You may have heard that Samuel R. Delany was recently named 2013 Grand Master by the Science Fiction Writers of America (SFWA). He will receive the award at the Nebula Awards weekend in May 2014. Long time readers of this blog knew he would win the honor last September. Following up on my prediction that […]
SFWA Grand Master – next prediction Read More »
In our last post, where speculations about the Fermi Paradox moved from astrophysics to the life sciences, we looked at some of the many ways life could be prevented from giving rise to a pre-intelligent species–say, an animal like Proconsul, the earliest known ape, living about 25 million years ago. In doing so, we knocked
The Fermi Paradox and the Drake Equation – From the Cusp, to Intelligence (f_i, part 2) Read More »
My ebook sale is entering its final weekend. Now through Sunday, every ebook edition of all my stories and novels are on sale at over 50% off list price. That’s right, for less than the price of a latte, you can buy a novel or three short stories, from most major ebook retailers in countries
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As I mentioned previously, now through November 11, every ebook edition of all my stories and novels are on sale at over 50% off list price. That’s right, you can buy a novel for $2.99 or a short story for less than a dollar, from most major ebook retailers in countries around the world, including
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I had a marvelous image: a synthetic planet in the Kuiper Belt–deep deep space, far beyond the orbit of Neptune–made solely from water. We let buoyant fusion reactors drift in its depths, fusing deuterium extracted from all that water to provide the light and heat needed to keep the planet liquid. (All that water makes
The Universe Doesn’t Care Read More »
Autumn is the season to sit near the fire with a good book. To help you do that, now through November 11, every ebook edition of all my stories and novels are on sale at over 50% off list price. That’s right, for less than the price of a latte, you can buy a novel
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Thanks to Asher Pembroke and Victoria Astley, a while ago I was on a panel with “Analog MAFIA” member Alexis Glynn Latner, and Chad Wilson of the University of Houston to the Rice Physics and Astronomy Graduate Student Association about “The Interplay of Science and Science Fiction.” There’s about an hour of great video that
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Charles Chase of Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works (the folks who designed the U-2 and SR-71 reconnaisance planes and the F-22 Raptor, among other aircraft) recently gave a talk suggesting his group’s work could lead to commercially available nuclear fusion reactors within 15 years. Here are some quick thoughts: He’s talking about deuterium-tritium fusion. Deuterium is
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So far in our speculations about the Fermi Paradox, uncertainty in calculating the Drake Equation has led us to a broad range, with N = [0.84-16.03] * f_i * f_c * L. Despite the uncertainty, we concluded that relatively high values of f_i (the fraction of life-bearing worlds that give rise to intelligence), f_c (the
After one of my predictions came true, I got to thinking about my other comments in that predictions post. Recent events have led me to reconsider them. Here’s my update: Samuel R. Delany wins in 2014 Larry Niven will never win As a huge fan of Niven growing up, it pains me to write that.
SFWA Grand Master predictions update Read More »
