WE'RE BAILING OUT THE BILLIONAIRES AGAIN It’s getting to be rather a bad habit around here. And it all started with the Magna Carta. Bear with me. Many more qualified people have explained the ins and outs of the recent bank failures in our crazy financial system, here and here. I also have talked about the energy implications of money before. I don't want to talk about FDIC insurance. I want to talk about story. MONEY IS A STORY It's a story we made up when we moved beyond a barter economy. It's a brilliant story! I make cloth, and you grow apples. I want apples, but you don't need cloth. So I give you a tiny piece of metal instead, trusting that eventually somebody is going to need cloth and will replenish my stores of metal. None of us need the metal for anything, but it stands in for everything we do need. Evolve that miracle system long enough, and apparently, you get pure imaginary money where we don't even need the little pieces of metal, and we just tell each … [Read more...] about Why Money is Just a Rollicking Good Story
Friday Dive
ChatBots are Here. Did Sci-Fi Get It Right?
The Internet has exploded in the last month with news of GenerativeAI taking over search, authorship, art, and various other industries. And how it has gone promptly off the rails. DOES IT LIVE UP TO THE DECADES OF HYPE? Speculative fiction has been taking on AI for YEARS. How good a job did the sci-fi author of the past in predicting how this is going, and where is it going next? And how did those doomsday stories affect the development of the thing we have now IT'S NOT INTELLIGENT OR SENTIENT This is all a little disingenuous because ChatGPT/Bing/etc are not artificial intelligence. They're certainly not sentient. The wild turkeys in my back yard are capable of greater intuitive leaps. My favorite explanation as to why is from The Verge about the mirror test. (When you put a mirror in front of an animal, do they know its them or do they think it's another animal?) TOTAL side note, the only species to PASS the mirror test, who know they're looking at themselves … [Read more...] about ChatBots are Here. Did Sci-Fi Get It Right?
We’ve Had Enough Energy Since 1870. What Have We Done With it?
Last time, I imagined what a world with endless energy might be like in light of the new fusion breakthrough. This is one way an author can world-build a totally new civilization: you take one variable like the energy supply, change it, and see how it might affect everything from the morning coffee to marriage customs to the global economy. But lest you think our problems would be solved with enough energy (without the downsides of torching the world), I don't think it's going to be that simple... WE'VE HAD ENOUGH FOR OVER A CENTURY According to some sources, we've had enough energy to feed, house, clothe, and care for every human on earth since about 1870. Yes, it came with the downside of torching the world, and no, we haven't actually done that with our munificent bounty, but not enough energy is not our problem and hasn't been for a while. The problem and opportunity, and challenge, are what we build with that energy. The true constraint is taking that raw energy … [Read more...] about We’ve Had Enough Energy Since 1870. What Have We Done With it?
It’s Been 10 Years Since the End of the World
Remember the Mayan Calendar and the doomsday of December 21, 2012? I wrote about one of the worst predictions I personally experienced, but 2012 took over the world. Like so many things that crossed cultures, the real story was far less doomsday and far more cultural ignorance, at best. Most of the images of the circled stone were actually from the Aztec, not the Maya, who didn't really traffic in apocalypses. In reality, the Maya used two calendars: one with 365 days and one with 260 days. Every day had two names and reset every fifty-two years. In addition, they had a long count of years like the Roman calendar we use today. 2012 was a reset year for their two differing calendars. That's it. IN 5000 AD, WHAT WILL THEY THINK? Imagine a civilization in 5000 AD digging up one of our paper calendars with cute cats or hot firefighters on it, seeing December 31st, calculating what day it would be for them, and panicking because December 31st was in two of their months! … [Read more...] about It’s Been 10 Years Since the End of the World
How to World Build a New Future with Endless Energy
A scientist made a tiny sun on earth a few days ago, and it took less energy than it produced. It's been all over the news with good reason. It's huge. Endless energy for everyone! Well, maybe. Someday. It's important to note that sustaining a tiny sun on earth may never be possible; though we said that about the energy! At the very least, this solution is decades and decades away. If it ever happens, what does it mean? Let's do a little world-building, shall we? One of the most fun and important steps of writing speculative fiction is, well, speculating. Change a variable in your made-up world and play out all of the implications on money, religion, gender, power all of it. Variable: We now get energy from fusion, not from ancient dead plants. What does a world like that look like? POWER INDUSTRY I feel like this would be the least changed, ironically, since it doesn't fundamentally change electricity. We already have the grid. We even have real estate for … [Read more...] about How to World Build a New Future with Endless Energy
How to Go With Your Gut and Push Your Limits. Magically at the Same Time.
DO YOU PUSH OR DO YOU LISTEN? There are two conflicting pieces of advice that drive me crazy on a regular basis. Of course, the answer is both. As with all pieces of advice, context really matters. The problem? IF WE PICK WRONG, IT CAN GO SPECTACULARLY WRONG In both directions. Of course, those are the people who consistently take no risks or consistently take all of the risks, but the rest of us are just a messy combination of playing it way too safe and then practically killing ourselves. Sometimes you do exactly right and still get hurt. To quote Jean Luc Picard, or at least an anonymous Star Trek screenwriter: "It's possible to make no mistakes and still love." You listen to your gut and your gut is just plain wrong. You play it safe and miss the perfect opportunity. You take a huge risk and reap the consequence. So it’s not like the tips in the rest of this newsletter or foolproof and if you just do this you’re not gonna get hurt and you’re not gonna … [Read more...] about How to Go With Your Gut and Push Your Limits. Magically at the Same Time.
How to Stop Worrying and Love Our Social Media Future
Social Media. We love it. We hate it. We love to hate it. Photo: Sean MacEntee WHAT IS IT? No, but seriously? What is it?!? If the past few weeks of Twitter drama have proven anything, no one is exactly sure, even the people who own these companies. ANY BUSINESS IS JUST A STORY Complete with protagonist, antagonist, love interest, conflict, challenge, triumph, and disaster. That doesn't mean to imply they don't have an effect on the real world. Stories can be dangerous! Okay, most of the time, a business strategy document is a really boring story, where the villain is a slightly disappointing third-quarter report and employee turnover, but I don't think enough people realize it's a story they made up about a hopelessly complex reality nobody can completely comprehend. But sometimes even business stories become totally fascinating. SOCIAL MEDIA WAS AN INNOVATION. It upended the publishing industry. Yes, the publishing industry. Up until this point, … [Read more...] about How to Stop Worrying and Love Our Social Media Future
8 Sanity-Saving Hacks I Learned Writing 8 Novels
I just finished my eighth novel. Yes, I've only published one. No, you'll never see the earlier ones. It would be more charitable to call them novel-shaped objects. But they sure taught me a lot about getting things done. This is not about the writing, particularly. There are some universal truths about work I've learned through this process that I hope you'll find at least interesting if not helpful. (That should be the new tagline of this newsletter! Hopefully, this is interesting if not helpful…) 1. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS PROCRASTINATION Don't get me wrong, I am a master procrastinator. Witness eight novels. It took active work to not publish after a while. But the more I work, the more I realize delaying work, writer's block, fear, and all of these tactics are rooted in good instincts in my brain. It usually means something is wrong with the work itself and if I resist writing something, it shouldn't get written. Sometimes it means I'm terrified of the marketing side … [Read more...] about 8 Sanity-Saving Hacks I Learned Writing 8 Novels