scifi author Neal Stephenson wants us smart folks to "Solve for X"

[Darren Dirt]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TE0n_5qPmRM

http://www.youtube.com/user/wesolveforx/videos


"A forum to encourage and amplify technology-based moonshot thinking and teamwork."
http://www.wesolveforx.com/

(think TED Talks ... but with ridiculously ambitious vision)

[Mr. Analog]

I remember reading somewhere (Slashdot maybe?) that Stephenson felt some level of guilt about popularizing dystopian fiction hence his drive to get people excited about the future by getting involved.

Personally speaking I like that gung ho spirit of "let's build something", it just seems weird to have a guy like Neal Stephenson on that team

I mean it's kind of like if one day Tim Burton started making brightly coloured happy muppets, it'd be cool but weird.

[Darren Dirt]

it just seems weird to have a guy like Neal Stephenson on that team

I mean it's kind of like if one day Tim Burton started making brightly coloured happy muppets, it'd be cool but weird.

hey, Pee-wee's Big Adventure and Ed Wood both had a very light-hearted mood! (of course both were not written, just directed, by The Dark Artist... but still...)

[Mr. Analog]

True but you know what I mean

[Darren Dirt]

"Project Hieroglyph" was mentioned (and clarified) in the December 21st "Brain Food Daily" (and now I'll just think of it as "a call for sci fi writers/visionaries to return to their roots of optimistic future-forecasting"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRXBSrilO84

http://www.google.com/search?q=%22Project+Hieroglyph%22
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Hieroglyph
http://hieroglyph.asu.edu/


Stephenson's "Innovation Starvation" article that started this (a call to "infuse science fiction with optimism that could inspire a new generation to get big stuff done")
http://www.worldpolicy.org/journal/fall2011/innovation-starvation
"Good SF supplies a plausible, fully thought-out picture of an alternate reality in which some sort of compelling innovation has taken place." (excessive lens flares not required)

[Mr. Analog]

Unless unbridled enthusiasm somehow becomes trendy I don't see how optimistic fiction could ever fly off the shelves.

As absurd and somewhat amusing as it is go back and read Sci-Fi from the era of pulp magazines (well, specifically 30s and 40s stuff), there was a certain headspace you had to be in to not only enjoy it but be inspired by it. As now with tales of dystopia, it's been drilled into the pop-culture psyche so long it flavours everything.

To be honest I think that's why the original Star Trek still works, it was a curious conglomeration of gee-whiz optimism and nihilistic pessimism perched right at the cliff where gleaming spaceships were traded for crumbling cities.

I guess I like optimistic fiction tempered with Classical ethics, like you can't have a gleaming city in the sky without morlocks somewhere, something would feel artificial about it, forced I guess.

My head is in a funny place today, I've been reading a site That Will Not be Named that takes particular pride in a kind of inbred Schadenfreude for the purpose of my own entertainment (irony is detected and acknowledged). Seeing long-winded, allegedly humourous articles with hundreds of edits over the course of years with the sole purpose of tearing down others has left me with a rather... negative view of humanity today.

No doubt reinforced by a dark creeping suspicion of the inherently ignoble traits found in the soul of man reinforced by decades of pessimistic fiction.



(just kidding of course)

I'm going to watch The Rocketeer!

[Darren Dirt]

I'm going to watch The Rocketeer!

And then after that, check out the same actor, different but not completely dissimilar role, watch the entire series of The 4400. #headasplode (cuz he kinda has the same naive optimistic/romantic "one guy can change/save the world" thinking -- and quite nearly does it!)

[Mr. Analog]

Then later I'll watch Captain America because same director.

[Lazybones]

STTNG had a rather positive view of humans and the federation as a whole. Problems still existed but they seemed to be presented as not normal / renegade.

DS9 tossed in a view of more internal troubles.

Original trek focused really heavy on other worlds that where like how we "used to be" and well there was the conflict with the Klingons.

A positive future with dark patches can work vs a negative one with small rays of hope. You just can't do 100% of one or the other since it is unlikely given the divers points of view we see today.

[Mr. Analog]

Exactly, that's a great way of putting it

[Darren Dirt]

Then later I'll watch Captain America because same director.

Not even close to what I was saying ... plus, that guarantees nothing.

[Mr. Analog]

Then later I'll watch Captain America because same director.

Not even close to what I was saying ... plus, that guarantees nothing.

Like that matters