Canadian sf author Karl Schroeder has the sort of day job that anyone with a science fictional mindset would probably love to have – he’s a foresight consultant. Luckily, as internet denizens we can enjoy the fruits of his thinking without having to lash out on consultancy fees. Here’s his latest article for the consistently excellent Worldchanging blog, wherein Schroeder discusses the ecological footprint of humans as a species, and how we should approach our existence on Earth in much the same way as we would build a colony on another planet.
Peter Watts on altruism
If you’ve read his fiction, you’ll probably be aware that Peter Watts doesn’t hold to the romantic notions that pervade around the idea of human altruism. He gets asked about it a lot, apparently, and so Watts decided to explain his reductionist position on human altruism publicly. Warning – unless you have a healthy cynicism about your own species, you’re not going to like what he has to say. Which leads me to believe he’s probably correct.
Interviews with Gibson and Vinge
Poor Bill Gibson – the publicity wagon for his current novel Spook Country is still rolling, and he’s probably sick to death of public appearances and interviews, itching to get back to researching his next book. Still, lucky for us – here’s another interview with Gibson by Rick ‘Agony Column’ Kleffel, in audio form for your mobile media player pleasure.
Meanwhile, Vernor Vinge has been chatting to French science fiction site ActuSF (don’t worry, text in English) about his recent (and highly recommended) novel Rainbows End. [Both links via BoingBoing]
Life on other planets
Nothing divides space geeks like the question of extraterrestrial life. SETI boffin Seth Shostak is an avowed believer, even though he concedes there’s no compelling evidence to support the assertion so far. George Dvorsky is very interested in the Fermi Paradox, too, but much more willing to pick holes in accepted philosophy.
We’re still looking, of course – but we could do with more telescopes in space to help us locate and image exoplanets, and we’re still not entirely certain of how the universe itself came to be.
ICE Encroaches on ModChip Installers
As a gamer, I hate cheaters. As a game developer, I can’t stand piracy. But as a consumer who believes if you can’t open it and hack it you don’t really own it, my personal reservations on the recent US government’s ICE sweep of Mod-Chip installers are many and varied. A slew of interesting and opinionated links on the topic are available at Slashdot.