<article>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#article10_01_24_1655235</id>
	<title>A Case For the Necessity of Science Fiction</title>
	<author>Soulskill</author>
	<datestamp>1264357860000</datestamp>
	<htmltext>unc0nn3ct3d writes <i>"This article makes an interesting point about <a href="http://blog.netflowdevelopments.com/2010/01/24/science-fiction-tool-survival/">the necessity of science fiction</a> &mdash; or, more specifically, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speculative\_fiction">speculative fiction</a> as a tool to aid in the long-term survival of the human species.  'We live in a world that is incredibly frightening for a growing portion of the population because of the exponential rate of change we are experiencing.  Our world is changing so fast now that we often don't have time to contemplate the full ramifications that come with the increasingly rapid adoption of new technologies and social changes.  Most often this is simply because these changes are being introduced almost one after another after another, without any time to breathe.  Speculative fiction, however, if widely adopted, makes it almost instinctive that we think about these situations and possible outcomes before they even arise.'"</i></htmltext>
<tokenext>unc0nn3ct3d writes " This article makes an interesting point about the necessity of science fiction    or , more specifically , speculative fiction as a tool to aid in the long-term survival of the human species .
'We live in a world that is incredibly frightening for a growing portion of the population because of the exponential rate of change we are experiencing .
Our world is changing so fast now that we often do n't have time to contemplate the full ramifications that come with the increasingly rapid adoption of new technologies and social changes .
Most often this is simply because these changes are being introduced almost one after another after another , without any time to breathe .
Speculative fiction , however , if widely adopted , makes it almost instinctive that we think about these situations and possible outcomes before they even arise .
' "</tokentext>
<sentencetext>unc0nn3ct3d writes "This article makes an interesting point about the necessity of science fiction — or, more specifically, speculative fiction as a tool to aid in the long-term survival of the human species.
'We live in a world that is incredibly frightening for a growing portion of the population because of the exponential rate of change we are experiencing.
Our world is changing so fast now that we often don't have time to contemplate the full ramifications that come with the increasingly rapid adoption of new technologies and social changes.
Most often this is simply because these changes are being introduced almost one after another after another, without any time to breathe.
Speculative fiction, however, if widely adopted, makes it almost instinctive that we think about these situations and possible outcomes before they even arise.
'"</sentencetext>
</article>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881320</id>
	<title>prior art(icle)</title>
	<author>G\_bass\_luthier</author>
	<datestamp>1264366140000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Informativ</modclass>
	<modscore>2</modscore>
	<htmltext>Reminds me of a much earlier article by Athena Andreadis:
<a href="http://www.starshipreckless.com/stories/archives/The\%20Double\%20Helix.pdf" title="starshipreckless.com" rel="nofollow">http://www.starshipreckless.com/stories/archives/The\%20Double\%20Helix.pdf</a> [starshipreckless.com]
The Wired article's author is listed as 'admin'.... wonder if admin has read any of Athena's articles...
Of course, there is nothing new. No doubt many have penned similar sentiments before. I'd take a slightly different tack and suggest that imaginative work in any realm is not only essential, but part of the human construct. We thrive on extending our possibilities through thought experiment. We stagnate when the imagination fails.</htmltext>
<tokenext>Reminds me of a much earlier article by Athena Andreadis : http : //www.starshipreckless.com/stories/archives/The \ % 20Double \ % 20Helix.pdf [ starshipreckless.com ] The Wired article 's author is listed as 'admin'.... wonder if admin has read any of Athena 's articles.. . Of course , there is nothing new .
No doubt many have penned similar sentiments before .
I 'd take a slightly different tack and suggest that imaginative work in any realm is not only essential , but part of the human construct .
We thrive on extending our possibilities through thought experiment .
We stagnate when the imagination fails .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Reminds me of a much earlier article by Athena Andreadis:
http://www.starshipreckless.com/stories/archives/The\%20Double\%20Helix.pdf [starshipreckless.com]
The Wired article's author is listed as 'admin'.... wonder if admin has read any of Athena's articles...
Of course, there is nothing new.
No doubt many have penned similar sentiments before.
I'd take a slightly different tack and suggest that imaginative work in any realm is not only essential, but part of the human construct.
We thrive on extending our possibilities through thought experiment.
We stagnate when the imagination fails.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882300</id>
	<title>I wonder if dreams are similar ...</title>
	<author>swframe</author>
	<datestamp>1264328640000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Interestin</modclass>
	<modscore>3</modscore>
	<htmltext>I didn't RTFA but I've wondered if dreams are similar.
When faced with a similar situation, do people use their dream
experiences to help make a quicker decision.
I wonder if deja vu is just the feeling of experiencing something
from a forgotten dream.</htmltext>
<tokenext>I did n't RTFA but I 've wondered if dreams are similar .
When faced with a similar situation , do people use their dream experiences to help make a quicker decision .
I wonder if deja vu is just the feeling of experiencing something from a forgotten dream .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>I didn't RTFA but I've wondered if dreams are similar.
When faced with a similar situation, do people use their dream
experiences to help make a quicker decision.
I wonder if deja vu is just the feeling of experiencing something
from a forgotten dream.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30884302</id>
	<title>Lots of exponential progress in other areas</title>
	<author>Paul Fernhout</author>
	<datestamp>1264341480000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Insightful</modclass>
	<modscore>4</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>You missed the revolutions in network connectedness (and global consciousness),<br>
&nbsp; <a href="http://www.global-mindshift.org/memes/wombat.swf" title="global-mindshift.org">http://www.global-mindshift.org/memes/wombat.swf</a> [global-mindshift.org]<br>robotics, materials, genetics, and design tools. Examples of the state of the art in robots:<br>
&nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="http://listcultures.org/pipermail/p2presearch\_listcultures.org/2009-November/005926.html" title="listcultures.org">http://listcultures.org/pipermail/p2presearch\_listcultures.org/2009-November/005926.html</a> [listcultures.org]</p><p>Here is an index into stuff I wrote on why doomsters are wrong about material issues (but may be right about social issues):<br>
&nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="http://listcultures.org/pipermail/p2presearch\_listcultures.org/2009-August/thread.html#4123" title="listcultures.org">http://listcultures.org/pipermail/p2presearch\_listcultures.org/2009-August/thread.html#4123</a> [listcultures.org]</p><p>We are not running out of stuff or energy by any means. The human imagination is the ultimate resource (as Julian Simon suggests). Are you suggesting optical fiber uses more energy that copper?</p><p>On earth, we can recycle and use renewables (or other energy sources even -- whether nuclear or coal), and there are enough resources in the solar system to support quadrillions of humans at a higher than current US standard of living, building thousands of Earth's worth of area in space habitats. How can we be running out of, say, metals when we just need to mine the landfills to get them back? The US auto industry has also become a *net* producer of metal as people downsize cars. And if we switched to electric cars, we would use less electricity (since it takes more electricity to make a gallon of gas than it takes to make an electric car go the same distance as a gasoline car).<br>
&nbsp; &nbsp; "Why luxury safer electric cars should be free-to-the-user"<br>
&nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="http://groups.google.com/group/openmanufacturing/msg/09eb7f4c973349f2?hl=en" title="google.com">http://groups.google.com/group/openmanufacturing/msg/09eb7f4c973349f2?hl=en</a> [google.com]</p><p>Try James P. Hogan or Iain Banks or Ursula K. Le Guin for something different in sci-fi.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>You missed the revolutions in network connectedness ( and global consciousness ) ,   http : //www.global-mindshift.org/memes/wombat.swf [ global-mindshift.org ] robotics , materials , genetics , and design tools .
Examples of the state of the art in robots :     http : //listcultures.org/pipermail/p2presearch \ _listcultures.org/2009-November/005926.html [ listcultures.org ] Here is an index into stuff I wrote on why doomsters are wrong about material issues ( but may be right about social issues ) :     http : //listcultures.org/pipermail/p2presearch \ _listcultures.org/2009-August/thread.html # 4123 [ listcultures.org ] We are not running out of stuff or energy by any means .
The human imagination is the ultimate resource ( as Julian Simon suggests ) .
Are you suggesting optical fiber uses more energy that copper ? On earth , we can recycle and use renewables ( or other energy sources even -- whether nuclear or coal ) , and there are enough resources in the solar system to support quadrillions of humans at a higher than current US standard of living , building thousands of Earth 's worth of area in space habitats .
How can we be running out of , say , metals when we just need to mine the landfills to get them back ?
The US auto industry has also become a * net * producer of metal as people downsize cars .
And if we switched to electric cars , we would use less electricity ( since it takes more electricity to make a gallon of gas than it takes to make an electric car go the same distance as a gasoline car ) .
    " Why luxury safer electric cars should be free-to-the-user "     http : //groups.google.com/group/openmanufacturing/msg/09eb7f4c973349f2 ? hl = en [ google.com ] Try James P. Hogan or Iain Banks or Ursula K. Le Guin for something different in sci-fi .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>You missed the revolutions in network connectedness (and global consciousness),
  http://www.global-mindshift.org/memes/wombat.swf [global-mindshift.org]robotics, materials, genetics, and design tools.
Examples of the state of the art in robots:
    http://listcultures.org/pipermail/p2presearch\_listcultures.org/2009-November/005926.html [listcultures.org]Here is an index into stuff I wrote on why doomsters are wrong about material issues (but may be right about social issues):
    http://listcultures.org/pipermail/p2presearch\_listcultures.org/2009-August/thread.html#4123 [listcultures.org]We are not running out of stuff or energy by any means.
The human imagination is the ultimate resource (as Julian Simon suggests).
Are you suggesting optical fiber uses more energy that copper?On earth, we can recycle and use renewables (or other energy sources even -- whether nuclear or coal), and there are enough resources in the solar system to support quadrillions of humans at a higher than current US standard of living, building thousands of Earth's worth of area in space habitats.
How can we be running out of, say, metals when we just need to mine the landfills to get them back?
The US auto industry has also become a *net* producer of metal as people downsize cars.
And if we switched to electric cars, we would use less electricity (since it takes more electricity to make a gallon of gas than it takes to make an electric car go the same distance as a gasoline car).
    "Why luxury safer electric cars should be free-to-the-user"
    http://groups.google.com/group/openmanufacturing/msg/09eb7f4c973349f2?hl=en [google.com]Try James P. Hogan or Iain Banks or Ursula K. Le Guin for something different in sci-fi.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882258</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882940</id>
	<title>Re:Load of old psychobable</title>
	<author>Smallpond</author>
	<datestamp>1264332300000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p><div class="quote"><p>Constant change is here to stay.</p></div><p>Didn't you read the summary?</p><p>Constant change would be k * t<br>Merely polynomial change would be k0 + k1 * t + k2 * t^2<nobr> <wbr></nobr>...<br>Exponential change would be k ^ t</p><p>Hope that clears everything up.</p></div>
	</htmltext>
<tokenext>Constant change is here to stay.Did n't you read the summary ? Constant change would be k * tMerely polynomial change would be k0 + k1 * t + k2 * t ^ 2 ...Exponential change would be k ^ tHope that clears everything up .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Constant change is here to stay.Didn't you read the summary?Constant change would be k * tMerely polynomial change would be k0 + k1 * t + k2 * t^2 ...Exponential change would be k ^ tHope that clears everything up.
	</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881144</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882258</id>
	<title>What "exponential change?</title>
	<author>Animats</author>
	<datestamp>1264328460000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Interestin</modclass>
	<modscore>4</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>
The article has much blithering about "exponential change", probably written by someone who has no idea what that means, or that the exponent might be &lt; 1.  Actually, the rate of change in lifestyle for the average person in the developed world is slowing down.  And much of the change is negative.
</p><p>
It's useful to think of the Industrial Revolution as starting in 1808.  That's the first year someone bought a train ticket and went someplace.  Technology prior to that was spotty and didn't have much broad impact.  Most people never got more than 50 miles from where they were born, just as in the previous 5000 years or so.
</p><p>
Jump ahead 50 years, to 1858.  Railroads were all over France, Germany, Britain, and the eastern US.  Telegraph lines were widespread. The first Atlantic cable was just starting to work.   Heavy machinery and big factories were producing goods in volume.  The world had become much smaller, and there was far more man-made stuff in it.  The life of someone who lived from 1808 to 1858 changed enormously during one lifespan.
</p><p>
Jump ahead to 1908.  Railroads to everywhere worth going.  Electric power.  Telephones.  Wireless.  Cars.  The first airplanes.  Much more manufacturing.  The world of 1908 had early versions of most of the important stuff we have now, yet it was a century ago.
</p><p>
Jump ahead to 1958.  Almost everything we have now already existed.  Jet aircraft, nuclear power plants, space satellites, transistors, computers, television, Interstate highways, data communications - they were all up and running.
The first IC was proposed in 1958.  Antibiotics were available, and DNA had been identified.
Manufacturing was so good that production gluts were common.  Agriculture in the developed world was producing so much food that surpluses were a major issue.
</p><p>
Now look at the last 50 years.    All the stuff from 1958 works, usually better, but most of what's happened since then is tweaks on 1958 technology.  No new big sources of energy.  No big progress in space travel in 40 years.  Progress has slowed down.  Per capita income real for the median American hasn't increased much in 40 years. Corporate leaders don't even talk about "progress" any more; just "change".
</p><p>
The next 50 years are going to be about running out of stuff.  Oil, copper, neodymium, and tantalum are already getting scarce.  Substitutes all use more energy and money.  A century ago, raw materials were available near where they were used. The easy to get at resources have already been extracted.  It looks like it's all downhill from here.
</p><p>Which is why SF has lost its optimism.  Popular SF today is either space opera or about vampires.  Or it's about a realistic, but grim, near future.  SF is now just entertainment; it has no major cultural function, other than perhaps preparing us for the future society of scarcity.
</p><p>
<i>
"My grandfather rode a camel, my father rode a camel, I drive a Mercedes, my son drives a Land Rover, his son will drive a Land Rover, but his son will ride a camel." </i> - Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum, Emir of Dubai.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>The article has much blithering about " exponential change " , probably written by someone who has no idea what that means , or that the exponent might be It 's useful to think of the Industrial Revolution as starting in 1808 .
That 's the first year someone bought a train ticket and went someplace .
Technology prior to that was spotty and did n't have much broad impact .
Most people never got more than 50 miles from where they were born , just as in the previous 5000 years or so .
Jump ahead 50 years , to 1858 .
Railroads were all over France , Germany , Britain , and the eastern US .
Telegraph lines were widespread .
The first Atlantic cable was just starting to work .
Heavy machinery and big factories were producing goods in volume .
The world had become much smaller , and there was far more man-made stuff in it .
The life of someone who lived from 1808 to 1858 changed enormously during one lifespan .
Jump ahead to 1908 .
Railroads to everywhere worth going .
Electric power .
Telephones. Wireless .
Cars. The first airplanes .
Much more manufacturing .
The world of 1908 had early versions of most of the important stuff we have now , yet it was a century ago .
Jump ahead to 1958 .
Almost everything we have now already existed .
Jet aircraft , nuclear power plants , space satellites , transistors , computers , television , Interstate highways , data communications - they were all up and running .
The first IC was proposed in 1958 .
Antibiotics were available , and DNA had been identified .
Manufacturing was so good that production gluts were common .
Agriculture in the developed world was producing so much food that surpluses were a major issue .
Now look at the last 50 years .
All the stuff from 1958 works , usually better , but most of what 's happened since then is tweaks on 1958 technology .
No new big sources of energy .
No big progress in space travel in 40 years .
Progress has slowed down .
Per capita income real for the median American has n't increased much in 40 years .
Corporate leaders do n't even talk about " progress " any more ; just " change " .
The next 50 years are going to be about running out of stuff .
Oil , copper , neodymium , and tantalum are already getting scarce .
Substitutes all use more energy and money .
A century ago , raw materials were available near where they were used .
The easy to get at resources have already been extracted .
It looks like it 's all downhill from here .
Which is why SF has lost its optimism .
Popular SF today is either space opera or about vampires .
Or it 's about a realistic , but grim , near future .
SF is now just entertainment ; it has no major cultural function , other than perhaps preparing us for the future society of scarcity .
" My grandfather rode a camel , my father rode a camel , I drive a Mercedes , my son drives a Land Rover , his son will drive a Land Rover , but his son will ride a camel .
" - Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum , Emir of Dubai .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>
The article has much blithering about "exponential change", probably written by someone who has no idea what that means, or that the exponent might be 
It's useful to think of the Industrial Revolution as starting in 1808.
That's the first year someone bought a train ticket and went someplace.
Technology prior to that was spotty and didn't have much broad impact.
Most people never got more than 50 miles from where they were born, just as in the previous 5000 years or so.
Jump ahead 50 years, to 1858.
Railroads were all over France, Germany, Britain, and the eastern US.
Telegraph lines were widespread.
The first Atlantic cable was just starting to work.
Heavy machinery and big factories were producing goods in volume.
The world had become much smaller, and there was far more man-made stuff in it.
The life of someone who lived from 1808 to 1858 changed enormously during one lifespan.
Jump ahead to 1908.
Railroads to everywhere worth going.
Electric power.
Telephones.  Wireless.
Cars.  The first airplanes.
Much more manufacturing.
The world of 1908 had early versions of most of the important stuff we have now, yet it was a century ago.
Jump ahead to 1958.
Almost everything we have now already existed.
Jet aircraft, nuclear power plants, space satellites, transistors, computers, television, Interstate highways, data communications - they were all up and running.
The first IC was proposed in 1958.
Antibiotics were available, and DNA had been identified.
Manufacturing was so good that production gluts were common.
Agriculture in the developed world was producing so much food that surpluses were a major issue.
Now look at the last 50 years.
All the stuff from 1958 works, usually better, but most of what's happened since then is tweaks on 1958 technology.
No new big sources of energy.
No big progress in space travel in 40 years.
Progress has slowed down.
Per capita income real for the median American hasn't increased much in 40 years.
Corporate leaders don't even talk about "progress" any more; just "change".
The next 50 years are going to be about running out of stuff.
Oil, copper, neodymium, and tantalum are already getting scarce.
Substitutes all use more energy and money.
A century ago, raw materials were available near where they were used.
The easy to get at resources have already been extracted.
It looks like it's all downhill from here.
Which is why SF has lost its optimism.
Popular SF today is either space opera or about vampires.
Or it's about a realistic, but grim, near future.
SF is now just entertainment; it has no major cultural function, other than perhaps preparing us for the future society of scarcity.
"My grandfather rode a camel, my father rode a camel, I drive a Mercedes, my son drives a Land Rover, his son will drive a Land Rover, but his son will ride a camel.
"  - Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum, Emir of Dubai.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30887242</id>
	<title>Re:This is true.</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264410720000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p><div class="quote"><p>but it often does a much poorer job with political and social stuff,</p></div><p>Yeah, this struck me today -- I've finally gotten around to Heinlein's \_Starship Troopers\_, listening to the audiobook at work today, and while I'm liking the whole powered-armor jumping-around blowing-stuff-up angle, his political and social predictions actually had me laughing at points.</p><p>
&nbsp; I mean, people talk about the mandatory military service as some awful fascist idea Heinlein came up with, but that didn't bother me too much - I would predict stupid dick-waving wars to be much less common if everyone had to serve in the military before gaining full citizenship. The biggest warmongers are generally not old generals, they're overgrown man-boys who wanna play "IRL Army Guys" with other people and can't relate to the suffering on the ground.<br>
&nbsp; Sure, I'd prefer a military system without so much of a certain Prussian psychopath's disciplinary and command structure, but hey. It's not a really awful idea, IMO.</p><p>
&nbsp; No, the parts that got me laughin were the predictiions that ending corporal punishment in schools would <i> <b>destroy</b> the United States of America,</i> and his opining on the "pre-scientific pseudo-psychology" that made people think public beatings weren't so hot. (Which he endorses by having his mouthpiece character spout voluminous amounts of traditionalist, "spare the rod" pre-scientific pseudo-psychology!) He even claims "there is no moral instinct in man", which is a prediction that turns out to have been flatly wrong. (See \_The Origins of Virtue\_, a pop sci book on evolutionary biology as it relates to human social dynamics and the moral instinct specifically.) Oops!<br>
&nbsp; No, Heinlein predicted, those foolish mollycoddlers who said humans were basically good would be proven wrong and end up destroying the world along the way, and only a return to good old-fashioned beatings could possibly instill a moral compass in people and save us all.</p><p>
&nbsp; And as a side note, his "demolishing" of Marx's Labor Theory of Value was downright ridiculous. He should have left the attacks on Marx to people who've actually <i>read</i> Marx. (Not to mention understood him. If the LTV seems stupid or crazy, you haven't understood it yet. If your attack seems simple, or obvious, you are <i>way</i> off track. Marx, while undeniably an autocratic asshole, and while wrong about a good number of things, was <i>absolutely</i> not a fool.)</p></div>
	</htmltext>
<tokenext>but it often does a much poorer job with political and social stuff,Yeah , this struck me today -- I 've finally gotten around to Heinlein 's \ _Starship Troopers \ _ , listening to the audiobook at work today , and while I 'm liking the whole powered-armor jumping-around blowing-stuff-up angle , his political and social predictions actually had me laughing at points .
  I mean , people talk about the mandatory military service as some awful fascist idea Heinlein came up with , but that did n't bother me too much - I would predict stupid dick-waving wars to be much less common if everyone had to serve in the military before gaining full citizenship .
The biggest warmongers are generally not old generals , they 're overgrown man-boys who wan na play " IRL Army Guys " with other people and ca n't relate to the suffering on the ground .
  Sure , I 'd prefer a military system without so much of a certain Prussian psychopath 's disciplinary and command structure , but hey .
It 's not a really awful idea , IMO .
  No , the parts that got me laughin were the predictiions that ending corporal punishment in schools would destroy the United States of America , and his opining on the " pre-scientific pseudo-psychology " that made people think public beatings were n't so hot .
( Which he endorses by having his mouthpiece character spout voluminous amounts of traditionalist , " spare the rod " pre-scientific pseudo-psychology !
) He even claims " there is no moral instinct in man " , which is a prediction that turns out to have been flatly wrong .
( See \ _The Origins of Virtue \ _ , a pop sci book on evolutionary biology as it relates to human social dynamics and the moral instinct specifically .
) Oops !
  No , Heinlein predicted , those foolish mollycoddlers who said humans were basically good would be proven wrong and end up destroying the world along the way , and only a return to good old-fashioned beatings could possibly instill a moral compass in people and save us all .
  And as a side note , his " demolishing " of Marx 's Labor Theory of Value was downright ridiculous .
He should have left the attacks on Marx to people who 've actually read Marx .
( Not to mention understood him .
If the LTV seems stupid or crazy , you have n't understood it yet .
If your attack seems simple , or obvious , you are way off track .
Marx , while undeniably an autocratic asshole , and while wrong about a good number of things , was absolutely not a fool .
)</tokentext>
<sentencetext>but it often does a much poorer job with political and social stuff,Yeah, this struck me today -- I've finally gotten around to Heinlein's \_Starship Troopers\_, listening to the audiobook at work today, and while I'm liking the whole powered-armor jumping-around blowing-stuff-up angle, his political and social predictions actually had me laughing at points.
  I mean, people talk about the mandatory military service as some awful fascist idea Heinlein came up with, but that didn't bother me too much - I would predict stupid dick-waving wars to be much less common if everyone had to serve in the military before gaining full citizenship.
The biggest warmongers are generally not old generals, they're overgrown man-boys who wanna play "IRL Army Guys" with other people and can't relate to the suffering on the ground.
  Sure, I'd prefer a military system without so much of a certain Prussian psychopath's disciplinary and command structure, but hey.
It's not a really awful idea, IMO.
  No, the parts that got me laughin were the predictiions that ending corporal punishment in schools would  destroy the United States of America, and his opining on the "pre-scientific pseudo-psychology" that made people think public beatings weren't so hot.
(Which he endorses by having his mouthpiece character spout voluminous amounts of traditionalist, "spare the rod" pre-scientific pseudo-psychology!
) He even claims "there is no moral instinct in man", which is a prediction that turns out to have been flatly wrong.
(See \_The Origins of Virtue\_, a pop sci book on evolutionary biology as it relates to human social dynamics and the moral instinct specifically.
) Oops!
  No, Heinlein predicted, those foolish mollycoddlers who said humans were basically good would be proven wrong and end up destroying the world along the way, and only a return to good old-fashioned beatings could possibly instill a moral compass in people and save us all.
  And as a side note, his "demolishing" of Marx's Labor Theory of Value was downright ridiculous.
He should have left the attacks on Marx to people who've actually read Marx.
(Not to mention understood him.
If the LTV seems stupid or crazy, you haven't understood it yet.
If your attack seems simple, or obvious, you are way off track.
Marx, while undeniably an autocratic asshole, and while wrong about a good number of things, was absolutely not a fool.
)
	</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882736</id>
	<title>Re: Faster Than The Other Side</title>
	<author>RonTheHurler</author>
	<datestamp>1264330980000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Insightful</modclass>
	<modscore>5</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>I have first hand experience with this.  I used to employ two skilled carpenters to cut wood all day long. For the cost of one year's salary for those guys, I bought an automated CNC machine that does everything they did, and more, and has been running virtually non-stop for a solid three years.</p><p>Sounds awful when I stop there. So then what happened...</p><p>My product's quality, consistency and reliability shot up dramatically,  Tolerances went from 1/4" to 0.005".  My customers noticed, and then my sales shot up too.  So my employee count went up to handle the new order volume.  I have employees doing jobs that didn't exist when I started this business ten years ago. And now my employees get to work in an air conditioned office and don't have to worry about cutting their fingers off with a table saw either.</p><p>So, because technology killed two jobs, I'm better off, my customers are better off, and I was able to hire more employees who are also better off.</p><p>When a textile worker was complaining about his job going to China (in the news last year), an astute interviewer asked him "Do you want your kids to grow up to work in this same sweaty factory, breathing this lint filled air?"  Of course, the answer was "No.", so then, why not let the job go to China, and teach your kids to embrace the innovation and change that will be so inevitable in his lifetime?  That's the value of Science Fiction in my opinion. Once a kid gets his head around it, he understands intrinsically that that "different" is natural, and change is normal.  He has to change his world-view to get into the story, for most of the stories he reads.  That's good practice for living in any future, especially your own.</p><p>I grew up on a steady diet of science fiction. I'm 50 years old now, and I've changed careers in every one of my adult decades.  It has always been a good thing for me too.  Follow-up studies consistently show that 95\% of workers who are laid off get better jobs at higher pay within two years of being laid off.</p><p>By the way, here's how the economy really works -- It's not "supply and demand" as the old school used to teach, it's really all about production and consumption, which is subtly different, but in a very important way. A healthy economy is driven by production. Production is driven by consumption. Consumption is driven by innovation (think iPhone, Blu-Ray, etc.), and innovation is driven by education and imagination.   If you want a healthy economy,  invest in education and support the arts. Give a kid a Kindle stuffed with a thousand books (there are literally thousands of free and nearly-free books for the kindle on Amazon, including the HG Wells collection for $0.99,  etc...)</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>I have first hand experience with this .
I used to employ two skilled carpenters to cut wood all day long .
For the cost of one year 's salary for those guys , I bought an automated CNC machine that does everything they did , and more , and has been running virtually non-stop for a solid three years.Sounds awful when I stop there .
So then what happened...My product 's quality , consistency and reliability shot up dramatically , Tolerances went from 1/4 " to 0.005 " .
My customers noticed , and then my sales shot up too .
So my employee count went up to handle the new order volume .
I have employees doing jobs that did n't exist when I started this business ten years ago .
And now my employees get to work in an air conditioned office and do n't have to worry about cutting their fingers off with a table saw either.So , because technology killed two jobs , I 'm better off , my customers are better off , and I was able to hire more employees who are also better off.When a textile worker was complaining about his job going to China ( in the news last year ) , an astute interviewer asked him " Do you want your kids to grow up to work in this same sweaty factory , breathing this lint filled air ?
" Of course , the answer was " No .
" , so then , why not let the job go to China , and teach your kids to embrace the innovation and change that will be so inevitable in his lifetime ?
That 's the value of Science Fiction in my opinion .
Once a kid gets his head around it , he understands intrinsically that that " different " is natural , and change is normal .
He has to change his world-view to get into the story , for most of the stories he reads .
That 's good practice for living in any future , especially your own.I grew up on a steady diet of science fiction .
I 'm 50 years old now , and I 've changed careers in every one of my adult decades .
It has always been a good thing for me too .
Follow-up studies consistently show that 95 \ % of workers who are laid off get better jobs at higher pay within two years of being laid off.By the way , here 's how the economy really works -- It 's not " supply and demand " as the old school used to teach , it 's really all about production and consumption , which is subtly different , but in a very important way .
A healthy economy is driven by production .
Production is driven by consumption .
Consumption is driven by innovation ( think iPhone , Blu-Ray , etc .
) , and innovation is driven by education and imagination .
If you want a healthy economy , invest in education and support the arts .
Give a kid a Kindle stuffed with a thousand books ( there are literally thousands of free and nearly-free books for the kindle on Amazon , including the HG Wells collection for $ 0.99 , etc... )</tokentext>
<sentencetext>I have first hand experience with this.
I used to employ two skilled carpenters to cut wood all day long.
For the cost of one year's salary for those guys, I bought an automated CNC machine that does everything they did, and more, and has been running virtually non-stop for a solid three years.Sounds awful when I stop there.
So then what happened...My product's quality, consistency and reliability shot up dramatically,  Tolerances went from 1/4" to 0.005".
My customers noticed, and then my sales shot up too.
So my employee count went up to handle the new order volume.
I have employees doing jobs that didn't exist when I started this business ten years ago.
And now my employees get to work in an air conditioned office and don't have to worry about cutting their fingers off with a table saw either.So, because technology killed two jobs, I'm better off, my customers are better off, and I was able to hire more employees who are also better off.When a textile worker was complaining about his job going to China (in the news last year), an astute interviewer asked him "Do you want your kids to grow up to work in this same sweaty factory, breathing this lint filled air?
"  Of course, the answer was "No.
", so then, why not let the job go to China, and teach your kids to embrace the innovation and change that will be so inevitable in his lifetime?
That's the value of Science Fiction in my opinion.
Once a kid gets his head around it, he understands intrinsically that that "different" is natural, and change is normal.
He has to change his world-view to get into the story, for most of the stories he reads.
That's good practice for living in any future, especially your own.I grew up on a steady diet of science fiction.
I'm 50 years old now, and I've changed careers in every one of my adult decades.
It has always been a good thing for me too.
Follow-up studies consistently show that 95\% of workers who are laid off get better jobs at higher pay within two years of being laid off.By the way, here's how the economy really works -- It's not "supply and demand" as the old school used to teach, it's really all about production and consumption, which is subtly different, but in a very important way.
A healthy economy is driven by production.
Production is driven by consumption.
Consumption is driven by innovation (think iPhone, Blu-Ray, etc.
), and innovation is driven by education and imagination.
If you want a healthy economy,  invest in education and support the arts.
Give a kid a Kindle stuffed with a thousand books (there are literally thousands of free and nearly-free books for the kindle on Amazon, including the HG Wells collection for $0.99,  etc...)</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881236</id>
	<title>Danger, Will Robinson!!!!</title>
	<author>John Guilt</author>
	<datestamp>1264365780000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Interestin</modclass>
	<modscore>3</modscore>
	<htmltext>I basically agree that science fiction can help forearm us for making reasonable decisions, but think there's a danger of people swallowing authors' interpretations of what the effects of different developments might entail whole. Roy Blount reports that a man was once asked if he '...believed in infant babtism', and he responded 'Believe it?  I've seen it done!'   Though we can tell reality from fantasy (and science fiction...incorporating the worlds of if), some works can make impressions to the point that people treat them as if they were evidence.
<br> <br>
This can range from a shrill 'Any altruist or collectivist government action will lead to disaster---I <em>saw</em> that happen in <i>Atlas Shrugged</i>!' to a smug 'All giant corporations are evil---I saw that in every sci-fi movie from 1970 onward,' to an arse-hurt 'Charles Stross is wrong when he says that space colonisation is probably impractical---I've <i>seen</i> it happen in 99\% of the books I've read since the age of 8.'  Again, the problem is that within a book the author has control not only of what arguments are presented, but of who presents them (either the estimable Wesley Mouch or that obnoxious and long-winded Galt/Ananconda/Swaggart crowd) and what happens when one idea or another is put into practice (think of a notional authors' fictional contention that a Marxist revolution---a <i>Marxist</i> one, mind you---would be followed massive State Capitalism, suppression of workers' rights, and the like).
<br> <br>
I think this is a particular danger in a society where 1.) so many religious fanatics insist that their children be taught that one particular book's premises, observations, and conclusions must be treated as infallible, and also 2.) many science fiction fans think, 'I'm <em>so</em> much more clever than those religious fanatics, I'd <i>never</i> be that gullible,' which is one of the stigmata of a mark.  Newt Gingrich, Cory Doctorow, and that woman in the Dorsai merc outfit at that Westercon who apparently jills-off to the thought of our getting <i>Starship Trooper</i>'s political system all come to mind.</htmltext>
<tokenext>I basically agree that science fiction can help forearm us for making reasonable decisions , but think there 's a danger of people swallowing authors ' interpretations of what the effects of different developments might entail whole .
Roy Blount reports that a man was once asked if he '...believed in infant babtism ' , and he responded 'Believe it ?
I 've seen it done !
' Though we can tell reality from fantasy ( and science fiction...incorporating the worlds of if ) , some works can make impressions to the point that people treat them as if they were evidence .
This can range from a shrill 'Any altruist or collectivist government action will lead to disaster---I saw that happen in Atlas Shrugged !
' to a smug 'All giant corporations are evil---I saw that in every sci-fi movie from 1970 onward, ' to an arse-hurt 'Charles Stross is wrong when he says that space colonisation is probably impractical---I 've seen it happen in 99 \ % of the books I 've read since the age of 8 .
' Again , the problem is that within a book the author has control not only of what arguments are presented , but of who presents them ( either the estimable Wesley Mouch or that obnoxious and long-winded Galt/Ananconda/Swaggart crowd ) and what happens when one idea or another is put into practice ( think of a notional authors ' fictional contention that a Marxist revolution---a Marxist one , mind you---would be followed massive State Capitalism , suppression of workers ' rights , and the like ) .
I think this is a particular danger in a society where 1 .
) so many religious fanatics insist that their children be taught that one particular book 's premises , observations , and conclusions must be treated as infallible , and also 2 .
) many science fiction fans think , 'I 'm so much more clever than those religious fanatics , I 'd never be that gullible, ' which is one of the stigmata of a mark .
Newt Gingrich , Cory Doctorow , and that woman in the Dorsai merc outfit at that Westercon who apparently jills-off to the thought of our getting Starship Trooper 's political system all come to mind .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>I basically agree that science fiction can help forearm us for making reasonable decisions, but think there's a danger of people swallowing authors' interpretations of what the effects of different developments might entail whole.
Roy Blount reports that a man was once asked if he '...believed in infant babtism', and he responded 'Believe it?
I've seen it done!
'   Though we can tell reality from fantasy (and science fiction...incorporating the worlds of if), some works can make impressions to the point that people treat them as if they were evidence.
This can range from a shrill 'Any altruist or collectivist government action will lead to disaster---I saw that happen in Atlas Shrugged!
' to a smug 'All giant corporations are evil---I saw that in every sci-fi movie from 1970 onward,' to an arse-hurt 'Charles Stross is wrong when he says that space colonisation is probably impractical---I've seen it happen in 99\% of the books I've read since the age of 8.
'  Again, the problem is that within a book the author has control not only of what arguments are presented, but of who presents them (either the estimable Wesley Mouch or that obnoxious and long-winded Galt/Ananconda/Swaggart crowd) and what happens when one idea or another is put into practice (think of a notional authors' fictional contention that a Marxist revolution---a Marxist one, mind you---would be followed massive State Capitalism, suppression of workers' rights, and the like).
I think this is a particular danger in a society where 1.
) so many religious fanatics insist that their children be taught that one particular book's premises, observations, and conclusions must be treated as infallible, and also 2.
) many science fiction fans think, 'I'm so much more clever than those religious fanatics, I'd never be that gullible,' which is one of the stigmata of a mark.
Newt Gingrich, Cory Doctorow, and that woman in the Dorsai merc outfit at that Westercon who apparently jills-off to the thought of our getting Starship Trooper's political system all come to mind.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880544</id>
	<title>Adolescent fantasies</title>
	<author>pigiron</author>
	<datestamp>1264362120000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Insightful</modclass>
	<modscore>3</modscore>
	<htmltext>Engineers and scientists will invent things anyway regardless of whether there has been bad fiction written about the concept beforehand.</htmltext>
<tokenext>Engineers and scientists will invent things anyway regardless of whether there has been bad fiction written about the concept beforehand .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Engineers and scientists will invent things anyway regardless of whether there has been bad fiction written about the concept beforehand.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882876</id>
	<title>Re:Adolescent fantasies</title>
	<author>Sperbels</author>
	<datestamp>1264331880000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>Adolescent fantasies?  So fiction that takes place in a modern day or historical setting is mature fantasy while science fiction settings are all adolescent fantasies?  Can you say pretentious snob?</htmltext>
<tokenext>Adolescent fantasies ?
So fiction that takes place in a modern day or historical setting is mature fantasy while science fiction settings are all adolescent fantasies ?
Can you say pretentious snob ?</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Adolescent fantasies?
So fiction that takes place in a modern day or historical setting is mature fantasy while science fiction settings are all adolescent fantasies?
Can you say pretentious snob?</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880544</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30883750</id>
	<title>Re:This is true.</title>
	<author>kenwd0elq</author>
	<datestamp>1264337580000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Insightful</modclass>
	<modscore>2</modscore>
	<htmltext>The problem with the whole "flying cars" thing is that they are technologically possible, and have been for some time now.  The problem is lawyers.  Every time somebody comes up with a great idea, some shyster starts thinking of ways to steal all the money by filing frivolous lawsuits based on a worst-case scenario about what could happen.  If we were allowed to shoot any lawyer who filed a lawsuit based on the FEAR of some outcome instead of on some ACTUAL outcome, the world would be a better place - and we would have our rocket packs and flying cars.</htmltext>
<tokenext>The problem with the whole " flying cars " thing is that they are technologically possible , and have been for some time now .
The problem is lawyers .
Every time somebody comes up with a great idea , some shyster starts thinking of ways to steal all the money by filing frivolous lawsuits based on a worst-case scenario about what could happen .
If we were allowed to shoot any lawyer who filed a lawsuit based on the FEAR of some outcome instead of on some ACTUAL outcome , the world would be a better place - and we would have our rocket packs and flying cars .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>The problem with the whole "flying cars" thing is that they are technologically possible, and have been for some time now.
The problem is lawyers.
Every time somebody comes up with a great idea, some shyster starts thinking of ways to steal all the money by filing frivolous lawsuits based on a worst-case scenario about what could happen.
If we were allowed to shoot any lawyer who filed a lawsuit based on the FEAR of some outcome instead of on some ACTUAL outcome, the world would be a better place - and we would have our rocket packs and flying cars.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880460</id>
	<title>Only on slashdot</title>
	<author>CodeDragonDM</author>
	<datestamp>1264361820000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Informativ</modclass>
	<modscore>5</modscore>
	<htmltext>Only on Slashdot will you find an article saying we need more science fiction as news.</htmltext>
<tokenext>Only on Slashdot will you find an article saying we need more science fiction as news .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Only on Slashdot will you find an article saying we need more science fiction as news.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882182</id>
	<title>Social Change?!</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264327980000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>I am almost 30 years old, during my lifetime there were no wars (in my country...), no major new Ideology like socialism, communism or facism was born, or grew strong and even the liberalization trends in society were thoroughly solid before I was even born. Sure, the internet, cloning, blablabla, all nice and dandy, but compared to the horrific political and social clash of ideologies in the past its almost like we reached a plateau.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>I am almost 30 years old , during my lifetime there were no wars ( in my country... ) , no major new Ideology like socialism , communism or facism was born , or grew strong and even the liberalization trends in society were thoroughly solid before I was even born .
Sure , the internet , cloning , blablabla , all nice and dandy , but compared to the horrific political and social clash of ideologies in the past its almost like we reached a plateau .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>I am almost 30 years old, during my lifetime there were no wars (in my country...), no major new Ideology like socialism, communism or facism was born, or grew strong and even the liberalization trends in society were thoroughly solid before I was even born.
Sure, the internet, cloning, blablabla, all nice and dandy, but compared to the horrific political and social clash of ideologies in the past its almost like we reached a plateau.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880810</id>
	<title>Re: Faster Than The Other Side</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264363380000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>Obligatory <a href="http://www.marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm" title="marshallbrain.com">link proving that sci-fi thinks of these things</a> [marshallbrain.com]</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>Obligatory link proving that sci-fi thinks of these things [ marshallbrain.com ]</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Obligatory link proving that sci-fi thinks of these things [marshallbrain.com]</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882742</id>
	<title>Re:What change?</title>
	<author>Leuf</author>
	<datestamp>1264331040000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>Whatever technological changes have come around are any of them the sort of thing that has one lying awake at night wondering how to cope? Only when a technology supersedes a previous technology does it really have a major impact, but only on those who directly made their living from the prior tech.  The only real societal change I can point to that really affects how we live our lives is the role women are playing in society now, the prevalence of two income households where we are working twice as much but no further ahead than before, and the impact that has on the following generations.  Technology has little to do with that.</htmltext>
<tokenext>Whatever technological changes have come around are any of them the sort of thing that has one lying awake at night wondering how to cope ?
Only when a technology supersedes a previous technology does it really have a major impact , but only on those who directly made their living from the prior tech .
The only real societal change I can point to that really affects how we live our lives is the role women are playing in society now , the prevalence of two income households where we are working twice as much but no further ahead than before , and the impact that has on the following generations .
Technology has little to do with that .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Whatever technological changes have come around are any of them the sort of thing that has one lying awake at night wondering how to cope?
Only when a technology supersedes a previous technology does it really have a major impact, but only on those who directly made their living from the prior tech.
The only real societal change I can point to that really affects how we live our lives is the role women are playing in society now, the prevalence of two income households where we are working twice as much but no further ahead than before, and the impact that has on the following generations.
Technology has little to do with that.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880964</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881240</id>
	<title>Re:This is true.</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264365780000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>However the way that situations proposed in SF actually play out in real-life (when or if they so occur) is almost never the way the author wrote it. So in that respect SF may well be preparing us for the future - but it's the <b>wrong</b> future. (where's my flying car?)</htmltext>
<tokenext>However the way that situations proposed in SF actually play out in real-life ( when or if they so occur ) is almost never the way the author wrote it .
So in that respect SF may well be preparing us for the future - but it 's the wrong future .
( where 's my flying car ?
)</tokentext>
<sentencetext>However the way that situations proposed in SF actually play out in real-life (when or if they so occur) is almost never the way the author wrote it.
So in that respect SF may well be preparing us for the future - but it's the wrong future.
(where's my flying car?
)</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880442</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30884988</id>
	<title>science, speculative, or future fiction</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264346280000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>However the genre is sub-defined, science fiction, speculative fiction, or future fiction, people like to wonder about the future.</p><p>What is fun, to me, is comparing how people liked to imagine the future, based on their current reality.</p><p>There is Jules Verne's "The Time Machine" (published around 1895), and it is amazing how his ideas on future cultures might be.<br>The science of the time machine seemed to be analog electronic, mechanical, Victorian.</p><p>There is "2001 A Space Odyssey" (published around 1968), and the idea of us having Moon colonies, artificial intelligence, human inter solar exploration.</p><p>In some ways, progress is very slow: We still have the basic automobile to drive in, hasn't changed much since 1900. Passenger jet airplanes have not changed much since the 60's, it seems. Trucks and trains also not much changed in a hundred years.</p><p>In some ways, progress has been better than the science fiction author's imaginations, mostly computers, in terms of pervasiveness and penetration to many products (digital tv's, cell phones, netbooks, personal music players).</p><p>On a personal note, it seems that written science fiction, at bookstores, is starting to become less and less popular.<nobr> <wbr></nobr>:(</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>However the genre is sub-defined , science fiction , speculative fiction , or future fiction , people like to wonder about the future.What is fun , to me , is comparing how people liked to imagine the future , based on their current reality.There is Jules Verne 's " The Time Machine " ( published around 1895 ) , and it is amazing how his ideas on future cultures might be.The science of the time machine seemed to be analog electronic , mechanical , Victorian.There is " 2001 A Space Odyssey " ( published around 1968 ) , and the idea of us having Moon colonies , artificial intelligence , human inter solar exploration.In some ways , progress is very slow : We still have the basic automobile to drive in , has n't changed much since 1900 .
Passenger jet airplanes have not changed much since the 60 's , it seems .
Trucks and trains also not much changed in a hundred years.In some ways , progress has been better than the science fiction author 's imaginations , mostly computers , in terms of pervasiveness and penetration to many products ( digital tv 's , cell phones , netbooks , personal music players ) .On a personal note , it seems that written science fiction , at bookstores , is starting to become less and less popular .
: (</tokentext>
<sentencetext>However the genre is sub-defined, science fiction, speculative fiction, or future fiction, people like to wonder about the future.What is fun, to me, is comparing how people liked to imagine the future, based on their current reality.There is Jules Verne's "The Time Machine" (published around 1895), and it is amazing how his ideas on future cultures might be.The science of the time machine seemed to be analog electronic, mechanical, Victorian.There is "2001 A Space Odyssey" (published around 1968), and the idea of us having Moon colonies, artificial intelligence, human inter solar exploration.In some ways, progress is very slow: We still have the basic automobile to drive in, hasn't changed much since 1900.
Passenger jet airplanes have not changed much since the 60's, it seems.
Trucks and trains also not much changed in a hundred years.In some ways, progress has been better than the science fiction author's imaginations, mostly computers, in terms of pervasiveness and penetration to many products (digital tv's, cell phones, netbooks, personal music players).On a personal note, it seems that written science fiction, at bookstores, is starting to become less and less popular.
:(</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30886384</id>
	<title>Re:Stories With Messages</title>
	<author>unc0nn3ct3d</author>
	<datestamp>1264357920000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>By Startrek I was referring to the JJ Abrahms star trek, not the traditional Star Trek, or even TNG, Voyager and DS9 in some poignant episodes</htmltext>
<tokenext>By Startrek I was referring to the JJ Abrahms star trek , not the traditional Star Trek , or even TNG , Voyager and DS9 in some poignant episodes</tokentext>
<sentencetext>By Startrek I was referring to the JJ Abrahms star trek, not the traditional Star Trek, or even TNG, Voyager and DS9 in some poignant episodes</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881292</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881468</id>
	<title>Exponential rate of change</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264323720000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>
A constant rate of change results in exponential growth, so what is an exponential rate of change?</htmltext>
<tokenext>A constant rate of change results in exponential growth , so what is an exponential rate of change ?</tokentext>
<sentencetext>
A constant rate of change results in exponential growth, so what is an exponential rate of change?</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30885148</id>
	<title>changes</title>
	<author>zogger</author>
	<datestamp>1264347300000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>I think technological change is *way* more fast now than in the past, the fastest it has ever been. I'm not that old, but I remember when most people didn't have TVs yet, and a lot of people didn't even have landline phones, so that's old enough to have somewhat of a longer range historical perspective. Fast changes then, but twin turbo with the nitrous button now.</p><p>It used to be you could be a generalist, and keep up with things, then a specialist, now you have to be a sub-specialist inside of a specialty, just to maintain the pace.</p><p>Read every single eurekalert press release for a few weeks, all the disciplines there, just to get a small smattering of a handle on it, just an overview, a summary...that's some serious fast change. We are crossing from what was dang woo-woo not too long ago into serious practical science, and quickly.</p><p>
&nbsp; We are going to hit this "singularity" thing they talk about a lot sooner than most folks realize...if we don't major screwup and destroy the planet and ourselves *right* before that threshold is crossed first. And that's a big "if". If you include our evolution socially/psychologically, which we must in looking at the whole "human" thing, the two paths are not even close in maintaining parity in the speed of evolutionary change. Tech is outstripping the other important bits, by a large factor, which means we could screw up pretty bad.   And that's my sci fi prediction, complete with cliffhanger, for the sequel.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>I think technological change is * way * more fast now than in the past , the fastest it has ever been .
I 'm not that old , but I remember when most people did n't have TVs yet , and a lot of people did n't even have landline phones , so that 's old enough to have somewhat of a longer range historical perspective .
Fast changes then , but twin turbo with the nitrous button now.It used to be you could be a generalist , and keep up with things , then a specialist , now you have to be a sub-specialist inside of a specialty , just to maintain the pace.Read every single eurekalert press release for a few weeks , all the disciplines there , just to get a small smattering of a handle on it , just an overview , a summary...that 's some serious fast change .
We are crossing from what was dang woo-woo not too long ago into serious practical science , and quickly .
  We are going to hit this " singularity " thing they talk about a lot sooner than most folks realize...if we do n't major screwup and destroy the planet and ourselves * right * before that threshold is crossed first .
And that 's a big " if " .
If you include our evolution socially/psychologically , which we must in looking at the whole " human " thing , the two paths are not even close in maintaining parity in the speed of evolutionary change .
Tech is outstripping the other important bits , by a large factor , which means we could screw up pretty bad .
And that 's my sci fi prediction , complete with cliffhanger , for the sequel .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>I think technological change is *way* more fast now than in the past, the fastest it has ever been.
I'm not that old, but I remember when most people didn't have TVs yet, and a lot of people didn't even have landline phones, so that's old enough to have somewhat of a longer range historical perspective.
Fast changes then, but twin turbo with the nitrous button now.It used to be you could be a generalist, and keep up with things, then a specialist, now you have to be a sub-specialist inside of a specialty, just to maintain the pace.Read every single eurekalert press release for a few weeks, all the disciplines there, just to get a small smattering of a handle on it, just an overview, a summary...that's some serious fast change.
We are crossing from what was dang woo-woo not too long ago into serious practical science, and quickly.
  We are going to hit this "singularity" thing they talk about a lot sooner than most folks realize...if we don't major screwup and destroy the planet and ourselves *right* before that threshold is crossed first.
And that's a big "if".
If you include our evolution socially/psychologically, which we must in looking at the whole "human" thing, the two paths are not even close in maintaining parity in the speed of evolutionary change.
Tech is outstripping the other important bits, by a large factor, which means we could screw up pretty bad.
And that's my sci fi prediction, complete with cliffhanger, for the sequel.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880964</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30884516</id>
	<title>Re: Faster Than The Other Side</title>
	<author>dissy</author>
	<datestamp>1264343220000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>While it is very true we still have a long way to go, it is worth pointing out that thoughts about the effects of such change have been pondered over before.</p><p>Some interesting reading, especially the social aspects in the later chapters, is Engines of Creation by Eric Drexler.</p><p>Full online version: <a href="http://e-drexler.com/d/06/00/EOC/EOC\_Table\_of\_Contents.html" title="e-drexler.com">http://e-drexler.com/d/06/00/EOC/EOC\_Table\_of\_Contents.html</a> [e-drexler.com]<br>Or it's about a $6 paperback these days.</p><p>I think you might find it interesting.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>While it is very true we still have a long way to go , it is worth pointing out that thoughts about the effects of such change have been pondered over before.Some interesting reading , especially the social aspects in the later chapters , is Engines of Creation by Eric Drexler.Full online version : http : //e-drexler.com/d/06/00/EOC/EOC \ _Table \ _of \ _Contents.html [ e-drexler.com ] Or it 's about a $ 6 paperback these days.I think you might find it interesting .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>While it is very true we still have a long way to go, it is worth pointing out that thoughts about the effects of such change have been pondered over before.Some interesting reading, especially the social aspects in the later chapters, is Engines of Creation by Eric Drexler.Full online version: http://e-drexler.com/d/06/00/EOC/EOC\_Table\_of\_Contents.html [e-drexler.com]Or it's about a $6 paperback these days.I think you might find it interesting.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882120</id>
	<title>Re:And then, we....</title>
	<author>Runaway1956</author>
	<datestamp>1264327560000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>You used the words "bed" and "suck" in the same sentence - and you expect what exactly?  Whatever it is, I'm at least marginally interested!</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>You used the words " bed " and " suck " in the same sentence - and you expect what exactly ?
Whatever it is , I 'm at least marginally interested !</tokentext>
<sentencetext>You used the words "bed" and "suck" in the same sentence - and you expect what exactly?
Whatever it is, I'm at least marginally interested!</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880406</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30886216</id>
	<title>Is it OK to just like imaginative stories?</title>
	<author>brennanw</author>
	<datestamp>1264356540000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>Science Fiction (and to a lesser extent, fantasy) seems to be hell-bent on being seen as "respectable" and I just don't understand why. Do roving gangs of literature professors give speculative fiction authors wedgies, swirlies, and shove them into lockers? Is it no longer OK to like stories about space rockets, laser beams and aliens?</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>Science Fiction ( and to a lesser extent , fantasy ) seems to be hell-bent on being seen as " respectable " and I just do n't understand why .
Do roving gangs of literature professors give speculative fiction authors wedgies , swirlies , and shove them into lockers ?
Is it no longer OK to like stories about space rockets , laser beams and aliens ?</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Science Fiction (and to a lesser extent, fantasy) seems to be hell-bent on being seen as "respectable" and I just don't understand why.
Do roving gangs of literature professors give speculative fiction authors wedgies, swirlies, and shove them into lockers?
Is it no longer OK to like stories about space rockets, laser beams and aliens?</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30890982</id>
	<title>Re:What "exponential change?</title>
	<author>Toze</author>
	<datestamp>1264438500000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p><div class="quote"><p>No big progress in space travel in 40 years.</p></div><p> <a href="http://www.vancouversun.com/technology/rocket\%20engine\%20could\%20make\%20trips\%20Mars\%20realistic/2119300/story.html" title="vancouversun.com" rel="nofollow">Sir, I disagree.</a> [vancouversun.com]</p></div>
	</htmltext>
<tokenext>No big progress in space travel in 40 years .
Sir , I disagree .
[ vancouversun.com ]</tokentext>
<sentencetext>No big progress in space travel in 40 years.
Sir, I disagree.
[vancouversun.com]
	</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882258</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30886416</id>
	<title>Re:What "exponential change?</title>
	<author>unc0nn3ct3d</author>
	<datestamp>1264358280000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/juan\_enriquez\_shares\_mindboggling\_new\_science.html" title="ted.com" rel="nofollow">http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/juan\_enriquez\_shares\_mindboggling\_new\_science.html</a> [ted.com]

Enjoy..  It is shown that the rate of development AND adoption of technology(be it biological or technological) follows something similar to Moore's law, not a linear curve</htmltext>
<tokenext>http : //www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/juan \ _enriquez \ _shares \ _mindboggling \ _new \ _science.html [ ted.com ] Enjoy.. It is shown that the rate of development AND adoption of technology ( be it biological or technological ) follows something similar to Moore 's law , not a linear curve</tokentext>
<sentencetext>http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/juan\_enriquez\_shares\_mindboggling\_new\_science.html [ted.com]

Enjoy..  It is shown that the rate of development AND adoption of technology(be it biological or technological) follows something similar to Moore's law, not a linear curve</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882258</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30886988</id>
	<title>Re:Adolescent fantasies</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264451100000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p><div class="quote"><p>Engineers and scientists will invent things anyway regardless of whether there has been bad fiction written about the concept beforehand.</p></div><p>What do you think inspires the fucking engineers?</p><p>The engineers that I know are boring, uninspired dumb-asses.  They can usually follow simple instructions, but I can't trust them with any design, or problem solving that actually requires, you know, imagination.</p><p>Sure there are a few exceptions to that rule, but very few exceptions. Also just because they like SF doesn't mean they're good engineers, its just &gt;80\% of the good ones all like SF.</p></div>
	</htmltext>
<tokenext>Engineers and scientists will invent things anyway regardless of whether there has been bad fiction written about the concept beforehand.What do you think inspires the fucking engineers ? The engineers that I know are boring , uninspired dumb-asses .
They can usually follow simple instructions , but I ca n't trust them with any design , or problem solving that actually requires , you know , imagination.Sure there are a few exceptions to that rule , but very few exceptions .
Also just because they like SF does n't mean they 're good engineers , its just &gt; 80 \ % of the good ones all like SF .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Engineers and scientists will invent things anyway regardless of whether there has been bad fiction written about the concept beforehand.What do you think inspires the fucking engineers?The engineers that I know are boring, uninspired dumb-asses.
They can usually follow simple instructions, but I can't trust them with any design, or problem solving that actually requires, you know, imagination.Sure there are a few exceptions to that rule, but very few exceptions.
Also just because they like SF doesn't mean they're good engineers, its just &gt;80\% of the good ones all like SF.
	</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880544</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30884206</id>
	<title>Voyage from Yesteryear by James P. Hogan</title>
	<author>Paul Fernhout</author>
	<datestamp>1264340700000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>This sci-fi book from 1982 explores a lot of these issues:<br>
&nbsp; <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voyage\_from\_Yesteryear" title="wikipedia.org">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voyage\_from\_Yesteryear</a> [wikipedia.org]<br>"Since the availability of power from fusion reactors and cheap automated labor has enabled them to develop a post-scarcity economy, they do not use money as a means of exchange, nor do they recognize material possessions as symbols of status. Instead, competence and talent are considered symbolic of one's social standing - resources that cannot be counterfeited or hoarded, and must be put to use if they are to be acknowledged. As a result, the competitive drive that fuels capitalist financial systems has filled the colony with the products of decades of incredible artistic and technical talent, and there are no widespread hierarchies. No one person or group of people can know everything, so no one person or group of people is expected to speak for all. They have no centralized authorities; some would say they have no government at all."</p><p>Iain Banks "Culture" series explores these themes too.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>This sci-fi book from 1982 explores a lot of these issues :   http : //en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voyage \ _from \ _Yesteryear [ wikipedia.org ] " Since the availability of power from fusion reactors and cheap automated labor has enabled them to develop a post-scarcity economy , they do not use money as a means of exchange , nor do they recognize material possessions as symbols of status .
Instead , competence and talent are considered symbolic of one 's social standing - resources that can not be counterfeited or hoarded , and must be put to use if they are to be acknowledged .
As a result , the competitive drive that fuels capitalist financial systems has filled the colony with the products of decades of incredible artistic and technical talent , and there are no widespread hierarchies .
No one person or group of people can know everything , so no one person or group of people is expected to speak for all .
They have no centralized authorities ; some would say they have no government at all .
" Iain Banks " Culture " series explores these themes too .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>This sci-fi book from 1982 explores a lot of these issues:
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voyage\_from\_Yesteryear [wikipedia.org]"Since the availability of power from fusion reactors and cheap automated labor has enabled them to develop a post-scarcity economy, they do not use money as a means of exchange, nor do they recognize material possessions as symbols of status.
Instead, competence and talent are considered symbolic of one's social standing - resources that cannot be counterfeited or hoarded, and must be put to use if they are to be acknowledged.
As a result, the competitive drive that fuels capitalist financial systems has filled the colony with the products of decades of incredible artistic and technical talent, and there are no widespread hierarchies.
No one person or group of people can know everything, so no one person or group of people is expected to speak for all.
They have no centralized authorities; some would say they have no government at all.
"Iain Banks "Culture" series explores these themes too.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880958</id>
	<title>Re: Faster Than The Other Side</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264364160000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Interestin</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>People are growing up now to expect everything to be done for them, either by technology or the government. Pretty soon there will be very little room for the common labor class, and unfortunately we don't seem to be encouraging many young ones to get serious with science for more R&amp;D. It makes little sense to replace your workforce with robots to cut expenses, and thereby eliminating the income sources your customers used to pay you back for the products you (they?) made.</htmltext>
<tokenext>People are growing up now to expect everything to be done for them , either by technology or the government .
Pretty soon there will be very little room for the common labor class , and unfortunately we do n't seem to be encouraging many young ones to get serious with science for more R&amp;D .
It makes little sense to replace your workforce with robots to cut expenses , and thereby eliminating the income sources your customers used to pay you back for the products you ( they ?
) made .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>People are growing up now to expect everything to be done for them, either by technology or the government.
Pretty soon there will be very little room for the common labor class, and unfortunately we don't seem to be encouraging many young ones to get serious with science for more R&amp;D.
It makes little sense to replace your workforce with robots to cut expenses, and thereby eliminating the income sources your customers used to pay you back for the products you (they?
) made.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882002</id>
	<title>tl;dr</title>
	<author>redjack</author>
	<datestamp>1264326900000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Redundant</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>In a 140-byte world, who has time to read, much less reflect and speculate?</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>In a 140-byte world , who has time to read , much less reflect and speculate ?</tokentext>
<sentencetext>In a 140-byte world, who has time to read, much less reflect and speculate?</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880604</id>
	<title>Faster Than The Other Side</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264362480000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Interestin</modclass>
	<modscore>5</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>        We do need to speed up social conventions to match the speed of technology. For example part of the unemployment crises that we are now seeing is due to technology displacing workers. Whet people don't seem to grasp is that there is a very serious intention to replace all labor with machines. Education and shifting from job skill to job skills will not be enough to keep afloat soon. Yet when social scientists try to offer solutions they are seen as crackpots and lunatics. Frankly some of their solutions make a lot of sense.<br>
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; However there are some basic issues that never resolved before robotics and the like advanced and one wonders what will happen if robotics is able to solve them. For example robots designed to remove dents and to paint cars might be able to keep every car looking new. But sense we were never able to do that before robotics what will be the economic effect of doing it. The same is true of house and lawn work. Good roofs and fresh paint on a sharp looking lawn without human effort would be a shocker. But what does that do to an economy. We don't even know if humans should be involved in an economy or whether we best let robots and computers serve us all things that we need.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>We do need to speed up social conventions to match the speed of technology .
For example part of the unemployment crises that we are now seeing is due to technology displacing workers .
Whet people do n't seem to grasp is that there is a very serious intention to replace all labor with machines .
Education and shifting from job skill to job skills will not be enough to keep afloat soon .
Yet when social scientists try to offer solutions they are seen as crackpots and lunatics .
Frankly some of their solutions make a lot of sense .
                  However there are some basic issues that never resolved before robotics and the like advanced and one wonders what will happen if robotics is able to solve them .
For example robots designed to remove dents and to paint cars might be able to keep every car looking new .
But sense we were never able to do that before robotics what will be the economic effect of doing it .
The same is true of house and lawn work .
Good roofs and fresh paint on a sharp looking lawn without human effort would be a shocker .
But what does that do to an economy .
We do n't even know if humans should be involved in an economy or whether we best let robots and computers serve us all things that we need .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>        We do need to speed up social conventions to match the speed of technology.
For example part of the unemployment crises that we are now seeing is due to technology displacing workers.
Whet people don't seem to grasp is that there is a very serious intention to replace all labor with machines.
Education and shifting from job skill to job skills will not be enough to keep afloat soon.
Yet when social scientists try to offer solutions they are seen as crackpots and lunatics.
Frankly some of their solutions make a lot of sense.
                  However there are some basic issues that never resolved before robotics and the like advanced and one wonders what will happen if robotics is able to solve them.
For example robots designed to remove dents and to paint cars might be able to keep every car looking new.
But sense we were never able to do that before robotics what will be the economic effect of doing it.
The same is true of house and lawn work.
Good roofs and fresh paint on a sharp looking lawn without human effort would be a shocker.
But what does that do to an economy.
We don't even know if humans should be involved in an economy or whether we best let robots and computers serve us all things that we need.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880862</id>
	<title>Re: Faster Than The Other Side</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264363620000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>Odd... I've heard that said many times, but really haven't seen it.  What I have seen is workers from areas with a lower cost of living replacing workers from areas that have a higher cost of living.  I'm not saying that isn't a change that needs to happen.  Just that such an immediate change can be quite painful.  It would seem to me that the proper use of machines help to slow that transition to an "even" playing field.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>Odd... I 've heard that said many times , but really have n't seen it .
What I have seen is workers from areas with a lower cost of living replacing workers from areas that have a higher cost of living .
I 'm not saying that is n't a change that needs to happen .
Just that such an immediate change can be quite painful .
It would seem to me that the proper use of machines help to slow that transition to an " even " playing field .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Odd... I've heard that said many times, but really haven't seen it.
What I have seen is workers from areas with a lower cost of living replacing workers from areas that have a higher cost of living.
I'm not saying that isn't a change that needs to happen.
Just that such an immediate change can be quite painful.
It would seem to me that the proper use of machines help to slow that transition to an "even" playing field.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880498</id>
	<title>Hmm..</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264361940000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>who was that author again who wrote: "from stone axe to copper sword"...?</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>who was that author again who wrote : " from stone axe to copper sword " ... ?</tokentext>
<sentencetext>who was that author again who wrote: "from stone axe to copper sword"...?</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30887044</id>
	<title>Re:What "exponential change?</title>
	<author>strangelovian</author>
	<datestamp>1264451880000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>Now here's someone who gets it.  It's hardly coincidental that science fiction really took off in the 1950's and 1960's, during an era of tremendous material progress and optimism fueled by abundant cheap energy.  The science fiction that will probably turn out to be most prescient for the times ahead isn't Heinlein, Clarke or Asimov, but dystopian novels like these:
<br> <br>
<b>The Drowned World</b>, by J.G. Ballard: in the late 21st century the ice caps have melted, iguanas and alligators inhabit a drowned London and humanity has retreated toward the poles.  Kind of a dull story that reads like a post-apocalypse Heart of Darkness, but very visionary considering it was written in 1962.
<br> <br>
<b>Wolf and Iron</b>, by Gordon R. Dickson: A man and a wolf band together to survive in an America devastated by financial collapse.
<br> <br>
<b>Earth Abides</b>, by George R. Stewart: civilization is destroyed by a plague, and humans have reverted to tribes that survive by scavenging from the old civilization or Paleolithic-style hunter-gathering.
<br> <br>
<b>The Sheep Look Up</b>, by John Brunner: set in a corporate-controlled U.S. with a devastated environment.  William Gibson said of this novel: "No one except possibly the late John Brunner, in his brilliant novel 'The Sheep Look Up',  has ever described anything in science fiction that is remotely like the reality of 2007 as we know it."
<br> <br>
To the commenter below who accused you of being Malthusian: anyone who thinks that on a planet with an exploding population of nearly 7 billion people (compared to say 1.5 billion in 1890), supported by ecosystems and climate that are in disarray, new technology can prevent a large die-off is, shall we say, optimistic.
<br> <br>
In general, I agree that SF serves a useful function by imagining the dark side of technological progress, which in our present situation seems much more prophetic than the more sterile, utopian visions of more celebrated authors.</htmltext>
<tokenext>Now here 's someone who gets it .
It 's hardly coincidental that science fiction really took off in the 1950 's and 1960 's , during an era of tremendous material progress and optimism fueled by abundant cheap energy .
The science fiction that will probably turn out to be most prescient for the times ahead is n't Heinlein , Clarke or Asimov , but dystopian novels like these : The Drowned World , by J.G .
Ballard : in the late 21st century the ice caps have melted , iguanas and alligators inhabit a drowned London and humanity has retreated toward the poles .
Kind of a dull story that reads like a post-apocalypse Heart of Darkness , but very visionary considering it was written in 1962 .
Wolf and Iron , by Gordon R. Dickson : A man and a wolf band together to survive in an America devastated by financial collapse .
Earth Abides , by George R. Stewart : civilization is destroyed by a plague , and humans have reverted to tribes that survive by scavenging from the old civilization or Paleolithic-style hunter-gathering .
The Sheep Look Up , by John Brunner : set in a corporate-controlled U.S. with a devastated environment .
William Gibson said of this novel : " No one except possibly the late John Brunner , in his brilliant novel 'The Sheep Look Up ' , has ever described anything in science fiction that is remotely like the reality of 2007 as we know it .
" To the commenter below who accused you of being Malthusian : anyone who thinks that on a planet with an exploding population of nearly 7 billion people ( compared to say 1.5 billion in 1890 ) , supported by ecosystems and climate that are in disarray , new technology can prevent a large die-off is , shall we say , optimistic .
In general , I agree that SF serves a useful function by imagining the dark side of technological progress , which in our present situation seems much more prophetic than the more sterile , utopian visions of more celebrated authors .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Now here's someone who gets it.
It's hardly coincidental that science fiction really took off in the 1950's and 1960's, during an era of tremendous material progress and optimism fueled by abundant cheap energy.
The science fiction that will probably turn out to be most prescient for the times ahead isn't Heinlein, Clarke or Asimov, but dystopian novels like these:
 
The Drowned World, by J.G.
Ballard: in the late 21st century the ice caps have melted, iguanas and alligators inhabit a drowned London and humanity has retreated toward the poles.
Kind of a dull story that reads like a post-apocalypse Heart of Darkness, but very visionary considering it was written in 1962.
Wolf and Iron, by Gordon R. Dickson: A man and a wolf band together to survive in an America devastated by financial collapse.
Earth Abides, by George R. Stewart: civilization is destroyed by a plague, and humans have reverted to tribes that survive by scavenging from the old civilization or Paleolithic-style hunter-gathering.
The Sheep Look Up, by John Brunner: set in a corporate-controlled U.S. with a devastated environment.
William Gibson said of this novel: "No one except possibly the late John Brunner, in his brilliant novel 'The Sheep Look Up',  has ever described anything in science fiction that is remotely like the reality of 2007 as we know it.
"
 
To the commenter below who accused you of being Malthusian: anyone who thinks that on a planet with an exploding population of nearly 7 billion people (compared to say 1.5 billion in 1890), supported by ecosystems and climate that are in disarray, new technology can prevent a large die-off is, shall we say, optimistic.
In general, I agree that SF serves a useful function by imagining the dark side of technological progress, which in our present situation seems much more prophetic than the more sterile, utopian visions of more celebrated authors.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882258</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880406</id>
	<title>And then, we....</title>
	<author>FooAtWFU</author>
	<datestamp>1264361520000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Interestin</modclass>
	<modscore>3</modscore>
	<htmltext>And then, we get all frightened and refuse to build large-scale particle colliders because we're afraid that black hole monsters will crawl out from under our beds and suck us into the fifth dimension.</htmltext>
<tokenext>And then , we get all frightened and refuse to build large-scale particle colliders because we 're afraid that black hole monsters will crawl out from under our beds and suck us into the fifth dimension .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>And then, we get all frightened and refuse to build large-scale particle colliders because we're afraid that black hole monsters will crawl out from under our beds and suck us into the fifth dimension.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881578</id>
	<title>I wish I could believe it</title>
	<author>AmElder</author>
	<datestamp>1264324320000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Interestin</modclass>
	<modscore>4</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>I had a teacher as a child who told me "art teaches us how to be human."  It's a compelling idea that neatly sums up my experience with novels, music, theatre, and some movies.  I think, though, if it can also be a deceptive illusion that distracts us and convinces us the world is better than it is and we ourselves are kinder, more knowledgeable, better meaning, more competent than we really are.  </p><p>If I understand the article right, the idea is that speculative sci-fi helps people beat future shock.  By reading/viewing speculative stories, models of good technology use lodge in our minds and we get prepared to make decisions about using tools that come to us.  I can see that.  But counter that rosy image with the idea that stories featuring high technology instead train us to acquiesce to technology in our lives, not making conscious choices but instead sleepwalking into an isolated, un-fun, inhuman world all the while under the illusion that we're in control of the process.</p><p>I'm inclined to think that the best way to make good choices is by paying attention to the here and now, not by putting "the logical part of our brains... 100\% in the future at all times."  We can recognize good technology by seeing the good it does in our lives, not by comparing it Blade Runner, Star Trek, or District 9.  (or Snowcrash, Red Mars, or Neuromancer).  Marry that with social interaction, so that adopting/creating new technology is a communal, connected process and we have a good chance of making good decisions.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>I had a teacher as a child who told me " art teaches us how to be human .
" It 's a compelling idea that neatly sums up my experience with novels , music , theatre , and some movies .
I think , though , if it can also be a deceptive illusion that distracts us and convinces us the world is better than it is and we ourselves are kinder , more knowledgeable , better meaning , more competent than we really are .
If I understand the article right , the idea is that speculative sci-fi helps people beat future shock .
By reading/viewing speculative stories , models of good technology use lodge in our minds and we get prepared to make decisions about using tools that come to us .
I can see that .
But counter that rosy image with the idea that stories featuring high technology instead train us to acquiesce to technology in our lives , not making conscious choices but instead sleepwalking into an isolated , un-fun , inhuman world all the while under the illusion that we 're in control of the process.I 'm inclined to think that the best way to make good choices is by paying attention to the here and now , not by putting " the logical part of our brains... 100 \ % in the future at all times .
" We can recognize good technology by seeing the good it does in our lives , not by comparing it Blade Runner , Star Trek , or District 9 .
( or Snowcrash , Red Mars , or Neuromancer ) .
Marry that with social interaction , so that adopting/creating new technology is a communal , connected process and we have a good chance of making good decisions .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>I had a teacher as a child who told me "art teaches us how to be human.
"  It's a compelling idea that neatly sums up my experience with novels, music, theatre, and some movies.
I think, though, if it can also be a deceptive illusion that distracts us and convinces us the world is better than it is and we ourselves are kinder, more knowledgeable, better meaning, more competent than we really are.
If I understand the article right, the idea is that speculative sci-fi helps people beat future shock.
By reading/viewing speculative stories, models of good technology use lodge in our minds and we get prepared to make decisions about using tools that come to us.
I can see that.
But counter that rosy image with the idea that stories featuring high technology instead train us to acquiesce to technology in our lives, not making conscious choices but instead sleepwalking into an isolated, un-fun, inhuman world all the while under the illusion that we're in control of the process.I'm inclined to think that the best way to make good choices is by paying attention to the here and now, not by putting "the logical part of our brains... 100\% in the future at all times.
"  We can recognize good technology by seeing the good it does in our lives, not by comparing it Blade Runner, Star Trek, or District 9.
(or Snowcrash, Red Mars, or Neuromancer).
Marry that with social interaction, so that adopting/creating new technology is a communal, connected process and we have a good chance of making good decisions.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881250</id>
	<title>Re:Adolescent fantasies</title>
	<author>thms</author>
	<datestamp>1264365840000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>While inventions might be more or less independent of literature (but who knows how many inventors were inspired by it), the <b>acceptance</b> of new technology by the general public can be influenced by it. Take for example the (alleged) enthusiasm for robots by the Japanese vs. the much more sceptical stance in the West.<br> <br>

Science literacy and SF also go hand in hand I would claim, positive effects for the economy aren't hard to imagine there. But this also goes the other way, sadly, bad science fiction with their Mad Scientist and the Doomsday Devices come to mind. Or destruction of the One Prototype magically erases the knowledge of how they build it out of everyone's mind.</htmltext>
<tokenext>While inventions might be more or less independent of literature ( but who knows how many inventors were inspired by it ) , the acceptance of new technology by the general public can be influenced by it .
Take for example the ( alleged ) enthusiasm for robots by the Japanese vs. the much more sceptical stance in the West .
Science literacy and SF also go hand in hand I would claim , positive effects for the economy are n't hard to imagine there .
But this also goes the other way , sadly , bad science fiction with their Mad Scientist and the Doomsday Devices come to mind .
Or destruction of the One Prototype magically erases the knowledge of how they build it out of everyone 's mind .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>While inventions might be more or less independent of literature (but who knows how many inventors were inspired by it), the acceptance of new technology by the general public can be influenced by it.
Take for example the (alleged) enthusiasm for robots by the Japanese vs. the much more sceptical stance in the West.
Science literacy and SF also go hand in hand I would claim, positive effects for the economy aren't hard to imagine there.
But this also goes the other way, sadly, bad science fiction with their Mad Scientist and the Doomsday Devices come to mind.
Or destruction of the One Prototype magically erases the knowledge of how they build it out of everyone's mind.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880544</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881040</id>
	<title>Re:And then, we....</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264364700000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Informativ</modclass>
	<modscore>3</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>Suck us into the fifth dimension? You're already in the fifth dimension. You're already in every dimension that exists. Saying you're not in the fifth dimension is like saying a ship has no altitude. It's incorrect - the altitude is zero relative to sea level.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>Suck us into the fifth dimension ?
You 're already in the fifth dimension .
You 're already in every dimension that exists .
Saying you 're not in the fifth dimension is like saying a ship has no altitude .
It 's incorrect - the altitude is zero relative to sea level .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Suck us into the fifth dimension?
You're already in the fifth dimension.
You're already in every dimension that exists.
Saying you're not in the fifth dimension is like saying a ship has no altitude.
It's incorrect - the altitude is zero relative to sea level.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880406</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30884410</id>
	<title>Not impressed</title>
	<author>rumblin'rabbit</author>
	<datestamp>1264342320000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>I've never been impressed with the ability of SF to predict the future, either technologically or socially. Just read the old SF (of which I have a substantial collection). Not much there I would call prescient, despite some authors' obvious attempts at it. The issues of today are poorly reflected in the SF of yesterday.
<br> <br>
As such, I am skeptical of SF's ability to help us deal with change and avoid mistakes.</htmltext>
<tokenext>I 've never been impressed with the ability of SF to predict the future , either technologically or socially .
Just read the old SF ( of which I have a substantial collection ) .
Not much there I would call prescient , despite some authors ' obvious attempts at it .
The issues of today are poorly reflected in the SF of yesterday .
As such , I am skeptical of SF 's ability to help us deal with change and avoid mistakes .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>I've never been impressed with the ability of SF to predict the future, either technologically or socially.
Just read the old SF (of which I have a substantial collection).
Not much there I would call prescient, despite some authors' obvious attempts at it.
The issues of today are poorly reflected in the SF of yesterday.
As such, I am skeptical of SF's ability to help us deal with change and avoid mistakes.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881620</id>
	<title>Re:Exponential rate of change</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264324500000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>Incorrect. A constant rate of change results in linear growth. Either way, the author of the summary has no clue what "exponential" means.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>Incorrect .
A constant rate of change results in linear growth .
Either way , the author of the summary has no clue what " exponential " means .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Incorrect.
A constant rate of change results in linear growth.
Either way, the author of the summary has no clue what "exponential" means.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881468</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882248</id>
	<title>Re:This is true.</title>
	<author>HiThere</author>
	<datestamp>1264328400000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>I can remember two or three science fiction stories that had flying cars.  No more.  In all of them very few owned such a vehicle.  Most of them are from the 1940's.  Fancy spaceships are much more common.  (I still want my own "Skylark of Valeron", or even "Skylark III".)</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>I can remember two or three science fiction stories that had flying cars .
No more .
In all of them very few owned such a vehicle .
Most of them are from the 1940 's .
Fancy spaceships are much more common .
( I still want my own " Skylark of Valeron " , or even " Skylark III " .
)</tokentext>
<sentencetext>I can remember two or three science fiction stories that had flying cars.
No more.
In all of them very few owned such a vehicle.
Most of them are from the 1940's.
Fancy spaceships are much more common.
(I still want my own "Skylark of Valeron", or even "Skylark III".
)</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881240</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882416</id>
	<title>Re:Hmm..</title>
	<author>Beyond\_GoodandEvil</author>
	<datestamp>1264329240000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>Not quite that phrasing but google finds <a href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&amp;source=web&amp;ct=res&amp;cd=1&amp;ved=0CAcQFjAA&amp;url=http\%3A\%2F\%2Fwww.jstor.org\%2Fstable\%2F279232&amp;rct=j&amp;q=from+stone+axe+to+copper&amp;ei=IbxcS-TIHs-l8QaWkND\_BA&amp;usg=AFQjCNHU3f\_PVCE9fPpGozh18WEOXNQoxw" title="google.com">article</a> [google.com] about speed of tech advancement esp. with respect to metallic axes in Europe.</htmltext>
<tokenext>Not quite that phrasing but google finds article [ google.com ] about speed of tech advancement esp .
with respect to metallic axes in Europe .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Not quite that phrasing but google finds article [google.com] about speed of tech advancement esp.
with respect to metallic axes in Europe.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880498</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30893898</id>
	<title>Re:And then, we....</title>
	<author>ezwip</author>
	<datestamp>1264449540000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext>Sorry folks but Science Fiction could fall under the category of Conspiracy Theory. The White House's chief information czar (praise Stalin) will fine you if you attempt to release it.</htmltext>
<tokenext>Sorry folks but Science Fiction could fall under the category of Conspiracy Theory .
The White House 's chief information czar ( praise Stalin ) will fine you if you attempt to release it .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Sorry folks but Science Fiction could fall under the category of Conspiracy Theory.
The White House's chief information czar (praise Stalin) will fine you if you attempt to release it.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880406</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30887062</id>
	<title>Re:What "exponential change?</title>
	<author>sp3d2orbit</author>
	<datestamp>1264452060000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>You are missing the biggest two developments of the last 50 years because they don't affect you directly. The first is birth control (the pill), which some have argued is the most important invention of the last 1000 years. The second is the green revolution, that lifted a few billion people out of starvation.</p><p>Sure, the average American may not see much different since 1958 (except maybe Google, cell phones, most modern medicine), but people living in India and China definitely notice the difference.</p><p>Maybe I'm an optimist, but I think humanity will continue to find ways to eliminate scarcity during the next century.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>You are missing the biggest two developments of the last 50 years because they do n't affect you directly .
The first is birth control ( the pill ) , which some have argued is the most important invention of the last 1000 years .
The second is the green revolution , that lifted a few billion people out of starvation.Sure , the average American may not see much different since 1958 ( except maybe Google , cell phones , most modern medicine ) , but people living in India and China definitely notice the difference.Maybe I 'm an optimist , but I think humanity will continue to find ways to eliminate scarcity during the next century .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>You are missing the biggest two developments of the last 50 years because they don't affect you directly.
The first is birth control (the pill), which some have argued is the most important invention of the last 1000 years.
The second is the green revolution, that lifted a few billion people out of starvation.Sure, the average American may not see much different since 1958 (except maybe Google, cell phones, most modern medicine), but people living in India and China definitely notice the difference.Maybe I'm an optimist, but I think humanity will continue to find ways to eliminate scarcity during the next century.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882258</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30907804</id>
	<title>Weather is critical</title>
	<author>minstrelmike</author>
	<datestamp>1264534800000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>Every golden age had good weather. That is what made it golden. Rome collapsed dues to a cold spell 100ad-700ad.<br> <br>
The usefulness of science fiction is that it makes the reader think about ramifications, the inability to only do one thing or the fact of TANSTAAFL (no free lunch--all costs \_will\_ be paid by someone at some time). But as long as we get to blame kings for the weather or blame politicians for obeying the 'mandate' of the voters, then we get to ignore the costs of our desires.</htmltext>
<tokenext>Every golden age had good weather .
That is what made it golden .
Rome collapsed dues to a cold spell 100ad-700ad .
The usefulness of science fiction is that it makes the reader think about ramifications , the inability to only do one thing or the fact of TANSTAAFL ( no free lunch--all costs \ _will \ _ be paid by someone at some time ) .
But as long as we get to blame kings for the weather or blame politicians for obeying the 'mandate ' of the voters , then we get to ignore the costs of our desires .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Every golden age had good weather.
That is what made it golden.
Rome collapsed dues to a cold spell 100ad-700ad.
The usefulness of science fiction is that it makes the reader think about ramifications, the inability to only do one thing or the fact of TANSTAAFL (no free lunch--all costs \_will\_ be paid by someone at some time).
But as long as we get to blame kings for the weather or blame politicians for obeying the 'mandate' of the voters, then we get to ignore the costs of our desires.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881962</id>
	<title>Speculation about the future is overrated</title>
	<author>jeffomatic</author>
	<datestamp>1264326660000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>I have to admit that I find speculation about radically advanced technology to be boring and sort of irrelevant to the myriad human issues that actually concern us here and now. But I also feel like the best science fiction is in fact about taking the here-and-now and pursuing it to a logical extreme. E.g. cyberpunk works because it's about the commodification of everything, including politics, your identity, and your body. In other words, good science fiction is like good fiction in general: it's about real social issues and real human problems.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>I have to admit that I find speculation about radically advanced technology to be boring and sort of irrelevant to the myriad human issues that actually concern us here and now .
But I also feel like the best science fiction is in fact about taking the here-and-now and pursuing it to a logical extreme .
E.g. cyberpunk works because it 's about the commodification of everything , including politics , your identity , and your body .
In other words , good science fiction is like good fiction in general : it 's about real social issues and real human problems .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>I have to admit that I find speculation about radically advanced technology to be boring and sort of irrelevant to the myriad human issues that actually concern us here and now.
But I also feel like the best science fiction is in fact about taking the here-and-now and pursuing it to a logical extreme.
E.g. cyberpunk works because it's about the commodification of everything, including politics, your identity, and your body.
In other words, good science fiction is like good fiction in general: it's about real social issues and real human problems.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30886802</id>
	<title>Re:Stories With Messages</title>
	<author>phantomfive</author>
	<datestamp>1264362780000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>Wait, how is the message in Avatar hypocritical?  As far as I could tell, the message was, "Don't take stuff that belongs to other people."  It seems pretty straightforward to me....what is wrong with that?</htmltext>
<tokenext>Wait , how is the message in Avatar hypocritical ?
As far as I could tell , the message was , " Do n't take stuff that belongs to other people .
" It seems pretty straightforward to me....what is wrong with that ?</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Wait, how is the message in Avatar hypocritical?
As far as I could tell, the message was, "Don't take stuff that belongs to other people.
"  It seems pretty straightforward to me....what is wrong with that?</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881292</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30884320</id>
	<title>Re:Ecomist's solution</title>
	<author>Paul Fernhout</author>
	<datestamp>1264341600000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Interestin</modclass>
	<modscore>2</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>Everyone could get a basic income, even millionaires:<br>
&nbsp; &nbsp; "Basic income from a millionaire's perspective? "<br>
&nbsp; &nbsp; <a href="http://www.pdfernhout.net/basic-income-from-a-millionaires-perspective.html" title="pdfernhout.net">http://www.pdfernhout.net/basic-income-from-a-millionaires-perspective.html</a> [pdfernhout.net]<br>"One may ask, why should millionaires support a basic income as depicted in Marshall Brain's Australia Project fictional example in "Manna", but, say, right now in the USA, of US$2000 a month per person (with some deducted for universal health insurance), or $24K per year? With about 300 million residents in the USA, this would require about seven trillion US dollars a year, or half the current US GDP. Surely such a proposal would be a disaster for millionaires in terms of crushing taxes? Or would it?"</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>Everyone could get a basic income , even millionaires :     " Basic income from a millionaire 's perspective ?
"     http : //www.pdfernhout.net/basic-income-from-a-millionaires-perspective.html [ pdfernhout.net ] " One may ask , why should millionaires support a basic income as depicted in Marshall Brain 's Australia Project fictional example in " Manna " , but , say , right now in the USA , of US $ 2000 a month per person ( with some deducted for universal health insurance ) , or $ 24K per year ?
With about 300 million residents in the USA , this would require about seven trillion US dollars a year , or half the current US GDP .
Surely such a proposal would be a disaster for millionaires in terms of crushing taxes ?
Or would it ?
"</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Everyone could get a basic income, even millionaires:
    "Basic income from a millionaire's perspective?
"
    http://www.pdfernhout.net/basic-income-from-a-millionaires-perspective.html [pdfernhout.net]"One may ask, why should millionaires support a basic income as depicted in Marshall Brain's Australia Project fictional example in "Manna", but, say, right now in the USA, of US$2000 a month per person (with some deducted for universal health insurance), or $24K per year?
With about 300 million residents in the USA, this would require about seven trillion US dollars a year, or half the current US GDP.
Surely such a proposal would be a disaster for millionaires in terms of crushing taxes?
Or would it?
"</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880948</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881114</id>
	<title>Re:What change?</title>
	<author>tenco</author>
	<datestamp>1264365060000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>So you're not counting the internet with it's plethora of protocols like WWW, XMPP, SMTP,<nobr> <wbr></nobr>... and services like bittorrent and MMORPGs? These things changed my life more than cellphones for sure. I almost exclusively communicate with my friends and family via instant messaging, email or voip.</htmltext>
<tokenext>So you 're not counting the internet with it 's plethora of protocols like WWW , XMPP , SMTP , ... and services like bittorrent and MMORPGs ?
These things changed my life more than cellphones for sure .
I almost exclusively communicate with my friends and family via instant messaging , email or voip .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>So you're not counting the internet with it's plethora of protocols like WWW, XMPP, SMTP, ... and services like bittorrent and MMORPGs?
These things changed my life more than cellphones for sure.
I almost exclusively communicate with my friends and family via instant messaging, email or voip.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880722</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881296</id>
	<title>Whereas with Syfy...</title>
	<author>feepness</author>
	<datestamp>1264366080000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Insightful</modclass>
	<modscore>3</modscore>
	<htmltext>You can keep up on the latest trends in who Marsha might be attracted to besides Curtis!  And is the Jennifer's baby actually Devon's?  And will Steve ever come out of that coma, and if he does, what will happen to June and Chris?</htmltext>
<tokenext>You can keep up on the latest trends in who Marsha might be attracted to besides Curtis !
And is the Jennifer 's baby actually Devon 's ?
And will Steve ever come out of that coma , and if he does , what will happen to June and Chris ?</tokentext>
<sentencetext>You can keep up on the latest trends in who Marsha might be attracted to besides Curtis!
And is the Jennifer's baby actually Devon's?
And will Steve ever come out of that coma, and if he does, what will happen to June and Chris?</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881604</id>
	<title>Re:This is true.</title>
	<author>fuzzyfuzzyfungus</author>
	<datestamp>1264324380000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Interestin</modclass>
	<modscore>4</modscore>
	<htmltext>I think "flying cars" brings up an important limitation of much of sci-fi as a future-predicting instrument.<br> <br>
Science fiction does, in some cases, do a fairly decent job of predicting some scientific advances(Clarke and Satellites, etc.); but it often does a much poorer job with political and social stuff, either wildly overshooting(In the future, politics will be replaced by instantaneous world democracy through voting brain implants and the UN!) or wildly  undershooting(Yes Virginia, even in the future with spaceships and robots, politics and gender roles will look exactly like 1950's America...). Also very common is succumbing to the pressure to make things "speculative, futuristic, or creative" and underestimating the degree to which glacially slow progress is mixed with radical change. For instance, consider the percentage of the world population that is still dying like flies because they have shit in their drinking water, or is fighting some ghastly little bush war with Eastern Bloc kit from the 60's and 70's; but also owns(or at least has access to within a small social group) a cellphone with more computing power than the dumb terminals that Asimov's characters were connecting to MULTIVAC with.<br> <br>

In the case of flying cars, we've had helicopters for decades, and various slightly more tractable variants have been on the drawing board or in prototype for some time; but we are actively moving away from the economic conditions that would make the middle class wealthy enough for these to, like cars, be more or less ubiquitous.</htmltext>
<tokenext>I think " flying cars " brings up an important limitation of much of sci-fi as a future-predicting instrument .
Science fiction does , in some cases , do a fairly decent job of predicting some scientific advances ( Clarke and Satellites , etc .
) ; but it often does a much poorer job with political and social stuff , either wildly overshooting ( In the future , politics will be replaced by instantaneous world democracy through voting brain implants and the UN !
) or wildly undershooting ( Yes Virginia , even in the future with spaceships and robots , politics and gender roles will look exactly like 1950 's America... ) .
Also very common is succumbing to the pressure to make things " speculative , futuristic , or creative " and underestimating the degree to which glacially slow progress is mixed with radical change .
For instance , consider the percentage of the world population that is still dying like flies because they have shit in their drinking water , or is fighting some ghastly little bush war with Eastern Bloc kit from the 60 's and 70 's ; but also owns ( or at least has access to within a small social group ) a cellphone with more computing power than the dumb terminals that Asimov 's characters were connecting to MULTIVAC with .
In the case of flying cars , we 've had helicopters for decades , and various slightly more tractable variants have been on the drawing board or in prototype for some time ; but we are actively moving away from the economic conditions that would make the middle class wealthy enough for these to , like cars , be more or less ubiquitous .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>I think "flying cars" brings up an important limitation of much of sci-fi as a future-predicting instrument.
Science fiction does, in some cases, do a fairly decent job of predicting some scientific advances(Clarke and Satellites, etc.
); but it often does a much poorer job with political and social stuff, either wildly overshooting(In the future, politics will be replaced by instantaneous world democracy through voting brain implants and the UN!
) or wildly  undershooting(Yes Virginia, even in the future with spaceships and robots, politics and gender roles will look exactly like 1950's America...).
Also very common is succumbing to the pressure to make things "speculative, futuristic, or creative" and underestimating the degree to which glacially slow progress is mixed with radical change.
For instance, consider the percentage of the world population that is still dying like flies because they have shit in their drinking water, or is fighting some ghastly little bush war with Eastern Bloc kit from the 60's and 70's; but also owns(or at least has access to within a small social group) a cellphone with more computing power than the dumb terminals that Asimov's characters were connecting to MULTIVAC with.
In the case of flying cars, we've had helicopters for decades, and various slightly more tractable variants have been on the drawing board or in prototype for some time; but we are actively moving away from the economic conditions that would make the middle class wealthy enough for these to, like cars, be more or less ubiquitous.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881240</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880496</id>
	<title>Re:And then, we....</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264361940000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>Well you can't generalize that now. Every coin has two sides, right?</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>Well you ca n't generalize that now .
Every coin has two sides , right ?</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Well you can't generalize that now.
Every coin has two sides, right?</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880406</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880878</id>
	<title>Re: Faster Than The Other Side</title>
	<author>gmuslera</author>
	<datestamp>1264363680000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Interestin</modclass>
	<modscore>2</modscore>
	<htmltext>Only social conventions? See how media that used to have physical distribution clash about digital age? Internet changed the board for everything, and still 15 years after it started to popularize we are slowly, very slowly, adapting to all that it implies.

<p>What fails most science fiction is that they add a new technology, and shows how it changes one aspect of our life usually towards the plot of the story, but leaves everything else, on how we think and see life, as normal. Maybe it would happen that way anyway, culture don't change very fast, but after some time one would think that we shouldn't be able to understand how behaves people far enoiugh after a critical change.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>Only social conventions ?
See how media that used to have physical distribution clash about digital age ?
Internet changed the board for everything , and still 15 years after it started to popularize we are slowly , very slowly , adapting to all that it implies .
What fails most science fiction is that they add a new technology , and shows how it changes one aspect of our life usually towards the plot of the story , but leaves everything else , on how we think and see life , as normal .
Maybe it would happen that way anyway , culture do n't change very fast , but after some time one would think that we should n't be able to understand how behaves people far enoiugh after a critical change .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Only social conventions?
See how media that used to have physical distribution clash about digital age?
Internet changed the board for everything, and still 15 years after it started to popularize we are slowly, very slowly, adapting to all that it implies.
What fails most science fiction is that they add a new technology, and shows how it changes one aspect of our life usually towards the plot of the story, but leaves everything else, on how we think and see life, as normal.
Maybe it would happen that way anyway, culture don't change very fast, but after some time one would think that we shouldn't be able to understand how behaves people far enoiugh after a critical change.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30888012</id>
	<title>Re:And then, we....</title>
	<author>cpscotti</author>
	<datestamp>1264420380000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>You mean the much anticipated <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langoliers" title="wikipedia.org" rel="nofollow">Langoliers</a> [wikipedia.org]??</htmltext>
<tokenext>You mean the much anticipated Langoliers [ wikipedia.org ] ?
?</tokentext>
<sentencetext>You mean the much anticipated Langoliers [wikipedia.org]?
?</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880406</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881862</id>
	<title>Re:And then, we....</title>
	<author>ObsessiveMathsFreak</author>
	<datestamp>1264325880000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>Yet we eagerly embrace the promise of new genetics technology and ignore the cautionary messages of films like GATTACA.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>Yet we eagerly embrace the promise of new genetics technology and ignore the cautionary messages of films like GATTACA .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Yet we eagerly embrace the promise of new genetics technology and ignore the cautionary messages of films like GATTACA.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880406</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30889370</id>
	<title>SF is only relevant to a meaningful minority</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264432620000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>Look, I'm sorry to say that this article is stupid, okay? We at<nobr> <wbr></nobr>/. like SF, and try to argue that it is necessary. Necessary for whom exactly? You know what happens when I give "The left hand of darkness" to my sister or to my in-laws? They frown like I came into the house dressed as the Tin man from The wizard of Oz, they leaf through it and hand it back like I gave them a beaker with a culture of Black Death for their children to drink. They tell me it's a "stupid book". Not only SF, I gave A confederacy of dunces to my mom, she didn't go past the first 5 pages. Never understood it. So what good does SF as an art form, any other dimension of existence for that matter to society? My friend, to the people in the middle of the bell curve, the only important things, the things for *which* *they* *live* are money and flattery. I'm bitter yes, today I am. To the idiots in this world the only important things are out-car-ing and out-house-ing their neighbors, while maintaining a civilian and proper attitude all the time.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>Look , I 'm sorry to say that this article is stupid , okay ?
We at / .
like SF , and try to argue that it is necessary .
Necessary for whom exactly ?
You know what happens when I give " The left hand of darkness " to my sister or to my in-laws ?
They frown like I came into the house dressed as the Tin man from The wizard of Oz , they leaf through it and hand it back like I gave them a beaker with a culture of Black Death for their children to drink .
They tell me it 's a " stupid book " .
Not only SF , I gave A confederacy of dunces to my mom , she did n't go past the first 5 pages .
Never understood it .
So what good does SF as an art form , any other dimension of existence for that matter to society ?
My friend , to the people in the middle of the bell curve , the only important things , the things for * which * * they * * live * are money and flattery .
I 'm bitter yes , today I am .
To the idiots in this world the only important things are out-car-ing and out-house-ing their neighbors , while maintaining a civilian and proper attitude all the time .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Look, I'm sorry to say that this article is stupid, okay?
We at /.
like SF, and try to argue that it is necessary.
Necessary for whom exactly?
You know what happens when I give "The left hand of darkness" to my sister or to my in-laws?
They frown like I came into the house dressed as the Tin man from The wizard of Oz, they leaf through it and hand it back like I gave them a beaker with a culture of Black Death for their children to drink.
They tell me it's a "stupid book".
Not only SF, I gave A confederacy of dunces to my mom, she didn't go past the first 5 pages.
Never understood it.
So what good does SF as an art form, any other dimension of existence for that matter to society?
My friend, to the people in the middle of the bell curve, the only important things, the things for *which* *they* *live* are money and flattery.
I'm bitter yes, today I am.
To the idiots in this world the only important things are out-car-ing and out-house-ing their neighbors, while maintaining a civilian and proper attitude all the time.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30884392</id>
	<title>Re: Faster Than The Other Side</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264342200000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>&gt; So, because technology killed two jobs, I'm better off, my customers are better off, and I was able to hire more employees who are also better off.</p><p>I hate to put it this way, but... you're only considering your own company, not your entire industry. Your industry's efficiency gain has likely been a net job loss. This IS a pretty good example of the sort of issues civilization will have to start figuring out soon; the quality and efficiency gains are great, but if we don't get better at creating new fields to employ the displaced workers, then not as many people will be able to afford the new efficiently made stuff, which means production will scale back, which means your industry will employ even fewer people, which means even fewer of the population will be able to buy your stuff, and so on.</p><p>If jobs are lost here because the work moved to China, but new jobs *aren't* available here, then it's still a loss here.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>&gt; So , because technology killed two jobs , I 'm better off , my customers are better off , and I was able to hire more employees who are also better off.I hate to put it this way , but... you 're only considering your own company , not your entire industry .
Your industry 's efficiency gain has likely been a net job loss .
This IS a pretty good example of the sort of issues civilization will have to start figuring out soon ; the quality and efficiency gains are great , but if we do n't get better at creating new fields to employ the displaced workers , then not as many people will be able to afford the new efficiently made stuff , which means production will scale back , which means your industry will employ even fewer people , which means even fewer of the population will be able to buy your stuff , and so on.If jobs are lost here because the work moved to China , but new jobs * are n't * available here , then it 's still a loss here .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>&gt; So, because technology killed two jobs, I'm better off, my customers are better off, and I was able to hire more employees who are also better off.I hate to put it this way, but... you're only considering your own company, not your entire industry.
Your industry's efficiency gain has likely been a net job loss.
This IS a pretty good example of the sort of issues civilization will have to start figuring out soon; the quality and efficiency gains are great, but if we don't get better at creating new fields to employ the displaced workers, then not as many people will be able to afford the new efficiently made stuff, which means production will scale back, which means your industry will employ even fewer people, which means even fewer of the population will be able to buy your stuff, and so on.If jobs are lost here because the work moved to China, but new jobs *aren't* available here, then it's still a loss here.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882736</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880640</id>
	<title>Been making speculative fiction before language</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264362600000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>Cave paintings and sand drawings have been speculating on what tomorrow's hunt may have been like. Religion has been speculating on what may happen after death. Man has always been speculating on the future and that is why we are here now in full survival mode.</p><p>And the rate of change may possibly be historic, but the sum of relative change during the agricultural revolution must have been greater considering the lack of cultural base and breath of historical knowledge and technology that we have today.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>Cave paintings and sand drawings have been speculating on what tomorrow 's hunt may have been like .
Religion has been speculating on what may happen after death .
Man has always been speculating on the future and that is why we are here now in full survival mode.And the rate of change may possibly be historic , but the sum of relative change during the agricultural revolution must have been greater considering the lack of cultural base and breath of historical knowledge and technology that we have today .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Cave paintings and sand drawings have been speculating on what tomorrow's hunt may have been like.
Religion has been speculating on what may happen after death.
Man has always been speculating on the future and that is why we are here now in full survival mode.And the rate of change may possibly be historic, but the sum of relative change during the agricultural revolution must have been greater considering the lack of cultural base and breath of historical knowledge and technology that we have today.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881520</id>
	<title>Re: Faster Than The Other Side</title>
	<author>khallow</author>
	<datestamp>1264324080000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p><div class="quote"><p>Yet when social scientists try to offer solutions they are seen as crackpots and lunatics. Frankly some of their solutions make a lot of sense.</p></div><p>What are these solutions so that I can judge for myself whether these solutions make sense or not?</p><p><div class="quote"><p>We don't even know if humans should be involved in an economy or whether we best let robots and computers serve us all things that we need.</p></div><p>There's still the matter of comparative advantage. Why is it better to have these sophisticated robots trim lawns and paint houses than whatever else they could be doing?</p></div>
	</htmltext>
<tokenext>Yet when social scientists try to offer solutions they are seen as crackpots and lunatics .
Frankly some of their solutions make a lot of sense.What are these solutions so that I can judge for myself whether these solutions make sense or not ? We do n't even know if humans should be involved in an economy or whether we best let robots and computers serve us all things that we need.There 's still the matter of comparative advantage .
Why is it better to have these sophisticated robots trim lawns and paint houses than whatever else they could be doing ?</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Yet when social scientists try to offer solutions they are seen as crackpots and lunatics.
Frankly some of their solutions make a lot of sense.What are these solutions so that I can judge for myself whether these solutions make sense or not?We don't even know if humans should be involved in an economy or whether we best let robots and computers serve us all things that we need.There's still the matter of comparative advantage.
Why is it better to have these sophisticated robots trim lawns and paint houses than whatever else they could be doing?
	</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30892774</id>
	<title>"On The Two Cultures", CP Snow, 1959</title>
	<author>whitroth</author>
	<datestamp>1264444440000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>Definition:<br>
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; sff = science fiction and fantasy, 99.999\% of which is written, and has *nothing* to do with anything ever filmed/video'd/gamed</p><p>This is nothing new. Too bad it'll be a one-day wonder on slashdot, and ignored thereafter.</p><p>When I first got into fandom (we're talking Real fandom, not media fandom (Trekkie/Who/etc) in the mid-sixties, there was a lot of talk about sff as being the bridge between the two cultures. The two cultures were liberal arts and the sciences. As Snow pointed out, he knew plenty of scientists and engineers who could quote Shakespeare, chapter and verse, but not a single liberal arts person who knew even the simplified version of the Three Laws of Thermodynamics.</p><p>It's gotten *WAY* worse as the right, esp., has pushed the dumbing down of the American educational system the last 35 years. ("we value education", but we'll only fund it with property taxes, no income taxes, and we'll put a cap on property taxes). The result is that too many people in the US conflate electricity with magic.</p><p>One result of this is that sf is looked down on by the majority of Americans, except for maybe movies, and they're 90\% made by producers and directors and scriptwriters who can't figure out how to have a consistent storyline, much less keep the real world in mind (Armageddon being a perfect example, where, on top of every other thing that's wrong with it, has Willis just sort of pushing the button... without paying any attention to whether he was doing it at the right instant).</p><p>SF, yeah, that "Buck Rogers stuff", it's all fantastic (the speaker being unable to distinguish between sf &amp; fantasy, since they live in a fantasy world in their heads). Yeah, laser beams, I mean, ray guns, and asteroids hitting the Earth, and designer diseases, yup, all fantasy.</p><p>Yeah, it is pro-survival. We get to worry about things 20-30 years before the rest of you do, and come to some kinds of answers (got gray goo? microwave it!) But does the majority care? They think Godzilla movies are sf.</p><p>In the meantime, I can point to any number of books with serious literary merit (ranging from Brunner's Stand On Zanzibar, using the style of Dos Passos' USA, to Stephenson's Anathem, and a ton in between), that I'd love to see brought into any English class, and give kids things to think about... but science is hard, as Barbie said.</p><p>
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; mark</p></div>
	</htmltext>
<tokenext>Definition :       sff = science fiction and fantasy , 99.999 \ % of which is written , and has * nothing * to do with anything ever filmed/video 'd/gamedThis is nothing new .
Too bad it 'll be a one-day wonder on slashdot , and ignored thereafter.When I first got into fandom ( we 're talking Real fandom , not media fandom ( Trekkie/Who/etc ) in the mid-sixties , there was a lot of talk about sff as being the bridge between the two cultures .
The two cultures were liberal arts and the sciences .
As Snow pointed out , he knew plenty of scientists and engineers who could quote Shakespeare , chapter and verse , but not a single liberal arts person who knew even the simplified version of the Three Laws of Thermodynamics.It 's gotten * WAY * worse as the right , esp. , has pushed the dumbing down of the American educational system the last 35 years .
( " we value education " , but we 'll only fund it with property taxes , no income taxes , and we 'll put a cap on property taxes ) .
The result is that too many people in the US conflate electricity with magic.One result of this is that sf is looked down on by the majority of Americans , except for maybe movies , and they 're 90 \ % made by producers and directors and scriptwriters who ca n't figure out how to have a consistent storyline , much less keep the real world in mind ( Armageddon being a perfect example , where , on top of every other thing that 's wrong with it , has Willis just sort of pushing the button... without paying any attention to whether he was doing it at the right instant ) .SF , yeah , that " Buck Rogers stuff " , it 's all fantastic ( the speaker being unable to distinguish between sf &amp; fantasy , since they live in a fantasy world in their heads ) .
Yeah , laser beams , I mean , ray guns , and asteroids hitting the Earth , and designer diseases , yup , all fantasy.Yeah , it is pro-survival .
We get to worry about things 20-30 years before the rest of you do , and come to some kinds of answers ( got gray goo ?
microwave it !
) But does the majority care ?
They think Godzilla movies are sf.In the meantime , I can point to any number of books with serious literary merit ( ranging from Brunner 's Stand On Zanzibar , using the style of Dos Passos ' USA , to Stephenson 's Anathem , and a ton in between ) , that I 'd love to see brought into any English class , and give kids things to think about... but science is hard , as Barbie said .
                      mark</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Definition:
      sff = science fiction and fantasy, 99.999\% of which is written, and has *nothing* to do with anything ever filmed/video'd/gamedThis is nothing new.
Too bad it'll be a one-day wonder on slashdot, and ignored thereafter.When I first got into fandom (we're talking Real fandom, not media fandom (Trekkie/Who/etc) in the mid-sixties, there was a lot of talk about sff as being the bridge between the two cultures.
The two cultures were liberal arts and the sciences.
As Snow pointed out, he knew plenty of scientists and engineers who could quote Shakespeare, chapter and verse, but not a single liberal arts person who knew even the simplified version of the Three Laws of Thermodynamics.It's gotten *WAY* worse as the right, esp., has pushed the dumbing down of the American educational system the last 35 years.
("we value education", but we'll only fund it with property taxes, no income taxes, and we'll put a cap on property taxes).
The result is that too many people in the US conflate electricity with magic.One result of this is that sf is looked down on by the majority of Americans, except for maybe movies, and they're 90\% made by producers and directors and scriptwriters who can't figure out how to have a consistent storyline, much less keep the real world in mind (Armageddon being a perfect example, where, on top of every other thing that's wrong with it, has Willis just sort of pushing the button... without paying any attention to whether he was doing it at the right instant).SF, yeah, that "Buck Rogers stuff", it's all fantastic (the speaker being unable to distinguish between sf &amp; fantasy, since they live in a fantasy world in their heads).
Yeah, laser beams, I mean, ray guns, and asteroids hitting the Earth, and designer diseases, yup, all fantasy.Yeah, it is pro-survival.
We get to worry about things 20-30 years before the rest of you do, and come to some kinds of answers (got gray goo?
microwave it!
) But does the majority care?
They think Godzilla movies are sf.In the meantime, I can point to any number of books with serious literary merit (ranging from Brunner's Stand On Zanzibar, using the style of Dos Passos' USA, to Stephenson's Anathem, and a ton in between), that I'd love to see brought into any English class, and give kids things to think about... but science is hard, as Barbie said.
                      mark
	</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880964</id>
	<title>Re:What change?</title>
	<author>JoshuaZ</author>
	<datestamp>1264364160000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Informativ</modclass>
	<modscore>2</modscore>
	<htmltext>When were you born? Sure the tech changes now aren't as extreme as they may have been in some other historical time periods (around 1900 the radio, car, and airplane all showed up in only a few years) but we do have a lot of technological change still happening. Moreover, the technological change that is happening is change that raises ethical concerns. For example, surveillance technology and other technologies that raise privacy issues have become far more advanced. Medical technologies of all sorts (genetic engineering of all sorts is a very recent issue) have become far more common and practical. Moreover, the pace looks like it is going to continue. And these are but a few examples. There are many others which bring up both ethical and societal issues. It might seem like the only change in the last 20 years has been cell-phones, but that just means that one hasn't been paying that much attention to technologies that aren't in your pocket or on your desk.</htmltext>
<tokenext>When were you born ?
Sure the tech changes now are n't as extreme as they may have been in some other historical time periods ( around 1900 the radio , car , and airplane all showed up in only a few years ) but we do have a lot of technological change still happening .
Moreover , the technological change that is happening is change that raises ethical concerns .
For example , surveillance technology and other technologies that raise privacy issues have become far more advanced .
Medical technologies of all sorts ( genetic engineering of all sorts is a very recent issue ) have become far more common and practical .
Moreover , the pace looks like it is going to continue .
And these are but a few examples .
There are many others which bring up both ethical and societal issues .
It might seem like the only change in the last 20 years has been cell-phones , but that just means that one has n't been paying that much attention to technologies that are n't in your pocket or on your desk .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>When were you born?
Sure the tech changes now aren't as extreme as they may have been in some other historical time periods (around 1900 the radio, car, and airplane all showed up in only a few years) but we do have a lot of technological change still happening.
Moreover, the technological change that is happening is change that raises ethical concerns.
For example, surveillance technology and other technologies that raise privacy issues have become far more advanced.
Medical technologies of all sorts (genetic engineering of all sorts is a very recent issue) have become far more common and practical.
Moreover, the pace looks like it is going to continue.
And these are but a few examples.
There are many others which bring up both ethical and societal issues.
It might seem like the only change in the last 20 years has been cell-phones, but that just means that one hasn't been paying that much attention to technologies that aren't in your pocket or on your desk.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880722</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880442</id>
	<title>This is true.</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264361700000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Interestin</modclass>
	<modscore>4</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>
I find in talking with my wife and other friends/family who are not SciFi readers that they are often surprised by certain events in the news. Whereas I will say something like, "Oh, this reminds me of Snow Crash, or Left Hand of Darkness<nobr> <wbr></nobr>... kewl!"
</p><p>
Good quality, 'what if'-style SciFi keeps your world view more flexible than reading most any other kind of genre.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>I find in talking with my wife and other friends/family who are not SciFi readers that they are often surprised by certain events in the news .
Whereas I will say something like , " Oh , this reminds me of Snow Crash , or Left Hand of Darkness .. .
kewl ! " Good quality , 'what if'-style SciFi keeps your world view more flexible than reading most any other kind of genre .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>
I find in talking with my wife and other friends/family who are not SciFi readers that they are often surprised by certain events in the news.
Whereas I will say something like, "Oh, this reminds me of Snow Crash, or Left Hand of Darkness ...
kewl!"

Good quality, 'what if'-style SciFi keeps your world view more flexible than reading most any other kind of genre.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30884508</id>
	<title>That's an interesting definition of "specifically"</title>
	<author>liquiddark</author>
	<datestamp>1264343100000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>Speculative Fiction:  Fantasy, Science Fiction, and various other kinds of speculation-rooted fiction.  <br>
Science Fiction:  one of the genres named above.</htmltext>
<tokenext>Speculative Fiction : Fantasy , Science Fiction , and various other kinds of speculation-rooted fiction .
Science Fiction : one of the genres named above .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Speculative Fiction:  Fantasy, Science Fiction, and various other kinds of speculation-rooted fiction.
Science Fiction:  one of the genres named above.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30887492</id>
	<title>All a big nothing</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264413660000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p><div class="quote"><p>"This article makes an interesting point about the necessity of science fiction &mdash; or, more specifically, speculative fiction as a tool to aid in the long-term survival of the human species. 'We live in a world that is incredibly frightening for a growing portion of the population because of the exponential rate of change we are experiencing. "</p></div><p>Maybe people are frightened because they're told that they should be frightened. "long-term survival of the human species". Alarmist, much? Nothing to see here, please move along.</p></div>
	</htmltext>
<tokenext>" This article makes an interesting point about the necessity of science fiction    or , more specifically , speculative fiction as a tool to aid in the long-term survival of the human species .
'We live in a world that is incredibly frightening for a growing portion of the population because of the exponential rate of change we are experiencing .
" Maybe people are frightened because they 're told that they should be frightened .
" long-term survival of the human species " .
Alarmist , much ?
Nothing to see here , please move along .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>"This article makes an interesting point about the necessity of science fiction — or, more specifically, speculative fiction as a tool to aid in the long-term survival of the human species.
'We live in a world that is incredibly frightening for a growing portion of the population because of the exponential rate of change we are experiencing.
"Maybe people are frightened because they're told that they should be frightened.
"long-term survival of the human species".
Alarmist, much?
Nothing to see here, please move along.
	</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30887134</id>
	<title>Re:What "exponential change?</title>
	<author>phantomfive</author>
	<datestamp>1264452780000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>It all depends on how you measure it.  If you measure it in terms of how quickly a person can get from one place to another, then yeah, there was a big jump a hundred years ago.<br> <br>
On the other hand, if you count the <i>number</i> of innovations/inventions that are happening, it's a huge difference. Qualcomm has a wall filled with patents for things it invented in the radio (cell phone) industry, and a large number of them are real inventions, not patent-troll type stuff, but you don't really hear about it because you need to have a strong basics in radio-physics before you can even begin to understand them.  That is one company.  Another company recently came out with a GPS receiver that picks up the signal <i>below the noise floor</i>. Do you understand how impressive that is?  It's amazing, and yet it goes mostly unnoticed because most people don't even understand what that means.<br> <br>
It's easy to say, "oh, we had transistors 50 years ago, what has changed?" but the answer is a lot.  Transistors don't get smaller by themselves, billions of dollars worth of new inventing has gone into making them smaller and smaller.  If you want to see something amazing, look at the techniques they use to make chips. <br> <br>
If you want to look at micro-biology, the advances we've made there are amazing as well.  It may not seem like it if you look at it from the standpoint of, "oh, but we aren't curing new diseases as much as we used to."  But that's because all the really deadly diseases have already been cured.  People mainly die from the body wearing down, not from small-pox or polio.<br> <br>
Consider the number of inventors.  In the old days there was Thomas Edison, Nikola Tesla.....you can probably name others.  They were famous because they were few.  You don't really hear about inventors these days, not because they don't exist, but because there are so many of them that being an inventor isn't all that exciting to the general public.  We even have a profession, engineer, who essentially do what engineers did in the old days.<br> <br>
It may seem like new technologies are tapering off, but only if you don't actually count the new inventions that are happening every day.</htmltext>
<tokenext>It all depends on how you measure it .
If you measure it in terms of how quickly a person can get from one place to another , then yeah , there was a big jump a hundred years ago .
On the other hand , if you count the number of innovations/inventions that are happening , it 's a huge difference .
Qualcomm has a wall filled with patents for things it invented in the radio ( cell phone ) industry , and a large number of them are real inventions , not patent-troll type stuff , but you do n't really hear about it because you need to have a strong basics in radio-physics before you can even begin to understand them .
That is one company .
Another company recently came out with a GPS receiver that picks up the signal below the noise floor .
Do you understand how impressive that is ?
It 's amazing , and yet it goes mostly unnoticed because most people do n't even understand what that means .
It 's easy to say , " oh , we had transistors 50 years ago , what has changed ?
" but the answer is a lot .
Transistors do n't get smaller by themselves , billions of dollars worth of new inventing has gone into making them smaller and smaller .
If you want to see something amazing , look at the techniques they use to make chips .
If you want to look at micro-biology , the advances we 've made there are amazing as well .
It may not seem like it if you look at it from the standpoint of , " oh , but we are n't curing new diseases as much as we used to .
" But that 's because all the really deadly diseases have already been cured .
People mainly die from the body wearing down , not from small-pox or polio .
Consider the number of inventors .
In the old days there was Thomas Edison , Nikola Tesla.....you can probably name others .
They were famous because they were few .
You do n't really hear about inventors these days , not because they do n't exist , but because there are so many of them that being an inventor is n't all that exciting to the general public .
We even have a profession , engineer , who essentially do what engineers did in the old days .
It may seem like new technologies are tapering off , but only if you do n't actually count the new inventions that are happening every day .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>It all depends on how you measure it.
If you measure it in terms of how quickly a person can get from one place to another, then yeah, there was a big jump a hundred years ago.
On the other hand, if you count the number of innovations/inventions that are happening, it's a huge difference.
Qualcomm has a wall filled with patents for things it invented in the radio (cell phone) industry, and a large number of them are real inventions, not patent-troll type stuff, but you don't really hear about it because you need to have a strong basics in radio-physics before you can even begin to understand them.
That is one company.
Another company recently came out with a GPS receiver that picks up the signal below the noise floor.
Do you understand how impressive that is?
It's amazing, and yet it goes mostly unnoticed because most people don't even understand what that means.
It's easy to say, "oh, we had transistors 50 years ago, what has changed?
" but the answer is a lot.
Transistors don't get smaller by themselves, billions of dollars worth of new inventing has gone into making them smaller and smaller.
If you want to see something amazing, look at the techniques they use to make chips.
If you want to look at micro-biology, the advances we've made there are amazing as well.
It may not seem like it if you look at it from the standpoint of, "oh, but we aren't curing new diseases as much as we used to.
"  But that's because all the really deadly diseases have already been cured.
People mainly die from the body wearing down, not from small-pox or polio.
Consider the number of inventors.
In the old days there was Thomas Edison, Nikola Tesla.....you can probably name others.
They were famous because they were few.
You don't really hear about inventors these days, not because they don't exist, but because there are so many of them that being an inventor isn't all that exciting to the general public.
We even have a profession, engineer, who essentially do what engineers did in the old days.
It may seem like new technologies are tapering off, but only if you don't actually count the new inventions that are happening every day.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882258</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881432</id>
	<title>Plastic Fantastic Lover</title>
	<author>mindbrane</author>
	<datestamp>1264366740000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext>I think the title to my post is lifted from a rock song but it suits my needs. First off, as an aside, what fiction isn't speculative? <p>We have a fairly plastic period of development that ends in a sort of hormonal fixative we call puberty. Puberty is often interwoven with plastic fantastic lovers, and secret penchants to transform into telekinetic vampires and such. For some it's hell for others, like me, it's something to be clung onto long past adolescence. Science fiction, more so fantasy, can cater to pubescent transmogrification, but can also function as a trail breaking exercise for societies. Still the mind, as an American neuroscientist put it, is just the brain doing it's job and it goes about it's job with the same stringent constraints, barring illness, that the rest of a somewhat healthy body does. From almost a preschool age we generally demonstrate the ability to acquire language, even two, three or more languages, at a seemingly unnatural rate. Once the window for acquiring languages closes around the early teens, acquiring even one's native language can be difficult and curtailed.</p><p>From the above jumble two quick points tumble free. One is that the plasticity of our minds has constraints, some of those constraints are developmental and thus temporally constrained. The other is that once the most plastic state of our development closes anything we acquire afterward is by dint of rote and reason and, for all that, will probably carry with it the hallmarks of our native environment from early development. We talk with accents and there's reason to think we think with an accent. Further our cultures worldwide tend to be xenophobic and, to my mind, deeply linked to our primate natures. Because of these things we will, as we're doing now, bend technology to our biological and cultural needs much more than technology will ever mysteriously, perchance malevolently transform our brains constraints. Look at what the web is. Isn't Facebook your high school yearbook writ large where you get to play editor and pose and post the stuff that makes you the centre of attention? We're primates, not plastic fantastic lovers, and until technology can transform our basic natures in a way that allows for a functional society, technology will be made to serve our nature.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>I think the title to my post is lifted from a rock song but it suits my needs .
First off , as an aside , what fiction is n't speculative ?
We have a fairly plastic period of development that ends in a sort of hormonal fixative we call puberty .
Puberty is often interwoven with plastic fantastic lovers , and secret penchants to transform into telekinetic vampires and such .
For some it 's hell for others , like me , it 's something to be clung onto long past adolescence .
Science fiction , more so fantasy , can cater to pubescent transmogrification , but can also function as a trail breaking exercise for societies .
Still the mind , as an American neuroscientist put it , is just the brain doing it 's job and it goes about it 's job with the same stringent constraints , barring illness , that the rest of a somewhat healthy body does .
From almost a preschool age we generally demonstrate the ability to acquire language , even two , three or more languages , at a seemingly unnatural rate .
Once the window for acquiring languages closes around the early teens , acquiring even one 's native language can be difficult and curtailed.From the above jumble two quick points tumble free .
One is that the plasticity of our minds has constraints , some of those constraints are developmental and thus temporally constrained .
The other is that once the most plastic state of our development closes anything we acquire afterward is by dint of rote and reason and , for all that , will probably carry with it the hallmarks of our native environment from early development .
We talk with accents and there 's reason to think we think with an accent .
Further our cultures worldwide tend to be xenophobic and , to my mind , deeply linked to our primate natures .
Because of these things we will , as we 're doing now , bend technology to our biological and cultural needs much more than technology will ever mysteriously , perchance malevolently transform our brains constraints .
Look at what the web is .
Is n't Facebook your high school yearbook writ large where you get to play editor and pose and post the stuff that makes you the centre of attention ?
We 're primates , not plastic fantastic lovers , and until technology can transform our basic natures in a way that allows for a functional society , technology will be made to serve our nature .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>I think the title to my post is lifted from a rock song but it suits my needs.
First off, as an aside, what fiction isn't speculative?
We have a fairly plastic period of development that ends in a sort of hormonal fixative we call puberty.
Puberty is often interwoven with plastic fantastic lovers, and secret penchants to transform into telekinetic vampires and such.
For some it's hell for others, like me, it's something to be clung onto long past adolescence.
Science fiction, more so fantasy, can cater to pubescent transmogrification, but can also function as a trail breaking exercise for societies.
Still the mind, as an American neuroscientist put it, is just the brain doing it's job and it goes about it's job with the same stringent constraints, barring illness, that the rest of a somewhat healthy body does.
From almost a preschool age we generally demonstrate the ability to acquire language, even two, three or more languages, at a seemingly unnatural rate.
Once the window for acquiring languages closes around the early teens, acquiring even one's native language can be difficult and curtailed.From the above jumble two quick points tumble free.
One is that the plasticity of our minds has constraints, some of those constraints are developmental and thus temporally constrained.
The other is that once the most plastic state of our development closes anything we acquire afterward is by dint of rote and reason and, for all that, will probably carry with it the hallmarks of our native environment from early development.
We talk with accents and there's reason to think we think with an accent.
Further our cultures worldwide tend to be xenophobic and, to my mind, deeply linked to our primate natures.
Because of these things we will, as we're doing now, bend technology to our biological and cultural needs much more than technology will ever mysteriously, perchance malevolently transform our brains constraints.
Look at what the web is.
Isn't Facebook your high school yearbook writ large where you get to play editor and pose and post the stuff that makes you the centre of attention?
We're primates, not plastic fantastic lovers, and until technology can transform our basic natures in a way that allows for a functional society, technology will be made to serve our nature.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30883022</id>
	<title>Oh okay</title>
	<author>SmallFurryCreature</author>
	<datestamp>1264332900000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Insightful</modclass>
	<modscore>2</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>ATM's. I saw the first being installed in holland, before that if you wanted cash, you had to get it from a bank.
</p><p>Phone boots were the only way to make a call outside your house, and they had paper phone books installed that we NOT stolen in seconds.
</p><p>Computers were hooked up to your tv, that had a knob to tune it. Programs came on casettes, if you could afford it, else you had to retype your program each time. And yes, I did this.
</p><p>Movies had animatronics and we thought it was the most amazing thing ever. Three enemy fighters at once! The hight of technology.
</p><p>Kirk was the one true captain of the Enterprise and he never EVER called a conference meeting.
</p><p>There was portable music, it was a record player that was a large orange oblong with a slot in the side that you could put a record in, that stuck out on all sides.
</p><p>Sony owned the walkman and they were cool.
</p><p>Pong was the height of CGI
</p><p>MS had yet to steal the GUI.
</p><p>Everyone was complaining about those Asians stealing all our production job. No, the other ones.
</p><p>Apples were expensive. Oh wait...
</p><p>The americans were driving V8's that guzzled gas despite the oil shortage...
</p><p>You are right, everything is the same, just with cellphones.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>ATM 's .
I saw the first being installed in holland , before that if you wanted cash , you had to get it from a bank .
Phone boots were the only way to make a call outside your house , and they had paper phone books installed that we NOT stolen in seconds .
Computers were hooked up to your tv , that had a knob to tune it .
Programs came on casettes , if you could afford it , else you had to retype your program each time .
And yes , I did this .
Movies had animatronics and we thought it was the most amazing thing ever .
Three enemy fighters at once !
The hight of technology .
Kirk was the one true captain of the Enterprise and he never EVER called a conference meeting .
There was portable music , it was a record player that was a large orange oblong with a slot in the side that you could put a record in , that stuck out on all sides .
Sony owned the walkman and they were cool .
Pong was the height of CGI MS had yet to steal the GUI .
Everyone was complaining about those Asians stealing all our production job .
No , the other ones .
Apples were expensive .
Oh wait.. . The americans were driving V8 's that guzzled gas despite the oil shortage.. . You are right , everything is the same , just with cellphones .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>ATM's.
I saw the first being installed in holland, before that if you wanted cash, you had to get it from a bank.
Phone boots were the only way to make a call outside your house, and they had paper phone books installed that we NOT stolen in seconds.
Computers were hooked up to your tv, that had a knob to tune it.
Programs came on casettes, if you could afford it, else you had to retype your program each time.
And yes, I did this.
Movies had animatronics and we thought it was the most amazing thing ever.
Three enemy fighters at once!
The hight of technology.
Kirk was the one true captain of the Enterprise and he never EVER called a conference meeting.
There was portable music, it was a record player that was a large orange oblong with a slot in the side that you could put a record in, that stuck out on all sides.
Sony owned the walkman and they were cool.
Pong was the height of CGI
MS had yet to steal the GUI.
Everyone was complaining about those Asians stealing all our production job.
No, the other ones.
Apples were expensive.
Oh wait...
The americans were driving V8's that guzzled gas despite the oil shortage...
You are right, everything is the same, just with cellphones.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880722</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880722</id>
	<title>What change?</title>
	<author>Leuf</author>
	<datestamp>1264362960000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>The world is pretty much the same as when I entered it, except now everyone has a cellphone.</htmltext>
<tokenext>The world is pretty much the same as when I entered it , except now everyone has a cellphone .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>The world is pretty much the same as when I entered it, except now everyone has a cellphone.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30885572</id>
	<title>Re:Stories With Messages</title>
	<author>gmhowell</author>
	<datestamp>1264351080000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>If you think Atlas Shrugged was a good story ruined <i>only</i> by a blatant and heavy-handed message, may you please stay far, far, far away from writing.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>If you think Atlas Shrugged was a good story ruined only by a blatant and heavy-handed message , may you please stay far , far , far away from writing .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>If you think Atlas Shrugged was a good story ruined only by a blatant and heavy-handed message, may you please stay far, far, far away from writing.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881292</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881798</id>
	<title>Re: Faster Than The Other Side</title>
	<author>misexistentialist</author>
	<datestamp>1264325580000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Offtopic</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext>Every human will be trained as a lawyer to bring lawsuits against the owners for patent infringement or negligence when the robots malfunction.</htmltext>
<tokenext>Every human will be trained as a lawyer to bring lawsuits against the owners for patent infringement or negligence when the robots malfunction .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Every human will be trained as a lawyer to bring lawsuits against the owners for patent infringement or negligence when the robots malfunction.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30883870</id>
	<title>yeah dud</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264338360000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>Minority Report has philosophical questions about our increased statistical prediction abilities.<br>The Recruit has warnings about problems with complicated bureaucracy.<br>The Matrix - virtual lifestyles<br>Terminator - Robots, AI problems<br>Mad Max etc. - overuse of resources.<br>Surrogates - too much assistive technologies<nobr> <wbr></nobr>...<br>the list goes on and on</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>Minority Report has philosophical questions about our increased statistical prediction abilities.The Recruit has warnings about problems with complicated bureaucracy.The Matrix - virtual lifestylesTerminator - Robots , AI problemsMad Max etc .
- overuse of resources.Surrogates - too much assistive technologies ...the list goes on and on</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Minority Report has philosophical questions about our increased statistical prediction abilities.The Recruit has warnings about problems with complicated bureaucracy.The Matrix - virtual lifestylesTerminator - Robots, AI problemsMad Max etc.
- overuse of resources.Surrogates - too much assistive technologies ...the list goes on and on</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30888296</id>
	<title>Re: Faster Than The Other Side</title>
	<author>Carra</author>
	<datestamp>1264424100000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext>One dollar sounds cheap but why would you have to pay for books in the public domain?</htmltext>
<tokenext>One dollar sounds cheap but why would you have to pay for books in the public domain ?</tokentext>
<sentencetext>One dollar sounds cheap but why would you have to pay for books in the public domain?</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882736</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881542</id>
	<title>The need for SF</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264324200000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>is obvious.</p><p>The problem is it has been done, because of:<br>- economical interests: if you have a population of lawyers, they're not gonna dig out science, nor \_physical\_ laws;<br>- genre mix-mash: SF films become more &amp; more like CSI (read "they suck");<br>- political influence: you're gonna talk about the future? in the USA or China? Good luck.<br>- influence from the Present: Avatar is Pocahontas with Iraq in the sky with diamonds (unobtanium).</p><p>There hasn't been good SF (at least, with mass-media impact) since long. Passable exceptions would be:<br>- Babylon 5, great story, bad implementation;<br>- Stargate, great idea, well done, but excessive battling -- the future cannot be all about war!</p><p>What sucks:<br>- Lost, I can't even watch it;<br>- Heroes, bad idea, well done, much CSI influence.</p><p>The traditional franchises (ST, SW) went down spiralling with different speeds. They're mostly trash now.</p><p>Where's Irwin Allen when we need him? (btw, Lost in Space, the recent movie, sucked).</p><p>Maybe we have to imitate Asimov, stop complaining and do it ourselves...</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>is obvious.The problem is it has been done , because of : - economical interests : if you have a population of lawyers , they 're not gon na dig out science , nor \ _physical \ _ laws ; - genre mix-mash : SF films become more &amp; more like CSI ( read " they suck " ) ; - political influence : you 're gon na talk about the future ?
in the USA or China ?
Good luck.- influence from the Present : Avatar is Pocahontas with Iraq in the sky with diamonds ( unobtanium ) .There has n't been good SF ( at least , with mass-media impact ) since long .
Passable exceptions would be : - Babylon 5 , great story , bad implementation ; - Stargate , great idea , well done , but excessive battling -- the future can not be all about war ! What sucks : - Lost , I ca n't even watch it ; - Heroes , bad idea , well done , much CSI influence.The traditional franchises ( ST , SW ) went down spiralling with different speeds .
They 're mostly trash now.Where 's Irwin Allen when we need him ?
( btw , Lost in Space , the recent movie , sucked ) .Maybe we have to imitate Asimov , stop complaining and do it ourselves.. .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>is obvious.The problem is it has been done, because of:- economical interests: if you have a population of lawyers, they're not gonna dig out science, nor \_physical\_ laws;- genre mix-mash: SF films become more &amp; more like CSI (read "they suck");- political influence: you're gonna talk about the future?
in the USA or China?
Good luck.- influence from the Present: Avatar is Pocahontas with Iraq in the sky with diamonds (unobtanium).There hasn't been good SF (at least, with mass-media impact) since long.
Passable exceptions would be:- Babylon 5, great story, bad implementation;- Stargate, great idea, well done, but excessive battling -- the future cannot be all about war!What sucks:- Lost, I can't even watch it;- Heroes, bad idea, well done, much CSI influence.The traditional franchises (ST, SW) went down spiralling with different speeds.
They're mostly trash now.Where's Irwin Allen when we need him?
(btw, Lost in Space, the recent movie, sucked).Maybe we have to imitate Asimov, stop complaining and do it ourselves...</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882240</id>
	<title>Neither Necessary Nor Sufficient</title>
	<author>DynaSoar</author>
	<datestamp>1264328340000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>S(peculative)F is solidified imagination. Imagination must remain fluid, but it should also be provided material from which to start and with which to work. In the absence of this particular form, another would no doubt come to fore, such as the original Hypercard was intended. Perhaps after the fact such a codification of material for speculating might be seen as necessary, but that's only after the fact. At the time it (SF or its substitute for the purpose stated) is simply an inevitable and spontaneous emergent property/process of imagination exercising itself with the at least hopeful intention of being shared. It occurs to me that even critics of religion could accept its utility in these terms.<br>
&nbsp;</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>S ( peculative ) F is solidified imagination .
Imagination must remain fluid , but it should also be provided material from which to start and with which to work .
In the absence of this particular form , another would no doubt come to fore , such as the original Hypercard was intended .
Perhaps after the fact such a codification of material for speculating might be seen as necessary , but that 's only after the fact .
At the time it ( SF or its substitute for the purpose stated ) is simply an inevitable and spontaneous emergent property/process of imagination exercising itself with the at least hopeful intention of being shared .
It occurs to me that even critics of religion could accept its utility in these terms .
 </tokentext>
<sentencetext>S(peculative)F is solidified imagination.
Imagination must remain fluid, but it should also be provided material from which to start and with which to work.
In the absence of this particular form, another would no doubt come to fore, such as the original Hypercard was intended.
Perhaps after the fact such a codification of material for speculating might be seen as necessary, but that's only after the fact.
At the time it (SF or its substitute for the purpose stated) is simply an inevitable and spontaneous emergent property/process of imagination exercising itself with the at least hopeful intention of being shared.
It occurs to me that even critics of religion could accept its utility in these terms.
 </sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880632</id>
	<title>Re:Adolescent fantasies</title>
	<author>Kell Bengal</author>
	<datestamp>1264362600000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Interestin</modclass>
	<modscore>4</modscore>
	<htmltext>But a surprising amount of technology is inspired directly or indirectly from fiction.  I work in robotics and I can tell you that there isn't a single person I've met robotics conferences who didn't grow up thinking about robots from the works of Asimov or Lucas or Japanese anime.  We loved them and we wanted to be a part of that - to make it so.<br> <br>  Science fiction is a history of the future - a self-fulfilling prophecy.</htmltext>
<tokenext>But a surprising amount of technology is inspired directly or indirectly from fiction .
I work in robotics and I can tell you that there is n't a single person I 've met robotics conferences who did n't grow up thinking about robots from the works of Asimov or Lucas or Japanese anime .
We loved them and we wanted to be a part of that - to make it so .
Science fiction is a history of the future - a self-fulfilling prophecy .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>But a surprising amount of technology is inspired directly or indirectly from fiction.
I work in robotics and I can tell you that there isn't a single person I've met robotics conferences who didn't grow up thinking about robots from the works of Asimov or Lucas or Japanese anime.
We loved them and we wanted to be a part of that - to make it so.
Science fiction is a history of the future - a self-fulfilling prophecy.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880544</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30894166</id>
	<title>Re:This is true.</title>
	<author>jgrahn</author>
	<datestamp>1264450800000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><blockquote><div><p>I can remember two or three science fiction stories that had flying cars. No more. In all of them very few owned such a vehicle. Most of them are from the 1940's.</p></div></blockquote><p>What kind of SF was that?
Seems to me that half of Philip K Dick's stories had flying cars. (With the hero stuck in traffic
jams on his way to work, and contemplating suicide.)</p></div>
	</htmltext>
<tokenext>I can remember two or three science fiction stories that had flying cars .
No more .
In all of them very few owned such a vehicle .
Most of them are from the 1940 's.What kind of SF was that ?
Seems to me that half of Philip K Dick 's stories had flying cars .
( With the hero stuck in traffic jams on his way to work , and contemplating suicide .
)</tokentext>
<sentencetext>I can remember two or three science fiction stories that had flying cars.
No more.
In all of them very few owned such a vehicle.
Most of them are from the 1940's.What kind of SF was that?
Seems to me that half of Philip K Dick's stories had flying cars.
(With the hero stuck in traffic
jams on his way to work, and contemplating suicide.
)
	</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882248</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881144</id>
	<title>Load of old psychobable</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264365240000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Insightful</modclass>
	<modscore>3</modscore>
	<htmltext>Constant change is here to stay.
<p>Really, there have always been people who are unable or unwilling to deal with change. It's nothing new and it certainly isn't getting worse with time. 100 years ago some individuals were having a tough time dealing with the idea of mass population moving to the new fangled "factories" (or as they were originally called: manufactories) and leaving the farming life behind. 50 years ago some people were having a hard time coming to terms with the social changes hitting society - lack of respect, sexual freedom and all this rock-n-roll.
</p><p>
So no, I don't buy the basic premise and I certainly disagree with the idea that the people who are insecure about change will want to read books about <b>even more change</b>.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>Constant change is here to stay .
Really , there have always been people who are unable or unwilling to deal with change .
It 's nothing new and it certainly is n't getting worse with time .
100 years ago some individuals were having a tough time dealing with the idea of mass population moving to the new fangled " factories " ( or as they were originally called : manufactories ) and leaving the farming life behind .
50 years ago some people were having a hard time coming to terms with the social changes hitting society - lack of respect , sexual freedom and all this rock-n-roll .
So no , I do n't buy the basic premise and I certainly disagree with the idea that the people who are insecure about change will want to read books about even more change .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Constant change is here to stay.
Really, there have always been people who are unable or unwilling to deal with change.
It's nothing new and it certainly isn't getting worse with time.
100 years ago some individuals were having a tough time dealing with the idea of mass population moving to the new fangled "factories" (or as they were originally called: manufactories) and leaving the farming life behind.
50 years ago some people were having a hard time coming to terms with the social changes hitting society - lack of respect, sexual freedom and all this rock-n-roll.
So no, I don't buy the basic premise and I certainly disagree with the idea that the people who are insecure about change will want to read books about even more change.</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30884036</id>
	<title>Makes no difference</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264339500000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>In a sense it really doesn't make any difference to the economy if you have robots doing all the work or not. What would simply happen is that people will find other ways of generating an economy into which they can project social status, and which they will take as seriously as they do the status driven consumption of todays economy. It might be online games or painting or masturbation olympics, it doesn't matter. We will never reach a nirvana where we won't be striving and in despair at the unfairness of the inequity of life, all while we live relatively pain free lives, operating fantastic machines of which our ancestors couldn't even dream, live in mansions and eat incredible food without an once of labour involved.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>In a sense it really does n't make any difference to the economy if you have robots doing all the work or not .
What would simply happen is that people will find other ways of generating an economy into which they can project social status , and which they will take as seriously as they do the status driven consumption of todays economy .
It might be online games or painting or masturbation olympics , it does n't matter .
We will never reach a nirvana where we wo n't be striving and in despair at the unfairness of the inequity of life , all while we live relatively pain free lives , operating fantastic machines of which our ancestors could n't even dream , live in mansions and eat incredible food without an once of labour involved .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>In a sense it really doesn't make any difference to the economy if you have robots doing all the work or not.
What would simply happen is that people will find other ways of generating an economy into which they can project social status, and which they will take as seriously as they do the status driven consumption of todays economy.
It might be online games or painting or masturbation olympics, it doesn't matter.
We will never reach a nirvana where we won't be striving and in despair at the unfairness of the inequity of life, all while we live relatively pain free lives, operating fantastic machines of which our ancestors couldn't even dream, live in mansions and eat incredible food without an once of labour involved.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30888952</id>
	<title>Re:Social Change?!</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264430220000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p><div class="quote"><p>I am almost 30 years old, during my lifetime there were no wars (in my country...), no major new Ideology like socialism, communism or facism was born, or grew strong and even the liberalization trends in society were thoroughly solid before I was even born. Sure, the internet, cloning, blablabla, all nice and dandy, but compared to the horrific political and social clash of ideologies in the past its almost like we reached a plateau.</p></div><p>You should read the news more often. There is currently an upsurge in violent Mohammedanism, and Western civilization is under attack. There have been attacks on many major cities, including New York, London, Paris, Madrid, Bombay and other.</p><p>The PC Western authorities are trying to deny it, but the reality is that we are in a war now.</p></div>
	</htmltext>
<tokenext>I am almost 30 years old , during my lifetime there were no wars ( in my country... ) , no major new Ideology like socialism , communism or facism was born , or grew strong and even the liberalization trends in society were thoroughly solid before I was even born .
Sure , the internet , cloning , blablabla , all nice and dandy , but compared to the horrific political and social clash of ideologies in the past its almost like we reached a plateau.You should read the news more often .
There is currently an upsurge in violent Mohammedanism , and Western civilization is under attack .
There have been attacks on many major cities , including New York , London , Paris , Madrid , Bombay and other.The PC Western authorities are trying to deny it , but the reality is that we are in a war now .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>I am almost 30 years old, during my lifetime there were no wars (in my country...), no major new Ideology like socialism, communism or facism was born, or grew strong and even the liberalization trends in society were thoroughly solid before I was even born.
Sure, the internet, cloning, blablabla, all nice and dandy, but compared to the horrific political and social clash of ideologies in the past its almost like we reached a plateau.You should read the news more often.
There is currently an upsurge in violent Mohammedanism, and Western civilization is under attack.
There have been attacks on many major cities, including New York, London, Paris, Madrid, Bombay and other.The PC Western authorities are trying to deny it, but the reality is that we are in a war now.
	</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882182</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880720</id>
	<title>Re: Faster Than The Other Side</title>
	<author>drinkypoo</author>
	<datestamp>1264362960000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p><div class="quote"><p>For example robots designed to remove dents and to paint cars might be able to keep every car looking new. But sense we were never able to do that before robotics what will be the economic effect of doing it.</p></div><p>It would be vastly cheaper to build cars that have all-replacable body panels, or cars designed to allow you to easily strip all components from the body and install them into another, than to build robots that could do auto body work. You'd basically need a car factory, <em>plus</em> a car factory in reverse, to do what a human can do &mdash; and humans are involved in the assembly of all vehicles currently made. Or, you'd need a robot as capable <em>in every way</em> as a human. Those will be subject to frequent failure for the forseeable future. The singularity is probably largely a myth because humans keep finding sociological ways to interfere with it... that, or it will take the form of Skynet/the Matrix superseding us. Thinking meat, indeed.</p><p><div class="quote"><p>We don't even know if humans should be involved in an economy or whether we best let robots and computers serve us all things that we need.</p></div><p>Humans will be making decisions for the direction of humanity, as always. Well, again, unless the robots take over one day. Robots WILL eventually be able to provide us everything, and we WILL have to find something else for humans to do during that time. By that time we should have the technology to colonize other planets, so I suppose there will be something for those people to do.</p></div>
	</htmltext>
<tokenext>For example robots designed to remove dents and to paint cars might be able to keep every car looking new .
But sense we were never able to do that before robotics what will be the economic effect of doing it.It would be vastly cheaper to build cars that have all-replacable body panels , or cars designed to allow you to easily strip all components from the body and install them into another , than to build robots that could do auto body work .
You 'd basically need a car factory , plus a car factory in reverse , to do what a human can do    and humans are involved in the assembly of all vehicles currently made .
Or , you 'd need a robot as capable in every way as a human .
Those will be subject to frequent failure for the forseeable future .
The singularity is probably largely a myth because humans keep finding sociological ways to interfere with it... that , or it will take the form of Skynet/the Matrix superseding us .
Thinking meat , indeed.We do n't even know if humans should be involved in an economy or whether we best let robots and computers serve us all things that we need.Humans will be making decisions for the direction of humanity , as always .
Well , again , unless the robots take over one day .
Robots WILL eventually be able to provide us everything , and we WILL have to find something else for humans to do during that time .
By that time we should have the technology to colonize other planets , so I suppose there will be something for those people to do .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>For example robots designed to remove dents and to paint cars might be able to keep every car looking new.
But sense we were never able to do that before robotics what will be the economic effect of doing it.It would be vastly cheaper to build cars that have all-replacable body panels, or cars designed to allow you to easily strip all components from the body and install them into another, than to build robots that could do auto body work.
You'd basically need a car factory, plus a car factory in reverse, to do what a human can do — and humans are involved in the assembly of all vehicles currently made.
Or, you'd need a robot as capable in every way as a human.
Those will be subject to frequent failure for the forseeable future.
The singularity is probably largely a myth because humans keep finding sociological ways to interfere with it... that, or it will take the form of Skynet/the Matrix superseding us.
Thinking meat, indeed.We don't even know if humans should be involved in an economy or whether we best let robots and computers serve us all things that we need.Humans will be making decisions for the direction of humanity, as always.
Well, again, unless the robots take over one day.
Robots WILL eventually be able to provide us everything, and we WILL have to find something else for humans to do during that time.
By that time we should have the technology to colonize other planets, so I suppose there will be something for those people to do.
	</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30891860</id>
	<title>Re: Faster Than The Other Side</title>
	<author>rwv</author>
	<datestamp>1264441200000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>2</modscore>
	<htmltext><p><div class="quote"><p>Good roofs and fresh paint on a sharp looking lawn without human effort would be a shocker. But what does that do to an economy. We don't even know if humans should be involved in an economy or whether we best let robots and computers serve us all things that we need.</p></div><p>It's probably too late for this comment to get modded high enough for many people to see it, but I'm in the process of polishing/publishing a speculative fiction novel that attacks this topic.  Preview version is available <a href="http://www.2076book.com/" title="2076book.com">here</a> [2076book.com].

</p><p>I think the basic social motivation will evolve to (a) robots do boring work, (b) humans do creative work.  Certainly, a robot driven economy will be capable of supporting a centralized leadership, but as long as the general population is given enough freedom to basically do whatever they want within a loose social construct it's hard to imagine many people would complain.  Though, naturally a big part of a lot of speculative fiction is "Post Scarcity Economy" (which implies that enough resources are available to support everybody [regardless of whether they do any work or not] so that nobody is left wanting).

</p><p>Two concepts that are truly impossible to anticipate the outcomes of... ruling classes are predisposed to nepotism and cronyism and these things invariably lead to corruption.  The other thing is all centralized governments support censorship to a certain degree and it's impossible to draw a line where censorship can be enforced without removing people's freedom.  It's not clear how robotics can be used to address these two concerns.</p></div>
	</htmltext>
<tokenext>Good roofs and fresh paint on a sharp looking lawn without human effort would be a shocker .
But what does that do to an economy .
We do n't even know if humans should be involved in an economy or whether we best let robots and computers serve us all things that we need.It 's probably too late for this comment to get modded high enough for many people to see it , but I 'm in the process of polishing/publishing a speculative fiction novel that attacks this topic .
Preview version is available here [ 2076book.com ] .
I think the basic social motivation will evolve to ( a ) robots do boring work , ( b ) humans do creative work .
Certainly , a robot driven economy will be capable of supporting a centralized leadership , but as long as the general population is given enough freedom to basically do whatever they want within a loose social construct it 's hard to imagine many people would complain .
Though , naturally a big part of a lot of speculative fiction is " Post Scarcity Economy " ( which implies that enough resources are available to support everybody [ regardless of whether they do any work or not ] so that nobody is left wanting ) .
Two concepts that are truly impossible to anticipate the outcomes of... ruling classes are predisposed to nepotism and cronyism and these things invariably lead to corruption .
The other thing is all centralized governments support censorship to a certain degree and it 's impossible to draw a line where censorship can be enforced without removing people 's freedom .
It 's not clear how robotics can be used to address these two concerns .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Good roofs and fresh paint on a sharp looking lawn without human effort would be a shocker.
But what does that do to an economy.
We don't even know if humans should be involved in an economy or whether we best let robots and computers serve us all things that we need.It's probably too late for this comment to get modded high enough for many people to see it, but I'm in the process of polishing/publishing a speculative fiction novel that attacks this topic.
Preview version is available here [2076book.com].
I think the basic social motivation will evolve to (a) robots do boring work, (b) humans do creative work.
Certainly, a robot driven economy will be capable of supporting a centralized leadership, but as long as the general population is given enough freedom to basically do whatever they want within a loose social construct it's hard to imagine many people would complain.
Though, naturally a big part of a lot of speculative fiction is "Post Scarcity Economy" (which implies that enough resources are available to support everybody [regardless of whether they do any work or not] so that nobody is left wanting).
Two concepts that are truly impossible to anticipate the outcomes of... ruling classes are predisposed to nepotism and cronyism and these things invariably lead to corruption.
The other thing is all centralized governments support censorship to a certain degree and it's impossible to draw a line where censorship can be enforced without removing people's freedom.
It's not clear how robotics can be used to address these two concerns.
	</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30886708</id>
	<title>Re:What "exponential change?</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264361880000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>And what is the internet, chopped liver?</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>And what is the internet , chopped liver ?</tokentext>
<sentencetext>And what is the internet, chopped liver?</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30882258</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30881292</id>
	<title>Stories With Messages</title>
	<author>Garrett Fox</author>
	<datestamp>1264366020000</datestamp>
	<modclass>Insightful</modclass>
	<modscore>3</modscore>
	<htmltext>Summarized the article just says, "SF is good because it helps us think about stuff -- but not that icky lowbrow SF like Star Trek; that's practically porn."<br> <br>
That's not a fair distinction. The author dismisses Trek, which in the 60s had some ham-fisted attempts at an Important Message (mainly re: race), and puts "Avatar" in that category even though it has a (stupid, hypocritical) moral message too. So it's not having A Message that makes for the kind of SF the author likes. The article's more like a guide to making movies that will get whipped in profits by the latest Star Trek. For good or ill, I hear some people were deeply affected by "Avatar", so that sort of movie <i>is</i> capable of being deep and meaningful in some people's eyes.<br> <br>
I wrote an SF novel recently. There was supposed to be a Message in it. I'd read enough SF to know that making the Important Message blatant and heavy-handed is a way to ruin an otherwise decent story; famous example "Atlas Shrugged". What I found to be a good solution is to focus on being entertaining first, with plot and character being much more important than the Deep Philosophical Implications. The same group of characters could've been used to tell a story with a different message, if the character development had gone a different way ("This cause isn't worth killing over!"), and that's a good thing.<br> <br>
So, if anyone wants to apply the article's advice, they should interpret it as, "Write stories with meaningful takes on the possible future -- but they should be <i>stories</i> first."<br> <br>
(One bit of snootiness: I've got a theory that a way to describe character growth is a two-axis method. One axis is, "Can the hero find the strength to do what he's trying to do?" and the other, harder-to-write one is, "Is the hero questioning what he <i>should</i> do?" Simpler stories tend not to bother much with the second one, but overusing it gets angsty and annoying quickly.)</htmltext>
<tokenext>Summarized the article just says , " SF is good because it helps us think about stuff -- but not that icky lowbrow SF like Star Trek ; that 's practically porn .
" That 's not a fair distinction .
The author dismisses Trek , which in the 60s had some ham-fisted attempts at an Important Message ( mainly re : race ) , and puts " Avatar " in that category even though it has a ( stupid , hypocritical ) moral message too .
So it 's not having A Message that makes for the kind of SF the author likes .
The article 's more like a guide to making movies that will get whipped in profits by the latest Star Trek .
For good or ill , I hear some people were deeply affected by " Avatar " , so that sort of movie is capable of being deep and meaningful in some people 's eyes .
I wrote an SF novel recently .
There was supposed to be a Message in it .
I 'd read enough SF to know that making the Important Message blatant and heavy-handed is a way to ruin an otherwise decent story ; famous example " Atlas Shrugged " .
What I found to be a good solution is to focus on being entertaining first , with plot and character being much more important than the Deep Philosophical Implications .
The same group of characters could 've been used to tell a story with a different message , if the character development had gone a different way ( " This cause is n't worth killing over !
" ) , and that 's a good thing .
So , if anyone wants to apply the article 's advice , they should interpret it as , " Write stories with meaningful takes on the possible future -- but they should be stories first .
" ( One bit of snootiness : I 've got a theory that a way to describe character growth is a two-axis method .
One axis is , " Can the hero find the strength to do what he 's trying to do ?
" and the other , harder-to-write one is , " Is the hero questioning what he should do ?
" Simpler stories tend not to bother much with the second one , but overusing it gets angsty and annoying quickly .
)</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Summarized the article just says, "SF is good because it helps us think about stuff -- but not that icky lowbrow SF like Star Trek; that's practically porn.
" 
That's not a fair distinction.
The author dismisses Trek, which in the 60s had some ham-fisted attempts at an Important Message (mainly re: race), and puts "Avatar" in that category even though it has a (stupid, hypocritical) moral message too.
So it's not having A Message that makes for the kind of SF the author likes.
The article's more like a guide to making movies that will get whipped in profits by the latest Star Trek.
For good or ill, I hear some people were deeply affected by "Avatar", so that sort of movie is capable of being deep and meaningful in some people's eyes.
I wrote an SF novel recently.
There was supposed to be a Message in it.
I'd read enough SF to know that making the Important Message blatant and heavy-handed is a way to ruin an otherwise decent story; famous example "Atlas Shrugged".
What I found to be a good solution is to focus on being entertaining first, with plot and character being much more important than the Deep Philosophical Implications.
The same group of characters could've been used to tell a story with a different message, if the character development had gone a different way ("This cause isn't worth killing over!
"), and that's a good thing.
So, if anyone wants to apply the article's advice, they should interpret it as, "Write stories with meaningful takes on the possible future -- but they should be stories first.
" 
(One bit of snootiness: I've got a theory that a way to describe character growth is a two-axis method.
One axis is, "Can the hero find the strength to do what he's trying to do?
" and the other, harder-to-write one is, "Is the hero questioning what he should do?
" Simpler stories tend not to bother much with the second one, but overusing it gets angsty and annoying quickly.
)</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30885570</id>
	<title>Re:Adolescent fantasies</title>
	<author>Skreems</author>
	<datestamp>1264351080000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><blockquote><div><p>Engineers and scientists will invent things anyway regardless of whether there has been bad fiction written about the concept beforehand.</p></div></blockquote><p>
Right, but the point of the article is that the rest of us laymen will be more likely to burn them as witches when they do if we stop reading sci-fi. Or something.</p></div>
	</htmltext>
<tokenext>Engineers and scientists will invent things anyway regardless of whether there has been bad fiction written about the concept beforehand .
Right , but the point of the article is that the rest of us laymen will be more likely to burn them as witches when they do if we stop reading sci-fi .
Or something .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Engineers and scientists will invent things anyway regardless of whether there has been bad fiction written about the concept beforehand.
Right, but the point of the article is that the rest of us laymen will be more likely to burn them as witches when they do if we stop reading sci-fi.
Or something.
	</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880544</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30887518</id>
	<title>Definitely a necessity</title>
	<author>TandooriC</author>
	<datestamp>1264413900000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext>Oh yes, it is very necessary indeed. A lightsaber has become a necessity in the situation the world is currently in. Wonder how does a lightsaber fare against bullets... hmmm...</htmltext>
<tokenext>Oh yes , it is very necessary indeed .
A lightsaber has become a necessity in the situation the world is currently in .
Wonder how does a lightsaber fare against bullets... hmmm.. .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Oh yes, it is very necessary indeed.
A lightsaber has become a necessity in the situation the world is currently in.
Wonder how does a lightsaber fare against bullets... hmmm...</sentencetext>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880836</id>
	<title>Re:Adolescent fantasies</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264363500000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>Yes, yes.  Just lie back and think of all that bad fiction next time you sleep on a water bed.  Or perhaps the next time you undergo orthoscopic surgery.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>Yes , yes .
Just lie back and think of all that bad fiction next time you sleep on a water bed .
Or perhaps the next time you undergo orthoscopic surgery .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Yes, yes.
Just lie back and think of all that bad fiction next time you sleep on a water bed.
Or perhaps the next time you undergo orthoscopic surgery.</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880544</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880948</id>
	<title>Ecomist's solution</title>
	<author>Anonymous</author>
	<datestamp>1264364040000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>0</modscore>
	<htmltext><p><div class="quote"><p>Education and shifting from job skill to job skills will not be enough to keep afloat soon.</p> </div><p>everybody go up the food chain to stay employed - i.e. get more education. The thing is, not everyone is cut out for higher education or education in disciplines that are in demand. And they never mention the part of supply of said educated workers outstripping demand.</p><p>So, the stupid people sit around and collect a check from the Government?</p></div>
	</htmltext>
<tokenext>Education and shifting from job skill to job skills will not be enough to keep afloat soon .
everybody go up the food chain to stay employed - i.e .
get more education .
The thing is , not everyone is cut out for higher education or education in disciplines that are in demand .
And they never mention the part of supply of said educated workers outstripping demand.So , the stupid people sit around and collect a check from the Government ?</tokentext>
<sentencetext>Education and shifting from job skill to job skills will not be enough to keep afloat soon.
everybody go up the food chain to stay employed - i.e.
get more education.
The thing is, not everyone is cut out for higher education or education in disciplines that are in demand.
And they never mention the part of supply of said educated workers outstripping demand.So, the stupid people sit around and collect a check from the Government?
	</sentencetext>
	<parent>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30880604</parent>
</comment>
<comment>
	<id>http://www.semanticweb.org/ontologies/ConversationInstances.owl#comment10_01_24_1655235.30883962</id>
	<title>Solar powered nanotechnology paint cars..</title>
	<author>xtal</author>
	<datestamp>1264338960000</datestamp>
	<modclass>None</modclass>
	<modscore>1</modscore>
	<htmltext><p>..or roving bands of cannibal gangs. The next twenty years are going to be a fun time to be alive.</p></htmltext>
<tokenext>..or roving bands of cannibal gangs .
The next twenty years are going to be a fun time to be alive .</tokentext>
<sentencetext>..or roving bands of cannibal gangs.
The next twenty years are going to be a fun time to be alive.</sentencetext>
</comment>
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