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more about #vernorvinge more comments → Hamslicer: Akira more » Gann: If the singularity were to happen, we more than likely would not notice. It would be produced in secrecy, and would be intelligent enough to not reve... more » Doctor Who?: To be honest, on the topic of "internet in your head," Gibson's Bridge Trilogy seems to take a far better approach than the more futuristic and fancif... more » GreyHammer: i thought sci-fi was about opening doors not closing them because you think things may happen. thats a cop out more » fistrodisco: I don't see any productive SF writer stopping writing futuristic SF because of the Singularity. I even see some funny workarounds (in Banks' Culture s... more » Yamato: The world is going ot end not in 2012 but the year 20XX when Dr. Wily will release his mavericks to rule the world! more » skippitymonster: Hmmmm... could The Singularity just be a convenient marketing buzz-type term vaguely based on certain observations of probability and extrapolations o... more » Briareosdx: I have a theory as to why the Singularity and its innevetability/impossibility have become stumbling blocks for many writers. It's related to the leng... more » pjcamp: I think the pro-Singularity crowd forgets that we are talking about real human beings here. Unless we are replaced wholesale by robots, technology can... more » GuyNermie: It ain't gonna happen because the singularity is essentially a religious idea based on a supreme amount of wishful thinking of the unfettered extrapol... more » Bill-Lee: What about Dune? Dune is about a far future society that has rejected almost all technology more complex than a tape recorder. The role taken in our ... more » derekhaltom: No. The future is not here yet. I say this because as I child I was promised flying cars, jetpacks, and food in capsule form. Until those things are a... more » jccalhoun: I don't know that the idea of the Singularity is preventing people from writing about the future. We know that interstellar travel is pretty unlikely... more » Ben Babcock: Hmm ... this sounds familiar. Where did I hear this before? Oh wait, I heard this before on io9. The other article even uses the same picture! I lov... more » Rocketknight: Correct me if I misunderstood what this is about. So the Singularity is a single defining moment that revolutionizes the way humankind lives on, riva... more » -
#worldcon
Can You Still Write Science Fiction Set In The Future?
The future is over! It's no longer possible to write about the future, because the Singularity will definitely happen in twenty years. We'll have artificial intelligence, and the meaning of humanity will be transformed. Is this idea hindering science fiction?
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#triviagasm
The Most Badass Female Space Pilots Of All Time
Some of the hottest hot-shot pilots in space opera are women. It's a longstanding tradition in science fiction to show women taking the controls of starships, space fighters and star-cruisers, and here are our favorite badass female cockpit jockeys.
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#rant
The Singularity Backlash
Are you sick of the shiny, high-tech future where humans evolve into superbeings? Join the club. The latest trend is for anti-singularity futures, where tomorrow looks like yesterday. More » -
#vernorvinge
Moore's Law Won't Create The Singularity On Its Own
Moore's Law, which predicts a doubling of transistor density every 18 months, won't give us superhuman intelligence in a reasonable timeframe by itself, says author Vernor Vinge in this new video from the Ideas Project. More » -
#books
4 Science Fiction Books Every Social Media Junkie Must Read
Social-media nerds need to read more science fiction, says Web 2.0 blog Anthrogoggles. To get you started, they have a list of four must-read novels, including Vernor Vinge's Rainbow's End, and two William Gibson books. -
#sciencefictiondeaths
12 Coolest Deaths In Science Fiction History
It's never great to watch a beloved science fiction hero die — but sometimes a memorable heroic death can help turn a science fiction story into a real epic. And some science fiction characters are unforgettable and bad-ass precisely because they died in a memorable way. Here's our list of the dozen greatest deaths in the history of science fiction. With some spoilers, natch. More » -
#spaceporn
Does the New Shape of the Solar System Prove Vernor Vinge is Right About the Galaxy?
By now you've probably heard the news about our solar system not quite being the shape that everybody thought. A study in Nature today shows results gathered from the two Voyager space probes launched in the 1970s, which are both nearing the edge of the heliosphere, the region where the solar winds end and deep space begins. Based on data the probes beamed back, it would appear that the heliosphere isn't a sphere — it's more of an egg shape (pictured). And the boundary between heliosphere and deep space is shifting all the time. It sounds very similar to the way scifi author Vernor Vinge describes the Milky Way's galactic sphere in A Fire Upon the Deep. If Vinge is right about what happens when you leave a gravitational sphere for deep space, the Voyager probes are in for an interesting ride. More » -
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#lyingmentors
What Scifi Teaches Us About Lying, Deceitful Mentors
In two of this summer's biggest action movies, the hero's mentor turns out to be a lying, manipulative sack of villainy. And nobody in the audience is surprised, because it's a scifi fact of life: mentors lie to you. They feed you half-truths ("Darth Vader killed your dad") and outright lies, to get you to follow their agenda. That's just what mentors do. But the good news is, studying the deceitful ways of scifi mentors can help you to deal with your misleading mentros in real life. Spoilers ahead. More »
