Filed under: Artificial Intelligence, Augmented Reality, Brave New World, Fermi's Paradox, General Musings, Humor, Predictions, Science, Science Fiction, SETI, Society, Space, tech, Writing stuff | Tags: augmented reality, blogging, Communion of Dreams, Fermi's Paradox, humor, jim downey, Kickstarter, predictions, Rich Terrile, science, Science Fiction, simulation, space, technology, writing
Interesting article, all in all. But I particularly had a chuckle over this bit:
Beings with whom you could interact?
Maybe, or maybe I’d just let them go. They’d be living out their lives in an incredibly short amount of time. Maybe I could change the physical laws. I could make them live in places both hospitable and inhospitable. I could make it so that they’re completely alone—perhaps that’s a boundary condition for us, and explains why there are no aliens.
Hehehehehehe. Yeah, maybe it does. Maybe it does.
Kickstarter is almost ready. Watch for an announcement soon.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Artificial Intelligence, Brave New World, DARPA, Predictions, Science Fiction, Society, tech, YouTube | Tags: blogging, Boston Dynamics, DARPA, jim downey, predictions, robotics, Science Fiction, video, www youtube
Step by step, the future gets closer:
That’s a new robot from Boston Dynamics called the LS3 – Legged Squad Support Systems. It’ll carry 400 pounds and run for 20 miles/24 hours before needing to be refueled. You don’t even need a ‘driver’: it’ll follow a designated leader automatically, picking its way over terrain on its own.
I’ll leave it to you to consider the implications of that last point.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Failure, Feedback, Kindle, Marketing, Preparedness, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction, Writing stuff | Tags: Amazon, blogging, Communion of Dreams, direct publishing, hutzpah, jim downey, Kickstarter, Kindle, literature, predictions, promotion, Science Fiction, St. Cybi's Well, writing
I was chatting with another friend who is a writer, doing a bit of commiseration about the common panic that hits most writers at some point or another.
Panic?
Yeah, that nothing you say is worth saying. That you’re asking readers to spend a part of their time, perhaps part of their money, reading what you write … and the terror that they will not find the trade worthwhile. Just about every writer I have ever known has gone through some version of this. Because face it, it takes a lot of hutzpah to think that you have something worthwhile to say, in a world where it seems like everything of value has already been said better by someone else.
And as I told my friend, I have discovered a whole new level of terror related to this as I have been working to set up the Kickstarter project for St. Cybi’s Well: asking people to actually hand over money before the book has even been written. That takes nerve. And a facade of self-confidence which far exceeds almost anything I’ve ever accomplished previously.
It’s not that I don’t actually think that I can write this book. I know I can. And I know that I can do it in the time-frame I’ve outlined. Combine the experience of writing and then revising Communion of Dreams and Her Final Year, and I know about the pacing of getting a book ready for publication. I know I can also produce the necessary volume of material by the deadlines I’ve set — I’ve done it in the same time frame previously (and recently) in doing freelance articles. So the actual writing is not the problem, though of course there will be challenges as I go through it.
No, it’s the matter of thinking that the book is worth it. Worth asking people to hand over money for it in advance. Because that’s essentially what this Kickstarter will be: asking for advance sales of a book which doesn’t even entirely exist in my head yet. In this way it’s crowd-funding a traditional writer’s advance from a publisher. Except that taking an advance from a publisher meant only potentially disappointing the publisher (and their Board of Directors and share-holders, I suppose). In this instance it means potentially disappointing friends and fans … a *lot* of them. (Hopefully a lot of them, anyway.)
Yeah, that’s a whole new level of terror. And a whole new level of hutzpah for this kid.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Connections, Feedback, Marketing, Preparedness, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction, Writing stuff | Tags: Amazon, blogging, Communion of Dreams, direct publishing, jim downey, Kickstarter, Kindle, literature, predictions, promotion, Science Fiction, St. Cybi's Well, writing
As I noted yesterday, as we move through all the different components of getting a Kickstarter launched, one of the steps is setting up a website for St. Cybi’s Well.
Yesterday I posted the brief description of the book. Well, today here’s a mock-up of the website for you to take a look at:
You’ll note that not all the links are active yet, and the text is intended for the time when the Kickstarter is running.
Take a look, please let me know what you think of it in a comment here or a personal email/FB comment/Tweet.
Thanks!
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Connections, Faith healing, Feedback, Flu, Kindle, Marketing, Pandemic, Predictions, Preparedness, Promotion, Publishing, Religion, Saturn, Science Fiction, Society, Survival, tech, Titan, Travel, Writing stuff | Tags: Amazon, blogging, Communion of Dreams, direct publishing, fire-flu, flu, Israel, jim downey, Kickstarter, Kindle, literature, Moon, murder, predictions, Saturn, Science Fiction, space, St. Cybi's Well, technology, Titan, travel, Wales, writing
The description of Communion of Dreams on both the back of the book and on the website/Amazon is this:
The year is 2052, and the human race is still struggling to recover from a massive pandemic flu some 40 years previously. When an independent prospector on Saturn’s moon Titan discovers an alien artifact, assumptions that we are alone in the universe are called into question. Knowing that news of such a discovery could prompt chaos on Earth, a small team is sent to investigate and hopefully manage the situation. What they find is that there’s more to human history, and human abilities, than any of them ever imagined. And that they will need all those insights, and all those abilities, to face the greatest threat yet to human survival.
It was pretty easy to come up with that. It was written well after the fact, after all. The book had been done for years, worked over and tweaked endlessly.
Well, as I am getting things set to do the Kickstarter project to allow me to concentrate on writing St. Cybi’s Well, one of the components we have to get into place is setting up a website for it. To do that I needed to have the same sort of short description of that book as the one above for Communion of Dreams. But St. Cybi’s Well *isn’t* done yet. Far from it. I have a lot of ideas/thoughts/scenes for it, accumulated over the last nine years. I basically know what the book is going to be, but the story and the characters will evolve as I write. Nonetheless, I had to come up with a description.
This is what I came up with. See what you think:
Darnell Sidwell had a problem. Well, two, actually. One was the onset of an eye disease which threatened to end his career as a shuttle pilot for the Israeli Lunar Transfer, to the so-called New Ma’abarot colonies. That brought him to Wales, where his sister operated a spiritual healing center – a last, absurd hope for a man who didn’t believe in miracles.
The other problem was a small matter of a murder. His. But he didn’t know about that yet. Just as he didn’t know that the whole world was about to be plunged into the fire-flu.
It’s a start.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Brave New World, Failure, Feedback, General Musings, Kindle, Predictions, Preparedness, Publishing, Religion, Science Fiction, Synesthesia, Travel, Weather, Writing stuff | Tags: Amazon, blogging, Communion of Dreams, direct publishing, drought, holy wells, jim downey, Kickstarter, Kindle, literature, predictions, Science Fiction, St. Cybi's Well, travel, Wales, weather, writing
We got a little more than 2″ of rain yesterday.
On my walk this morning, the grass no longer crunched underfoot.
* * * * * * *
Got a note from a friend this morning. He’d just finished reading CoD last night, made this comment:
“That was one hell of a lot of keeping things straight on your part. Very nice job and a thoroughly enjoyable read.”
* * * * * * *
From almost a decade ago:
My awareness shifted, slowed, and a calmness and sense of peace came over me. I did a cursory examination of the cottage, but then walked behind the Well room to find the source of the stream which fed the pool there: it was a spring, unencumbered by metal bars, bubbling up in a stone-ledged pool complete with small steps, perhaps four feet across. I knelt on one knee, left hand on the cold stone slab, the right reaching down to caress the surface of the water. Just touching that water gave me an electric chill, and brought tears to my eyes. Those tears have returned as I write this. I paused there, and just felt the joy of that water through my fingers for a few minutes, before returning to the Well room.
This is a substantial room, all the walls mostly intact but the roof missing. Perhaps 15 feet on a side, the pool in the center 8 or 9 feet across. Again, there were stone steps leading down into the pool. In the thick stone walls are several niches for sitting, perfect for contemplation. I sat. I just felt that place, felt the faith and devotion that had shaped it, and the deep source that fed it. The pool is quiet, the surface a mirror for looking up into the open sky. After what was probably only a few minutes, but what felt like hours, I again kneeled, reaching down to touch that smooth inviting surface. Here there was a different character to the energy, less raw, perhaps easier to digest. A sense of communion with all the souls who had entered that pool. A moment that stretched back centuries.
I was speechless for a time. Alix (my wife) knows me well enough, has seen me in these moments before, that she let me be, allowed me to just experience the place, until I was filled and ready to move again. With the silky texture of worn stone sliding under my fingers, I rose and left the pool, pausing only to pat the dark stone of the doorway and give thanks.
In was in that moment that St. Cybi’s Well was conceived.
* * * * * * *
It’s a strange thing to write a novel. To have it churn inside you for years. To feel it gestate, to become heavy in your mind, slowly pushing aside everything else.
I think this is part of the reason why so many writers suffer with addiction and relationship problems of one sort or another. The book takes up all the space in your head. And if you can’t extract it at the right time, and in *just* the right way, it hurts. It hurts like hell.
* * * * * * *
We got a little more than 2″ of rain yesterday.
On my walk this morning, the grass no longer crunched underfoot. We’re still in a drought — still some 10″ under for total precipitation this year — but two inches of rain over the course of 24 hours has helped. A lot. It no longer feels as if the entire outdoors is holding its breath, hanging on in anticipation . . . and in worry. The world has sighed.
I was speechless for a time. I am no longer.
There is work to be done. Hard work. There is no guarantee that I’ll be successful. There certainly is no guarantee that anyone will like the book. While it is very much a prequel to Communion of Dreams, St. Cybi’s Well will not neatly fit in the usual framework of a classic science fiction story. The passage above should give you some sense of that.
But I have to be faithful to the story. And have faith in my fans.
Stick around.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Feedback, Humor, Kindle, Marketing, Predictions, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction, Weather | Tags: Amazon, blogging, Communion of Dreams, direct publishing, humor, jim downey, Kickstarter, Kindle, literature, predictions, promotion, reviews, Science Fiction, writing
That’s how the email started. Here’s part of how it continued:
Just completed Communion Of Dreams, and was delighted with the story! In fact, I sat with my Kindle, a good pipe and spent the time to read it front to back in one sitting. Its been a long time since I found a story that captivated me like this, a joy to read and keep. Thanks for the wonderful work, this is what good fiction is all about, a storyteller with a good tale and and time to enjoy the story in the telling.
It’s always good to hear from people, to get feedback. Particularly when they so obviously have such good taste and discerning judgment. 😉
Isaac has arrived. I think already today we’ve had more rain than we’ve had in the previous two months, perhaps longer. Last I checked the forecast is for another 4″ or more over the course of the weekend.
No flooding yet. Not of either the weather nor the ideas variety.
That’s OK. These things arrive when they do, like kindly reviews and comments in the email.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Astronomy, BoingBoing, Fermi's Paradox, NASA, Predictions, Publishing, Science, Science Fiction, SETI, Space, Survival, tech, Weather, Writing stuff | Tags: Aliens, BBC, BoingBoing, Communion of Dreams, direct publishing, Drake Equation, Isaac, jim downey, Kickstarter, NASA, predictions, science, Science Fiction, space, St. Cybi's Well, technology, Wired, writing
They say Isaac will be paying us a visit.
* * * * * * *
I’ve previously talked about the Drake Equation, and how new information from a host of sources is changing the calculus of expectation — expectation of what is waiting for us out in the universe.
Well, via Wired and BoingBoing, there’s a new fun graphical tool now available to explore the Drake Equation. Check it out:
* * * * * * *
From Chapter 4 of Communion of Dreams:
“But in any event, as Arthur Bailey said this morning ‘where are they?’ Where are the aliens? That’s what’s bothering me.”
* * * * * * *
They say Isaac will be paying us a visit.
I’m in a somewhat weird headspace right now. Maybe that’s the reason for it. We’re suffering such a drought that it seems almost surreal that there may be rain this weekend. And not just a little rain: current forecast models say between two and six inches, most of it in about a 24 hour period. That won’t break the drought, but it would cause flash floods.
Like I said, surreal.
Similarly, I’ve been thinking — and thinking hard — about the Kickstarter for St. Cybi’s Well. But all my thoughts seem to be random, chaotic. Nothing will quite ‘gel’, to use another reference from Communion of Dreams.
But when it does, I think there will be a flood.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Climate Change, Emergency, Survival, Weather | Tags: Burr Oak, drought, jim downey, McBaine, photography, predictions, weather, WIlliamson Oak
I’ve written before (even recently) about the tree in the image at the top of this page. It’s locally known as the “Williamson Oak”, named after the family which owns the property where it grows. It is, simply, magnificent, and the oldest/largest such tree in the world.
And it is suffering from the drought which is having a devastating effect across the whole state and region:
The tree was starting to show signs of distress, Williamson said. “The leaves are beginning to curl up a little bit, and they have turned kind of brown. I think it has aborted a lot of the acorns. And the leaves turn upside down to keep from losing moisture.”
The ongoing drought didn’t get much worse in the past week, but things in Boone County and across the Midwest did not improve much either. According to the drought monitor report issued this morning, 99.29 percent of Missouri is in extreme drought or worse. The remainder of the state, a tiny sliver of the northwest, is only under a “severe” drought designation. More than one-third of the state, including most of Boone County, is designated as undergoing an “exceptional drought.”
Typically, the older a tree is, the deeper the roots it has. So older trees tend to fare better in severe droughts. And the Williamson Oak is in the Missouri River bottoms — the river’s natural flood plain, where ground water isn’t that far below the surface. In other words, this tree should have the best possible chance to survive this drought. Still, things are so bad that this was the image on our local paper’s front page last evening:
John Sam Williamson releases 850 gallons of water at the base of the 350-year old champion bur oak at McBaine Wednesday. Six generations of his family have owned the land since the 1830s. Williamson plans to release roughly 1,600 gallons of water around the base of the tree each week for the next several weeks.
Yeah, this drought is bad. The worst I’ve ever seen.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Connections, Emergency, Failure, Flu, Government, Health, Pandemic, Plague, Predictions, Preparedness, Science, Society, Survival | Tags: antibiotics, blogging, flu, health, jim downey, obesity, pandemic, plague, predictions, probiotics, science
Your body has something on the order of 10 trillion individual cells. But surprisingly, it has nine or ten times that number of microorganisms which it hosts in some capacity or another, many of which we have co-evolved with and which seem to be critical to our long health. While these microorganisms are typically much smaller than human body cells, in one very real sense, “you” is actually only about 10% “you.”
These microorganisms have a substantial impact on how your body digests food. On whether you can resist various kinds of infection or develop any of a range of auto-immune diseases. Perhaps even on your mood and risk assessment.
Would it therefore be any kind of a surprise at all if doing something to change the “mix” of these microorganisms had an impact on you?
Hell, it’d be a surprise if it didn’t.
Almost all of us know what happens when you have to take a broad-spectrum antibiotic: usually some degree of diarrhea and intestinal discomfort. And in the last decade or two it has become commonplace for people to seek out some variety of probiotics, frequently in the form of live yogurt, as a way to replenish gut flora following antibiotic treatment. I do it myself.
So, extending that idea a bit, researchers are now investigating whether part of the slow-moving plague of obesity can be due to the changes created in the human-hosted microorganisms:
Early use of antibiotics linked to obesity, research finds
The use of antibiotics in young children might lead to a higher risk of obesity, and two new studies, one on mice and one on humans, conclude that changes of the intestinal bacteria caused by antibiotics could be responsible.
Taken together, the New York University researchers conclude that it might be necessary to broaden our concept of the causes of obesity and urge more caution in using antibiotics. Both studies focus on the early age, because that is when obesity begins, the scientists say.
As I’ve noted previously:
In Communion I have a post-pandemic society, one which is recovering from a massive disruption caused by a flu virus which caused rapid death in a large percentage of the population. But the reality of what we’re dealing with might be even more insidious.
More insidious in this case because we have done it to ourselves.
And perhaps not even with direct antibiotic treatment to deal with some kind of life-threatening infection. Consider that it is still a widespread practice to boost livestock weight gain through the use of antibiotics, and that leaves a residue of antibiotics in the meat. If it boosts weight gain in feed animals, why wouldn’t it do the same to us?
I’ve said before that there has been some kind of change to the way our bodies absorb nutrients in the last 40 or 50 years, and that that is behind the global rise in obesity. Previously there were indications that it might be due to some kind of virus. Or an immune response to the germaphobia of the 20th century. But maybe it is more directly our own damned fault, and we’ve traded the ability to defeat infections for a different kind of health risk.
Jim Downey
Communion Of Dreams 