Arthur C. Clarke died early this morning after a long battle with post-polio syndrome. The New York Times has an interesting summary of his life and major accomplishments. I’m ashamed to say that I still haven’t read 2001: A Space Odyssey, but it is on my ever expanding reading list. Hopefully I can review it some time in the near future. Clark is well known for his laws of prediction, which are as follows:
When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
Frank Herbert goes in a completely new direction with his fourth book in the Dune series, God Emperor of Dune. This novel has quite a different feel than the first three. The setting takes place 3500 years after the ending of Children of Dune. Dune’s ecological transformation is complete except for a small patch of desert. As a result of the transformation, the sandworms (and the supply of new spice) died off. Leto has almost completely transformed into a sandworm, and has taken over as leader of the galaxy. He’s been working on his “Golden Path” all this time while sitting on the last big hoard of spice. (more…)
A few years ago, the Science Channel aired an episode of SciFi Science, “How to Build a Lightsaber” hosted by theoretical physicist Dr. Michio Kaku. He explained some theories that might be used and developed a rough design that should be “workable in our lifetimes.” Of course almost all of his episodes end up with that qualification. Last month it looks like there was a breakthrough in the hardest part of making a lightsaber work, getting the blade to stop at a certain point.
Although the most prominent uses for controlling the depth of laser cutting are surgical and clinical, Fraser said the team is “very excited about the potential industrial applications,” especially since compared to clinics it’s easier to get new technology into industries.
Unfortunately, the goal is to make the lasers useful surgery, not chopping off alien arms at cantinas.
As I sat down to write this review, I realized I couldn’t remember the last time I read an entire physical book. Since 2018, all my novel reading has been on a Kindle Paperwhite. Before that, I used a Kindle Fire but still alternated with physical books. Reading on the Fire was always a bit of a hassle because of the glare. The Paperwhite’s e-paper display is in a completely different league. I like it so much that when I revisited the Foundation novels a few years ago, I borrowed the ebooks from my local library even though I already had the physical copies on my shelf. One nice perk of the Paperwhite is that it’s easier to read while eating because I can flip pages with my knuckle.
Recently I wanted to disconnect from electronics before bed. The best way seemed to be grabbing something from my bookshelf that I hadn’t read yet and didn’t already have digitally. That’s when I noticed Svaha by Charles de Lint. I vaguely remembered seeing a recommendation for it years ago and picking up a copy through Book Mooch, a site where people trade books they’re done with. I’m pretty sure it’s been sitting unread for over ten years.
When I pulled Svaha off the shelf, I could barely remember how or why I got it. The cover, showing a Native American man with a wolf, didn’t ring any bells, and the back-cover description didn’t sound like my usual genre. Most of my reading leans toward science fiction and, more recently, fantasy. Still, I decided to trust my past self and give it a shot.
The story takes place in Canada sometime after 2094. Without spoiling too much, the setup is that in the 1990s a Native American named Daniel Hollow Horn became a music superstar and used his fortune to educate and empower his people. Over time they became world leaders in science, technology, and law, eventually surpassing the rest of the world. After a period of war, they withdrew into self-contained “Enclaves,” kind of like Wakanda from Black Panther, except everyone knows where they are. They managed to protect themselves from the pollution and fallout left behind while the rest of the world fell apart.
