I’ve been posting a review/response to each of the five sections of Visions, Ventures, and Escape Velocities: A Collection of Space Futures, which is available for free from Arizona State University’s Center for Science and the Imagination thanks to a grant from NASA. In this post, I’ll switch gears to some concluding thoughts about VVEV as a whole.
Response to VVEV: Section V – Concluding Thoughts
VVEV is illustrated by by Maciej Rebisz.
This is Part 5 of a six-part response to Visions, Ventures, and Escape Velocities: A Collection of Space Futures, which is available for free from Arizona State University’s Center for Science and the Imagination thanks to a grant from NASA. I say “response” and not “review” because I intend to engage with the ideas presented from my own point of view.
Section V of VVEV is entitled Concluding Thoughts, and contains three essays:
- The Luxury Problem: Space Exploration in the “Emergency Century, Kim Stanley Robinson, in conversation with James Bell
- The Practical Economics of Space, Clark A. Miller
- High Hedonistic and Low Fatalistic, Linda T. Elkins-Tanton
This blog post contains spoilers!
Response to VVEV: Section IV – Exoplanets
VVEV is illustrated by by Maciej Rebisz.
This is Part 4 of a six-part response to Visions, Ventures, and Escape Velocities: A Collection of Space Futures, which is available for free from Arizona State University’s Center for Science and the Imagination thanks to a grant from NASA. I say “response” and not “review” because I intend to engage with the ideas presented from my own point of view.
Section IV of VVEV is entitled Exoplanets, and contains one short story and two essays:
- Shikasta, by Vandana Singh
- The New Science of Astrobiology, by Sara Imari Walker
- Negotiating the Values of Space Exploration, by Emma Frow
This blog post contains spoilers!
Response to VVEV: Section III – Asteroids
VVEV is illustrated by Maciej Rebisz
This is Part 3 of a six-part response to Visions, Ventures, and Escape Velocities: A Collection of Space Futures, which is available for free from Arizona State University’s Center for Science and the Imagination thanks to a grant from NASA. I say “response” and not “review” because I intend to engage with the ideas presented from my own point of view.
Section III of VVEV is entitled Asteroids, and contains two short stories and two essays:
- The Use of Things, by Ramez Naam
- Toward Asteroid Exploration, by Roland Lehoucq
- Night Shift, by Eileen Gunn
- Rethinking Risk, by Andrew D. Maynard
This blog post contains spoilers!
Response to VVEV: Section II – Mars
VVEV is illustrated by Maciej Rebis
This is Part 2 of a six-part response to Visions, Ventures, and Escape Velocities: A Collection of Space Futures, which is available for free from Arizona State University’s Center for Science and the Imagination thanks to a grant from NASA. I say “response” and not “review” because I intend to engage with the ideas presented from my own point of view.
Section II of VVEV is entitled Mars, and contains two short stories and two essays:
- The Baker of Mars, by Karl Schroeder
- Exploration Fact and Exploration Fiction, by Lawrence Dritsas
- Death on Mars, by Madeline Ashby
- Life on Mars?, by Steve Ruff
This blog post contains spoilers!
Review of “The Swerve” by Stephen Greenblatt
The Swerve: How the World Became Modern by Stephen Greenblatt
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
On the surface, it is the story of Poggio Bracciolini, a 15th century Italian scholar who uncovers one of the last remaining manuscripts of Lucretius’s On the Nature of Things. The meta-story is really about the power of ideas to survive the fall of empire, the dark ages that come after, and re-emerge as the seeds of enlightenment. The narrative is engaging and coherent, and I left both inspired by humanism but also regretting how much knowledge must have been destroyed over the centuries by the forces of superstition and dogma.
Review of “The Wright Brothers” by David McCullough
The Wright Brothers by David McCullough
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
My first audiobook! I chose a topic of which I had prior knowledge, but I was surprised how many new things I learned from McCullough’s account of the Wright brothers’ journey to making the world’s first controlled, powered flight in an airplane. Like all good historical nonfiction, the account interweaves the individual human level with the big picture. McCullough shows the personal lives of the Wright family as well as the broader technological and political implications and context of their work.
I especially enjoy that the book is also a fine counter to the myth that genius is the product of natural talents and sudden epiphany. McCullough shows the childhood influences the brothers had to encourage tinkering and creativity, and details at length the decades of thought, experimentation, innovation, and perseverance through failure, injury, and ridicule that were necessary to arrive at their world-changing achievements. The book is as much a testament to the personal qualities and character of the whole Wright family as it is an account of their technological contribution to history.
My Indie Titles Will No Longer Distribute on Amazon
I have decided to pull Red Soil Through Our Fingers from Amazon’s e-bookshelves and refrain from allowing Amazon to distribute any of my future indie-published books for the time being.
Before I go any further, a word to Kindle users: You can still read my books! Buy from Smashwords, and you will be able to download the book in .mobi format. You will need to move the .mobi file to your Kindle (via USB), or you can read it via the Kindle Reader mobile or desktop apps.
My reasoning for taking this action is multi-fold. Most of my reasons break down into two categories:
Response to VVEV: Section I – Low Earth Orbit
This is Part 1 of a six-part response to Visions, Ventures, and Escape Velocities: A Collection of Space Futures, which is available for free from Arizona State University’s Center for Science and the Imagination thanks to a grant from NASA. I say “response” and not “review” because I intend to engage with the ideas presented from my own point of view.
VVEV is illustrated by Maciej Rebisz.
Section I of VVEV is entitled Low Earth Orbit, and contains two short stories and three essays:
- Vanguard 2.0, by Carter Scholtz
- Reflections on the Dual Uses of Space Innovation, by G. Pascal Zachary
- Mozart on the Kalahari, by Steven Barnes
- Past Empires and the Future of Colonization in Low Earth Orbit, by William K. Storey
- Expanding Our Solution Space: How We Can Build an Inclusive Future, by Deji Bryce Olukotun
This blog post contains spoilers!
Review: Dune, by Frank Hebert
Dune by Frank Herbert
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I’ve come to this book later than most, and I’m so glad I did.
I’ll start with the criticism. First let me acknowledge that, as a book published in 1965, Dune contains a few elements that are likely to be problematic to the modern reader. The world depicted (which is an active choice made by the author) is almost universally patriarchal — not just one society, mind you, but all of them, with the possible exception of one. (However, even that one, the Bene Gesserit multi-generational society of powerful sorcerer-ninja women, is incomplete and cannot fulfill its ultimate purpose until a LONG-PROPHESIED MALE CHILD is born to do what somehow none of them can.) And apropos of long prophesies, the story is definitely among the Chosen One narratives, which seem to have gone decisively out of style (at least in more literary science fiction).
All that said, I was thoroughly engrossed in the world: the captivating setting with its desert aesthetic strongly influenced by the Islamic world, the interweaving of complex politics and deep religions, and the layers upon layers of motivations and counter motivations that tear at almost any character with a name. Dune also falls within the prestigious company of those few books that I’ve read which manage to blend hard science fiction and fantastical elements seamlessly together in the service of evoking wonder — such as Revelation Space or Anathem.
I’m hooked. I can finally understand why Dune became the genre’s gold standard for science-fiction that isn’t afraid to talk about the human element, and does it exceptionally well. I definitely plan to add the rest of the series to my To-Read list.