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"Cyberpunk worked when the Internet was in its hand-wound crystal radio phase, when you had to be a sort of hobbyist to do e-mail, and it all had a very steep learning curve. Those days are over."
- William Gibson
 |
| Headspace | ||
| A virtual world in which a person could raise a virtual baby with full haptic realism. |
Maria lives in a world a world that is crumbling. As the Earth slowly floods, the infrastructure that supports her contact with her virtual child, Linda, is lost.
| Little Linda, a Headspace baby, was four years old now... The little girl playing on the sunlit patio still made a beautiful image for Maria to gaze upon, in her desktop screen, in her damp, darkened flat.
...Everything Linda knew Maria had taught her. Maria had gloves and a headset, and she would hear the child laugh, feel her when her avatar hugged her, a ghostly presence through the pads on her fingertips. She still couldn't be with the child, not fully... But that barrier was going to melt away someday soon. The transhumanists had promised... |
| Technovelgy from Flood,
by Stephen Baxter. Published by Gollancz in 2008 Additional resources -
|
This is one of my favorite scenes from the book, because it clearly contrasts two rather different visions of the future. One is that of the Singularity, which might bring technological nirvana to all humanity. The other is what I call the "Mud Hut future", in which we have lost almost everything we have now due to stupidity. Baxter writes:
The fact was, her access to Headspace was the product of a complex and interconnected society, the capstone of a pyramid grounded in very old technologies, in farming and mining and manufacture and transport and energy production. It was only as that essential pyramid was crumbling that Maria became fully aware of its existence. The singularity came to seem more and more out of reach - an absurdity, actually. You couldn't have the capstone without the pyramid to hold it up.
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Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from Flood
More Ideas
and Technology by Stephen Baxter
Tech news articles related to Flood
Tech news articles related to works by Stephen Baxter
Headspace-related
news articles:
- Someday, You Might Like VR Enough To Move In
- Via Virtual Reality, Mother Encounters Deceased Daughter
- Wearable Synthetic Skin for Virtual Reality
- Sorry, Futurists! Tamagotchi Kids, Virtual Children Already Predicted By SF Writer in 2008
| Anna Indiana AI Singer-Songwriter |
| Metaverse Hardware - Run And Flail Like A Maniac, Or Lie Quietly? |
| Virtual Co-Embodyment - Two People Control One Virtual Body |
| Sorry, Futurists! Tamagotchi Kids, Virtual Children Already Predicted By SF Writer in 2008 |
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'Our planes are going to start bringing in bales of discarded plastics...'
'... completely forgetting the ship at sight of the awesome figure and great head of the giant Gaut...'
'So, Ender, we will now begin your education.'
'What strange sensitivity! What an amazing development of science was manifested in every move and act and word of this Robot!'
'Forget the head atop it, the legs below, feet, arms, hands. It compels erasure.'
'That explains how it was so easy for me to remain motionless in midair or to perch on a flagpole in imitation of a giant bird, even in the windy city of Chicago.'
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