Filed under: Amazon, Artificial Intelligence, Brave New World, Connections, Emergency, Expert systems, Feedback, Google, Humor, Kindle, Marketing, Pandemic, Plague, Predictions, Publishing, Science, Science Fiction, Society, tech, Writing stuff | Tags: A.I., Alexa, Amazon, Andi, Communion of Dreams, coronavirus, Covid 19, epidemic, Google, News, pandemic, predictions, reviews, Seth, Siri, St. Cybi's Well, technology, Travis M. Andrews, Washington Post, writing
In Communion of Dreams, I have “experts” who are A.I. assistants. As I describe them in that book when I introduce one as the character ‘Seth’:
His expert was one of the best, one of only a few hundred based on the new semifluid CPU technology that surpassed the best thin-film computers made by the Israelis. But it was a quirky technology, just a few years old, subject to problems that conventional computers didn’t have, and still not entirely understood. Even less settled was whether experts based on this technology could finally be considered to be true AI. The superconducting gel that was the basis of the semifluid CPU was more alive than not, and the computer was largely self-determining once the projected energy matrix surrounding the gel was initiated by another computer. Building on the initial subsistence program, the computer would learn how to refine and control the matrix to improve its own ‘thinking’. The thin-film computers had long since passed the Turing test, and these semifluid systems seemed to be almost human. But did that constitute sentience? Jon considered it to be a moot point, of interest only to philosophers and ethicists.
In the world of 2052, when Communion is set, these “experts” are ubiquitous and extremely helpful. Seth is an “S-series”, the latest tech, and all S-series models have names which start with S. I figured that naming convention would be a nice way to track the development of such expert-systems technology, and in the course of the book you see earlier models which have appropriate names.
So when the time came to write St Cybi’s Well, I figured that I would introduce the first such model, named Andi. Here’s the first bit of dialog with Andi:
“Hi, I’m Andi, your assistant application. How can I help you?”
“Andi, check local restaurant reviews for Conwy and find the best ranked Fish & Chips place.”
“You’re not in Conwy. You’re in Holywell. Would you rather that I check restaurants where you are?”
“No, I’m not hungry yet. But I will be when I get to Conwy.”
“Very good. Shall I read off the names?”
“Not now. It can wait until I am closer.”
“Very good. Shall I track your movement and alert you?”
“No.”
“Very good. May I help you with something else?”
“Not right now.” Darnell shut off the app, then the phone, and dropped it back into his pocket. The walk back to his car was uneventful.
Now, I wrote this bit almost eight years ago, long before “Siri” or “Alexa” were announced. But it was predictable that such technology would soon be introduced, and I was amused as all get-out when Amazon decided to name their first assistant as “Alexa”.
Anyway, I also figured that since the technology would be new, and unsophisticated, that Andi would be slightly annoying to use. Because it would default to repetitions of scripts, be easy to confuse, et cetera, similar to encountering a ‘bot on a phone call. And you can judge for yourself, but I think I succeeded in the book — the readers of early chapters thought so, and commented on it.
So this article in the morning Washington Post made me chuckle:
Heh. Nailed another prediction.
* * *
It’s the first of the month. That means that both novels and our care-giving memoir are available for free download, as they are the first of each month. If you haven’t already, please help yourself and tell your friends.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Connections, Emergency, Faith healing, Feedback, Flu, Government, Health, Kindle, Pandemic, Plague, Predictions, Publishing, Science, Science Fiction, Society, Survival, Wales, Writing stuff | Tags: coronavirus, Covid 19, cytokine storm, emergency, epidemic, fire-flu, flu, influenza, Llandudno, News, pandemic, reviews, Spanish flu, St Melangell Centre, St. Cybi's Well, Wales, writing
I mentioned the other day that many of the early reviews of St Cybi’s Well talk about how eerily prescient the book seems now.
Well, judge for yourself. This is an excerpt from the book (Chapter 14: Llangelynnin) when news of the pandemic is just really getting started. The main characters are discussing it, and their plans to collect medical supplies since the St Melangell Centre is a designated rural care center. I first wrote this portion of the book about two years ago, did major revisions last fall.
“The government here is asking people to just stay home if they have any indications of illness. They’ve implemented a week-long ‘bank holiday’, so people don’t go in to work or school, and declared that only essential government employees and emergency workers are to report in. All the bus and train lines have been shut down. They’re even talking about closing all the restaurants and pubs. We’ll probably hear more about that later today. And there have been more anti-immigrant riots in London and some other places. And not just the so-called ‘Tommys’.”
“People are frightened.”
“Yeah, no surprise.” Darnell nodded at the stereo again. “There was also some science reporting about VCS itself. Looks like it is caused by a flu strain which is similar to the 1918 virus, the Spanish Flu, but one which is even more virulent.”
Megan paused, her hands lowered. The towel hung limply by her side. “Didn’t that kill millions, world-wide?”
“Yeah, something like fifty million.”
“And this looks to be worse?”
“Yeah,” Darnell repeated. “This seems to spread just as easily, but kills faster. Well, kills healthy adults faster – that cytokine storm thing, which is basically the immune system going crazy, creating high fever and complete exhaustion, leading to the inability to get enough oxygen and general system collapse. Victims often develop cyanosis – a blueish tint to the skin, particularly on the face and hands. Anyone who is very young, or old, or otherwise has a compromised immune system, can still get the flu, but don’t generally have the VCS reaction. But there’s a good chance that they’ll develop pneumonia which can kill them in a week or so without proper treatment.”
“But there are treatments for pneumonia.”
“There are. And even some things that can be done for someone with Cytokine Syndrome, if you get to them soon enough. Or anti-virals, like Theraflu.” He sighed. “But there’s not nearly enough of those stockpiled. And how well do you think the health system here or anywhere will be able to handle such a fast-moving epidemic, particularly if health workers are among the most vulnerable group because of massive exposure? Do you remember how devastating hemorrhagic fevers like Ebola have been in isolated areas, because health workers are often among the first victims of the disease? And those require direct contact with bodily fluids . . . this flu is airborne.”
There was a wild look in her eyes, and for a moment Darnell thought he even saw fear. Then Megan closed her eyes, clasped the small crucifix necklace she wore, and muttered what he assumed to be a prayer. When she opened her eyes again, the wildness was gone, replaced with a cold determination. “We already have basic personal protection gear – surgical masks, gloves, even disposable gowns – and it sounds like we should wear them when we go to Llandudno. I’ll get them and meet you downstairs when you’re done with your shower.”
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Augmented Reality, Brave New World, Connections, Emergency, Flu, General Musings, Humor, Kindle, Marketing, Pandemic, Politics, Predictions, Preparedness, Publishing, Science Fiction, Society, Uncategorized, Ursula K. Le Guin, Wales, Writing stuff | Tags: coronavirus, Covid 19, Donald Trump, dystopia, fire-flu, Lathe of Heaven, pandemic, St. Cybi's Well, theocracy, Ursula K. Le Guin, writing
So, since I haven’t been blogging here much in the last couple of years, I haven’t said anything about just how surreal it was working to finish my novel about a global pandemic … while an actual global pandemic was unfolding around us.
Yeah. Seriously. Real Lathe of Heaven stuff, making me wonder about just how much my envisioning a given reality was bleeding into this reality.
To a certain extent this had been an ongoing problem with writing St Cybi’s Well, as I had mentioned previously. I had to keep going back and making the ‘dystopia’ of SCW worse as our own world took a turn for the worse with the election of Trump, elements of Christian fascism seemed to be in ascendancy, et cetera.
But this year, after I had gotten a solid re-start on finishing St Cybi’s Well, watching the Covid-19 virus start to spread, was just … bizarre. And as you’ll see when you read the book, how the virus spread and the efforts that various governments tried to curtail it was pretty much exactly as what happened in real life. Fortunately, of course, C-19 hasn’t proven to be nearly as deadly as the Fire-Flu.
Well, at least not yet.
< shiver >
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Emergency, Faith healing, Feedback, Flu, Health, Kindle, Marketing, Pandemic, Plague, Predictions, Preparedness, Publishing, Science, Science Fiction, Society, Survival, Uncategorized, Wales, Writing stuff | Tags: coronavirus, Covid 19, News, reviews, St. Cybi's Well, writing
So, almost two months ago I ‘officially’ launched the publication of St Cybi’s Well.
No, I didn’t forget to mention it here. Since I have allowed this blog to go quiet, I didn’t see it as an important venue to announce it, and figured that it would make a little more sense to just let the book exist in the wild for a little while, then write about the reactions to it.
Currently, there are 14 reviews on Amazon, with an overall rating of 4.9 stars. Some are from friends. Some are from acquaintances. Some are from complete strangers. Among the reviews I have my favorites, and not necessarily ones which say good things. At this point, after struggling with the book for so long, I have very mixed feelings about it.
But my strongest emotion about the book, and something that keeps coming up in the reviews of it, is just how surreal it is to have finished the book during the middle of a real pandemic, and having our reality seeming to follow the path I had laid out in the book. Here are some excerpts as examples of what I mean.
The first review, by someone who backed my Kickstarter and had an advance copy of St Cybi’s:
With some recent political developments and COVID-19, I found this unsettlingly realistic.
That he wrote this well before our current pandemic was even a thing is a testament to his spooky prescience …
And:
The images are vivid and remain. No one took epidemic plagues too seriously anymore, Polio was long ago. But since Covid and Ebola, there is a realization that the 4 Horsemen of the Apocolypse are alive and kicking.
And:
What I found most compelling is the almost prescient storyline of the Fire Flu and its attendant effects on society. I can’t imagine a more difficult proposition than trying to finish your novel about an apocalyptic disease while having to do so with one currently taking over the news. There are some eerie moments in the book where it feels as though it’s a ‘ripped from the headlines’ story.
And:
Set in 2012, the overlap with current events in 2020 is uncanny.
And:
… the story is kind of terrifying considering its striking similarity to current events …
Of course, I’m not prescient. I had no real idea that the coronavirus pandemic was coming, though I had long known that we were about due for another pandemic and were likely unprepared for it. And what I put into the book about how the FireFlu virus spread, and how people reacted to it, was just based on history. What we’re seeing now … all the good and bad of it … was entirely predictable, because it is the sort of reaction that human societies have always had to pandemics.
Which, of course, doesn’t give me any comfort. As is said in one of the reviews:
… I ended up feeling that the story is part of what science fiction does best – telling you a tale that just *might* be real.
Stay safe. Stay healthy. Download my book, or order a paper copy. If money is a little tight, wait until the first of the month, and download it for free. And please, if you do read it, leave a review.
Thanks.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Art, Bipolar, Book Conservation, Connections, Depression, Health, Politics, Predictions, Religion, Science Fiction, Society, Survival, tech, U of Iowa Ctr for the Book, University of Iowa Center for the Book, Writing stuff | Tags: art, bipolar, blogging, book conservation, bookbinding, Cheryl Jacobsen, Communion of Dreams, creative process, darkness, depression, Glowforge, goatskin, health, jim downey, Kickstarter, laser, leather, Legacy Bookbindery, literature, manic, mental health, predictions, Robert Funk, Science Fiction, society, St. Cybi's Well, survival, The Gospel of Jesus, The Jesus Seminar, UICB, Westar Institute, writing
It’s … been a while.
And a lot has happened. Mostly good.
* * * * * * *
Many years ago, a friend got involved in something called “The Jesus Seminar“, which eventually produced (among other things) The Gospel of Jesus.
My friend commissioned Cheryl Jacobsen, well-known calligrapher and friend of mine from my UI Center for the Book days, to do a hand-lettered edition of the book as a gift for Robert Funk, the founder of the Seminar. The work was done on calligraphic vellum, and when it was completed, I did the binding. This is it, which I have used as the main image on my business homepage for at least a dozen years:
And here’s the descriptive text from my site:
The Gospel According to Jesus: Full leather contemporary case binding, shown here as tooling is being done. Collaborative work with calligrapher Cheryl Jacobsen of Iowa City. Sewn on linen tabs, cover mounted to text block using adhesive. Covered full in burgundy Chieftain Goatskin, blind tooled using a hot brass folder.
It’s a lovely, but very simple and traditional binding.
* * * * * * *
Filed under: Art, Bipolar, Book Conservation, Connections, Failure, General Musings, Health, Politics, Predictions, Publishing, Science Fiction, Society, Survival, Travel, Wales, Writing stuff | Tags: art, bipolar, blogging, book conservation, bookbinding, brick walk, calfskin, Communion of Dreams, construction, creative process, darkness, depression, goatskin, health, jim downey, Kickstarter, leather, Legacy Bookbindery, literature, manic, mental health, politics, predictions, Science Fiction, society, St. Cybi's Well, survival, Wales, writing
I sewed up a book yesterday.
* * *
It’s been a rough year.
Oh, a good one, in many ways. The delightful trip to Wales was certainly wonderful. And I was pleased to finally wrap up our two-year work on the brick walkway; I recently used it, and it was nice to see how it has settled solidly after a couple of months weather. There have been other highlights, time spent with those I love, sharing & caring.
But it’s been a rough year. Mostly, because back in early spring I started my slow bipolar descent, and then got stuck stumbling along the bottom of my personal trough for the last six weeks or so. And, while I haven’t talked about it (or anything else) much here, the political situation has been extraordinarily depressing. It’s been a weird combination of things I have long dreaded and things I was writing to warn people about in St Cybi’s Well, and after significant effort to re-write the draft of that book to reflect the new political reality I found myself without the energy or inclination to continue. I felt paralyzed.
* * *
But, as these things go if you are lucky, the wheel continued to turn.
Even if the progress is steady, and consistent with my previous personal experience, it’ll be some 4 – 6 months before I completely climb out of the depressive part of my bipolar cycle.
But I sewed up a book yesterday. This one, for the first time in at least a year and a half:
Yeah, it’s one of the premium leather bindings of Communion of Dreams.
Finally.
For whatever reason, completing those books got mixed up emotionally with completing the writing of St Cybi’s Well. I think I understand it, but I don’t think that I can explain it. Well, I understand it now. At least part of it.
That’s how you solve art, sometimes. And how you walk out of depression: one part at a time, one step at a time.
The writing wants to start again.
In the meantime, I sew books.
Happy New Year.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Book Conservation, Civil Rights, Connections, Government, Health, Politics, Privacy, Society | Tags: Adolf Hitler, Aparthied, blogging, book conservation, bookbinding, health, history, Jim Crow, jim downey, Legacy Bookbindery, medicine, Missouri History, Nazi, Nazism, racism, Third Reich
Thought I’d share a small discovery I made this weekend.
I’m working on a book conservation project for an institutional client. It’s a patient ledger for a public hospital from the 1880s. It’s a large, heavy account book, and the binding structure had broken down, the original leather-covered covers have a bad case of red rot, and a number of the individual pages had been damaged. All in all, a fairly routine project; an important piece of mundane history, but not particularly interesting from a bookbinding standpoint.
So I took it apart, cleaned and repaired the individual pages, organized the folios back into sections, and set to resewing the book. Here’s the start of that process:
And here it is further along, as I’m sewing the individual sections onto ‘tapes’ as part of the new structure:
As I did this, something caught my eye I hadn’t noticed previously: here and there was the world “cold”.
Now, people don’t usually go to the hospital for a “cold”. Particularly in the 1880s, when hospitals were usually places most people avoided. So I looked a little more closely, and saw that the entries were under the column for where in the hospital patients had been put:
Here’s the top of that page:
Why on Earth would you put someone into a “cold” ward? That didn’t make sense.
Then I noticed something else, further across the page. Here’s a pic of it from a blank page, so as not to inadvertently violate someone’s privacy:
What I thought was “cold” was actually “col’d”, the abbreviation used for “Colored.”
As I’ve said previously, about another historical artifact:
So I understand the importance of preserving the artifacts of that history. And so understanding, felt that it was my responsibility to use the skills I have acquired to that end, no matter how distasteful the task. It was my small tribute to all who resisted, who persevered, who fought.
I’m not equating the two.
But it is important that we not forget either history.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Book Conservation, Reproduction, Science, Science Fiction, Society, Travel, Wales | Tags: blogging, book conservation, bookbinding, Castell Henllys, Craig Rhosyfelin, Gors Fawr, Hywel Dda, jim downey, Legacy Bookbindery, Llandysul, neolithic, science, Science Fiction, St. Cybi's Well, technology, travel, Wales, Wikipedia
Part 1. Part 2. Part 3. Part 4. Part 5. Part 6. Part 7.
We spent the bulk of Sunday driving to Llandysul in SW Wales. There we’d made arrangements to stay with an online friend of Martha’s.
Monday we spent mostly in prehistoric Britain, starting with Castell Henllys. This is an iron age hillfort which has been partially reconstructed, using solid archeological research done on the site. Since the roundhouses have been rebuilt right on the original foundations, you get a real sense of what life in the village must have been like. You can see it, feel it, smell it. They’ve done a remarkable job in building the structures and constructing the everyday items which would have been inside them.
Typical traps between the defensive berms: sharp rocks, pot holes, mires.
Inside defensive berm.
What you see as you come through the defensive perimeter.
Nice to see how the thatch around the vent hole was replaced recently.
Common house and animal pen.
Entrance to the chieftain’s hut.
Interior roof support structure.
Simple loom.
Grindstone.
Firepit.
Cooking gear.
Decorative end of log seat.
Interior wall.
‘Bedroom.’
Interior decoration.
Pole lathe.
Storage/work shed.
Fish basket.
Roof detail.
Granary.
We decided to have lunch at a local pub, then I wanted to make another stop at Craig Rhosyfelin (from Part 3), to take some additional images for my own reference in working on St Cybi’s Well:
Approaching the point.
And from there we went exploring — driving off into an area we hadn’t been before, just looking to see what we might find on the map. And we wound up at Gors Fawr, a wonderful remote neolithic stone circle. With the clouds hanging low and covering the nearby mountain tops, you couldn’t ask for a more atmospheric scene:
The whole circle.
The ‘avenue stones.’
Lastly, on our way back to Llandysul, we stopped by the Hywel Dda Centre in Whitland. We had been to the Centre previously, but only when it wasn’t open. This time we had a chance to chat with a charming docent, who shared his enthusiasm for Welsh history. And of professional interest, we got to see the excellent facsimile copy of ‘Boston Manuscript of the Laws of Hywel Dda‘:
It was a delightful day.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Alzheimer's, Book Conservation, Civil Rights, Connections, Constitution, Emergency, General Musings, George Orwell, Government, Heinlein, Paleo-Future, Politics, Predictions, Preparedness, Robert A. Heinlein, Science Fiction, Society, Survival, Violence, Writing stuff | Tags: 1984, Alzheimer's, America, blogging, care-giving, civil liberties, Civil War, civilization, Communion of Dreams, Crazy Years, dementia, Donald Trump, election, Heinlein, Her Final Year, Hilary Clinton, jim downey, luck, Nazi, NPR, politics, predictions, Robert A. Heinlein, Science Fiction, St. Cybi's Well, survival, technology, theocracy, Wikipedia, writing
The eighty-something man fumbled with the pocket knife he had carried his whole life. His hands trembled with age, rage, and fear, but if the hulking stranger refused to leave his house, well, then by God he’d force the man to leave!
The stranger easily took away the knife, and told the man to go back upstairs. Then he sat down on the mechanic’s stool next to his motorcycle and began to weep.
I was about 14, and had just witnessed age-related dementia for the first time.
The hulking stranger was my uncle, whom I had come to live with. The elderly man was his grandfather. We were at his grandparent’s home, using the garage under the house as a warm place to get a little work done on his bike. He and his grandparents were close, always had been. He had lived with them for a while when he was young.
* * *
President Trump is certain that he was cheated out of a popular election mandate due to voter fraud. Almost no one else agrees, and even members of his own party who are responsible for elections at the state and local level have said that there is virtually no evidence of actual fraud.
The President has also claimed that his inauguration had more people in attendance and watching around the world than any previous. The best evidence and estimates available from multiple sources do not support this claim.
I could go on.
* * *
I remember Martha Sr getting fixated on things which were weird, unpredictable. Fixated in such a way that no matter what we tried to say or do, she was certain that we were wrong. Or just lying to her. Or something.
It was almost always some strange idea or memory or object which would catch her attention seemingly out of the blue and often at the most inconvenient times. The idea that the strawberry seeds in her yogurt were necessary for completing a crossword puzzle, so she had to pick them out and keep them. Or that she was going on a train trip, and had to make sure to go get her tickets right now. It drove us completely nuts, and was one of the more difficult challenges of being care-givers. We’d try to distract her with other things, or explain that we already had her tickets and she didn’t need to worry. Sometimes that worked. Sometimes she’d go on and on and on about whatever it was which had captured her attention, returning to it for days on end.
* * *
In the aftermath of the presidential election, many people who had supported Secretary Clinton were shocked, stunned, at the outcome.
Some started looking for ways to challenge the results. First there was an effort to get the Electoral College to not affirm Donald Trump as the winner, on the basis that Russia had influenced the election. Then there was a hope that the House of Representatives would not confirm the results of the Electoral College vote. Then there were challenges made to whether President Trump could hold the office, since he was in violation of the Constitution.
I could go on.
* * *
It seems like the long-respected norms of civic behavior are finally starting to break down. They’ve been stressed for a very long time, like a marriage which has gone badly wrong, but is held together out of fear for what would actually happen if one partner were to confront the other over perceived slights or suspected betrayal.
But now someone has had enough, and said words which cannot be taken back.
The shouting, the screaming, the breaking of china in anger and frustration has begun.
Young children stand in the doorway to the kitchen, tears streaming down their face, unsure what this means or what will happen next.
* * *
Someone punched a neo-Nazi. Plenty of people cheered. It’s hard not to cheer when Nazis get punched.
The day after the inauguration, millions of people marched in protest of the new president and his administration. Plenty of people cheered. It’s hard not to cheer the affirmation of civil rights and political empowerment.
The day after that, a top-level presidential advisor ill-advisedly used the term “alternative facts” when disagreeing about the turnout at the inauguration. Plenty of people jeered at her for doing so. It’s hard not to mock something straight out of 1984.
The day after that saw the start of a number of Executive Orders and memoranda signed by President Trump, putting into motion the changes which he and other members of his party had promised. Plenty of people cheered to see the change they wanted starting. Plenty of people jeered both the spirit and the letter of the changes.
* * *
I’m not saying that President Trump has age-related dementia. Not even the first signs of it. I’m a bookbinder, not a doctor, and am in no way qualified to make such an assessment.
And I’m not saying that the rhetoric and actions from those who oppose the new administration are equivalent to the rhetoric and actions of those who have supported it.
I am saying that things have changed. I think that we are on the precipice of something akin to Heinlein’s “The Crazy Years”. Things have changed so much, and so quickly, that I have had to go back and make substantial revisions to St Cybi’s Well. Because what before was a challenge to the reader’s ‘suspension of disbelief’ has been completely superseded by our reality. It’s not the president who is showing signs of dementia — it’s our society.
And I am saying that when you accept and embrace the use of violence against a political opponent, you open yourself up to the use of violence against you by your political opponents. Because there are always justifications and rationalizations for such use, and human history is filled with the resultant wars civil and decidedly uncivil. Be very careful what you wish for.
Jim Downey
Filed under: ACLU, Amazon, Brave New World, Civil Rights, Connections, Fireworks, George Orwell, Government, Humor, movies, NPR, Paleo-Future, Politics, Predictions, Preparedness, Science Fiction, Society, Violence | Tags: 1984, ACLU, George Orwell, Guy Fawkes, humor, investments, jim downey, literature, money, movies, NPR, police, politics, predictions, protest, Science Fiction, Wikipedia, women's march
Hmm. Perhaps it’s time to invest in companies which make those Guy Fawkes masks …
Even better, we can set up an investment fund which holds stock in companies which make yarn, knitting needles, Maalox, poster board, magic markers, etc. Just to hedge our bets, it should also look at firms which deal in security consultation, drones, police & military equipment, private prisons, and so forth. Pity there’s no way to own stock in the ACLU.
Oh, and I wish I held the copyright on 1984 …
Who’s in?
Jim Downey
