Vernor Vinge's _A Fire Upon the Deep_
Dan Briggs
book was freshly out. I hadn't read it then, and hence avoided most of
the messages for fear of spoilers. (There are no significant spoilers
here.) Apologies if it's come up too recently and I haven't seen it.
I just read it and enjoyed myself thoroughly. The major plot of struggle
against a near omnipotent evil was fun, but a little bit hackneyed in
places. The secondary plot of an adventure on the Tines' world was fun,
largely because the Tines are such interesting beasties that it would be
hard to write much about them that wasn't at least somewhat interesting.
The thing that made it the most fun, and a 'must read' for any self
respecting net.sf.citizen (IMHO) is his description of a Galaxy wide
Usenet.
His network really does resemble Usenet more than any of the other
commercial networks that I know of. The headers even look like they follow
RFC-100000 or so. And Vernor's characterization of the different
characters one runs across on the net was *perfect*. Vernor absolutely has
to have done some background research here -- not at all unreasonable,
since he is an academic CS professor. I found myself reading each message
from the net and trying to guess who it most resembled on today's net.
(This Twirlip "Hexapodia as the key insight" of the mists dude, is he
closer to Alexander "Time has inertia" Abian or Ludwig "The universe is a
plutonium atom" Plutonium?) In a lot of cases this is pretty hopeless,
since the same people aren't posting now as when it was written. But one
case in particular really struck me as likely based on a real person.
"Sandor Arbitration Intelligence at the Zoo" really screams Henry Spencer
to me. This is hardly an original thought, since in the thread titles I
dimly remember from before, I recall people debating this very question.
But I too see the resemblence, and it caused me to wonder if there was any
conclusion reached in the earlier discussion. Did anyone ever get in touch
with Vinge directly and ask him? Are there any other network personalities
in the book that have less obvious real world mappings?
All in all, well worth the read. (It *is* a Hugo "Best Novel" winner,
btw.) If any of you like me just hadn't gotten around to it, consider
yourself encouraged.
--
| Daniel Briggs (dbr...@nrao.edu) | USPA C-23367
| New Mexico Tech / National Radio Astronomy Observatory | DoD #387
| P.O. Box O / Socorro, NM 87801 (505) 835-7391 |
| Dart: MC Ot+W H 4 Y L+ W C+ I++ T++ A+ H+ S+ V+ P++/P B+ |
Mike Arnautov
> I just read it and enjoyed myself thoroughly.
I am just finishing it and am also enjoying it enormously. IMHO it is
the best science fiction book in *ages*. I didn't start with any great
expectations, having been disappointed by the supposedly brilliant books
many times in the past -- so I had a really pleasant surprise!
> The thing that made it the most fun, and a 'must read' for any self
> respecting net.sf.citizen (IMHO) is his description of a Galaxy wide
> Usenet.
While I agree that the Known Net is fun, it is the concept of "zones"
and their "sub-zones" (High Beyond, Low Transcend etc...) that really
makes Vinge's universe a major new invention. Even if he never invents
anything else and spends the rest of his career writing books in the
setting of the zoned galaxy (and I *do* hope he will write a few, at
least! :-), the concept is quite enough to ensure him an honoured place
in the annals of SF. I just *love* the baroque Milky Way, full of
mysteries, incomprehensible technologies and forgotten lore. A
tremendous come-back for space opera!
There a few loose ends which I wonder whether any rational suggestions
have been offered for. (I deliberately avoided all previous discussions
of the book, to avoid spoilers.) Small things, like
1. Why should OOB II carry any "flamed trellises"?
2. Why can't a "flamed trellis" be manufactured by "reality graphics"?
(Fractal structure?)
3. What *are* the limitation of the "reality graphics" technique?
4. What originally triggered Old One's interest?
5. What major change occurs on the Beyond/Transcend boundary?
Etc, etc...
--
Mike Arnautov
mla...@ggr.co.uk
Tony Zbaraschuk
Dan Briggs <dbr...@nrao.edu> wrote:
>(This Twirlip "Hexapodia as the key insight" of the mists dude, is he
>closer to Alexander "Time has inertia" Abian or Ludwig "The universe is a
>plutonium atom" Plutonium?)
Actually, Twirlip is the ONLY person who actually has a clue what's going
on. Hexapodia sounds crazy, right... but remember that (A) Twirlip's posts
are coming through several layers of translation, and (B) Skoderiders have
SIX limbs (well, OK, wheels -- but it IS a translation.)
Tony Z
--
"I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its
swiftness. I love that which they defend, the city of the Men of Numenor."
--- Faramir, _The Two Towers_
Arthur Bernard Byrne
>But one case in particular really struck me as likely based on a
>real person.
>"Sandor Arbitration Intelligence at the Zoo" really screams Henry Spencer
>to me.
Ummm... someone hit me with a e-mail clue-- who? what groups?
claim to (in)fame(y)?
>Are there any other network personalities
>in the book that have less obvious real world mappings?
Well, there's the passing reference to the "Sndwhp Oracle" (sp?),
who is "the only oracle currently on the net... a little unreliable".
This is a reasonably accurate summary (for some large value of "little")
of the Usenet Oracle, <ora...@cs.indiana.edu>, and perhaps a reference
to same.
AB^2
--
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Go not unto Usenet for advice, for the denizens will say both yes, and no,
and maybe, and I don't know, and buzz off, and...." --Unknown net.wit
Robert Winfield
: and their "sub-zones" (High Beyond, Low Transcend etc...) that really
: makes Vinge's universe a major new invention. Even if he never invents
"Brain Wave" if you like hte idea of thought zones in the galaxy
I have read Fire on Deep a total of 3x since there was so much stuff
there i miss parts each time. very enjoyaable
Brad Templeton
>makes Vinge's universe a major new invention. Even if he never invents
>anything else and spends the rest of his career writing books in the
>setting of the zoned galaxy (and I *do* hope he will write a few, at
>least! :-), the concept is quite enough to ensure him an honoured place
But here is a question to answer. Would you rather he wrote another
book set in these zones, or wrote another book in a new universe that
he tries to make just as creatively devised?
>5. What major change occurs on the Beyond/Transcend boundary?
I seem to recall it was the ability of computers to use FTL internal
circuitry, which, we presume has some interesting computational theoretical
results.
--
Brad Templeton, publisher, ClariNet Communications Corp. | www.clarinet.com
The net's #1 Electronic newspaper (circulation 80,000) | in...@clarinet.com
John Novak
>But here is a question to answer. Would you rather he wrote another
>book set in these zones, or wrote another book in a new universe that
>he tries to make just as creatively devised?
When dealing with an author of Vinge's talent and imagination, my
answer is thus:
I'll read whatever he bloody chooses to write.
--
John S. Novak, III Minions wanted
j...@cegt201.bradley.edu See .plan for details
The Humblest Man on the Net
Mike Arnautov
> you migght try also reading a fairly old novel by Poul Anderson called
> "Brain Wave" if you like hte idea of thought zones in the galaxy
Read it -- years ago. OK, but not exceptional. Vinge's zones are much
more interesting being (a) non-random (Anderson's might have been, of
course, but not as the story is told) and (b) more physically specific
(the Slow/Beyond boundary is very specific with a very specific change
in physics).
br...@clarinet.com (Brad Templeton) writes:
> But here is a question to answer. Would you rather he wrote another
> book set in these zones, or wrote another book in a new universe that
> he tries to make just as creatively devised?
The answer is dead simple -- BOTH! :-)
> >5. What major change occurs on the Beyond/Transcend boundary?
>
> I seem to recall it was the ability of computers to use FTL internal
> circuitry, which, we presume has some interesting computational theoretical
> results.
Hmmm... I'll bear it in mind on my second read. My impression was that
this occured on the Slow/Beyond boundary, which is why no automation
worth the name could occur in the slowness. Surely FTL comms make FTL
computing just a matter of technology, not of a breakthrough in
principle.
--
Mike Arnautov
mla...@ggr.co.uk
Brad Templeton
Mike Arnautov <mla...@ggr.co.uk> wrote:
>> >5. What major change occurs on the Beyond/Transcend boundary?
>>
>> I seem to recall it was the ability of computers to use FTL internal
>> circuitry, which, we presume has some interesting computational theoretical
>> results.
>
>Hmmm... I'll bear it in mind on my second read. My impression was that
>this occured on the Slow/Beyond boundary, which is why no automation
>worth the name could occur in the slowness. Surely FTL comms make FTL
>computing just a matter of technology, not of a breakthrough in
>principle.
>
No, in the "beyond" one could, with somewhat complex equipment, send
and decode FTL signals. Inside your microchips I presume things were
limited to light.
Consider that in the one chapter where the Blight point of view is
presented, it thinks....
Below the level of supreme consciousness, its paranoid
inclinations rampaged through the humans' databases. Checking, just to
be sure. Just to be sure. The humans' oldest local network used light
speed connections. Thousands of microseconds were spent (_wasted_)
bouncing around it, sorting the trivia... finally spotting one
incredible item:
Now, this might refer to the Straumers deliberately using stupid computers
for safety, but in fact it states elsewhere than their local net is faster
than anything on Straum.
Doug Jones
: In article <3du9cj$c...@shanti.aoc.nrao.edu>,
: Dan Briggs <dbr...@nrao.edu> wrote:
: >since the same people aren't posting now as when it was written. But one
: >But one case in particular really struck me as likely based on a
: >real person.
: <SNIP>
: >"Sandor Arbitration Intelligence at the Zoo" really screams Henry Spencer
: >to me.
: Ummm... someone hit me with a e-mail clue-- who? what groups?
: claim to (in)fame(y)?
Henry always seems to have the last, authoritative, rational word on
almost any discussion in sci.space.(whatever). Met him at Space Access
94- he was the only hairier person than I there... appropriate that he
posts from a zoology department.
--
Doug Jones (ran...@usa.net)
Hummingbird Launch Systems is moribund. DCX kinda made it redundant (sigh).
Scott Schwartz
But here is a question to answer. Would you rather he wrote another
book set in these zones, or wrote another book in a new universe that
he tries to make just as creatively devised?
New universe. Definitely. A sequel for the sake of a sequel just
dilutes the magic.
Flash Sheridan
>I seem to recall it was the ability of computers to use FTL internal
>circuitry, which, we presume has some interesting computational theoretical
>results.
It might. My ex-supervisor [Robin Gandy] did a paper translating his
supervisor's [Turing] work on computability from human computation to
mechanical computation. As I recall, he had to make four plausible
assumptions on the mechanism; one of them was that there was some finite
limit on the velocity of information.
I don't have the reference at hand, but I originally found it by
looking up "Robin Gandy" in the Philosopher's Index.
Of course, if you're taking relativity and faster than light information
transfer seriously, you've got information-theoretic time travel, so you
probably wouldn't need to compute anything anyway.
--
<LI><a href="ftp://ftp.rahul.net/pub/flasheridn/snug/">Snug</a>
<LI><a href="ftp://ftp.rahul.net/pub/flasheridn/">Flash Sheridan</a>
Jo Walton
>5. What major change occurs on the Beyond/Transcend boundary?
I thought that this was the change to the Singularity - to trans-human
intelligence and therefore intelligence by definition beyond our comprehension
and un-writable about. Transcendent intelligence and technology are never
defined, but are equated with divinity. This is not such a comprehensible
physical change as the FTL boundary at the Slow/Beyond barrier.
--
Jo
*********************************************************
- - I kissed a kif at Kefk - -
*********************************************************
Diane Duane
But here's the follow-up question. How do you (at some thousands
of miles' distance, perhaps) tell the difference between a sequel
"just for the sake of a sequel", and the sequel which the author
has planned from the very beginning of a given series? Some people
can't tell, I'm here to tell you.
best! D.
Diane Duane
part of the Owl Springs Partnership, Co. Wicklow, Ireland
"A little science...a little magic...a little chicken soup."
Also on Compu$erve: 73200,3112
Best tag line seen recently: "I am Scrooge McDuck of the
Clan McDuck. There can be only one!..."
Scott Schwartz
But here's the follow-up question. How do you (at some thousands
of miles' distance, perhaps) tell the difference between a sequel
"just for the sake of a sequel", and the sequel which the author
has planned from the very beginning of a given series? Some people
can't tell, I'm here to tell you.
That's a good point. It shows that these sorts of questions don't have
binary answers, and to be honest I'm a compulsive sequel reader in any
case. I'm glad Vinge wrote _A Fire Upon the Deep_ instead of a sequel
to _Marooned in Realtime_. On the other hand, I liked _Marooned_
better than _The Peace War_. We could trade examples all day, but as
a general rule I think that once a story is done the energy that might
go into creating a sequel could otherwise be spent on something that I
would like better.
That said, artists shouldn't pander to fans, so just use your best
judgment Diane. :-)
Mike Arnautov
> >this occured on the Slow/Beyond boundary, which is why no automation
> >worth the name could occur in the slowness. Surely FTL comms make FTL
> >computing just a matter of technology, not of a breakthrough in
> >principle.
>
> No, in the "beyond" one could, with somewhat complex equipment, send
> and decode FTL signals. Inside your microchips I presume things were
> limited to light.
I can't see why, unless there is a specific physically imposed
limitation which somehow prevents ultralight to be used on very small
scales. If so, what is this limitation? Besides, if that is the case,
then what causes the gradual deterioration of the Beyond automation as
one approaches the Slow zone, and particularly, why does it break down
altogether on the boundary -- just when ultralight ceases to be possible?
> Now, this might refer to the Straumers deliberately using stupid computers
> for safety, but in fact it states elsewhere than their local net is faster
> than anything on Straum.
But that was already built on the basis of the archive info. Quoting
from the Prologue:
The archive informed the automation. Data structures were built,
recipes followed. A local network was built, faster than anything on
Straum, but surely safe.
If you are doing your damnedest to be paranoic, you certainly want your
base network to be incapable of supporting any kind of intelligence when
opening a Transcend archive, so it is logical to use the lowest
technology feasible -- a Slowness technology, rather than a Beyond one.
Flash Sheridan <FlaSh...@rahul.net> writes:
> Of course, if you're taking relativity and faster than light information
> transfer seriously, you've got information-theoretic time travel, so you
> probably wouldn't need to compute anything anyway.
Only true under the rules of physics we know and love (or hate, as
the case may be). _AFUtD_ postulates a different physics beyond the
Slow zone, so no paradoxes need occur.
--
Mike Arnautov
mla...@ggr.co.uk
Vociferous Mole
>Arthur Bernard Byrne (ab...@fulton.seas.Virginia.EDU) wrote:
>: In article <3du9cj$c...@shanti.aoc.nrao.edu>,
>: Dan Briggs <dbr...@nrao.edu> wrote:
>: >"Sandor Arbitration Intelligence at the Zoo" really screams Henry Spencer
>: >to me.
>
>: Ummm... someone hit me with a e-mail clue-- who? what groups?
>: claim to (in)fame(y)?
>
>Henry always seems to have the last, authoritative, rational word on
>almost any discussion in sci.space.(whatever). Met him at Space Access
>94- he was the only hairier person than I there... appropriate that he
>posts from a zoology department.
comp.std.c, too. Author of "Henry Spencer's 10 Commandments for C
Programmers", more good advice wrapped up in 10 sentences than most
people give in their life-time.
--
The Mole - I think, therefore I scream
"Been through Hell? Whaddya bring back for me?"
[A. Brilliant]
Mike Arnautov
> br...@clarinet.com (Brad Templeton) writes:
> But here is a question to answer. Would you rather he wrote another
> book set in these zones, or wrote another book in a new universe that
> he tries to make just as creatively devised?
>
> New universe. Definitely. A sequel for the sake of a sequel just
> dilutes the magic.
Hang on... Who said anything about "sequels"? Stories set in the same
universe are not necessarily sequels, are they? My feeling is that the
"zoned" Galaxy is a rich enough environment for any number of
independent novels, stories and even series. :-)
--
Mike Arnautov
mla...@ggr.co.uk
John Novak
>I thought that this was the change to the Singularity - to trans-human
>intelligence and therefore intelligence by definition beyond our comprehension
>and un-writable about. Transcendent intelligence and technology are never
>defined, but are equated with divinity. This is not such a comprehensible
>physical change as the FTL boundary at the Slow/Beyond barrier.
It is possible to bring about such a change through a simple
change in the laws of physics if the Transcend physics allow
machine or machine-natural-blend intelligences to become as far
ahead of ours as, say, ours are ahead of squirrels'.
Joe Slater
>br...@clarinet.com (Brad Templeton) writes:
>> No, in the "beyond" one could, with somewhat complex equipment, send
>> and decode FTL signals. Inside your microchips I presume things were
>> limited to light.
>I can't see why, unless there is a specific physically imposed
>limitation which somehow prevents ultralight to be used on very small
>scales. If so, what is this limitation?
Perhaps the fact that the equipment is complex. There must be some minimum
size for this device, and that means that it is effectively impossible to
use FTL over shorter distances. There's not much point in being able to
send data FTL over a distance of half a centimeter, if it takes a device
tens of centimeters in diameter to do so.
jds
--
j...@zikzak.apana.org.au | `You may call it "nonsense" if you
T: +61-3-525-8728 F: +61-3-562-0756 | like, but I'VE heard nonsense, com-
If all else fails try Fidonet: | pared with which that would be as sen-
joe_s...@f351.n632.z3.fidonet.org | sible as a dictionary!' - The Red Queen
JMKE...@news.delphi.com
regions of space affect computation and thinking) is trivial in the
transcend, and becomes ever more demanding the deeper into the beyond you
go, increasing asymptotically as you approach the slow zone. (At and
beyond the slow zone boundary, it's impossible to do the computation.)
Comments?
Chris Clayton
>>I thought that this was the change to the Singularity - to trans-human
>>intelligence and therefore intelligence by definition beyond our comprehension
snip
>It is possible to bring about such a change through a simple
>change in the laws of physics if the Transcend physics allow
>machine or machine-natural-blend intelligences to become as far
>ahead of ours as, say, ours are ahead of squirrels'.
One interesting thing is that human intelligence, which originated in the Slowness,
doesn't seem to increase much in the Beyond. On the other hand, going into
the Unthinking Depths makes one quite stupid. I get the sense that the
Transcend allows thinking beings to attain a level of intelligence that produces
changes similar to the Singularity of Marooned in Realtime, or that Poul Anderson
talks about in Brain Wave. But all that seems to happen at the Slow/Beyond
barrier is that technology changes.
The other thing that I wonder about is that Vinge speaks of civilizations and
cultures becoming Transcendant, but the Transcend Powers are spoken of
as individuals, not civilizations. Does Transcendence cause group minds,
sort of like Olaf Stapeldon's "advanced" human cultures in Last and First Men?
Chris Clayton
Return mail to: USFM...@ibmmail.com
Ford has a better idea, but the opinions are all mine.
David W. Levine
--
David W. Levine -- d...@watson.ibm.com -- IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center
-- My Opinions, IBM's hardware. --
"Fanaticism consists in redoubling your efforts when you have forgotten your
aim" - George Santayana
Something of this sort, coupled with another effect described in the book
would seem to be the culprit. When the erruption of the slow zone washes
over the fleet chasing OOB II, they lose thier "ultra-wave" traces which
show them (in FTL) the area around them, and the computer reports being
unable to calculate a new jump. When they emerge form the wave of slowness,
they start to get a gradually improving plot of the area, and then a
report that they have a valid jump calculation, at which point they
"auto-commit" the computer to keep jumping.
Notice also, that at the High Beyond, the jumps are described as both
longer and more frequent. One gets the impression that the bottom of the
beyond represents a point where it takes too long to get enough information
to make a jump far enough to actually get a FTL effect out of jumping.
Two other interesting tidbits to consider. Countermeasure/Pham/OldOne
is able to send some sort of message a *very* long way, and get a response,
in the form of the zone erruption, *very* quickly. In _The Blabber_ (the
novella that Vinge wrote well before _A Fire Upon the Deep_, which describes
the zoned universe as well, but not quite consistently) there is a ansible
device which can send information at FTL speeds, but with incredibly low
bandwidht (bit / Minutes) at the cost of "a few percent of the suns output"
- David W. Levine
Vincent ARCHER
>But you could also have seen more in the universe of The Peace War, and
>while I would enjoy that, I enjoyed A Fire Upon the Deep more.
They're very different. By scope alone, AFUD calls more for other books
than the Peace War universe, which is more self contained. But then, we're
biased, we already live on the Known Net... :-)
>I would rather have another novel of the scope of A Fire Upon the Deep, though
>that is more work.
Just appeared in french edition (Un Feu sur l'Abime) around here. I browsed
thru it, and it looks like a fairly sound work of translation, but they
botched a *lot* of the typographic cues...
>Of course consider David Brin. Fans beg him to resolve his dolphins and
>the world of uplift. Would you rather he did that, or that he wrote
>novels like Earth and Glory Season?
Both! :-)
>The message he gets, where Uplift War wins a Hugo while those two novels
>get nominated but lose, is to write another uplift book. But I didn't
>think Uplift War was superior to those two novels myself.
I think that his resolve "write an uplift every three books at most" is
a sound one.
>Ideally you want both, but at the rate Vinge and Brin write novels, you can't
>always get what you want.
Would any of us prefer that they suffer Piersanthonytis? Turn out three
books a year, but with one good book every ten years?
--
Vincent Archer Email: arc...@cett.alcatel-alsthom.fr
aka: ne...@cett.alcatel-alsthom.fr
Bob Corrigan
>
>In article <Pine.SGI.3.91.950102151842.2985E-100000@uk0x11>,
>Mike Arnautov <mla...@ggr.co.uk> wrote:
>>ar...@galapagos.cse.psu.edu) writes:
>>
>>Hang on... Who said anything about "sequels"? Stories set in the same
>>universe are not necessarily sequels, are they? My feeling is that the
>>"zoned" Galaxy is a rich enough environment for any number of
>>independent novels, stories and even series. :-)
>>
>universe by Vernor Vinge.
I hope so. Much like Hyperion, the 'atmospherics' were so strong in
FUTD that my imagination ran away with the possibilities.
>But you could also have seen more in the universe of The Peace War, and
>while I would enjoy that, I enjoyed A Fire Upon the Deep more.
The Peace War was more self-contained/self-limiting. I got the sense
that FOTD almost got away from VV - just too many options. This suggests
that a more carefully planned, derivative novel based on the FOTD milieu
would explore many of the themes and ideas which FOTD blew by.
>I would rather have another novel of the scope of A Fire Upon the Deep, though
>that is more work.
>
>Of course consider David Brin. Fans beg him to resolve his dolphins and
>the world of uplift. Would you rather he did that, or that he wrote
>novels like Earth and Glory Season?
>
>The message he gets, where Uplift War wins a Hugo while those two novels
>get nominated but lose, is to write another uplift book. But I didn't
>think Uplift War was superior to those two novels myself.
If you create an imagined environment, a phantom reality and infuse it
with sufficient depth and -possibility-, it will prove more durable
than a somewhat more well-crafted, self-contained environment. While I
agree that Earth and Glory Season were fine books, Brin's Uplift books
compell the reader to extend the imagination past the boundaries of the
novel and onwards to the suggested, hinted, or even implied realities
of that universe.
>Ideally you want both, but at the rate Vinge and Brin write novels, you can't
>always get what you want.
>
>However, I would encourage writers to emulate Vinge. With True Names,
>Marooned in Realtime and A Fire Upon the Deep, he's managed to create three
>groundbreaking works exploring whole new worlds of SF. Most authors never
>do that. As much as I like Connie Willis and felt that Doomsday Book was
>a well written and moving story, I was surprised at the tie, for I don't
>think it was in the groundbreaking ideas class that A Fire Upon the Deep
>was.
Agreed. Challenge me with something rich and new, and I'll shell out
5 clams anyday.
bob
---
bob corr...@sybase.com
#include <std_disclaimer.h>
John Novak
>Quite so. This surely indicates that the boundaries are qualitatively
>different -- different changes occur at different boundaries. (BTW, was
>there a faint suggestion that Transcend is not the *last* zone?)
I seem to remember there having been a hint, but it was just a
character musing on what might lay even farther out. No hard
proof-- by the time you've gotten that far, you're not of a mind
to be telling the Beyonder plebes about it.
However, there _was_ mention of an expensive communication link
with one of the Magellanic Clouds, was there not? The
implication there, at least, was that the Transcend didn't
penetrate all the way through that Cloud, with the likely
possibility that there's a Beyond, a Slowness, and probably an
Unthinking Depths there as well.
So, in some sense, you can think of the zones as a contour map,
with the galaxies being islands or pools (depending on how you
want to think of it) and the Transcend (and whatever else might
lay beyond it) as an ocean or a complex series of ridges.
>> I get the sense that the Transcend allows thinking beings to attain a
>> level of intelligence that produce s changes similar to the Singularity
>> of Marooned in Realtime, or that Poul Anders on talks about in Brain
>> Wave.
>Well, it would seem to be not as simple as that. See below.
>> But all that seems to happen at the Slow/Beyond barrier is that
>> technology changes.
>No, physics changes, allowing new technology. Essentially ultralight
>comes into existence in Beyond and one might infer that its speed
>gradually increases as one moves up to Transcend (becoming infinite in
>the Transcend, perhaps?)
Asymptotic curve, at least.
It seems, from the description of the books, to have been a
mathematical computability thing. Toward the Slowness, it
becomes increasingly difficult to make the necessary calculations
to run your skip drive. You putter along and find yourself
taking longer and longer between each jump, for shorter and
shorter jumps, until eventually it becomes either flat-out
impossible, or unattracive because you'd be better off using a
'normal' drive.
Probably flat-out impossible.
>We know for certain that human intelligences in Transcend do *not* get
>enhanced -- as demonstrated by Straumers in High Lab. Also, thourhgout
>the book there are references to "transcending" civilisations creating
>superminds plus some faint suggestions of sometimes coalescing into
>superminds. Only these superminds are considered to be true Transcend
>inhabitants and are therefore spoken of as individuals.
Looking at _Marooned in Realtime_, Tunc Blumenthal mentions that
he and his group of seven or eight business partners often used
their hardware and software links to enter a kind of a collective
fugue state of enhanced intelligence.
I'd always thought of the advanced, Transcended beings of aFutD
as being the next logical step in that direction-- take a group
(a fairly large group) of human beings, and link them together
permanently into a group mind, all of them augmented with
whatever intelligence enhancing FTL hardware and software they
can cobble together.
Get enough in the link, and the thing eventually becomes rather
god-like.
And with the possibility of micro or nano-scale FTL in the
Transcend, you can probably work some pretty serious shit.
But I digress. The result would, I imagine, be something not
quite singular, nor entirely plural. But being limited
ourselves, we'd probably find it easier to refer to one of these
collectives as 'it'.
Bryce Wilcox
>Hang on... Who said anything about "sequels"? Stories set in the same
>universe are not necessarily sequels, are they? My feeling is that the
>"zoned" Galaxy is a rich enough environment for any number of
>independent novels, stories and even series. :-)
On the other hand, after having seen the Zones themselves upheaved
(upheaven? <g>) and the Known Net shattered, having witnessed the near-
triumph and eventual defeat of the most severe peril that the galaxy has
ever known, would you really be satisfied reading about the antics of
some unimportant little planet-hopping humanoids?
It would kind of feel anticlimactic to me.
Brad Templeton
Mike Arnautov <mla...@ggr.co.uk> wrote:
>ar...@galapagos.cse.psu.edu) writes:
>
>universe are not necessarily sequels, are they? My feeling is that the
>"zoned" Galaxy is a rich enough environment for any number of
>independent novels, stories and even series. :-)
>
universe by Vernor Vinge.
But you could also have seen more in the universe of The Peace War, and
while I would enjoy that, I enjoyed A Fire Upon the Deep more.
I would rather have another novel of the scope of A Fire Upon the Deep, though
that is more work.
Of course consider David Brin. Fans beg him to resolve his dolphins and
the world of uplift. Would you rather he did that, or that he wrote
novels like Earth and Glory Season?
The message he gets, where Uplift War wins a Hugo while those two novels
get nominated but lose, is to write another uplift book. But I didn't
think Uplift War was superior to those two novels myself.
Ideally you want both, but at the rate Vinge and Brin write novels, you can't
always get what you want.
However, I would encourage writers to emulate Vinge. With True Names,
Marooned in Realtime and A Fire Upon the Deep, he's managed to create three
groundbreaking works exploring whole new worlds of SF. Most authors never
do that. As much as I like Connie Willis and felt that Doomsday Book was
a well written and moving story, I was surprised at the tie, for I don't
think it was in the groundbreaking ideas class that A Fire Upon the Deep
was.
John Novak
>Just appeared in french edition (Un Feu sur l'Abime) around here. I browsed
>thru it, and it looks like a fairly sound work of translation, but they
>botched a *lot* of the typographic cues...
Oh, the irony.
>>Ideally you want both, but at the rate Vinge and Brin write novels, you can't
>>always get what you want.
>Would any of us prefer that they suffer Piersanthonytis? Turn out three
>books a year, but with one good book every ten years?
Actually, we should join them at the hip for a year or so, and
see what they produce.
Travis Corcoran
In article <D1uwn...@clarinet.com> br...@clarinet.com (Brad Templeton) writes:
> Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written
> From: br...@clarinet.com (Brad Templeton)
> Date: Wed, 4 Jan 1995 01:11:38 GMT
>
> As much as I like Connie Willis and felt that Doomsday Book was
> a well written and moving story, I was surprised at the tie, for I don't
> think it was in the groundbreaking ideas class that A Fire Upon the Deep
> was.
As I recall, Hugos are awarded by popular ballot ( unlike Nebulas,
which are awarded by vote of members of the SFWA). It seems very
plausible to me that a large percent of SF readers want well crafted
books with simple, comfortable ideas.
Witness the popularlity of Star Trek...
--
TJIC (Travis J.I. Corcoran) TJ...@icd.teradyne.com
opinions(TJIC) != opinions(employer(TJIC))
"Buy a rifle, encrypt your data, and wait for the Revolution!"
John Novak
>Actually, having seen them both together at Vernor's Hugo party, I'm not
>too sure they could collaborate - they are very different personalities.
>(of course, David is a very different personality all by himself.... :^)
Well, I've never met either of them (a peeve, actually, as I'm
hardpressed to come up with two SF authors I respect more) but I
do know this-- sometimes, collaborations between 'very different
personalities' can be astonishingly successful. And sometimes
collaborations between people too much alike go nowhere.
(I'm not nec. referring to writing here, but to team efforts in
general.)
So, you never can tell.
Donna Woodka
>Actually, we should join them at the hip for a year or so, and
>see what they produce.
>--
>John S. Novak, III Minions wanted
Um, John, would you like to take that back *now*, or should I forward this
to both of them and let them flame you themselves? ;^)
Donna Woodka | "There are a number of mechanical devices which increase
woo...@sdsc.edu | sexual arousal, particularly in women. Chief amoung these
| is the Mercedes-Benz 380SL convertible." --P.J. O'Rourke
John Novak
>Um, John, would you like to take that back *now*, or should I forward this
>to both of them and let them flame you themselves? ;^)
_Metaphorically_, not literally.
Jeez.
(And no, I have no desire to be flamed by two professional
writers. I've seen writers get pissed off, before. Ain't
pretty.)
--
John S. Novak, III Minions wanted
Brad Templeton
I would go nuts if all my friends had my personality.
But how do you know the suggestion wasn't to join Piers Anthony and Vernor
at the hip?
Brad Templeton
>> As much as I like Connie Willis and felt that Doomsday Book was
>> a well written and moving story, I was surprised at the tie, for I don't
>> think it was in the groundbreaking ideas class that A Fire Upon the Deep
>> was.
>
>As I recall, Hugos are awarded by popular ballot ( unlike Nebulas,
>which are awarded by vote of members of the SFWA). It seems very
>plausible to me that a large percent of SF readers want well crafted
>books with simple, comfortable ideas.
Alas, you got that one exactly wrong. When these two books ran for the
Nebula, it was Willis than won, not Vinge. The Hugo voters preferred
A Fire Upon the Deep more than the SFWA members did.
John Novak
>But how do you know the suggestion wasn't to join Piers Anthony and Vernor
>at the hip?
Because the mere thought of ensnarling either Vinge or Brin with
the Albatross of Piers Anthony is enough to make me shudder and
turn the most amazing shade of putrescent green.
Vincent ARCHER
>I'd always thought of the advanced, Transcended beings of aFutD
>as being the next logical step in that direction-- take a group
>(a fairly large group) of human beings, and link them together
There are hints/suggestions on this at the beginning of the book, about
Straumers that would become gods or "part of a god", which suggests
precisely that it's what occurs when a species/group Transcends. With
the appropriate hints that you need to be in the Transcend for this kind
of link (would the Tines be able to Transcend in the Beyond? Hmmm...),
and some species are mentioned of being incapable of this kind of link-up,
either by deliberate engineering, or by merely natural disability.
Donna Woodka
John Novak <j...@cegt201.bradley.edu> wrote:
>In <3efg6g$k...@rosebud.sdsc.edu> woo...@pauline.uucp (Donna Woodka) writes:
>
>>Um, John, would you like to take that back *now*, or should I forward this
>>to both of them and let them flame you themselves? ;^)
>
>_Metaphorically_, not literally.
>Jeez.
>
>(And no, I have no desire to be flamed by two professional
>writers. I've seen writers get pissed off, before. Ain't
>pretty.)
>--
>John S. Novak, III Minions wanted
I *know* you meant metaphorically - just couldn't resist. ;^)
Actually, having seen them both together at Vernor's Hugo party, I'm not
too sure they could collaborate - they are very different personalities.
(of course, David is a very different personality all by himself.... :^)
Markus Freericks
> On the other hand, after having seen the Zones themselves upheaved
> (upheaven? <g>) and the Known Net shattered, having witnessed the near-
Only a part of the net is destroyed. I don't know whether any numbers are
given, but I estimate that a maximum of 20% of our galaxy is affected ;-)
> triumph and eventual defeat of the most severe peril that the galaxy has
> ever known, would you really be satisfied reading about the antics of
> some unimportant little planet-hopping humanoids?
>
> It would kind of feel anticlimactic to me.
The AFUTD universe still holds many epic plots. Just imagine a story
written from the viewpoint of an individuum living in a society in the
high beyond, at the moment it transcends.
Markus
Vincent ARCHER
>Only a part of the net is destroyed. I don't know whether any numbers are
>given, but I estimate that a maximum of 20% of our galaxy is affected ;-)
Probably even less than that. The Gods (what else - they're above Powers!)
just had to create a "tentacle" of Slowness to the Core of the Straumli
perversion, not more. Apparently, the width needed/mandated is large enough
tu extend above and under the galactic ecliptic plane, which causes the
total and utter "cut" in the Galaxy (all messages are routed now by making
a whole galatic turn), but I doubt that the cut is more than a few degrees
of the galactic disk...
>The AFUTD universe still holds many epic plots. Just imagine a story
>written from the viewpoint of an individuum living in a society in the
>high beyond, at the moment it transcends.
Very hard to do. As Vinge says himself, you cannot *really* write about
Transcendance. You can toy around, but there's no way we can imagine
what's life like, much less write about. To get another example, look
at Greg Bear's Earth from _Moving Mars_, which stands on the threshold of
some Singularity: Terrans are individuals, yet they're starting to show
symptoms of a group mind. I have difficulty enough to see myself agreeing
with 90% of the people on many subjects :-)
We're probably likely to see more on the Tines. They're the ones who are
really shown in the book, and they already appear in The Blabber, so I
guess Vinge must like them very much...
Mike Arnautov
> One interesting thing is that human intelligence, which originated in
> the Slown ess, doesn't seem to increase much in the Beyond. On the
> other hand, going into the Unthinking Depths makes one quite stupid.
Quite so. This surely indicates that the boundaries are qualitatively
different -- different changes occur at different boundaries. (BTW, was
there a faint suggestion that Transcend is not the *last* zone?)
> I get the sense that the Transcend allows thinking beings to attain a
> level of intelligence that produce s changes similar to the Singularity
> of Marooned in Realtime, or that Poul Anders on talks about in Brain
> Wave.
Well, it would seem to be not as simple as that. See below.
> But all that seems to happen at the Slow/Beyond barrier is that
> technology changes.
No, physics changes, allowing new technology. Essentially ultralight
comes into existence in Beyond and one might infer that its speed
gradually increases as one moves up to Transcend (becoming infinite in
the Transcend, perhaps?)
> The other thing that I wonder about is that Vinge speaks of
> civilizations and cultures becoming Transcendant, but the Transcend
> Powers are spoken of as individuals, not civilizations. Does
> Transcendence cause group minds, sort of like Olaf Stapeldon's
> "advanced" human cultures in Last and First Men?
We know for certain that human intelligences in Transcend do *not* get
enhanced -- as demonstrated by Straumers in High Lab. Also, thourhgout
the book there are references to "transcending" civilisations creating
superminds plus some faint suggestions of sometimes coalescing into
superminds. Only these superminds are considered to be true Transcend
inhabitants and are therefore spoken of as individuals.
br...@clarinet.com (Brad Templeton) writes:
> But you could also have seen more in the universe of The Peace War, and
> while I would enjoy that, I enjoyed A Fire Upon the Deep more.
Indeed. The _Across Realtime_ world is not anywhere near as rich. It is,
incidentally, incompatible with the AFUtD one!
--
Mike Arnautov
mla...@ggr.co.uk
Craig Arnush
>
>The AFUTD universe still holds many epic plots. Just imagine a story
>written from the viewpoint of an individuum living in a society in the
>high beyond, at the moment it transcends.
But that's part of what Vernor is trying to say here: there are some
things that not only are unknown, but are unknowable. There's no way to
describe to one of us what the transcendence is like. It's just exactly
like the Singularity of the Realtime books; as a matter of fact, he
mentions in his introduction (or epilogue) to "The Blabber" that he
invented the Zones in order to provide a different viewpoint of the
Singularity, to provide a method of looking at the Singularity without
wiping out all other known life.
Me
Jo Walton
> In article <D1uwn...@clarinet.com>, br...@clarinet.com (Brad Templeton) says:
> >
> >In article <Pine.SGI.3.91.950102151842.2985E-100000@uk0x11>,
> >Mike Arnautov <mla...@ggr.co.uk> wrote:
> >>ar...@galapagos.cse.psu.edu) writes:
> >>
> >>Hang on... Who said anything about "sequels"? Stories set in the same
> >>universe are not necessarily sequels, are they? My feeling is that the
> >>"zoned" Galaxy is a rich enough environment for any number of
> >>independent novels, stories and even series. :-)
> >>
> >It is, and I am sure you will see some more material written in that
> >universe by Vernor Vinge.
>
> I hope so. Much like Hyperion, the 'atmospherics' were so strong in
> FUTD that my imagination ran away with the possibilities.
Maybe this should go in the FAQ but - Vernor Vinge told me that he was
currently working on a novel about the adventures of Pham Nuwen in the
slowness.
--
Jo
*********************************************************
- - I kissed a kif at Kefk - -
*********************************************************
Sion Arrowsmith
>Of course consider David Brin. Fans beg him to resolve his dolphins and
>the world of uplift. Would you rather he did that, or that he wrote
>novels like Earth and Glory Season?
>
rather have more of the less-demanding stuff than another book throwing
together an action plot AND hard science AND socio-political commentary and
utterly failing to pull it off. _AFUtD_, and indeed the uplift books,
don't try to be so intellectually intensive, and are much better for it
(IMHO, of course). I don't really care *where* the next book is, but how
it's written.
--
\S | "Is he a mess, or is he depressed?
si...@bast.demon.co.uk | "Does he feel totally worthless?" They Might Be Giants
Mary K. Kuhner
>m...@cs.tu-berlin.de (Markus Freericks) writes:
>>The AFUTD universe still holds many epic plots. Just imagine a story
>>written from the viewpoint of an individuum living in a society in the
>>high beyond, at the moment it transcends.
>But that's part of what Vernor is trying to say here: there are some
>things that not only are unknown, but are unknowable. There's no way to
>describe to one of us what the transcendence is like.
You could write about someone who didn't participate in the Transcendence.
It would probably be a depressing story, but perhaps an interesting one.
Of course, someone might point out that Arthur C. Clarke has already
done this, but I would still be interested in Vinge's perspective.
The trick would be having a viewpoint character who was comprehensible to
us, but who had some ability to grasp what was happening so that we
could see it by reflection, in something of the same way that we see the
Old One reflected in Pham's perceptions. (I didn't think Vinge handled
that particularly successfully in AFotD, but it's really difficult.)
On the whole, though, I have to side with the person who said that
saving and half-destroying the galaxy is not a good setup for a sequel.
I was dismayed by the destruction at the end of AFotD, rather
overshadowing my pleasure that the viewpoint characters survived, and I
don't actually want to have a tour of the aftermath. So much is gone!
Mary Kuhner mkku...@genetics.washington.edu
Matt Austern
> On the whole, though, I have to side with the person who said that
> saving and half-destroying the galaxy is not a good setup for a sequel.
> I was dismayed by the destruction at the end of AFotD, rather
> overshadowing my pleasure that the viewpoint characters survived, and I
> don't actually want to have a tour of the aftermath. So much is gone!
But so much remains, too! The galaxy is a big place; probably most of
the worlds out there never heard about the Blight or about anything
that happened in the book.
Even from the limited perspective of homo sapiens, probably only a
small fraction was lost. All of the human worlds in the Beyond that
we've heard about were destroyed, but there's no reason to think that
there aren't lots of other human worlds somewhere else.
--
--matt
John Novak
>You could write about someone who didn't participate in the Transcendence.
>It would probably be a depressing story, but perhaps an interesting one.
>Of course, someone might point out that Arthur C. Clarke has already
>done this, but I would still be interested in Vinge's perspective.
You could (and I do) say that Vinge has already done this in
_Marooned in Realtime_.
--
John S. Novak, III Minions wanted
John Novak
>But so much remains, too! The galaxy is a big place; probably most of
>the worlds out there never heard about the Blight or about anything
>that happened in the book.
In order to go so far away from what had been the central stage
in aFutD, you'd probably have to go so far away that you lose the
best viewpoint characters you've ever had-- the Humans.
>Even from the limited perspective of homo sapiens, probably only a
>small fraction was lost. All of the human worlds in the Beyond that
>we've heard about were destroyed, but there's no reason to think that
>there aren't lots of other human worlds somewhere else.
No doubt there are humans left alive.
But are there any unaffected by the Blight and the Aftermath?
I doubt it.
Of course, you could roll the time forward or backward a few
millenia. I don't see humanity as a race so cohesive that we
all Transcend at once, but rather will Transcend in... groups, I
guess.
But still, while there is still plenty of room for epic stories
set in the Zoned Galaxy, I am hardpressed to come up with a
concept that would be anything less than a pale candle to the
original work.
Some settings, by virtue of the story they have been used to
tell, virtually scream, "Do not disappoint the readers with a
sequel unjustified." aFutD is, IMO, one of those works. As is
_Tigana_ for instance, on the fantasy side of things.
Chris Clayton
>However, there _was_ mention of an expensive communication link
>with one of the Magellanic Clouds, was there not? The
>implication there, at least, was that the Transcend didn't
>penetrate all the way through that Cloud, with the likely
>possibility that there's a Beyond, a Slowness, and probably an
>Unthinking Depths there as well.
And another thing.... <SPOILER!>
The end of FUtD implies that the Slowness is an artifact, not
a natural condition, since the Old One can "pull" the Slowness
out to the part of the Transcend where the Blight lived. Should
we deduce that ALL galaxies have problems that require
constructing a Slowness? If the Slowness is produced by the
density of the galaxy, how does even a Transcendant Power
pull the slowness out to the edge of the galaxy? Just
wondering....
(FWIW, I thought that making the slowness manipulable
like this was a major weakness in the construction of
this universe. I'd read more in a second, but I really
wish he hadn't solved the problem in this way.)
Chris Clayton
Return mail to: USFM...@ibmmail.com
Ford has a better idea, but the opinions are all mine.
Chris Clayton
>The AFUTD universe still holds many epic plots. Just imagine a story
>written from the viewpoint of an individuum living in a society in the
>high beyond, at the moment it transcends.
Or just how humanity made it out to the Beyond to begin with. I
remember seeing a CD-ROM by VInge where he discussed the
writing of FUtD, and how it evolved from "The Blabber". Does
anyone know where I could find a copy? Many Thanks!
John Novak
>The end of FUtD implies that the Slowness is an artifact, not
>a natural condition, since the Old One can "pull" the Slowness
>out to the part of the Transcend where the Blight lived. Should
>we deduce that ALL galaxies have problems that require
>constructing a Slowness? If the Slowness is produced by the
>density of the galaxy, how does even a Transcendant Power
>pull the slowness out to the edge of the galaxy? Just
>wondering....
That was my rede.
But I'm not so sure the zones were put there to protect the
Galaxy from _just_ perversions and Blights, but from _all_ the
Transcended beings.
Over New Year holiday, I was explaining the background to a
friend (who had astonishingly _not_ already read this book) and
he caught the concept immediately, saying, "Oh, life pushes it's
way up and out from the center. Like leaving part of the fields
fallow."
>(FWIW, I thought that making the slowness manipulable
>like this was a major weakness in the construction of
>this universe. I'd read more in a second, but I really
>wish he hadn't solved the problem in this way.)
If someone or something _built_ the Zones in the first place,
then they'd have to be manipulable in some way.
And, touching back to a previous thread about whether or not the
Zones ended with the Transcend, I always had the impression that
the Zone constructing/Zone altering technology was something
beyond the Transcended beings, as well.
No evidence, just a feeling that the Old One probably had to take
his case to something even higher than he was. Otherwise, we'd
be back to the original problem of keeping every idiot Perversion
the hell out of the fallow regions, again.
>Chris Clayton
>Return mail to: USFM...@ibmmail.com
>Ford has a better idea, but the opinions are all mine.
Arthur Bernard Byrne
John Novak <j...@cegt201.bradley.edu> wrote:
>In <Pine.SGI.3.91.950104163205.1226F-100000@uk0x11>,
>mla...@ggr.co.uk (Mike Arnautov) writes:
>>Quite so. This surely indicates that the boundaries are qualitatively
>>different -- different changes occur at different boundaries. (BTW, was
>>there a faint suggestion that Transcend is not the *last* zone?)
>
>character musing on what might lay even farther out.
p 578, PB:
"_Powers beyond the powers?_"
p 582, PB:
"'Something very... far... away has heard me, Ravna. It's coming.'"
>>No, physics changes, allowing new technology. Essentially ultralight
>>comes into existence in Beyond and one might infer that its speed
>>gradually increases as one moves up to Transcend (becoming infinite in
>>the Transcend, perhaps?)
>
>Asymptotic curve, at least.
>It seems, from the description of the books, to have been a
>mathematical computability thing. Toward the Slowness, it
>becomes increasingly difficult to make the necessary calculations
>to run your skip drive. You putter along and find yourself
>taking longer and longer between each jump, for shorter and
>shorter jumps, until eventually it becomes either flat-out
>impossible, or unattracive because you'd be better off using a
>'normal' drive.
>
>Probably flat-out impossible.
Madelbrot set. Inside |z|=0.5, the points are easily shown
bounded. Outside |z|=2, it's simply divergent-- trivial to show. In
between....
OK, it's a mediocre analogy, but what do you expect at 8 AM
and no sleep?
AB^2
--
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Go not unto Usenet for advice, for the denizens will say both yes, and no,
and maybe, and I don't know, and buzz off, and...." --Unknown net.wit
John Novak
>Probably even less than that. The Gods (what else - they're above Powers!)
>just had to create a "tentacle" of Slowness to the Core of the Straumli
>perversion, not more. Apparently, the width needed/mandated is large enough
>tu extend above and under the galactic ecliptic plane, which causes the
>total and utter "cut" in the Galaxy (all messages are routed now by making
>a whole galatic turn), but I doubt that the cut is more than a few degrees
>of the galactic disk...
Actually, one wonders how long it will be necessary to route
messages all the way around. Surely some enterprising, energetic
young race (humans?) will be exploring around the edges of this
thing, and eventually put up a few high powered communication
relays above (or below) the galactic plane.
The race to successfully get a lock and monopoly on that service
would no doubt find itself swimming in traffic and commerce.
Brenda Holloway
> The trick would be having a viewpoint character who was comprehensible to
> us, but who had some ability to grasp what was happening so that we
> could see it by reflection, in something of the same way that we see the
> Old One reflected in Pham's perceptions. (I didn't think Vinge handled
> that particularly successfully in AFotD, but it's really difficult.)
He also tried in _Marooned in Realtime_, where he showed the
differences in people asymptotically close to the Singularity. There's
the distinct impression that at the Singularity, people's consciousness
merged and formed something non-corporeal, doing some damage and
probably leaving bodies behind or something. I can't remember how
close some of the travellers got to the Singularity from the far side
before they bobbled into the far future, but my impression was that,
of the characters in the book, none came very close to it from the far
side, but some got very close to the near side.
Presumably, after the Singularity, those that were left behind or
bobbled through it weren't enough to keep going long enough to make
any sort of lasting impression.
Also ref: Michael Swanwick's "Vacuum Flowers" & "Stations of the Tide".
Brenda
Bryce Wilcox
> wil...@cs.colorado.edu (Bryce Wilcox) writes:
>> On the other hand, after having seen the Zones themselves upheaved
>> (upheaven? <g>) and the Known Net shattered, having witnessed the near-
>
>Only a part of the net is destroyed. I don't know whether any numbers are
>given, but I estimate that a maximum of 20% of our galaxy is affected ;-)
Au contraire. Everyone in that sector of the disk is affected and everyone
who dealt with anyone from that sector is affected and everyone who dealt
with anyone who dealt with anyone from that sector is affected and
everyone who routed messages through that sector to the people they dealt
with on the other side of the sector...
There is that about info tech: no man is an island in the net.
But the original point was that after this epochal event, any other story
would seem anticlimactic to me, and I still stand by it. It might make a
pleasant story, but I could never bring myself to *really* be concerned
about the things that happened in it because I would think "So what if this
person is going to die? Pham lived *and* died in order to prevent the
Blight from winning."
Bryce Wilcox
>
>
>The end of FUtD implies that the Slowness is an artifact, not
>a natural condition, since the Old One can "pull" the Slowness
>out to the part of the Transcend where the Blight lived. Should
>we deduce that ALL galaxies have problems that require
>constructing a Slowness? If the Slowness is produced by the
>density of the galaxy, how does even a Transcendant Power
>pull the slowness out to the edge of the galaxy? Just
>wondering....
>
>(FWIW, I thought that making the slowness manipulable
>like this was a major weakness in the construction of
>this universe. I'd read more in a second, but I really
>wish he hadn't solved the problem in this way.)
Hm. You seem to have thought that Vinge had to do that because he couldn't
think of a better way to "solve" the Blight. I, on the other hand, found
myself believing two things which left me no room for failure-of-disbelief
and subsequent disappointment:
1. This was the best way to solve the Blight because of something specific
(if unknown to the reader) about its nature.
2. Vinge has a good idea who how the zones were created, how the
Blight and the Countermeasure were created and by whom etc., which, if
we knew, would make it all make more common-sense.
These two ideas may be wrong, but the fact that I believed them at the
time left me completely awestruck by the awful necessity of expanding the
Slow zone. This seems to be a way that Vinge has with me-- he can get
me into a frame of mind where I never think "Oh, the author didn't think of
that." Instead I think "Oh, I wonder what the real explanation is which the
author knows but the characters and reader don't?"
A magnificent form of verisimilitude.
M. Otto
> The far more fascinating subject for investigation (to me) is
> _why_?
[...]
> Which, in a way, speaks for the Singularity being a process which
> lasted months or years. It also speaks, for whatever else their
> powers were, of their not being able to crack open bobbles.
And they were unable or unwilling to take the bobbles with them.
With some notable exceptions, moving bobbles around was trivial to
the 22nd-century high-techs.
Perhaps they were unwilling to take along people who were not capable
of joining the massmind (or whatever). The most advanced high-tech
still around after the singularity was from a small group set apart
from most of humanity. He was from at least a year, probably longer,
before the extinction. He might have been capable of joining the
trancendence, but his bobble was inaccessible for several thousand
years afterward (one of those notable exceptions). It seems a bit
odd that there were no accidents or willing time travellers after him.
--
__ ____ __ ot...@vaxb.acs.unt.edu
/|/| / / / / / / A virtual prisoner of the VAX // I'm sorry; my karma
/ |. /_/ / / /_/ at The University of North Texas \X/ ran over your dogma
Denton, USA
John Novak
about the Singularity in general. Subject change reflects this.
In <3ekj6k$e...@usenet1.sjc.in.sel.sony.com> Brenda Holloway <bre...@pdsc.com> writes:
>He also tried in _Marooned in Realtime_, where he showed the
>differences in people asymptotically close to the Singularity. There's
>the distinct impression that at the Singularity, people's consciousness
>merged and formed something non-corporeal, doing some damage and
>probably leaving bodies behind or something.
I dunno, I never really got that impression.
I always got the impression thaat they just... left.
How? We don't really know. I don't think, ultimately, that it's
that important, whether they figured out some bizarre technology
equally as improbably as bobbling, whether they just collectively
decided to go elsewhere, or what.
I guess I have this problem with non-corporeal intelligences.
Even in a world of singularites, or a zoned Galaxy with routinely
Transcending beings, I can't quite deal with a non-physical
intelligence... (Though I'm more than willing to have someone
point out a mechanism, for me.)
The far more fascinating subject for investigation (to me) is
_why_? Well, trivially, wherever we went, it was obviously
better to something that was probably a mass mind of several
billion members, with some damn fine artificial intelligence and
intelligence enhancing software thrown in. Something so
overwhelmingly glorious that _everyone_ went, presumeably before
even the stars were colonized. (And this was easily within their
power-- Della Lu went out poking around with sporting goods
equipment. And I assume Della would have found us, were we out
there.)
>Presumably, after the Singularity, those that were left behind or
>bobbled through it weren't enough to keep going long enough to make
>any sort of lasting impression.
Evidently not.
Which, in a way, speaks for the Singularity being a process which
lasted months or years. It also speaks, for whatever else their
powers were, of their not being able to crack open bobbles.
(Things on my list to get at a good SF bookstore, next time I'm
in Chicago-- anything by Vinge, anything I don't already have by
Brin, any of the Culture novels I can find by Banks... Something
of a theme excursion, I think. Can anyone recommend works in a
similar vein?)
Christopher Davis
** SPOILERS ** for AFUTD and "The Blabber"
DWL> Two other interesting tidbits to consider. [Countermeasure] is able
DWL> to send some sort of message a *very* long way, and get a response, in
DWL> the form of the zone erruption, *very* quickly. In _The Blabber_ [...]
DWL> there is a ansible device which can send information at FTL speeds,
DWL> but with incredibly low bandwidht (bit / Minutes) at the cost of "a
DWL> few percent of the suns output"
And CM/P/OO dims the Tinesworld sun to do it, too.
Methinks that the "Blabber" ansible is, in fact, an application of the same
technology that Countermeasure uses; it affects the Slow Zone as to "speed
it up" locally just enough for very slow FTL comm.
--
Christopher Davis * <c...@kei.com> | "It's 106 ms to Chicago, we've got a full
http://www.kei.com/homepages/ckd/ | disk of GIFs, half a meg of hypertext,
* MIME * PGP * WWW * [CKD1] * | it's dark, and we're wearing sunglasses."
Save swap space: gzip /proc/[0-9]* | "Click it." -- <blue...@bluesbros.com>
Christopher Davis
BT> The humans' oldest local network used light speed connections.
BT> Now, this might refer to the Straumers deliberately using stupid
BT> computers for safety, but in fact it states elsewhere than their
BT> local net is faster than anything on Straum.
That doesn't mean *all* of their local net is faster than anything on
Straum. Some sites have FDDI, Ethernet, and LocalTalk. That doesn't make
the LocalTalk part 100Mb/s :-)
PS: could ClariNet talk Vernor into an all-VV, all-annotated,
everything-he's-ever-published-plus-a-bunch-of-notes CD-ROM anthology?
Please?
I want to read TINES.TXT!
Brad Templeton
Christopher Davis <c...@loiosh.kei.com> wrote:
>PS: could ClariNet talk Vernor into an all-VV, all-annotated,
>everything-he's-ever-published-plus-a-bunch-of-notes CD-ROM anthology?
>
>Please?
>
Probably not, since I asked him if I could put a copy of The Blabber
on the CD-ROM with A Fire Upon the Deep since a lot of people have a hard
time finding that story these days. He didn't want to, though in part
that was because the CD was for Hugo nominees.
[Info on the CD is at net...@clarinet.com or http://www.clarinet.com]
--
Brad Templeton, publisher, ClariNet Communications Corp. | www.clarinet.com
The net's #1 Electronic newspaper (circulation 80,000) | in...@clarinet.com
Eve Vbofinge Vic Bofinger
> The end of FUtD implies that the Slowness is an artifact, not
> a natural condition, since the Old One can "pull" the Slowness
> out to the part of the Transcend where the Blight lived.
Just as we know forests are artefacts, because we can chop them down?
I don't think this follows, it seems to me transcendant powers are
able to extend the slowness (but don't want to) but not to reduce
it. From time to time it gets extended, the rest of the time it is in
the process of gradually shrinking back to its natural size.
> (FWIW, I thought that making the slowness manipulable
> like this was a major weakness in the construction of
> this universe.
I would agree with this if I agreed with the first thing you said.
Concerning the "what happened at the singularity" debate, I think
people who say things like "maybe they all became group minds" or
"maybe they left for another universe" are missing the fundamental
feature of the singularity -- the compression of history. Because
history is speeding up, there will be infinitely more of it between
now and the singularity than would occur in any finite time at the
rate it is now.
So they may well have become group minds, or philosophers, or any
number of less comprehensible things, but that isn't why they are
gone. They are gone because nothing lasts forever, and that's how long
a singularity lasts -- eternity, compressed into an instant.
And to those who say the singularity must have "lasted" weeks or
months -- quite true, it's lasted billions of years already, and all
but an infinitesimal fraction of it is still ahead. And always will
be...
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
David Bofinger AARNet: dxb...@rsphysse.anu.edu.au
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"To find eternity in a grain of sand."
Nancy Lebovitz
John Novak <j...@cegt201.bradley.edu> wrote:
>This is no longer about _A Fire upon the Deep_ specifically, but
>about the Singularity in general. Subject change reflects this.
>
>In <3ekj6k$e...@usenet1.sjc.in.sel.sony.com> Brenda Holloway <bre...@pdsc.com> writes:
>
>>He also tried in _Marooned in Realtime_, where he showed the
>>differences in people asymptotically close to the Singularity. There's
>>the distinct impression that at the Singularity, people's consciousness
>>merged and formed something non-corporeal, doing some damage and
>>probably leaving bodies behind or something.
>
>I dunno, I never really got that impression.
>I always got the impression thaat they just... left.
>
>How? We don't really know. I don't think, ultimately, that it's
>that important, whether they figured out some bizarre technology
>equally as improbably as bobbling, whether they just collectively
>decided to go elsewhere, or what.
>
in Real Time_ was anything but a conveniance for the sake of the
story. I don't think that *everyone* would decide to leave.
Just for the hell of it, I like to think that the human race
miniaturized itself to take advantage of very quick communication--
people had gotten so quick-minded that the macroscopic world was
hopelessly boring. You find Transcended Humanity by looking
for the dust mote with the death rays.....
Nancy Lebovitz
Barath Sundar
Marooned.... I do not think that the date of the Singularity was ever
mentioned, or implied to be fixed to even within a few decades.
Also, there is no guarantee that Tunc Blumenthal was the latest to leave
before the singularity - he was just the latest to join the Korolev's.
True, the Korolev's left messages and all, that, but these were ignored by
anyone unwilling to join them.
Re: the list
Clarke certainly deserved to be up there. Childhood's end, is definitely
excellent, but I am not sure that it is the best of his works
(notice something: Not a single short story collection in the top 100.
Lots of appearances by 2 novel/3 novel/multi novel story arcs.)
Clarke, being an "ideas" man, excels in the short story.
He gets short-shrifted here, obviously
Also, I did not realize it at the time, but Childhood's end definitely has
as a central theme, the Vinge singularity. Maybe it should be called a Clarke singularity instead. I do not know which came first tho'.
Maybe someone on the net may know.
I definitely disagree about the relative rating of some of the works, and have not read some of the others.
But, I was talking about "on the whole". Even so I agree, the list gives Clarke a raw deal.
Barath
Oolong
/If you create an imagined environment, a phantom reality and infuse it
/with sufficient depth and -possibility-, it will prove more durable
/than a somewhat more well-crafted, self-contained environment. While I
/agree that Earth and Glory Season were fine books, Brin's Uplift books
/compell the reader to extend the imagination past the boundaries of the
/novel and onwards to the suggested, hinted, or even implied realities
/of that universe.
Yah. Roger Zelazny, in agreement with many others, does not consider
the Amber books to be among his best, not compared with Lord of Light or
others. But many people dwell more on the Amber books than any of the
others. Because they have worse taste? Maybe, but I think (being one
of them) that it is because the Amber universe is so rich; presented to
the right mentality it just begs to be played with. (Having a game
based on it doesn't hurt, I admit.) Similarly, one of Tolkien's edges
over later fantasy writers in inducing addiction is the broad sweep he
covers lightly while focusing on the main story, leaving much to be
tinkered with. And because he's dead, we all go ape over the History
books, because we're desperate for more clues as to his world.
-xx- Damien X-)
"Food is much cheaper in Hong Kong than in Japan--
primarily because Hong Kong has almost no farmers."
-- World Bank report, on the political clout of farmers
Oolong
/The end of FUtD implies that the Slowness is an artifact, not
/a natural condition, since the Old One can "pull" the Slowness
/out to the part of the Transcend where the Blight lived. Should
/we deduce that ALL galaxies have problems that require
/constructing a Slowness? If the Slowness is produced by the
My guess of ancient history has been that the universe is naturally
High Transcendent. 5 billion years ago the Blight happened and was
defeated out of charity, and then the great Powers, in the interest of
a more aesthetically interesting universe, created the Zones, not just
for the Milky Way but around every major mass concentration, to
_anticipate_ problems such as the Blight elsewhere. Or maybe it was the
17th one in the universe, and they were sick of pulling fat out of the
fire. So the Zones were formed. (And the rate of Zone creep, over 5
billion year, is about what is needed for the High Lab orbit to pass
from Slowness to the Transcend. It may also be that Slowness was the
only way of dealing with a rogue Power that had grown to large -- and
again, the system was instituted universally.) And the High Transcend
now may simply be stretches between galaxies, occupied only by the
manufactured worlds some Powers haul out there.
The interesting bit is: why the Unthinking Depths? Basic chemistry is
the same, our bodies live, yet our minds cease to function. Sounds
fishy to me. Artificial. Perhaps to protect gas-plasma beings near the
core, disruptable by high speed ramscoops. Perhaps the true High
Transcend is there, protecting by the Depths, at the heart of the
galaxies. Suitably ironic at least.
-xx- Damien X-)
And it's hey boys, can't you code it? *huh*
Program it right;
Nothing ever happens in this life of mine,
I'm hauling out the data on the Xerox line.
Mike Arnautov
> But still, while there is still plenty of room for epic stories
> set in the Zoned Galaxy, I am hardpressed to come up with a
> concept that would be anything less than a pale candle to the
> original work.
Well, don't know about you, but imagination-vise I now that I am not in
Vinge's class, so just because *I* can't invent something, doesn't mean
that *he* can't.
> Some settings, by virtue of the story they have been used to
> tell, virtually scream, "Do not disappoint the readers with a
> sequel unjustified." aFutD is, IMO, one of those works. As is
> _Tigana_ for instance, on the fantasy side of things.
"Sequelitis" is one thing. A galaxy- (universe-?) wide framework of the
baroque complexity created by zoning is something else altogether.
--
Mike Arnautov
mla...@ggr.co.uk
Mike Arnautov
> The interesting bit is: why the Unthinking Depths? Basic chemistry is
> the same, our bodies live, yet our minds cease to function. Sounds
> fishy to me. Artificial. Perhaps to protect gas-plasma beings near the
> core, disruptable by high speed ramscoops. Perhaps the true High
> Transcend is there, protecting by the Depths, at the heart of the
> galaxies. Suitably ironic at least.
Aha! Asimov was right after all! "Foundation" *is* "at the other end of
the Galaxy"! :-) Bet you it's just the gas-plasma beings protecting
themselves from ramscoops, while diverting attention to the
intergalactic space.
So much for the doubters doubts -- how's that for a zoned Galaxy plot
to top _AFUtD_?
--
Mike Arnautov
mla...@ggr.co.uk
Brenda Holloway
> >He also tried in _Marooned in Realtime_, where he showed the
> >differences in people asymptotically close to the Singularity. There's
> >the distinct impression that at the Singularity, people's consciousness
> >merged and formed something non-corporeal, doing some damage and
> >probably leaving bodies behind or something.
>
> I dunno, I never really got that impression.
> I always got the impression thaat they just... left.
There's the traces of _something_ strange, which one character
exploits and enhances with a few well-placed bombs; but it does look
like the Singularity wasn't painless.
> >Presumably, after the Singularity, those that were left behind or
> >bobbled through it weren't enough to keep going long enough to make
> >any sort of lasting impression.
>
> Evidently not.
> Which, in a way, speaks for the Singularity being a process which
> lasted months or years. It also speaks, for whatever else their
> powers were, of their not being able to crack open bobbles.
Or not wanting to. But anyhow, the roots of the Singularity were in
the stories of those who bobbled from a time closest to it - and we
can just guess what happened after. One of the stories in THREATS...
AND OTHER PROMISES is set _post_ singularity, and posits travel
without spaceships or really, without any technology that we could
recognize as such at all.
> Can anyone recommend works in a
> similar vein?)
Well, as I mentioned earlier, Michael Swanwicks VACUUM FLOWERS has
all the people on Earth forming a mass mind (the Comprise) catalyzed
by people communicating on a network.
Brenda
Brenda Holloway
> Just for the hell of it, I like to think that the human race
> miniaturized itself to take advantage of very quick communication--
> people had gotten so quick-minded that the macroscopic world was
> hopelessly boring. You find Transcended Humanity by looking
> for the dust mote with the death rays.....
Re: the Chinese in Kurt Vonnegut's SLAPSTICK...
Brenda
John Novak
>Well, don't know about you, but imagination-vise I now that I am not in
>Vinge's class, so just because *I* can't invent something, doesn't mean
>that *he* can't.
How many times can you save the Galaxy?
Joe Slater
>The interesting bit is: why the Unthinking Depths? Basic chemistry is
>the same, our bodies live, yet our minds cease to function. Sounds
>fishy to me. Artificial. Perhaps to protect gas-plasma beings near the
>core, disruptable by high speed ramscoops.
We don't know that our bodies live *well*. Our brains are subtle things,
and it is reasonable that they would be the first to exhibit changes
caused by the Depths. Suppose that the changes between the Zones relates
to the "granularity" of the universe, and affects the smallest things
first. Anything intelligent in the Depths would be big (*). The deeper you
go, the bigger it would have to be. How big is an intelligent cloud of
plasma? Large, I suspect. And possibly immune to an environment where
chemistry stops working.
jds
(*) And slow, by virtue of its size.
--
j...@zikzak.apana.org.au | `You may call it "nonsense" if you
T: +61-3-525-8728 F: +61-3-562-0756 | like, but I'VE heard nonsense, com-
If all else fails try Fidonet: | pared with which that would be as sen-
joe_s...@f351.n632.z3.fidonet.org | sible as a dictionary!' - The Red Queen
Samuel S. Paik
>How many times can you save the Galaxy?
Every week, at 8 PM.
--
Samuel Paik / Digital Equipment Corporation / 3D Device Support
pa...@avalon.eng.pko.dec.com / 508-493-4048 / I speak only for myself
The yin and yang of programming languages (due to Andrew Koenig)
Pure object-oriented programming:
everything is an object, even your program
Pure functional programming:
everything is a program, even your data.
Matt Austern
> Also, I did not realize it at the time, but Childhood's end
> definitely has as a central theme, the Vinge singularity. Maybe it
> should be called a Clarke singularity instead. I do not know which
> came first tho'.
A singularity of sorts, perhaps, but not really a Vinge singularity.
Childhood's End was really quite explicit: what happened there is that
humanity because something different---merged with God, perhaps, even
though that's not quite the language Clarke used---once it truly
learned to use its psychic powers. It's an excellent book, and the
end of it is haunting, but it's not about the same thing that Marooned
in Realtime is about.
Marooned in Realtime does owe something to Clarke, of course: the
section where Marta Korolev is trying to understand the technology of
Tunc Blumenthal's day is a perfect illustration of "Any sufficiently
advanced technology is indistinguishible from magic". But what's new
in Vinge's vision of the Singularity is that, in the end, it's clear
that we really are talking about technology instead of magic. What's
new in Vinge's vision, what gives it such a powerful hold on my
imagination, is the combination of materialism with something that's
very much like religion. That's an unlikely combination, and that
very incongruity is what makes it work so well.
--
--matt
Vincent ARCHER
>How many times can you save the Galaxy?
How many times do you need to?
Trying to outdo yourself in a sequel leads Doc Smith-itis, in which our
heroes have to face even greater dangers and destroy ever bigger things
in each successive book in a series.
No need for this (now awaiting the adventures of Pham Nuyen with a very BIG
impatience)
--
Vincent Archer Email: arc...@cett.alcatel-alsthom.fr
aka: ne...@cett.alcatel-alsthom.fr
A^3
: I never believed that the disappearance of the human race in _Marooned
: in Real Time_ was anything but a conveniance for the sake of the
: story. I don't think that *everyone* would decide to leave.
I had always thought that was one of the points Vernor was trying to
make in Marooned. There area couple of conversations between Exiles
from close to the Singularity which indicate that the Singularity
is not necessarily nice-as-pie for everyone around at the time.
There may be a minimum requirement for the number of people
needed for the specific transcendence that occurred, and it
might be more powerful the more people who take part, even if
some who take part are less-than-willing. This can be compared
with Greg Bear's Blood Music, where [SPOILERS]
those who are absorbed initially into the gestalt formed with the
aid of the nanotech are absorbed without choice, really. Some are
damaged in the process, some get given the choice, but most are
automatically absorbed by chance. Once they have been absorbed,
most find they wouldn't want to go back, anyway, but the girl
who survives in New York(?) is too frightened of losing her
individuality and so stays behind. Who says transendence of
a group entity is a melding of minds, it could be the worst tyranny
the human race has ever known. The whole point really is that
until (if) we get there, we cannot really know what it will be like,
and cannot understand the dangers, effects, pains etc. of the
singularity.
--
TTFN, A^3 ***************E-mail*a...@dcs.st-and.ac.uk*****************
***Mundus Vult Decipi****S-mail*45 Fife Park, St Andrews KY16 9UE****
****************************Tel*UK-01334-463268*(Office hours only)**
********Home Page: <http://www-theory.cs.st-and.ac.uk/~aaa/>*********
Wil McCarthy
In MAROONED IN REALTIME, Vinge's characters (particularly but not exclusively
Juan Chanson) make repeated references to a vanadium punch tape found in the
asteroid belt, and a graffito of some sort found on Earth, which are described
as the "death screams" of the last remaining humans as the singularity
unfolded. Interpretations varied, but there seemed little dispute as to the
contents of these artifacts.
In Vinge's nonfiction writings he is always careful to say that not everyone
will _want_ to pass through the singularity. The fact that everyone did so in
MiR is suggestive -- either it's much too pleasant to resist, or it's an
involuntary process and resistance is futile.
--
The ideal state provides its Wil McCarthy (wmccarth@t4fsa-gw)
citizens with the tools to succeed Martin Marietta Corporation
and the freedom to fail. I made this stuff up myself.
David Weingart
: rereading. I'm glad, BTW, to see the resurgence in attention for MAROONED IN
: REALTIME. It's a complex work that satisfies on many levels, but got very
: little attention when it was first out.
YES! Read _part_ of it in an Analog that was given away at a con
(Confederation in '86?), and HAD to get it ASAP. Wonderful book,
that one.
--
73 de Dave Weingart KB2CWF | From there to here
Personal: phyd...@emerald.princeton.edu | From here to there
Work: dwei...@firewall.nielsen.com | Funny things are everywhere
| -- Dr. Seuss
sTANg
si...@fehen.demon.co.uk (Simon H Le G Bisson) writes:
> If there ever was a man who predicted
yup!
Matt Austern
> There was a recent article in _Foundation_ which dealt with _Childhood's
> End_. The author's thesis was that Clarke was exploring (in strictly
> humanistic terms!) the Omega point of Teilhard de Chardin's theology.
I believe that, and I wouldn't be too surprised if Clarke was doing it
intentionally. Teilhard's philosophy was very popular at just around
the time when Childhood's End was written.
In any case, it's pretty clear that Childhood's End has a lot more to
do with Teilhard than with Vinge.
--
--matt
MisterSkin
Chardin's theories, because Vinge's idea is based on a testable hypothesis
(computer/mind links will drive human intelligence past recognizable
limits) whereas Clarke and Chardin's ideas, however well thought out, are
basically speculative hand waving.
If we want to, we can test the progress of Vinge's idea in fairly
straightforward ways. The same can't be said of Clarke and Chardin.
Jim Henry
In message <3g52q9$o...@newsbf02.news.aol.com>
miste...@aol.com (MisterSkin) writes:
MI>There's no comparison between Vinge's singularity idea and Clarke and
MI>Chardin's theories, because Vinge's idea is based on a testable hypothesis
^^^^^^^
Is this Teilhard de Chardin (sp)? I seem to have vaguely
heard about him in relation to singularities, but don't recall
anything specific about him or his theory.
* SLMR 2.1a * Internet: jim....@lightspeed.com
Matt Austern
> Is this Teilhard de Chardin (sp)? I seem to have vaguely
> heard about him in relation to singularities, but don't recall
> anything specific about him or his theory.
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was a Catholic priest and a paleontologist;
he made important contributions to the study of human evolution, but
he is best known for his philosophical work that (he believed) unified
Catholic theology and evolutionary theory. You can read about his
beliefs in his book The Phenomenon of Man. It's not a science fiction
book, but it has inspired a fair amount of science fiction; in
particular, I think you can make a decent case that it inspired some
of the important points in Hyperion/The Fall of Hyperion.
You can also read about Teilhard in quite a different context, in some
of Stephen Jay Gould's essays. I'd probably better say nothing
further about that, though, less a mob of irate Teilhard suporters
tear me to shreds.
--
--matt
Erich Schneider
>I think you can make a decent case that it inspired some of the
>important points in Hyperion/The Fall of Hyperion.
One might think that the presence of some rather explicit de Chardin
references in the two volumes would make making such a case extermely
easy.
--
Erich Schneider er...@bush.cs.tamu.edu http://bush.cs.tamu.edu/~erich
"You are a true believer. Blessings of the State; blessings of the
masses. Thou art a subject of the Divine, created in the image of
Man, by the masses, for the masses. Let us be thankful we have
commerce. Buy more. Buy more now. Buy. And be happy."
- Confession booth blessing, _THX-1138_
J.C. Stevens
: > Is this Teilhard de Chardin (sp)? I seem to have vaguely
: > heard about him in relation to singularities, but don't recall
: > anything specific about him or his theory.
: Pierre Teilhard de Chardin was a Catholic priest and a paleontologist;
: he made important contributions to the study of human evolution, but
: he is best known for his philosophical work that (he believed) unified
: Catholic theology and evolutionary theory. You can read about his
: beliefs in his book The Phenomenon of Man. It's not a science fiction
: book, but it has inspired a fair amount of science fiction; in
: particular,
I think you can make a decent case that it inspired some
: of the important points in Hyperion/The Fall of Hyperion.
Not hard to do, considering that Telhard is actually mentioned by name in
"Hyperion"
John
Vincent ARCHER
Date: 25 Jan 1995 12:26:26 GMT
Message-Id: <3g5g1i$k...@tardis-gw.alcatel-alsthom.fr>
MisterSkin <miste...@aol.com> wrote:
>There's no comparison between Vinge's singularity idea and Clarke and
>Chardin's theories, because Vinge's idea is based on a testable hypothesis
Where? Count me as a volunteer! :-)
In both cases, the singularity is inaccessible to *us* *now*. However,
Vinge's model rely on technology and science, whereas Clarke's model
requires an "act of god", i.e. intervention from outside; that model
assume that 'something' we're not privy to yet will change us without us
working to achieve it. In Vinge's case, even if we can't understand the
result, we can at least understand the process.
When you read Clarke's story, you get essentially the same theme as all
those "mutant" stories around: Suddendly, humans change... Some of these
mutant stories lead to singularities as well..
Tom
>From: Vincent...@f1.n328.z1.fidonet.org (Vincent ARCHER)
>Date: 25 Jan 95 12:26:26 -0500
>Subject: Re: Vernor Vinge's various singularities (was top 100 list)
>In both cases, the singularity is inaccessible to *us* *now*. However,
>Vinge's model rely on technology and science,
In which book does Vinge reveal the actual cause of the singularity?
I was under the impression that no one actually knows the cause. I will agree
that we led to believe that there is a technological innovation that leads to
a collective human transformation.
Keith Rogers
>You can also read about Teilhard in quite a different context, in some
>of Stephen Jay Gould's essays. I'd probably better say nothing
>further about that, though, less a mob of irate Teilhard suporters
>tear me to shreds.
You can read simliar comments to Gould's but with more sympathy for
Teilhard in Dawkins' Blind Watchmaker. Not that he agrees with
Teilhard but he admires his sincerity, etc. Dawkins isn't nearly so
ready with the torch as Gould except towards Gould himself. It's a
violent world in the pop evolution book scene...
--
Keith Rogers
kro...@es.com