fractalnavel

recent thread:

me:

Subject: Fwd: Amazon.com Presents the 2005 Hugo Award Winners

 

now this is really passing on junk mail, but some of those stories look really good. who is "charlie stross" ? lots of nominated works, never heard of him. and the book "the algebraist" looks like a lot of fun.

 

craig:

I read about Hugo awards on scifi.com a week or so ago. I agree some of them look very worthy. Lately I haven't had much success with award books and movies. Watched (or rather tried to watch) Shakespeare in Love the other night. Academy award film. Boooring, slow and just a waste of time. I read that Dan Simmons has written a new book. He was an award winner with one of those books with the shrike monster. Man was that a dumb book. I know you liked it but I just couldn't get into it. Although I will say that I picked up on Robert Sawyer and Nancy Kress this way, reading their Hugo award books. Both really good storytellers.

 

me:

"storyteller". that's what simmons lacks, he's not as smooth as others in that regard. there are much worse out there that i still like because the ideas they present are so unique.

 

as far as the hyperion series went, you had to read at least the first two books to make any sense of things. sometimes it was a forced march. there are two more books that may or may not shore up some other shortcomings from the first two, but i haven't read them.

 

i'd have to look at the award winners over the years to see how things have gone. i know up until the 70's they seemed pretty consistently good. but that was just before the current era started, and we've had discussions about that before.

 

i don't really expect to be "wowed" by new ideas in scifi anymore; it seems there's a natural limit to imagination. so other factors come into play, like stories and characterization. but that's not why i read scifi, so i don't have a lot of motivation these days to pick things up.

 

now, for younger folks who have yet to be exposed to the huge array of concepts in the genre, scifi is still a gold mine, better than ever. unfortunately, there are also land mines.

 

craig:

I checked out all the hugo nominees and the winner. Very underwhelming. What's with all the fantasy stuff? I thought Hugo was only scifi? One of those books isn't even scifi, it's a murder mystery. The author just happened to write a non-scifi book and gets nominated for a Hugo. Whats up with that? I guess I'll follow the other awards like Sidewise and Nebula. I remember last year's winners were about as lame. I think scifi.com covered the Sidewise awards which I thoght were pretty good, not the Hugos.

me:

the only one i bothered to check on was that "alebraist" one, and that sounded like fun, but nothing world-shaking.

 

i always felt that some of the best stories in scifi were the odd-length ones that are too short for stand-alone novels, and too long for anthologizing. there is a real wealth of classics in that limbo that you never see because of the publishing difficulties. that's why i used to buy up all the "tor double novels" i could find (two shorter stories that together made up barely a book length publication), there was some really cool stuff in those.

 

even though today's copyright laws have locked down all that stuff for the rest of our lifetimes and beyond, they're not likely to ever make anyone any money because of the issues i mentioned. so, why not provide them on the web ?

 

the other thing i'd like to see is some way of sorting through the pile of trash for the gems. although not foolproof and always contentious, some public rating database along the lines of imdb's would be helpful. i think i've come across some limited rating sites out there, but they're not very helpful. unfortunately, the fractitiousness of the scifi world, although of real benefit in some respects, works against the genre in cases like this.

 

as for the fact that the genre is "science fiction _and_fantasy_", i think it's long past due time when these two sub-genres would benefit from separation. in the early days it made sense for them to be combined, given their small contribution to the totality of literature, but now they've got substantial independent and distinct identities and fan bases. of course, there are always cross-over works, but they are a minority and can go either way, and in no way should keep captive the larger bodies of work.

 

however, that is the status-quo, and always has been, so i guess i'm surprised that you're surprised ;-) 

 

craig:

I always thought that fantasy books had their own set of awards, distinct from scifi awards like Hugo and Nebula. The fantasy genre is my mind is bigger than scifi at the moment. Plenty of hobbit/vampire/Harry Potter books and movies out there. As far as movies are, I think some of them are really good. It seems like fantasy has turned a corner in movies. Instead of being either horror based or child based they've figured out how to hone the best part of fantasy stories and have come up with some really good movies. However on the scifi side of things, there hasn't been a good scifi flick in quite awhile. The last Star Wars film was maybe the only one I can think of. The last Matrix movie was good too. Scifi movies have de-evolved into a vehicle for either horror or action based movies and crappy ones at that. Well I guess this would be a good blog eh?

me:

not to mention the huge influx of anime and other things.

 

i think science fiction is always going to be inherently more difficult to do in any medium.  i think there's stricter constraints.  hell, fantasy worlds create their own, or not, as they please.  so it's going to be easier to do special effects for fantasy.  one also has to consider that scifi has had a concept escalation that has effectively maxed out, and it is as far beyond visualization as it is beyond imagination.  so what you get are "scifi" films that are really pseudo-technological fantasies, which may validly be considered something else entirely.  matrix and starwars are kind of in these camps.

 

as for what "real" scifi movies would be like if we assume the above criteria (which is questionable), it's hard to say.  how do you visualize quantum, nano and cosmological effects ?  you don't, not with any accuracy.  you get things like "what the bleep" and "elegant universe", which were fun, but irrelevant to the realities they discussed.

 

i think stories that are primarily "horror" based, regardless of other trappings, have no place in either scifi or fantasy.  so things like "alien" would be non-scifi.  well, they are and they're not, shades of gray and all.  but such elements would seem to be valid evaluation criteria that would contribute negatively to the overall scifi or fantasy nature of a work.

 

fantasies that are limited to magic, battles and exotic creatures are not at root any different than the original king kong.  their realm is, in the end, much more concrete than advanced science.  the _source_ of the magics, etc., is usually left out, or simply implied with abstract or surreal symbolic effects, which is just fine for magics.

 

perhaps as society becomes more technologically and scientifically sophisticated, approaching the visualizable frontiers, it doesn't matter where the rest of science progresses.  so eventually scifi will be subsumed in conteporary culture, and it will effectively disappear.  space operas like bsg and sg-1 will continue, but those are old ideas, and their value is mostly in the non-science aspects of the productions.  charlie jade is an example of the newer contemporization effect.

 

as for fantasies, they depend on unassailable mysticisms that of course can never be commonplace objective occurences / experiences (what does _that_ say about religions ? ;-)).   the only thing i can think that could work to their detriment may be the discrediting (there's a better word) of superstitions, religions, etc. -  or, at the other extreme, the complete assimilation by one of the competing beliefs (eg, if "intelligent design" displaced all science, etc.).

 

perhaps a mature society will eventually dispense with its fairy tales altogether.  not sure what _any_ kind of fiction would look like in a world like that.  not to fear though, there's no danger of _that_ happening ;-)

 

 

blogging: when the thread is done, i guess.

not “identity” - “intelligent design” :

on evolution

A DEBATE OVER DARWIN
Squaring God and Evolution

Articles in this series examine the debate over the teaching of evolution and the politically astute challenge led by the Discovery Institute.

PART 1
Challenging the Theory
Politicized Scholars Put Evolution on the Defensive (August 21, 2005)

PART 2
Evolution or Design?
In Explaining Life's Complexity, Darwinists and Doubters Clash (August 22, 2005)

PART 3
Squaring God and Evolution
Scientists Speak Up on Mix of God and Science (August 23, 2005)

rough notes on the creationism / intelligent design “debate”:

• a nyt opinion: Editorial Observer: Grasping the Depth of Time as a First Step in Understanding Evolution
• not just the immense time scale, but the even more immense parallelism at play in evolution.  the opportunities for complexity to arise are enormous - !
• maybe consider the issues not only from an a priori standpoint, but also a posteriori: assume we accept or reject such-and-such, what are the positive / negative consequences ?  for creationism, it would seem to be relevant only to ethical and moral agendas, not scientific or technological ones.  for evolution, there are of course technical implications, but also ethical ones and historical ones.  it is an uneven field - and that's good.
• popperian definition of science (often boiled down to “falsifiability” ) may be problematic, as may be any definition, but imperfection doesn't justify outright rejection
• define “designer”. define “intelligence”.
• i've heard one i.d. supporter say something to the effect that just as cells or other parts of our bodies are not aware of the greater complexity realities (?) of our bodies, we won't necessarily be aware of something of greater complexity than ourselves of which we are a a part.  then he goes on to apply something resembling proof by induction to say that ultimately there is a universal complexity, and then declares this possibility as suggestive of i.d.  counterpoint: nested hierarchies of complexities have nothing to do with intention or intelligence, and the perception of emergent properties at various levels is dependent on the observer, not representative of any absoulute “truth”.
• it seems this need by religious folks to dispute science - and so many other things - really represents an insecurity, rather than an unshakeable faith.  well, of course.
• in some sense perhaps the i.d. people are less naive (or ingenuous) in their estimation of the import of evolution than is the science community, at the same time that their naivete with respect to faith is exposed.  the converse is also true of scientists.  forests and trees, i guess.
• what are some other alternatives to explaining the origins of current state of affairs, scientific or religious ?  all of science is extremely consistent internally, and i.d. stands against the body of evidence and theories accumulated by all of science, not just evolution.  evolution does not exist in some ideological vacuum.  this is the same criteria that any competing “theory” would face, regardless of underlying motivation. so i.d. is faced with integrating itself into the existing body of scientific knowledge - or with supplanting it.  even the catholic church's huge body of (cosmological) theology couldn't ultimately stand up to one man with a piece of ground glass, and i.d. is nowhere near achieving that magntitude of a body of knowledge. 
• what of godelian incompleteness ?
• this does not mean there are not important psycho-social issues to resolve.  but they should be addressed directly and explicitly for what they are, not through reactionary ideological proxies.
• argue the reverse: it's the lack of complexity that is the hallmark of “designed” objects.  we cannot create life.  in fact, we recognize the work of “intelligence” by the presence of geometric or other relatively simple patterns.  one might argue that higher and higher intelligences can create even more complexity, but i think you can always trump this by pointing out a complexity beyond their ability to create.  it's the difference between finite and infinite.  no “god” could do better than evolution (“better”?).  and even then, we are only perceiving an infinitesimal portion of all possible existing patterns, let alone all past and future ones. 
• and also a reminder-to-self here to consider anti-entropic processes.

iraq, aka “new texas” ?

there must be more of these...

in other news, it seems the military's force transformation initiative is directed at creating a global protection racket.  read between the lines of “Base closings hint at new air strategy”.  you don't think ? then how will american taxpayers be able to continue to foot the bill for protecting the increasingly free market places in the rest of the world ?  the other economies get the benefits, but none of the costs, of that protection.  that's not what i call “competition”.  they also get the benefits of free markets without the costs of many services, rights and privileges that we take for granted here. 

it's already established national policy to use military force abroad to “preserve” national security - and that includes economic security.  that typically means strong-arming regions into giving us what we want at otherwise unavailable terms.  don't want to play that game with us ?  no problem, we'll withdraw our “protection”.  even better, we'll throw our support behind groups that oppose you.

all old news.  the new part is that now it seems we will be doing the dirty work directly.

just an unbalanced note on one aspect of the issues here to remind me of some of the dynamics at play.

the disclaimer for tonight's network tv broadcast of “beautiful mind”. 

give - me - a - break.

double category entry here, and an unusual flag.  this one isn't about politics, but is still has social impact.

i was in a local drugstore during a recent heatwave, and the power went out.  instead of servicing the customers already in the store before shutting down, they kicked everyone out then and there.  which kinda sucked since i was just finishing up, and shopping time isn't necessarily trivial.  right down the drain.  and why ?  the computers were down.  if they are that critical to a business, a proper operating plan should at least include enough backup power (from ups, generator, whatever) to process some expected number of shoppers.  i suppose they may also have been concerned about theft & security.  again, where's the backup power ? 

i saw an article about the recent virus outbreak where the people just sat and twiddled their thumbs when the computers went down.  didn't matter what type of business it was, that was the result.  news agencies, customs, retailers, ...  all were basically taken completely offline and all operations halted.

you'd think some lessons would have been learned after the wtc incident.  you'd think the blackouts a couple years back would have taught lessons as well.  well, the lessons were there, but the prospective students were all skipping class.

so what's the flag ?  not just the inadequate technical infrastructure, which is bad enough.  that's solvable, for a price.  if our society is that heavily dependent on electronic devices then it is in taxpayers' interest to have a much more robust systems.  if that means mini-generating stations on every block, or some other localized backup, so be it.  or must we legislate that every independent business facility have their own backup systems ?  this is already done with critical services such as fire, police and medical.

of course, that's just the power supply side of things.  computing resources are affected by many things, like viruses.  and to a society whose lifeblood seems to be information, computing needs the same robustness as does power, perhaps more so. 

but it's not necessarily the vulnerable computing itself which needs to be directly addressed.  people and businesses have forgotten how to operate without computing machinery.  for years, unreliable computing was a concern that was addressed by having manual failover processes.  that required some duplication of effort and recordkeeping, but was seen as necessary given the uncertainties. 

now it seems we accept the inherent reliabilities in return for hyper-streamlining of nearly all processes.  i can understand the difficulties involved when the computing based changes have resulted in qualitatively different approaches, or even entirely new businesses.  but for retail, customs and even news ?  the manual failover processes are obvious and simple.  will things be as efficient ? no.  but a complete stoppage is much less efficient than even that.

apparently the business lost - to a company, or even a nation's economy - is seen as an acceptable risk in terms of cost / benefit analysis.  on the other hand, a lot of people in the front lines are just looking for any excuse not to work for a little bit.  computer down ?  no problem, i needed the breather anyway [wink].  nothing new there.

i don't know if this nearly complete dependence on computers is a great success story, or a horrible tragedy waiting to happen.  or maybe it's already happened.

teeny tiny bunny (palm sized)

everything's gone brown around here, little rain and hot days are the worst i've seen in seven summers here. so i'm trying to rescue a small ornamental tree in front (i think it's too little too late), and as i'm examining the water flow around the tree, one underfoot lump didn't feel right - no wonder ! poor little guy (girl?), got tromped on by an ogre. he seemed to have come through the experience all right, just seeming a tiny bit shaken and mostly sleepy, not to mention a little bit wet. good thing i wasn't mowing the lawn.

i just went out and checked; apparently i flooded a nest - he's got two siblings sticking their noses out of the water filled fluff- & moss-lined hole.  i hope they aren't standing on top of any brothers or sisters.  and where's mom ?