Problem-solving in the near future

Speculating about social & technological changes

Last year, the Pew Research Center asked a panel of tech experts to speculate about life would be like in the year 2025, taking into account changes in the aftermath of the pandemic – and other disruptive crises that may arise over the next few years. You can read the range of thought-provoking responses, which touched upon topics such as the future of economic and social inequality, as well as changes in the workplace due to increased automation, the rise of artificial intelligence and globalization. Discussions also focused on issues of sustainable energy, improved transportation and communication networks, and enhanced education opportunities. Many floated ideas about the near-term evolution of technologies that could improve the quality of life for vast numbers of people across the globe.

Below, I have reprinted my own response:

Assuming we restore the basic stability of the Western Enlightenment Experiment – and that is a big assumption, then several technological and social trends may come to fruition in the next five to ten years.

• Advances in cost-effectiveness of sustainable energy supplies will be augmented by better storage systems. This will both reduce reliance on fossil fuels and allow cities and homes to be more autonomous.
• Urban farming methods may expand to a more industrial scale, allowing similar moves toward local autonomy (perhaps requiring a full decade or more to show significant impact). Meat use will decline for several reasons, ensuring some degree of food security, as well. Tissue-cultured meat — long predicted in science fiction — is rapidly approaching sustainable levels. The planet, our health, our karma — and eventually, our wallets, will all benefit.
• Local, small-scale, on-demand manufacturing may start to show effects in 2025. If all of the above take hold, there will be surplus oceanic shipping capacity across the planet. Some of it may be applied to ameliorate (not solve) acute water shortages. Innovative uses of such vessels may range all the way to those depicted in my novel ‘Earth.’
• Full-scale diagnostic evaluations of diet, genes and microbiome will result in affordable micro-biotic therapies and treatments. AI appraisals of other diagnostics will both advance detection of problems and become distributed to handheld devices cheaply available to all, even poor clinics throughout the world.
• Inexpensive handheld devices will start to carry detection sensor technologies that can appraise across the spectrum, allowing NGOs and even private parties to detect and report environmental problems.
• Socially, this extension of citizen vision will go beyond the current trend of assigning accountability to police and other authorities. Despotisms will be empowered, as predicted in Orwell’s ‘Nineteen Eighty-four.’ But democracies will also be empowered (as I discuss in ‘The Transparent Society’) as those in power are increasingly held accountable for their actions.
• I give odds that tsunamis of revelation will crack the shields protecting many elites from disclosure of past and present torts and turpitudes. The Panama Papers and Epstein cases exhibit how fear propels the elites to combine efforts at repression. But only a few more cracks may cause the dike to collapse, revealing networks of blackmail. This is only partly technologically driven and hence is not guaranteed. If it does happen, there will be dangerous spasms by all sorts of elites, desperate to either retain status or evade consequences. But if the fever runs its course, the more transparent world will be cleaner and better run.
• Some of those elites have grown aware of the power of ninety years of Hollywood propaganda for individualism, criticism, diversity, suspicion of authority and appreciation of eccentricity. Counter-propaganda pushing older, more traditional approaches to authority and conformity are already emerging, and they have the advantage of resonating with ancient human fears. Much will depend upon this meme war.

Of course, much will also depend upon short-term resolution of current crises. If our systems remain undermined and sabotaged by incited civil strife and distrust of expertise, then all bets are off. You will get many answers to this canvassing fretting about the spread of ‘surveillance technologies that will empower Big Brother.’ These fears are well-grounded, but utterly myopic. First, ubiquitous cameras and facial recognition are only the beginning. Nothing will stop them and any such thought of ‘protecting’ citizens from being seen by elites is stunningly absurd, as the cameras get smaller, better, faster, cheaper, more mobile and vastly more numerous every month. Moore’s Law to the nth degree. Yes, despotisms will benefit from this trend. And hence, the only thing that matters is to prevent despotism altogether.

In contrast, a free society will be able to apply the very same burgeoning technologies toward accountability. We are seeing them applied to end centuries of abuse by ‘bad-apple’ police who are thugs, while empowering the truly professional cops to do their jobs better. It is not guaranteed that light will be used this way, despite many examples of unveiling abuses of power. It is an open question whether we citizens will have the gumption to apply ‘sousveillance’ upward at all elites.

But Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. likewise were saved by crude technologies of light in their days. And history shows that assertive vision by and for the citizenry is the only method that has ever increased freedom and – yes – some degree of privacy.

The Animated Storyboard as an Art Form in its Own Right

A producer’s or director’s tool – or a new kind of art?

Note: this proposal was first broached by me over 20 years ago. And yes, the available technology has caught up at last, making this so obvious that even Hollywood mavens can see it. And – naturally – they are viewing it in exactly the wrong way.

I’ve long proposed a concept for small-scale cinematic storytelling – one that could become a valuable studio pre-production tool, but that might also grow into an exciting medium in its own right, liberating small, writer-led teams to create vivid dramas, whether as first drafts or as final works of popular art. 

When I first broached the concept, I called it full-length, animated storvboarding.   Now — for reasons that should seem obvious in 2023’s era of AI-rendered art and semi-realistic computer authorship — that name seems obsolete. Yet, I will continue using it in this revision. Because the logic remains almost exactly the same… as does the artistic and commercial opportunity.

 Re-examining the traditional screenplay

For more than a century, the initial element in cinema has been the screenplay, generally around 120 pages for a ninety-minute film. While offering detailed dialogue and some scene description, scripts generally remain sketchy about many other aspects. Moreover, screenplays (and their writers) are treated with little respect, viewed as the most disposable or replaceable components of an expensive process.

In coming years, the screenplay, as such, may become obsolete, both to sell an idea for filming and as a working production tool.  Instead, a small team consisting of the writer, a computer-animator with AI tools, a photographer, a musical specialist and some voice actors, might team up before hitting the studios with a pitch.  Using animatics and integration technologies that already exist, such a team might create a complete 90-minute (or more) cinematic story wherein animated characters act and speak, upon sets that are computer-merged or extrapolated from still-photos or video pans. 

While (generally) too crude to display to the public as-such, these animated storyboards would nevertheless be much closer to realization than a mere 120-page bundle of paper sheets. For example, they could include simple musical background with dramatic beats and sound effects at the right places, etc., interwoven with the voiced words that are synchronized with the animations.  These full-length drafts might be screened before live or online audiences, swiftly testing alternative plot-twists and endings. They could decisively bridge the gap between writer and finished product. 

2023 note: Of course with more modern tools, the ‘storyboard’ as a series of static panels is easily replaced by much smoother animations, AI-generated or assisted. All this means is that a small team can take a script even farther along the pre-production process that I describe here.

Naturally, producers would take to such storyboarding drafts, and view the process as a producer’s tool. Directors would see it as a useful director’s tool, even if they intend to make a standard film with real actors before cameras. 

Whatever those two professions believe, the main beneficiaries of such tools will be writers – originators of the core elements, ideas, dialogue, characters and dramatic tension — as they would rise 5 levels of execution closer to final product before relinquishing control.

If producers say “this looks promising, but we’ll want to make changes,” the creative team can say “We’ll be back on Monday with three new versions we can test before focus groups.” All of which can happen before any contracts are signed… leaving the creators in a strong position.

Now, of course crude or partial versions of this notion have been around a long time. Way back when I first posted this forecast, Amazon Storyteller would let you upload a story/script and produce a customizable storyboard. And there was Crazy Talk Animator.  ToonBom was another incomplete move in this direction. Alas, none of them became truly liberating, in the way I describe.

A true animated storyboard (AS) or or cinematic draft would flow smoothly. It would have music and use real actors’ voices behind stick-figure or rendered avatar characters.  The animation itself would not have to be lavish, just good enough to vividly portray the story+action. In fact, much of the movement can be computer interpolated between artist sketches, almost seamless to the eye.

Think of an animated script… with some scenes rendered more vividly to show off possible special effects.  This could then be shopped around to directors & studios, saying “let’s make a deal based on this, and not arm-waved descriptions or an easily trashed sheaf of paper pages.”

One sub-variety – even more economical than the version described here — is the narrated storyboard, as illustrated by the famous Chris Marker film “La Jetee” (later remade as “Twelve Monkeys”) and more recently in “The Life of a Dog” by John Harden.  (Both of them are in French, interestingly.) A fertile technique, it has been under-utilized by indie film-makers and could easily be transformed into the full-voiceover version I propose here.

Another cool aspect — the animated storyboard is a product in itself!  Time and again it has been shown that people can accept and identify with very crude and even cartoony representations, so long as the drama, pace, music, dialogue and voices are first rate.  Even talking and moving stick figures (or a little better) can draw empathy and tears from an audience. Such full, feature-length renderings of a story might draw an avid community of fans or followers online, if the sequence of words-action-emotions and music are well done.  And if that online following is all the story gets, at first? Well, fine, there are monetization methods… and there would soon be awards.

Moreover, if an Animated Storyboard feature does gain a cult following online? That might lead to interest from producers later on, giving the story a second chance.

Ideally, we’re envisioning a product that enables a writer and a few specialists, plus several voice actors, to interact under the leadership of a “director” knowledgeable in the program itself.  A team of half a dozen could make a 90 minute feature, crude, but with incredible swiftness and agility, sometimes achieving drama better than many products coming out of studios today.

If I am right about this, we’ll soon see.

And hear and feel.

Dune: a morality tale against feudalism

All right, off-the-cuff let me say that, of course, the latest adaptation of Frank Herbert’s 1965 novel Dune by Denis Villeneuve is magnificent.  It is spectacularly good and supremely enjoyable, on a par with the best of Spielberg, or Zemeckis, or Cameron. The admirable qualities are apparent to all.

Still, even while enjoying great movies, there remains a part of me who keeps taking notes. Furthermore, general approval doesn’t forbid my making a few specific comments, including comparisons to earlier versions. 

And so, for those of you who enjoy nitpickery – and promise you won’t let it spoil for you a great flick – buckle up and let’s get to it:

SPOILERS

SPOILERS

– Okay, for starters, I must get this out there. Unlike almost everyone I know, I actually liked the David Lynch 1982 version, a lot. 

My own theory to explain all the hate it got is that it faithfully portrayed Frank Herbert’s original intent, which was to make feudalism look bad! To be clear, Herbert said that Lynch’s vision of the Dune Universe very closely matched the mental images that Frank himself had of Dune. He spoke of how closely he worked with Lynch. Though yes, some things that Lynch added were just bizarre. The Harkonnen skin disease for example and grotesque heart plugs  I do know Lynch’s clever-clumsy innovation of weapons based upon sound was not in the original novel, but was adopted by Frank Herbert at least somewhat, in later works.

I believe a lot of viewers were made uncomfortable by how Lynch succeeded at Frank’s intent to portray the Atreides as awful. Okay, they’re visually pretty and loved by their top officers and maybe they’re above-average for feudal lords – but they’re still feudal lords and that makes them kinda almost nazis… though still much less horrendous than Harkonnen vampires. A standard storytelling trick to get you to root for the unlikeable.

I came away from the Lynch film hoping – as Frank intended(!) – that all of the fighters and lords and emperors and guilds and Bene Gesserits would just go and die, please? Except maybe a couple of Atreides corporals with secret democratic ambitions. It’s also what I wanted George to do in Game of Thrones. Alas.

But sure, defeat the evil Harkonnen and Emperor, first.

Nor were the tribal Fremen any improvement. Oh, sure, gritty and oppressed underdogs – again, a very effective trope. Though Herbert later has them proceeding – across the Dune books – to wreak hell and death across the galaxy. Alas, try as he might, Frank Herbert kept failing to get his point across, as readers and viewers continued kvelling how they’d like to go to his wonderfully vivid, but also horrendously Halloween-level universe of failure, evil and pain. 

And yeah, that means I liked the story for some added reasons not shared by most. As a warning.

Key point about endings:

As I know very well from Kevin Costner’s film version of my novel The Postman, when a film’s ending sucks, that’s all people will remember, no matter how beautiful the first 90% was. 

And yeah, the last 10 minutes of David Lynch’s Dune was so awful. Making it rain? Feh. And promising to bring peace to a galaxy that Paul would soon send careening into jihad and hell? Just please defeat the villains and have done with it, will you? Don’t make it so abundantly clear we’ve only replaced ugly monsters with pretty ones? Worse, Paul suddenly transforms from underdog to creepy-bossy-arrogant mega-overdog. No, that Dune flick did not end well.

And yes, that constitutes the top lesson that I hope Denis Villeneuve studies carefully. And good luck to him!

Nit-picks!

– All right, taking all that into account, sure the Villeneuve Dune is vastly better than the 1984 Lynch version! Even if you take into account the incredible differences in rendering technology (e.g great ornithopters!), the 2021 film is just a better-told story.

For example, by showing Chani in 5 whole minutes worth of precognitive dreams, Villeneuve made the love story central to this telling of the first half, even long before their first kiss. Lynch had given Chani short-shrift and that irked. So the new one is a great improvement.

– In contrast, to save time, Villeneuve dumped any glimpse of the emperor or the Spacer Guild. And sure, that’s okay. He did just fine without them. But Lynch’s portrayals of both were memorable and I’d defend them. 
– Likewise, replacing the red-headed Harkonnen uniformity-trait (1984) with making them all baldies (2021) was fine too… achieving the same goal of conveying regimented sameness… though the Marlon Brando rubbing a wet-bald pate homage to Apocalypse Now might have been a bit indulgent.  Anyway, making the Baron slightly less cartoony was certainly called for. Lynch, can be very self-indulgent.

– Let’s be clear about the Lynch version’s voice-overs – both in character thoughts and data dumps. 

Sure, many of them were cringeworthy, though Frank Herbert used both methods extensively in the book. Only to be fair… well… they were necessary back in Lynch’s flick! Same as voice-over narrations had been needed 2 years earlier, in the first version of Bladerunner.  

Yes, I am glad Ridley Scott later did a Bladerunner director’s cut that omitted those voice-overs! The resulting version is far better art! By then, we all knew why Roy Blatty wanted Deckert to be with him, when he died and did not need Harrison Ford telling us. But in 1982, most of the audience really needed Ford’s narration. As they needed Lynch’s in Dune 1984.  (And are there voice-over cues in the contemporary Wonder Woman 1984? Never saw it.) 

The Villeneuve Dune didn’t require voice-overs and data dumps because millions who already knew the story could explain it to those who need explanations.

All right then, there’s all the sword fighting. 

Well, okay, I guess. Gives the flick a nice heroic medieval feel and that’s appropriate with all the feudalism, I guess. And the slow bombs were cool! (Though having separate shielded compartments within the ships would thwart the slow bombs, and compartmenting ships goes way back.)

And I guess we didn’t really need to know why lasers don’t work vs. transparent shields. I suppose. (Though that part of Frank’s setup never made much sense. What? Explosions don’t transfer momentum even to a shielded guy?) 

And so (I guess) we should ignore just about any other fighting advantage that might derive from technology. I guess. 

But sure, okay, as a former fencer and street-fighter, I could dig it, telling the nitpicking modernist corner of me to shut tf up and enjoy all the blade flouncing n’ stuff. I suppose.

Still, the whole notion that Doctor Yueh would be able to sabotage everything, including lookout outposts or maybe one on the feaking moon? Doesn’t that say something about Atreides martial stupidity? All right, that one is on Frank.

 Minor points.

– In Lynch, Paul eats some food-prepared spice because the aristocracy consumed it for life extension – one more way the rich get to be godlike. That aspect is dropped in the Villeneuve Dune and one’s impression is that Paul’s first encounter with the stuff is upon arriving on Arrakis. In fact, the reasons for spice greed are dropped after just one vague mention of the spacer guild. 

– Likewise, all the ecosystem stuff. In the Lynch version, Kynes the ecologist gets to weigh in on the mystery of the origins of spice, but Villeneuve’s Kynes doesn’t even try to hint. It’s only a central theme in six Herbert books.

– Again though, it is vital that someone remind you all that the Dune universe – just like Game of Thrones – is a morality tale against feudalism, which dominated and oppressed 99% of our ancestors for 6000 years! A beastly, horrid form of governance that rewarded the very worst males, that trashed freedom and justice and progress and that made most of those centuries a living hell. A system that will do all the same things to our heirs, if we let it return.
Indeed, in subsequent books, Frank kept trying to teach readers this one lesson. 
We can do better.

There’s more but… but if I went on, you’d get an impression I did not like the Villeneuve Dune. 

In fact, I loved it! 

He had to make choices.  Fine

The result is spectacular. And I kept the note-taker muffled during the viewing.

Still, there is a part of me that fetishistically takes notes, even on flicks that I love…

…so watch me pick apart and appraise several dozen more, along with their implications for our civilization, in Vivid Tomorrows: Science Fiction and Hollywood!

The Animated Storyboard as an Art Form in its Own Right

I’ve long proposed a concept for small-scale cinematic storytelling – one that could become a valuable studio pre-production tool, but might also grow into a medium in its own right, liberating small, writer-led teams to create vivid dramas, whether as first drafts or as final works of popular art. The concept is full-length, animated storyboarding.

For more than a century, the initial element in cinema has been the screenplay, generally around 120 pages for a ninety minute film. While offering detailed dialogue and some scene description, scripts remain sketchy about many other aspects. Moreover, screenplays (and their writers) are treated with little respect – as the most disposable or replaceable components of an expensive process.

In coming years the screenplay, as such, may become obsolete, both to sell an idea for filming and as a working production tool. Instead, a small team consisting of the writer, a computer-animator, a photographic specialist, a musical specialist and some voice actors might team up before hitting the studios with a pitch. Using animatics and integration technologies that already exist, such a team might create a complete 90 minute cinematic story wherein animated characters act and speak upon sets that are computer-merged from still-photos or video pans.

While (generally) too crude to display to the public as-such, these animated storyboards would nevertheless be much closer to realization than a mere 120 page bundle of paper sheets. For example, they would include simple musical background, sound effects, etc. These full-length drafts might be screened before live or online audiences, swiftly testing alternative plot-twists and endings. They would decisively bridge the gap between writer and finished product. (I have ideas how it could be implemented, in unexpected ways.)

Here’s one nifty aspect: producers would take to such storyboarding, and view it as a producer’s tool. Directors would see it as a useful director’s tool. But the main beneficiaries would be writers – originators of the core elements, ideas, dialogue, characters and dramatic tension — as they would rise 5 levels of execution closer to final product before relinquishing control.

If producers say “this looks promising, but we’ll want to make changes,” the creative team can say “We’ll be back on Monday with three new versions we can test before focus groups.” All of which can happen before any contracts are signed… leaving the creators in a strong position.

Now, crude or partial versions of this notion have been around. Amazon Storyteller let you upload a story/script and produce a customizable storyboard. And there’s ToonBoom and Crazy Talk Animator, as well as several others listed below. But none of them has been truly liberating.

A true animated Storyboard (AS) would flow smoothly, have music, and use real actors’ voices behind stick-figure (or rendered avatar) characters. The animation itself would not have to be lavish, just good enough to vividly portray the story and action. In fact, much of the movement can be computer interpolated between artist sketches, almost seamless to the eye.

Think of an animated script… with some scenes rendered more vividly to show off possible special effects. This could then be shopped around to directors & studios, saying “let’s make a deal based on this, and not arm-waved descriptions.”

One sub-variety – even more economical than the version described here — is the narrated storyboard, as illustrated by the famous Chris Marker film “La Jetee” (later remade as “Twelve Monkeys”) and more recently as “The Life of a Dog” by John Harden. (Both of them are in French, interestingly. A fertile technique, it has been under-utilized by indie film-makers and could easily be transformed into the full-voiceover version I propose here.)

Another cool aspect — the animated storyboard is a product in itself! Time and again it has been shown that people can accept and identify with very crude and even cartoonish representations, so long as the drama, pace, music, dialogue and voices are first rate. Even talking and moving stick figures (or a little better) can draw empathy and tears from an audience. Such full, feature-length renderings of a story might draw a following online, if the sequence of words-action-emotions and music are well done. And if that online following is all the story gets, at first? Well, fine, there are monetization methods… and there would soon be awards.

Moreover, if an AS feature gains a cult following online, that might lead to interest from producers, later on, giving the story a second chance.

Ideally, we’re envisioning a product that enables a writer and a few specialists, plus several voice actors, to interact under the leadership of a “director” knowledgeable in the program itself. A team of half a dozen could make a 90 minute feature, crude, but with incredible swiftness and agility, sometimes achieving drama better than many products coming out of studios today.

Now some news. While bits and pieces of this concept have been around for years, I can report on one company whose package appears to bring many of them together, at a level where small teams might actually accomplish something of value. The ToonBoom package is intended for professional storyboard artists. It’s more about making studio artists more productive (which is where the money is), but spec writers and their partners might soon use this – or similar – products to create an art form as influential as (but far better than) anything shown on any YouTube channel.

We’ll see.

And hear and feel.

======

* David Brin is a scientist, tech speaker/consultant, and author. His new novel about our survival in the near future is Existence.   A film by Kevin Costner was based on The Postman. His 16 novels, including NY Times Bestsellers and Hugo Award winners, have been translated into more than twenty languages.   Earth, foreshadowed global warming, cyberwarfare and the world wide web. David appears frequently on shows such as Nova and The Universe and Life After People, speaking about science and future trends. His non-fiction book — The Transparent Society: Will Technology Make Us Choose Between Freedom and Privacy? — won the Freedom of Speech Award of the American Library Association.   (Website: http://www.davidbrin.com/ )

====

NOTES:

Animation software examples:

ToonBoom https://www.toonboom.com/

Crazy Talk Animator Demo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_WLdBCns-s

CrazyTalk8: https://crazytalk.reallusion.com/

Anime Studio Pro: http://store.smithmicro.com/productDetails.aspx?pid=19282

Amazon Storyteller (no longer functioning): http://studios.amazon.com/storyteller

Studiobinder Templates:  https://www.studiobinder.com/blog/top-10-storyboard-software-of-2016-free-storyboard-templates/

Twinery: https://twinery.org/

TyranoBuilder: Visual Novel Studio  http://tyranobuilder.com/

Nevigo Game Design:  https://www.nevigo.com/en/articydraft/overview/

Six Science Fiction Questions

I’ve been answering quite a few queries over on the question and answer site Quora. Here are a few selected questions about science fiction, dystopias, fantasy, and more…

How plausible do you find Huxley’s Brave New World?

Your question is exactly the one asked by Huxley himself, and by his top-caste character, World Director Mustafa Mond., who accepts that change may inevitably come to his tightly organized world. That is one of many contrasts with Orwell’s 1984. Where one party controls with fear and pain, the other does with eugenics, conditioning and pleasure, lots of pleasure.

Note what happens when some alphas start asking inconvenient questions. Are they killed? No, they are sent to “the Islands” where they can study, experiment and keep arguing for changes to be made. This shows that Huxley’s directors are aware that change may come, but demand a steep burden of proof… while seeing value in those who question. A lot like Huxley himself.

For years, Orwell was deemed the one making a plausible prediction. But today the scientific and skilled classes and even the “prols” have so much potential power in their hands – making today’s “terrorists” seem lame by comparison – that no government can risk for long angering those castes or abusing them. Not for long. (Hence the utter stupidity of today’s oligarchs, who wage war on science and all the fact professions. Nothing else could show as starkly how deeply stupid the oligarchy is.)

No, any dictatorship in the future will have to be like Brave New World… or an augmented China … committed to keeping the populace content.

For more see my essay: George Orwell and the Self-Preventing Prophecy.

Which science fiction scenarios do you find the most disturbing?

The Matrix, for suggesting that advanced AI’s would be spectacularly self-defeating and stupid. The novel, Revolt in 2100 by Heinlein, for predicting with stunning accuracy how America might go crazy. The film Idiocracy, for coming true before our eyes.

Almost anything by Philip K Dick, for questioning our perception of reality. Orwell’s 1984 for prescribing tech empowerment of older means of despotism based on terror.  Huxley’s Brave New World for showing how the same thing could happen with pleasure and fun.

And hey, what’s my novel The Postman… chopped liver? Its premise is coming true before your very eyes.

Which science fiction book offers the most likely scenario to a better world?

If you want prescriptive preaching, set in plausible tomorrows and above average writing, try almost anything by Kim Stanley Robinson (his latest is New York 2140). He chides and finger wags, like LeGuin. But his aim is always to propose A Better Way. (I agree with him a lot… but he gives up too easily on regulated market enterprise.)

Iain Banks novels show alluring, post scarcity societies. (See his culture series: Consider Phlebas.)  So does Star Trek!. So does Robert Heinlein’s prescriptive utopia Beyond This Horizon. (Ignore the silly gun stuff at the beginning.)

My own novels Earth and Existence offer ruminations on the path ahead.

What do you consider to be the best Sci Fi/TV franchise?

Stargate was by far the best and most thorough exploration of a science fictional premise. It was tightly consistent and episodes all correlated with each other in a series of very well-managed plot and character arcs, while always striving to at least nod in the direction of scientific plausibility. It was also successful at engendering massive numbers of hours of diverse stories at a fairly low budget.

A final point about Stargate… it is one of the only SF franchises to revolve around a motif that is essentially optimistic. Of course, the equally good Star Trek had all of those traits, with a bit lower score on consistency, but even more hours and even more optimistic.

Ranking in the same general area – with similar qualities – would by Babylon Five.

See where I explain why optimism is so hard to do, in sci fi and hence so rare in my article: The Idiot Plot.

An excellent SF TV franchise at the opposite end of the optimism scale would be the remake of Battlestar Galactica. The premise and universe remained kinda dumb. But it had the best damn writing team imaginable. You had to watch.

And The Expanse has similar qualities.

What is the most interesting magic system from fantasy or science fiction?

Most magical systems rely upon a short list of basic fulcra:

1- similarity — make something similar to the object you seek to control. A voodoo doll of a person. Or a model of a valley where you want rain to fall.

2- contagion – add something that was part of the object to control. Add a person’a real hair trimmings to the voodoo doll.

3- True Names. Related to similarity. You gain power if you know the object’s full (or even hidden) names.

4- Appeal to powers…Invoke mighty spirits – or God – by offering what they want. Something valuable, ranging from a human sacrifice all the way to promising to be a good boy or girl.

5- Art… a florid- dynamic-dramatic VERBAL INCANTATION helps… it is the technique used by cable news and politicians – especially one side – to dazzle millions into magical thinking and hostility to fact-based and scientific systems. Other art enhancements could be visual or musical.

Note that all of these seemed to be reasonable things for our ancestors to try, even though magic almost never worked. Why? First, because these are all methods that work… on our fellow human beings! Persuasion uses all of them and other humans are the most important part of the environment. It was just an extrapolation for people to believe they could also persuade the capricious and deadly forces of nature.

Second, pattern seeking. We invest our hopes into an incantation… and shrug off when it fails, but shout with confirmation, if the thing we wanted happens.

All told, magic has been a horrid sickness that hobbled humans for ages, preventing us from honestly separating what work from what doesn’t. But we are all descended from priests and shamans who got extra food and mates because they pulled off this mumbo-jumbo really well. Their genes flow through our brains, today. No wonder there’s a War on Science!

But if you truly want a different system of magic, try my fun novel The Practice Effect! 😉

What is your most promising science fictional concept?

I suppose most people would cite the “Uplift” of pre-sapient creatures like dolphins and apes to full partnership in our civilization. It looks more likely by the day.

In my novel Earth, I posited both gravity lasers and a way the planet itself could become self-aware.

In Sundiver it’s — well — a way to go to the Sun.

In Existence it is the ultimate implication of self-replicating interstellar probes.

But my favorite is the machine I wish I had, from Kiln People, in which you can make 5 or 6 cheap, temporary clay “ditto” copies of yourself, each day, so that every single thing you needed to do, that day, could get done. I want that. I need that!

== See more questions on Quora, follow the links for more answers and lively discussions of each of these questions, or follow me on Quora.

New bill makes it harder to sell autographed memorabilia in California

 

I often hold up California as the dynamic leader in U.S. governance… e.g having the best election laws in the country, that have reduced radical partisanship, encouraging pragmatism and negotiation and yes, with the minority of moderate Republicans. It helps that Gov. Jerry Brown – while liberal and dynamic and busy, is also skeptical of meddlesome over-reach for its own sake. He vetoes fairly often.

All told, California is an utter refutation of the Foxite song that “divided government that does nothing is best.” Idiots. And yet… here’s a bill that Jerry shoulda trashed.

California’s new Assembly Bill 1570, ‘Sale of Autographed Memorabilia‘ law requires a Certificate of Authenticity (COA) for any signed item worth more than $5. Failure to issue the COA could make the seller liable for ten times the value in damages.

Besides brick and mortar stores, note that this bill applies also to “any dealer engaged in mail-order, telephone-order, or online business for the sale of collectibles in or from this state.”

Though I imagine that this bill was targeted primarily at sports memorabilia and movie schlock, where forgery is a real problem and ‘autograph mills’ pump out massive numbers of celebrity collectibles, it will be particularly hard on small booksellers and comic book sellers.

Specifically, California booksellers worry that it will make it more difficult to hold author signings or sell author-signed collectible books. In addition, bookstores may already be in possession of inventories of hundreds or thousands of autographed books.

Note that the seller can not just toss in a standard boilerplate form. Consider the rather onerous bookkeeping details required by this bill, set to go into effect January 1, 2017:

The Certificate of Authority must, “in at least 10-point boldface type” (1) Describe the collectible and specify the name of the personality who autographed it. (2) Either specify the purchase price and date of sale or be accompanied by a separate invoice setting forth that information. (3) Contain an express warranty, which shall be conclusively presumed to be part of the bargain, of the authenticity of the collectible… (4) Specify whether the collectible is offered as one of a limited edition… (5) Indicate whether the dealer is surety bonded… (6) Indicate the last four digits of the dealer’s resale certificate number… (7) Indicate whether the item was autographed in the presence of the dealer and specify the date and location of, and the name of a witness to, the autograph signing. (8) Indicate whether the item was obtained or purchased from a third party. If so, indicate the name and address of this third party. (9) Include an identifying serial number that corresponds to an identifying number printed on the collectible item, if any….

Furthermore, “the dealer shall retain a copy of the certificate of authenticity for not less than seven years.” That’s a lot of paperwork, particularly for small independent booksellers.

As an author, I often sign all the remaining inventory at a bookstore after personalizing books for fans. I now need a witness to my signing?

This bill also affects the individual consumer, who may wish to resell an item they purchased earlier. How many people will have obtained, or held on to the appropriate paperwork?

The law is dumb and troglodytic. The first obvious change is to increase the minimum value. It’s an absurd amount of bookkeeping for items valued at just over $5. And books should be excluded. At a time when small bookstores are already struggling, let’s not act in any way to discourage reading and literacy and love of books.

If provenance is a problem, a piece of paper won’t solve it. Most are not worth the paper they’re printed on. Of course, certificates can be forged as easily as collectibles. If you must verify, take a picture each time you sign an item and file the jpeg using a correlation app that will find that specific item by the shape of the signature – different each time! Much easier to do and to comply with the law and it can actually work! Correlating and verifying. Best of all it is not a stone-age 20th century “solution.”

When passing a new bill, one must always consider: Who’s going to enforce this bill… and at what cost?

== Politics of the situation ==

Fortunately, this is California. The law will be amended next year. Then amended again till the public and stakeholders care too little to make much noise. It is called real, functioning democracy. If you object to aspects of this law, contact your state legislator.

What this kind of bill demonstrates is that the Democratic-Republican divide is not left-vs-right… Democrats often de-regulate much more than GOPpers do. No, it is manic-vs-depressive. The Democratic-run California legislature rushes about in a frenzy, adapting the state’s laws to 21st Century conditions (it’s their job!), then modifying the modifications under comment/complaint from citizens and companies… then getting more feedback in public hearings and modifying again… Busy, busy, busy. And sometimes drawing vetoes from the liberal-but-pragmatic chief executive. But for the most part, it’s good or neutral stuff.)

Sure, manic is vexing, sometimes, like this silly autograph bill. But we move forward. Unlike the U.S. Congress, which has become utterly dysfunctional, unable to pass even a basic budget. Unable to hold hearings about pressing matters or even issue subpoenas… except In pathetically partisan-nonsensical witch hunts. The laziest Congresses in U.S. history. Except for trillions of gushing tax gifts to the rich, and awful wars, can you name any accomplishments?

 

Sci Fi Flicks! Some looks back & forward

Kurzweil & co give us a sneak peak at the forthcoming movie Autómata: “Starring Antonio Banderas, here we have a believable future (2044, thirty years from now) in which desertification is threatening society, and a single company is leading the way in intelligent robotics.” says one George Mason university blogger.  Indeed, it appears to be part of the new crop of films that treat AI with some attempts at subtlety.

Of course, like most of you, I am eagerly hopeful about Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar. There appears to be some indication that it will offer us all the optimistic, can-do kind of confidence-building sci fi that this civilization desperately needs, after decades of stylishly-imitative cynicism. A theme that Luc Besson kind-of, sort-of, went for in “LUCY” (an under-rated film) and that Nolan’s protege murkily tried for, but failed to achieve in “Transcendance.” Marc Zicree and his team are clearly trying for this sensibility in “Space Command.”

About LUCY. Now, first off, I am a Luc Besson fan — though I always make sure to tune down my IQ and mental age dials, whenever I go to see one of his films. I did that for LUCY and was rewarded by having a very good time. Though on this occasion… alas… well, this film was kind of tragic, because the IQ downshift should not have been necessary! Look, I am not looking for something as deeply thought provoking as Leslie Dixon’s wondrous screenplay for LIMITLESS…

… but just five minutes of dialogue-doctoring could have shifted LUCY’s “we use just 10% of our brains” howler (that offended so many) into some much more plausible-sounding blather that we could more-easily shrug off. A little work with some sober science-advisers and hard SF idea guys could have soothed you nerds out there enough to make this film a real success. Likewise, some of the most “magical” scenes could so easily have been replaced with equally cool tech-manipupation stuff.

Having said that… LUCY has many moving and thoughtful scenes, along with gobs of Luc Besson’s trademark fun. And it does not go for the cheap idiot plot that is so common these days — that all our human institutions, neighbors and professionals are useless fools. Indeed, most are portrayed here as fairly smart and trying very hard.

Especially, in the penultimate scene, when Morgan Freeman holds the super USB drive containing… well… no spoiler. But it represents a notion that is unabashedly Faustian and friendly to unlimited human ambition. That is refreshing, compared to the cliched, Crichtonian-nostalgic rant against science that pervades most media.

I saw this also in the lovely-gentle film HER.

The crux? I found myself won over more than I expected to be. Many good aspects of the film far outweighed howlers — like the ditzy villains. It is what Luc Besson does. As in The Fifth Element, this film is like a golden retriever who jumps on your lap and licks your face and pours love all over you until you surrender.

== Why this is rare ==

It is an uphill struggle for any film maker! Note the relentless number of dystopias, especially aimed at teenagers, that go for the cliched but timeless message: “I am a star-shaped peg that YOU (society/parents/schools) are pounding into a conformist square hole! Just you WAIT until I find my real friends and my real talents and powers!”

Who can compete with that timeless theme? Indeed, I praise and support the basic, individualistic, non-comformist love of tolerance, diversity and eccentricity that pervades most Hollywood dramas and sci fi novels! It is the only way we’ll get the self-preventing prophecies we desperately need, while keeping up our momentum of self-criticism toward a better world.

But when “warnings” become “idiot plots” that never once show the possibility of a decent civilization… that ONLY portray teen angst and repetitious chosen-one pablum, then we have a problem.

Below, I will offer up my comments (at last) on the flick Gavin Hood made from Orson Scott Card’s “Ender’s Game”… and my reaction may surprise you!

But first… and be warned I am about to go VERY fan-boyt geeky on you now…

== Star Trek Lives! ==

First… a couple of added notes about “Axanar” the cool looking indie film being developed in the pre-Kirk (and pre-JJ Abrams) Ortho Trek universe.

1) Reiterating — do have a look at the “Prelude” online. This is way cool and I hope you will support the Kickstarter.

2) All praise to Paramount for having taken the simultaneously noble and excellently profitable route of allowing wide latitude for indie and amateur play in this beloved universe, one of the very few that expresses belief in a better human tomorrow.

3) One small note… I have long been rankled by the tendency of Trek producers to admire the Klingons as macho dudes — kind of the way Frank Miller praises Spartans… when both were/are horrific slaver-holders and vile oppressors, deeply and savagely cruel. Yes, you must wind up with the Klingons of Deep Space Nine, who have reformed a lot and have (by that point) become gruff-macho but decent allies. But clearly they had to suffer many major losses before finally cleaning up… as did the Kzin in Larry Niven’s Known Space cosmos. One of those setbacks was the Chernobyl-like calamity shown in one of the Kirk flicks. Axanar will be the earliest of these setbacks for the earlier, super-nasty Klingon types. Fine..

But how about a glance at the slave races, languishing under Klingon conquest-rule? (If Klingon territory is comparable to that of the federation, there would be a lot of such oppressed systems.) Even a nod toward them changes the equation! As even a momentary sight of the Spartan Helot-slaves would destroy our sympathy for the vicious Queen Gorgo in the wretched “300” series by Frank Miller and Zack Snyder.

I hope the AXANAR script will show some slave planets rebelling and helped to join the Federation! With others promised… “someday, we’ll free you, too.”

4) Finally, about the J.J. Abrams spinoff series. Okay, okay, things could be way worse. Compared to the vast majority of Hollywood sci fi betrayals, they are fun flicks and Abrams seems to actually think he is paying homage to the Roddenberry vision. He does not get the need for an underlying theme of can-do optimism, but at least he’s not doing the opposite.

That is, except for killing off Planet Vulcan and raising James Kirk as a traumatized, bratty orphan. But yes, that works, too. Sort-of. At least Abrams is handling Chris Pine’s character well.

Only… here’s the rub… ** Has the original Kirk Universe been erased? **

It is a major bone of contention when you discuss the range of possibilities in multiverse and parallel universes! And artistically, it is one thing if the branch point (when Kirk’s father is killed) created a NEW track without destroying the original. It is another — with many philosophical ramifications — if it is an erasure and replacement. (For one thing, it means Abrams’s cosmos could likewise be erased, at any moment!)

Sure, this may be worrying the bone way too much! But it is a sign of how deeply this mythos has wormed its way into our hearts that it really does matter!

Indeed, what’s all this with the old (Nimoy) Spock having sworn never to tell anything or interfere? To what end? All the paradoxes are already in place. His words of advice are needed! Especially since, on this track, the Federation has been robbed of one of its strongest members — Vulcan itself. Old Spock should be putting a number of advice gems in a can — like Hari Seldon does for the First Foundation… and JJ Abrams could be doing this NOW, while Leonard Nimoy is still able!

One of those gems should show Nimoy’s Spock saying:

“The universe I came from has not been erased. It stands alongside this one, unreachable, but just inches away, sturdy, like a trellis on which the vine of your new adventure now grows. All of my friends, their triumphs and losses and accomplishments still flourish… elsewhere. But this timeline… this path… is yours.”

That statement would give solace and comfort to the millions of fans who are (frankly) just a bit cheesed off at Abtrams over the genocide of Vulcan and Kirk’s lost childhood. It also (hint-hint) lays the seed for a way-cool encounter between enterprises (and ChrisPine-Kirks) in some possible sequel.

And that’s my earnest (urgent) advice to JJ Abrams, as one storyteller about destiny to another.

== Ender’s Game ==

Okay, we finally rented Ender’s Game for a viewing of four families, having all delayed until we could share it, cheap. (That’s the trick, if you need to see a flick, legally, but want only pennies to go to the makers. And yes, it had many of the flaws I expected. And yet…

1) It is still the formula Card perfected so well. A demigod chosen-one Nietzchean ubermensch-child garners reader-viewer sympathy by seeming really weak and standing up to bullies… finding his “true friends and talents and powers” and showing those bullies what-for.

2) He feels really really BAD about every brutal use of power that he was forced… forced!… to engage in. Luring the reader or audience member to say: “Ender, don’t be so hard on yourself! They made you do it!”

That’s what I like about cardian demigods. They are so soulful and angst-ridden. When they take over the world, they never enjoy it. It’s always for our own good.

Gavin Hood’s screenplay softens some of this stuff. For example, Card’s relentless tirades that all democratic institutions absolutely cannot ever be trusted and are guaranteed to be corrupt, and that rule-by-demigod is the only rational choice. Those are gone from the film and the core villainy of the Earth Military is portrayed in a fairly plausible way. Indeed, that particular failure mode can – and has — happened! The quickie incorporation of the Formic Queen from “Speaker for the Dead” was okay and left out the truly horrific rationalizations in the original novel, reducing it, instead, to a fairly sweet paean to tolerance. Fine.

As a flick, it is only so-so. Ender only earns his rapid promotions by passing unscientific “tests” that are designed to fit the schoolmaster’s tendentious expectations. There is never a rising-from-equals that would truly be dramatic, as we see in “Hunger Games” for example. Still, without question, Hood’s film is an improvement over the dismally anti-civilization, demigod-worshipping originals.

I kind of enjoyed it, in fact.

A War on Reason? Many cliches you believe are “opposite to true”

In this era of argument-by-facebook-jpeg, there was a lot of positive vibe for the simple graphic that I posted, a while back, showing that the U.S. budget deficit suffers a positive 2nd-Derivative (2D) — that accelerates toward skyrocketing debt — during almost every year of every Republican administration since Eisenhower. And that the 2D — contrary to every “truthy” slogan we’ve been taught — improves or decelerates during almost every year of every Democratic presidential term.

Here’s a whole site (nonpartisan) of tax graphics of interest.

So, why do people continue to believe “common knowledge” things that are diametrically opposite to true? Other examples abound.

For example, Democratic presidents always beef up the U.S. Border Patrol and reduce illegal immigration, while GOP presidents almost always cripple the Border Patrol and open the floodgates of illegals. It is right there in the budgets and manpower figures, with the one exception that G.W. Bush started down the usual GOP path, slashing Border Patrol funding… but then had to increase it again after 9/11.

If you actually thought about it, you would understand why both parties’ actions run diametrically opposite to their reputations and rhetoric. Dems actually benefit from LEGAL immigration, which increases the potential numbers of loyal union members and voters. Unions do not want illegals undermining wages… which is something the top GOP masters do want. If you hate the ethnic changes in America, fine, but go after the dems for legal immigration, which they did open wider, and stop obsessing on the much smaller illegal influx, which your own party has relentlessly caused. But if you are that kind of person, logic is wasted on you, anyway.

The same cognitive dissonance between cliched expectation and reality can be found in “de-regulation of excessive government bureaucracy.”

Which party talks and talks and talks about that? Ah, but does the GOP ever do anything about it? Even during the many years when they held every lever of power?

In fact: ironically, it was the democrats who disbanded the ICC (Interstate Commerce Commission) that Ayn Rand deemed the worst example of “captured” government, favoring railroad moguls over competitors. It was the democrats who disbanded the horrid old Civil Aeronautics Board (CAB) and restored airline competition. They unleashed the wild-open Internet upon the world, with almost no regulation at all! Dems did every other major DE-regulation of the last century except in one industry.

Finance. Wall Street and banking. The GOP led the charge deregulating there, for the simple reason that regulation of finance is desperately necessary to prevent massive raids on our economy. And rampage raids on our wallets happened after every GOP-led “deregulation” of finance, especially in the 1920s, the 1980s and the mid-2000s.

And so the question is raised… why do all the pundits and journalists and pols and online yammerers never even glance at any of these horridly opposite-to-true cliches?

== The real war is against reality ==

Likewise, the War on Science… and against all smartypants professions. Forty-three years ago, when Richard Nixon was president, roughly forty percent of scientists and twenty-six percent of U.S. journalists (the people in society who interview and question the widest samplings of Americans) called themselves Republicans, only slightly fewer than called themselves democrats.

Today, just 7% of US journalists so identify and less than 5% of scientists.

What’s changed? Similar steep declines are seen in nearly all of the professions that require extensive knowledge and skill, from teaching and medicine to economics, law, law-enforcement and civil service to university professors in almost every field, even to the U.S. military officer corps.

When I ask my GOP friends (and I remain a registered Republican) to explain this, they reply with blanket condemnation of each of these professions, calling them rife with pointy-headed drones and herd-following myopics, betraying their fields by plunging into political bias. Science, they declare, has been betrayed by the scientists themselves!

An interesting assertion, argued generally by that most-persuasive modern device, the mass-forwarded facebook jpeg! Today’s postage-free equivalent of a crazy-uncle chain letter! How much more convincing than actually talking to the people who can tell Bernoulli’s equation from a cellular automata model… from a hole in the ground.

(Name a single exception to this demonization (mostly by the right, but also by some elements of the radical left) of folks who actually know a lot! After a decade spent asking this question publicly, I have seen just three professions listed that are of high intellectual attainment and skill, yet have escaped regular attack by the central cathedral of Know-Nothingness — Fox News. Can you name those three?)

The mass-desertion of the GOP by all the smart people does not discredit Smart People. It discredits a “side” that has gone crazy, by waging war on smart people. This is no longer “conservatism” in any recognizable sense, but rather a cult. Goldwater and Buckley are spinning in their graves.

 

== And Finally ==

All right, this is just terrific. A generic “why I am right and you are wrong” anthem for our (insanely self-righteous) times.

 

Why are the Koch brothers opposing solar energy?

General Stanley McChrystal (ret), in a TED talk, makes his brief but cogent “military case for sharing knowledge,” surprising all with his call for general transparency.

Of course there are a million ramifications and complexities that cannot fit into a TED talk. It is a complex world and our Protector Caste has genuine needs for tactical (short term) secrecy. But needs become excuses for bad habits that are self-defeating over the longer term … and that could ultimately lead to Big Brother. There must be an ultimate trend toward an open world, and Gen. McChrystal makes about as strong a case as you could in a ten minute TED.

“I am more scared of the bureaucrat that holds information in a desk drawer or in a safe than of someone who leaks, because ultimately we’ll be better off if we share.”

Oh, for a more in-depth appraisal of this new era, see (of course) The Transparent Society.

== Those who want to shut down both light and enlightenment ==

The Yiddish word “chutzpah” means gall and utterly arrogant nerve. It should be re-spelled to “koch-spah” after this news… that the ever-meddlesome Koch brothers are now funding a major campaign against state efforts to ramp up solar energy.

It would be one thing if they limited their attacks to ending tax rebates and minor subsidies for solar and wind… hypocritical, given how much they have benefited from vastly larger oil-gas-coal subsidies, tax breaks and almost free access to resources on public lands.

No, they are also targeting “net metering” which is the law allowing a homeowner who owns a rooftop solar unit to sell excess power back to the utility.

Please read that again. The Koch brothers do not want you selling your excess power to the market. Their beef is with filling energy markets with millions of little-guy producers. Their “institute” proclaims that its aim is to “preserve the public utility power company concept” — a state mandated monopoly system in which single companies control all access to energy. Some enterprise capitalists! Some libertarians!

But let’s dig deeper to the heart of it. WHY are the Kochs (and their Saudi partners) doing this right now? Because solar energy is taking off. Because efficiency and durability of photovoltaics have been skyrocketing, in part because we had the wisdom to use some mild incentives to boost an important new industry, the way the U.S. Postal contracts stimulated air travel, in the 1920s, or public roads spurred the rise of the automobile.

Only with this difference: renewable energy systems are improving far faster than airplanes or automobiles did, in their nascent days. And more spectacular tech advances loom on the horizon, that the Kochs can see coming fast.

Dig it well. They would not be doing this if renewables weren’t taking off and a looming threat to the brothers’ bottom line. Millions of autonomous citizens, generating and selling their own power is no longer a sci fi pipe dream. It is coming true fast…

…and parasitic dinosaurs are bellowing.

== focus where it hurts ==

Let’s get down to absolute fundamentals: what must shrink is ability of oligarchy to “capture” and corrupt government. Given how deeply committed the Koch brothers are, to meddling and altering our elections, we might want to show it goes both ways, by becoming aware of which products in your neighborhood store augment their Georgia-Pacific empire:

KOCH BRANDS: Brawny, Angel Soft, Quilted Northern, Soft ‘n’ Gentle, Dixie cups/plates/etc, Sparkle/Vanity Fair/Zee napkins.

OTHER BRANDS: Charmin, Cottonelle, Scott, Bounty, Viva, Hefty cups/plates/etc, Kleenex/Bounty/Scott napkins.

Hmmm. Print it out. Keep it next to your shopping list. Make up your own minds.

== Bad Democratic Oligarchs? ==

This article in the Washington Free Beacon, Oligarchy in the 21st Century, pushes the meme — and with some fascinating anecdotal support (!) — that democrats do oligarchy, just as much as republicans do! And indeed, the essay is worth reading, with some informative moments… except a conclusion that is warped and sick and just plain wrong.

Actually, it’s kind of sad, revealing something dark in this writer’s core, that he assumes rich democrats must have the same reasons for donating to liberal causes as wealthy donors on the right.

To him, the only conceivable reason that a rich person would donate money would be self-interest, cheating and greed. But the narrative does not wash when Bill Gates and Warren Buffett publicly proclaim “my class should be paying higher taxes.”

There is another possible motive. Love of a country and civilization and middle-class society that was very good to them.

== Military Matters ==

The US Navy is showing off, announcing the deployment on-ship of a close-defense laser system and the imminent shipboard testing of a railgun system.

You might recall the dramatically exaggerated depiction of a railgun in one of the Transformers flicks. Railguns use electromagnetic energy known as the Lorenz Force to launch a projectile between two conductive rails. The high-power electric pulse generates a magnetic field to fire the projectile with very little recoil. Many sci fi tales have portrayed rail guns used either in space combat or as great big electromagnetic launch systems, hurling cargoes from the Moon or even from Earth. The development of smaller scale guns for the military was an intermediate step, necessary in several ways.

Combine all this with the Navy’s new Zumwalt class destroyer and you can see how advanced a service got that was not crushed and half-ruined by a decade of brutally self-destructive and pointless land wars of attrition in Asia.

Here’s a thought-provoking essay on how empires — mostly spread by military means — do allow (for all their faults) greater safety from violence and opportunities for trade and development. There are feedback loops and ironies. I do not agree in all ways! But interesting.

Defend civilization, especially the ways in which ours has been unlike any others.

David Brin’s Favorite Science Fiction Films

Science Fiction is multi-dimensional and no one criterion can be used to determine a best-of list. Hence, I must divide my favorites into categories. And yes, each choice would be worth many paragraphs of explanation, including the runners-up and tragic misfires. I’ll be more concise.

1. Movies for grownups: I wish there were a lot more of these — films in which the director and writer actually cared about the deep implications of their visual thought experiment — their deliberate departure from reality. Works in which the creators paid close heed to logical what-if and (while delivering tasty action, plus biting social commentary) eschewed the lazy, “idiot plot“* assumption that civilization is automatically and entirely worthless. Some institutions actually function! Adversaries have plausible motives and no red, glowing eyes! Protagonists aren’t chosen-ones but merely above-average people with difficult challenges to overcome, in part by using their heads.

 Inception (2010) works harder than any film I ever saw. It can be overbearing, especially with the aggressive musical score cranked up! But I have never seen a director strive to juggle as many edgy intricacies as Nolan does in this mostly-successful tour-de-force.

Gattaca (1997) and Primer (2004) are much simpler films that nevertheless aim to tease your mind into real thinking. Gattaca isn’t as dystopian as some lazily take it to be and the protagonist is actually a self-centered jerk… but a true hero nonetheless, whose triumph is largely one of character and mind. Primer is a delight of logic and an example of what can be done when very smart people have a filming budget of about eighty-five cents.

James Cameron gets a couple of mentions here. But the one that was for grownups is The Abyss (1989). Yeah, sure, the ending was… well, I don’t care.

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) was epochal in its time — it helped make me who I am, and remains a mind stretcher — though it suffers a bit under close examination. So don’t.

And Kubrick’s other wonder…arguably the best motion picture ever made, though only marginally science fiction…Doctor Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964).

Honorable mentions in this category would include the recent films Limitless (2011) and Moon (2009). The grownup in me says thank you.

2. Joyful slumming: At the opposite end are films that I could only watch by tuning my “dials” before entering the theater. Cranking IQ and science and even logic down to”popcorn” levels, without sacrificing my standards when it came to deeper values, beauty, esthetics, ethics. Admit it, some of your brains must be left outside the theater, in order to enjoy most flicks, and that’s fine. In other words, appreciating as-if-stoned a movie-movie that is simply way-successful at delivering fun.

Noteworthy: all the fantasies are here. Show me one fantasy for grownups.

Conan the Barbarian (the original 1982) is simply the most successful film ever at delivering what it promised, while never promising what it couldn’t deliver. Every scene is filled with visual and musical beauty amid a tale that hearkens to the deeply non-western, non-modern and joyfully brainless part of you and me, going back to the Iliad and Gilgamesh and the caves.

 The Fifth Element (1997) is the single most joyful work of art I ever saw. Luc Besson’s sheer pleasure leaps onto your lap like a great big, floppy-dumb retriever and licks your face for ninety minutes. I adore it. And it adores us.

Avatar (2009)… well, James Cameron would demand that we put Avatar in category number one or even number 3. Sorry. Nice try. It is beyond-brilliant in the popcorn category, but keep those neuron dials turned way down. And then murmur… “wow!”

In contrast, the Back to the Future (1985) trilogy comes that close to vaulting into category three. It’s fantastic fun. bighearted, unabashedly logical and darn near perfect.

Honorable Mentions in this category:

Lord of the Rings (2001)… all right, Peter Jackson delivered a superb work of art and it was definitely not “just popcorn.” I have great respect for Tolkien’s complex world building craft and Jackson’s fealty to the original material. Still, neither the books nor the flicks bear adult scrutiny. So turn down the “adult” dials. Be a kid and enjoy. I know I did!

3. The whole package: Rarest of all — films that take us beyond our familiar horizons on adventures that satisfy every age you contain within yourself, from awestruck kid to sober grownup to mystic dreamer.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982) delivers from beginning to end. Not only a terrific motion picture but a love ode to the brash, Faustian, unbridled adolescent hopefulness that only Star Trek ever gave us, amid today’s grotesque tsunami of grouchy-cliched dystopias.

Bladerunner (1982). Of course. Nothing need be said.

——

BEYOND THE TOP TEN … WE ALSO HAVE…

Runners-up: There are so many films that came close, or just missed. Dozens that were enjoyable and I’d have been proud to be associated with. Only nit-picking kept them off the top tier.

 Contact (1997) was well worthwhile and inspiring, if a bit preachy in spots.

Gravity (2013). I expect this one may challenge its way into the Top Ten, with time. Exquisitely done, even if Cuaron depicts Earthy Orbit as roughly the size of L.A. County.

Things to Come (1936). My kids were bored. I was moved almost to tears by its paean to the civilization we might (with difficulty) make, if we overcome the worse sides of human nature. Maybe its a generation thing.

James Cameron’s Aliens (1986) is the best film about motherhood ever created. And Terminator II (1991) was even better than the first one.

(Note: All through the 80s and 90s there was a “third movie curse” in which the third flick in a franchise betrayed everything good about the wondrous second film. It happened to Star Trek, Star Wars, Terminator and especially the Aliens series. But not Back to the Future, somehow.)

I’m not done! And so let me roll off some of my favorites that fall just outside the top ten, each one funky and unique and different in its own way:

 Forbidden Planet (1956), Rollerball (1975), Men in Black (1997), Galaxy Quest (1999), Logan’s Run (1976), Source Code (2011), Soylent Green (1973), The Truman Show (1998), The Time Machine (1960), District 9 (2009), Alien Nation (1988), Charly (1968), Serenity (2005)… plus weirdnesses like Brazil (1985), SteamBoy (2004) and Solaris (1972)… illustrating the fantastic range and breadth and wondrous opportunities for creativity that science fiction offers to those who think bold.

Special Category: Faustian SF. I especially like films that buck a cliche. And the worst cliche of all is hopeless gloom. A few… a bold few… express confidence in us, in our ability and righteous right to go beyond what we were, and in our children to be better than us… call these the anti-Crichton movies that declare the opposite of Michael’s endless chiding: “don’t touch that!”

Examples mentioned already are The Wrath of Khan and Inception.

Also expressing this rebel sense of belief-in-us: Ghostbusters (1984), Brainstorm (1983), Altered States (1980), Dark City (1998), Quatermass and the Pit (1958), and eXistentZ (1999). And may I be honest? Kevin Costner’s The Postman (1997) was harmed by a nonsensical last 20 minutes – and was uneven throughout – and it might have benefited from even 5 minutes of talking to the original author. Still, large swathes of it were terrific. It features some of the most gorgeous cinematography in the history of film. Also, its heart was pure and brave and it belongs in this category. Still. Compare to the book.

Special Mention: Surprisingly, no single Steven Spielberg film made my top ten sci fi list. But almost all Steven Spielberg films would make it into my top fifty, while Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) and War of the Worlds (2005) and Minority Report (2002) skate much closer. Spielberg and Zemeckis are the most consistent and skilled story tellers of our age. Nolan and Cameron, while much more uneven and less disciplined, did make it onto the list. Ah well.  Vive les differences.

And finally….

Tragic misses: What might have been… if only...

 The Empire Strikes Back is a fine film in its own right, and it shows what a wonderful epic we might have had, if George Lucas had stuck to his strength, as one of the greatest of all visionary Hollywood producers, and simply hired great writers and directors for his films, the way he did in Empire… and the way he hired terrific artists for all the other Star Wars flicks. (Their one strong suit was then endlessly voluptuous visuals.) Alas, his choices became our tragedy.

The Day the Earth Stood Still… could have explored the immorality of the other side. It’s smarmy and unhelpful preachiness prevented adding another layer of potentially really interesting counter-preachiness. How tasty if one human had stepped up and said: “I know, I know we are all that… but what are you?”

Total Recall… you’re kidding me, right? You can be this creative — in BOTH versions (1990 and 2012) — yet still timidly shy away from getting all Phil Dick on us and persuading us to actually fret that it might all actually an actual bummer recall-trip? You couldn’t do that? Why? I mean, why not? It would have been so easy and so cool.  Dang.

 Dune (1984)… actually, I have no major complaints. It’s a pretty good movie and deLaurentis was utterly faithful to Herbert, accurately conveying the complex world and characters. Alas, lo and behold, the silver screen made clear what most readers of the novel – captivated and immersed – fail to notice. That every single character in the story is loathsome and ought to die. Yes, the “good” guys, too. Please. As quickly as possible.

E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (1982). Fun and all that. But. Um. And the real villain is…………?

And so it goes.  Let’s all hope that there will be great new films in the next decade the outshine all of the above!

Hey, here’s a pitch: “dolphins… in space!”

Eh? Who could possibly beat that?

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* Followup links:

The “Idiot Plot Cliche” that civilization must always be portrayed as worthless.

Other science fiction riffs by David Brin: Speculations on Science Fiction

David’s explorations in depth about Pop Culture: Star Wars to Tolkien

Name the Villain…