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<p>DaveW -</p>
<p>I too am a Bacigalupi fan, "Water Knife" in particular, also
"Windup Girl" but for different reasons. <br>
</p>
<p>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. The 2015 <a
href="https://www.amazon.com/Loosed-upon-World-Anthology-Climate/dp/1481450301/ref=asc_df_1481450301/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=312029683605&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=5512945638363124067&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9030505&hvtargid=pla-491283653239&psc=1">Loosed
Upon the World</a> anthology of Climate Fiction includes
contributions from Bacigalupi, Robinson, Atwood among others.</p>
<p>Most recently, I read Neal Stephenson's well crafted "Termination
Shock" which I feel is way too focused on TechnoPhilic
GeoEngineering escape conceptions but as is his style he covers
the sociopolitical implications of Climate Change *and* our
response to it well with his very unique style.</p>
<p>The classic (pre)CliFi (for me) is Santa Fe's own Roger Zelazny
(RIP) 70s "Damnation Alley" which was made into a very weak
B-movie (as most SF was before the budgets started getting
gargantuan (e.g. Star Wars/Trek/Gate/???). Bruce Sterling's 1994
Heavy Weather was a good (early) dip into the implications of
climate change on extreme weather from the perspective of a gaggle
of Storm Chasers. Another NM author(s) is Stephen Gould and Laura
Mixon's "GreenWar!". There are surely earlier examples, but I'm
not recalling. Of course one could press biblical things like the
Deluge (Genesis) or the 4 horsemen of the Apocalypse in Genesis,
Zecharia, Revelations...<br>
</p>
<p>Jack Williamson's (RIP) (New Mexico's amazing son raised on
classic Scientific Romances and contributing his own work right at
the beginning of the Golden Age). <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/898087.Terraforming_Earth">Terraforming
Earth</a> is a "Dont Look Up" (asteroid smacking) scenario which
does a good job IMO (I'm a big fan of his life story and work) of
addressing the (near) mortality of the human species and Earth's
biosphere itself. The friend who introduced me to him in his 90s
(died at 103?) knew him when he was a teen and provided him with
the title for this book, though his first choice was "Terraforming
Terra", but the publishers prevailed with "Earth" for arcane
reasons. FWIW the <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="https://www.capstan.be/sci-fi-is-a-fertile-breeding-ground-for-neologisms-some-have-entered-everyday-language-and-even-scientific-jargon/">OED's
SciFi inspired neologisms</a> credits Jack for coining
"Terraforming" in a 1941 novel. <br>
</p>
<p> ?Glen?'s invocation of the earth as a seed becoming an
(naturally) empty husk (an expelled placenta?, a recovering womb?)
as we flee it has interesting implications I hadn't thought of
before... it is a good complementary perspective to thinking of it
as simply escaping our own self-fouled water-hole. "Terraforming
Earth" also puts it's own twist on this.</p>
<p>Ramble,</p>
<p>- Steve<br>
</p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 1/25/22 2:05 PM, Prof David West
wrote:<br>
</div>
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<div style="font-family:Arial;">Paolo Bacigalupi, The Water Knife.
Excellent read, more for background on water and the kinds of
things people WILL do to access it, than the story line.<br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial;"><br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial;"><span><i>In the near future, the
Colorado River has dwindled to a trickle. Detective,
assassin, and spy, Angel Velasquez “cuts” water for the
Southern Nevada Water Authority, ensuring that its lush
arcology developments can bloom in Las Vegas. When rumors of
a game-changing water source surface in Phoenix, Angel is
sent south, hunting for answers that seem to evaporate as
the heat index soars and the landscape becomes more and more
oppressive. There, he encounters Lucy Monroe, a hardened
journalist with her own agenda, and Maria Villarosa, a young
Texas migrant, who dreams of escaping north. As bodies begin
to pile up, the three find themselves pawns in a game far
bigger and more corrupt than they could have imagined, and
when water is more valuable than gold, alliances shift like
sand, and the only truth in the desert is that someone will
have to bleed if anyone hopes to drink.</i></span></div>
<div style="font-family:Arial;"><br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial;">davew<br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial;"><br>
</div>
<div>On Tue, Jan 25, 2022, at 11:02 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite" id="qt" style="">
<div style="font-family:Calibri, Arial, Helvetica,
sans-serif;font-size:12pt;color:rgb(0, 0, 0);">Glen writes:<br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Calibri, Arial, Helvetica,
sans-serif;font-size:12pt;color:rgb(0, 0, 0);"><br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Calibri, Arial, Helvetica,
sans-serif;font-size:12pt;color:rgb(0, 0, 0);">< <span
style="color:rgb(32, 31, 30);background-color:rgb(255, 255,
255);display:inline !important;"><span class="font"
style="font-family:"Segoe UI", "Segoe UI
Web (West European)", "Segoe UI",
-apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, Roboto, "Helvetica
Neue", sans-serif;"><span class="size"
style="font-size:14.6667px;">I don't see how we can
prune the combinatorial explosion of [im]possible
outcomes without deciding some kind of objective at the
start, even if it's super vague like a Gaia-ish
homeostatic health of the biosphere. ></span></span></span><br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Calibri, Arial, Helvetica,
sans-serif;font-size:12pt;color:rgb(0, 0, 0);"><span
style="color:rgb(32, 31, 30);background-color:rgb(255, 255,
255);display:inline !important;"><span class="font"
style="font-family:"Segoe UI", "Segoe UI
Web (West European)", "Segoe UI",
-apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, Roboto, "Helvetica
Neue", sans-serif;"><span class="size"
style="font-size:14.6667px;"></span></span></span><br>
</div>
<div style=""><span class="colour" style="color:rgb(32, 31,
30);"><span style=""><span class="size"
style="font-size:14.6667px;">One could imagine a sort of
Mad Max scenario out in the streets where the Whole
Foods deliveries are intercepted by the street dwelling
climate refugees? Or large compounds where food,
water, temperature-controlled clean air were ensured for
a price? Take all the rusting metal sitting around
from Trump's wall and build bigger fences around
estates? Green Zones, like in the Iraq sense? </span></span></span><br>
</div>
<div style=""><span class="colour" style="color:rgb(32, 31,
30);"><span style=""><span class="size"
style="font-size:14.6667px;"></span></span></span><br>
</div>
<div style=""><span class="colour" style="color:rgb(32, 31,
30);"><span style=""><span class="size"
style="font-size:14.6667px;">Marcus</span></span></span><br>
</div>
<div id="qt-appendonsend"><br>
</div>
<div>
<hr style="display:inline-block;width:98%;"><br>
</div>
<div id="qt-divRplyFwdMsg" dir="ltr">
<div><span class="font" style="font-family:Calibri,
sans-serif;"><span class="colour" style="color:rgb(0, 0,
0);"><b>From:</b> Friam
<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:friam-bounces@redfish.com"><friam-bounces@redfish.com></a> on behalf of glen
<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:gepropella@gmail.com"><gepropella@gmail.com></a><br>
<b>Sent:</b> Tuesday, January 25, 2022 11:50 AM<br>
<b>To:</b> <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:friam@redfish.com">friam@redfish.com</a> <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:friam@redfish.com"><friam@redfish.com></a><br>
<b>Subject:</b> Re: [FRIAM] health care logistics</span></span>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
</div>
<div class="qt-BodyFragment"><span class="size"
style="font-size:13px;"><span style=""><span class="size"
style="font-size:11pt;">
<div class="qt-PlainText">
<div>Well, OK. But the question still stands:
Necessary for what objective?<br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div> The Siebert & Rees paper talks about shared
values like "socially just ecological
sustainability", "salvage civilization", "one-earth
living", etc. And each one of their criticisms in
section 3 also assume some values. So, I'm guessing
it's something like their objective that we're
assuming as our objective. And anything that does
not target that objective isn't put into the kitty
of things we'll evaluate as possible or impossible.
(E.g. the second-earth idea where we abandon this
earth as a husk is not part of the conversation.)<br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div> I don't see how we can prune the combinatorial
explosion of [im]possible outcomes without deciding
some kind of objective at the start, even if it's
super vague like a Gaia-ish homeostatic health of
the biosphere.<br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div> On 1/25/22 06:39, David Eric Smith wrote:<br>
</div>
<div> > To say this is a value question is fair,
glen, given my shorthands of language.<br>
</div>
<div> > <br>
</div>
<div> > However, I would like to split apart
questions of “who wants what” from questions of
“what can or cannot happen under what conditions,
irrespective of what anybody wants”. In principle
we have ways to get at the latter question; we often
do worse in getting any resolution out of the
former. Maybe there is something basic in this?
Our notion of truth is that on any properly-posed
question, there should only be one durable answer.
Whereas in the area of desires, we think it is
either inescapable, or for many also desirable (a
self-referential value judgment) that different
answers coexist indefinitely.<br>
</div>
<div> > <br>
</div>
<div> > Eric<br>
</div>
<div> > <br>
</div>
<div> > <br>
</div>
<div> > <br>
</div>
<div> >> On Jan 25, 2022, at 8:02 AM, glen
<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:gepropella@gmail.com"><gepropella@gmail.com></a> wrote:<br>
</div>
<div> >><br>
</div>
<div> >> Necessary for what, though? We need the
shared value(s) before we can ask what response we'd
get from the convergence on something that might be
necessary to adhere to that value. Is the shared
value that biology on this planet should be
preserved and the thing we need to do is impossible?
Or perhaps the shared value that all "lower forms of
life" were simply stepping stones to the human
organism, but to preserve the human organism is
impossible? Etc.<br>
</div>
<div> >><br>
</div>
<div> >> As Jon likes to ask: What are we
optimizing? If we can't agree on that, then the
responses to impossibilities will be as diverse as
the values that underlie those impossibilities. And,
if that's the case, then we're back to the
clustering/homogenizing we see in any aspect of pop
culture.<br>
</div>
<div> >><br>
</div>
<div> >> On 1/24/22 17:21, David Eric Smith
wrote:<br>
</div>
<div> >>> In a real situation where we
decided something was necessary that we believed
there was no way to do, somehow I feel like the same
movie doesn’t become the response. Something else
does. What is that?<br>
</div>
<div> >><br>
</div>
<div> >> On 1/24/22 17:34, Marcus Daniels wrote:<br>
</div>
<div> >>> Before I launch into a diatribe
about why the hell we can't agree to basic, never
mind interesting things:<br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div> -- <br>
</div>
<div> glen<br>
</div>
<div> Theorem 3. There exists a double master
function.<br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
<div> <br>
</div>
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