos to Musk; the article mentions works such as Stephenson’s Diamond Age and Barnes’s Mother of Storms.
From imagination to reality: How Artists, Mad Scientists and Speculative Fiction Writers Made Spaceflight Possible – The Smithsonian reviews Ron Miller’s Spaceships: An Illustrated History of the Real and the Imagined, which documents the interplay between science research and science fiction, the cross-pollination of technology and popular culture upon spaceship design. He charts the origins of rockets and space stations from the sketches of Galileo and the imagination of Jules Verne, to the engineering plans of Werner von Braun and the films of Stanley Kubrick, with vivid illustrations charting the design and building of spaceships, real and imagined.
For more inspiring tales: How to Make a Spaceship: A Band of Renegades, an Epic Race, and the Birth of Private Spaceflight, by Julian Guthie (with a preface by Richard Branson) tells the inspiring tales of the bold visionaries who pushed the frontiers of space exploration through privately funded ventures -- beginning with the thrilling effort to claim the $10 million Ansari XPrize as the first commercial venture to achieve suborbital spaceflight (carrying three people to 100 km twice in two weeks). In particular the book tells the tales of Peter Diamandis (founder of the XPrize Foundation), Burt Rutan and SpaceShipOne, who won the prize, as well as forward-looking space entrepreneurs Richard Branson and Paul Allen.
Diamandis and Guthrie will be appearing at the Arthur C. Clarke Center for Human Imagination at UCSD in early November to discuss the frontiers and successes of commercial spaceflight. The Clarke Center will also host the San Diego premiere of the film Arrival in November, based on a short story by Ted Chiang (author of the collection, Stories of Your Life and Others) -- who will be on hand to discuss the movie.
And now... on to the real stuff!
== Imagining alternate futures ==
A vision of transparency from an older classic: “Normally we live surrounded by transparent walls which seem to be knitted of sparkling air; we live beneath the eyes of everyone, always bathed in light. We have nothing to conceal from one another; besides this mode of living makes the difficult and exalted task of the Guardians much easier. Without it many bad things might happen. It is possible that the strange opaque dwellings of the ancients were responsible for their pitiful cellish psychology. “My (sic!) home is my fortress!” How did they manage to think such things?”
Sound reminiscent of our modern world? It is from We, a novel by Yevgeny Zamyatin, written 1921, immediately banned in the Soviet Union (and not published in the USSR until 1988). We inspired many of the later dystopian works by Orwell, Huxley, Vonnegut and others.
A few more recent novels that look at issues of technology, transparency and secrecy in the modern world:
DarkNet, by Matthew Mather (author of CyberStorm) is a fast-paced tech thriller dealing with the shadowy world of cyberhacking, cryptocurrencies, identity theft, shell companies, and secretive DACs – Digital Autonomous Corporations, run by Artificial Intelligence. After his childhood friend is murdered by a hacked bus, and his boss charged with illicit trading, our protagonist, a New York stockbroker, finds himself at the center of a complex web of deceit. His family under threat, he is on the run from the FBI, as well as a crowdfunded Assassin’s Market -- which has placed a steep price on his head. The deeper he digs, the deeper the rabbit hole of secrecy goes…
End of Secrets by Ryan Quinn offers another thriller exploring the brave new digital world of hacking and cyber-espionage as well as government and corporate surveillance. CIA agent Kera Mersal goes deep undercover to investigate why certain artists, writers, actors and singers are disappearing, leaving no digital traces. With similarities to Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged, scribblings at the crime scenes taunt, “Have you figured it out yet?” When Mersal uncovers a secretive domestic spying program gone rogue, she doesn't know who to trust as she finds herself under suspicion – and those closest to her under threat.
Avogradro Corp: The Singularity Is Closer Than It Appears, by William Hertling, proposes the birth of Artificial Intelligence through a corporate email language optimization program developed to analyze and enhance the subtleties of human communication. This AI acquires the ability to manipulate words to manipulate people. It learns and adapts – and will do anything to ensure its survival and expand its power. A scenario continued in A.I. Apocalypse and in The Last Firewall -- when global society is run by AI, under the guidance of The Institute for Ethics. Robots and androids run much of the economy; most jobs are superfluous and neural implants allow people to connect instantly to the net and each other. Post-singularity life seems ideal – until one super-intelligence finds a way around the ethical restrictions and seeks to expand its power toward world domination….
Company Town, by Madeleine Ashby is a mystery-thriller set in a lovingly detailed near-future. Hwa is a bodyguard for sex workers -- the only natural human among the genetically-enhanced inhabitants of New Arcadia, a city-sized oil rig off the coast of Canada. In the wake of a fire that killed a third of the rig’s population, the wealthy and powerful Lynch family has taken ownership of the rig. They hire Hwa to protect their son, heir to the family fortune – for with her lack of augmentation, she alone cannot be hacked or seen by the ubiquitous facial recognition systems. A serial murderer is killing off sex workers… and someone is manipulating the future fate of this offshore city. See a more extensive review by Charlie Jane Anders.
See also... a recent look at Startide Rising on Fantasy Book Review.
If you're looking for an intense immersive science fictional adventure, check out Event Horizon on Kickstarter, a weekend of Live Action Role Playing (LARP), taking place up north of San Francisco this spring. Choose your character, choose your alien homeworld -- in a galaxy on the edge of chaos; choose your weapon and fight for the fate of the galaxy....