[FRIAM] Cautionary Tales: CliFi

Thu Jan 27 19:17:50 EST 2022

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-04281-w

From: Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> On Behalf Of Steve Smith
Sent: Thursday, January 27, 2022 4:05 PM
To: friam at redfish.com
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Cautionary Tales: CliFi

I read quite a bit of existential-threat/remediation non-fiction as well, and sometimes it is hard to tell the difference because while the non-fiction (technical) is generally accurate to the details, it is always describing "a spherical cow", thus the "plausable on the surface" answers.   I worked a few years on a critical infrastructure protection modeling project (more from a resiliency to terrorism than to climate and other change, but focused on cascading failures). I also worked  among hurricane/disaster response teams as well.  It gave me a disturbing view of just how *systemically* vulnerable we all are.

Of course, the wealthy (really, currently middle-class and above) are fairly insulated from the (current) effects, but the threshold of who is affected and how deeply seems to be rising.  I think it is part of the reason that many of the well-off tend toward policies like building border walls and voter suppression... they see the stresses on the infrastructure putting their (our) privileged position at higher and higher risk as the overheated, hungry, etc. masses start to roil more (domestic and from the global south).   This is easier to think about than actually addressing/mitigating the deeper causes... and the results tend to be quicker, more obvious and therefore more satisfying in the moment.

Overshoot in several dimensions is already underway and the inertial properties are easy to underestimate.

I feel like THIS forum has become more open/supportive of discussing these topics than even 2-3 years ago... probably too small, too little and too late, but better than nothing.

Steve,

In the Bay Area, and in other places there is a trend toward electrification.  It sounds plausible on the surface, but to go all the way means solar for water and for electricity.  Most houses within financial reach for most people don't have the square footage to support all that.   Consider that a smaller electric on-demand hot water heater could draw 75 amps flat out.   There's no reasonable way to get lithium batteries that can absorb that kind of load.   That would be $50k just to even start on the batteries never mind the panels.   If not that, then one must give up (often limited) lot space for the tube style solar, which really isn't all that efficient.
The "freedom from the utility" is just not going to happen except in the posh South San Francisco type areas.   Meanwhile the utilities want to penalize individual solar producers because they stress the grid.

Meanwhile, if the price of gasoline goes north of $5 / gallon, people are screaming bloody murder.   Why isn't it $20?   No, these folks (which is mostly everyone it seems) aren't going to be joining the 2000-watt society.   And then there's the Manchin types holding out to keep coal afloat?   Don't we just deserve to suffer at this point?  At least we could try but fail to develop and deploy replacements.   That non-fiction would be interesting reading.

Marcus

________________________________
From: Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com><mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com> on behalf of Steve Smith <sasmyth at swcp.com><mailto:sasmyth at swcp.com>
Sent: Thursday, January 27, 2022 12:15 PM
To: friam at redfish.com<mailto:friam at redfish.com> <friam at redfish.com><mailto:friam at redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Cautionary Tales: CliFi

Marcus -

Thanks for your feedback on KSR's writing style... it really sobered me to realize how much of an obsessionist I am on this topic and what I will ignore to feed that obsession.

I tripped over (thank you Google News Feed) an interesting article in Grist:

https://grist.org/climate/with-the-world-on-fire-climate-fiction-no-longer-looks-like-fantasy/

that resonated with my reflections.   While I do feel a little obsessive on the topic (not just climate but all the convergent "endogenous existential threats" coming at us),  I feel somewhat balanced about it, especially as I graze on the buffets that books like MotF and Stephenson's Termination Shock and Amithav Ghosh's "Great Derangement" offer.   I also found William Gibson's Jackpot Series:

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/william-gibson-agency

refreshing (for a dystopia) with our myriad existential threats (climate, species, pollution, finance, civil unrest, fascism, etc.) converging on a bit of a (nasty) wet-fizzle of an apocalypse he sardonically dubs "The Jackpot".

The Grist article describes (somewhat) the value of keeping one's eye on the dystopian/apocalyptic future threatened by our short-sighted habits and (overly optimistic?) conceptions of the future generated by our materialistic pop-culture.

Someone here (Marcus, Glen, EricS ?) mentioned Musk and the idea that he might be pursuing the canonical "Good Old Fashioned Future" coined in the Golden Age and refashioned in the Modern Era of Science Fiction.    We boomers (and Xers?) who went into Sci/Tech likely read at least a lot of Marvel/DC comics (if not the Science Fiction without pictures) of our era and I claim it heavily shaped our image of what was possible/desireable.    I don't think it is serving us (Gaia of whom we are her most precocious children?)
[https://theretrofuturist.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/1958flyingcar.jpg]
- Steve

On 1/25/22 5:58 PM, Marcus Daniels wrote:

< It might not surprise anyone here that I have become a CliFi obsessionist with Kim Stanly Robinson's stuff well represented ("Ministry for the Future" standing out well above the others).  His Red/Green/Blue Mars series is a good complement with the social/technological/spiritual implications of Terraforming there. >

Huh.  I found MftF drawn-out and boring with distracting little nonsense chapters interleaved.   I don’t see why it is popular.   A few good ideas here and there but couldn’t care less about the characters.  It could be massively compressed.

That would be *all* of KSR's novels I'm afraid...  my obsession with the ideas (unanticipated problems as well as unanticipated responses) trumps any need I have for being entertained by the characters or even plot.

It really read to me (as you point out) as a series of loosely connected vignettes of specific interest.   To the extent that *some* of the MoTF characters did get under my skin, it was as an irritant as much as anything.   I probably read Red Mars when it was new as my introduction to KSR and did not go back to his writing until as little as 5 years ago when I found his topics more relevant than I had acknowledged before...  He seemed to me to be a lot preachy and I guess now I'm enough of the choir to be able to hum along with his sermons now.

Stephenson also gets very tedious for me, but I find his depth of research and quirkiness of characters and technical surprises worthy of my attention through his gruelingly long and seemingly careening storylines and characters.

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