Strange Attractor

Strange Attractor


Episode 48: Tea, Earl Grey, hot

July 13, 2017

What is science fiction?

Science fiction (Wikipedia)
Hard versus soft science fiction (Wikipedia)
Why is science fiction so hard to define? (BBC)
How America's leading science fiction authors are shaping your future (Smithsonian)
What is science fiction good for? (Huffington Post)
The underrated universal appeal of science fiction (The Atlantic)
Philip K. Dick (Wikipedia)
An article that notes how Philip K. Dick almost starved to death as a premature infant (The Independent)
Black Mirror (IMDb)
Johnny's recommended episodes of Black Mirror to start with: The Entire History of You, S01E03; White Bear, S02E02; San Junipero, S03E04 (Wikipedia)
Star Trek (Wikipedia)
James T. Kirk (Wikipedia)
Jean-Luc Picard (Wikipedia)
The economic lessons of Star Trek's money-free society (Wired)
List of science fiction universes (Wikipedia)
Dr Futurity by Philip K. Dick: The story Lucy was talking about where civilisation isn't fussed about death anymore (Wikipedia)
The Star Trek Prime Directive (Memory Alpha)
6 ways reading & watching science fiction makes you a more ethical person (Bustle)
Driverless trucks: Economic tsunami may swallow one of most common US jobs (The Guardian)
A plan in case robots take the jobs: Give everyone a pay check (The New York Times)
Ten inventions inspired by science fiction (Smithsonian)
Sci-Fi inspires engineers to build our future (NPR)
Why today's inventors need to read more science fiction (The Atlantic)
Isaac Asimov (Wikipedia)
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams (Wikipedia)
5 books that predicted the internet (Barnes & Noble)
The telescreen from 1984 by George Orwell (YouTube)
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley (Wikipedia)
Flawed forecasting – when science fiction gets it wrong (The Guardian)
Robert A. Heinlein (Wikipedia)
Hyperion by Dan Simmons (Wikipedia)
VALIS by Philip K. Dick (Wikipedia)
The Turning Wheel by Philip K. Dick: The story Lucy mentioned where he takes a jab at L. Ron Hubbard's dianetics book, the foundation of Scientology (Wikipedia)
L. Ron Hubbard (Wikipedia)
When L. Ron Hubbard briefly let down his guard & admitted Scientology was all a con (The Underground Bunker)
"You don't get rich writing science fiction. If you want to get rich, you start a religion", L. Ron Hubbard (WikiQuote)
The Star Trek 'PADD': Personal Access Display Device (Memory Alpha)
Amazon unveils the $230 Echo Show, with a screen for calls, shipping June 28 (TechCrunch)
Tiger Tiger Chardonnay (Collector Wines)
Our DNA is 99.9% the same as the person sitting next to us & we're surprisingly similar to a bunch of other living things (Business Insider)
Plasma aliens could live inside “Black Clouds”: Extraterrestrial life can be stranger than we even dare to imagine (Message To Eagle)
Iain M. Banks (Wikipedia)
The Culture series by Iain M. Banks (Wikipedia)
Elon Musk names SpaceX drone ships in honour of Sci-Fi legend (Space.com)
Data, the android from Star Trek (Memory Alpha)
Snowcrash by Neil Stevenson
Second Life
The Matrix (IMDb)
The Holodeck in Star Trek (Memory Alpha)
Euro Truck Simulator 2 (YouTube)
Road Work podcast: Dan Benjamin & John Roderick (5by5)
Roderick on the Line podcast: Merlin Mann & John Roderick (MerlinMann.com)
Where are you from? Send us a postcard! Strange Attractor, c/ PO Box 9, Fitzroy, VIC 3065, Australia

Corrections

Isaac Asimov coined the term 'robotics' & wrote the Laws of Robotics, but apparently the term 'robot' was first used by Czech playwright Karel Capek in the 1920s (Carnegie Mellon University)

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