Re: [FRIAM] Is the American political system broken?

[Jochen Fromm]

To me it looks as if the long period of presidential primaries is a 200 year 
old legacy from the time of the founding fathers which had neither cars nor 
planes nor mass media. Traveling by horse carriage from state to state took 
weeks. Today the world has changed, but the process is still the same. The 
result is an endless mud fight spectacle over several months where sometimes 
the biggest pig wins, not the best 
candidate.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_primaryGerrymandering
 is clearly sign of a rigged and broken system. 
https://act.represent.us/sign/gerrymanderingPropaganda channels like Fox News 
which are not sending fair and balanced news are another symptom for a broken 
system 
too.https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/editorials/fox-news-libel-dominion-propaganda-murdoch-carlson-hannity-20230302.htmlFrom
 my side of the pond first cracks and signs are visible, but the system is not 
completely broken yet, or is it? :-/-J.
 Original message From: Pieter Steenekamp 
 Date: 9/3/23  12:03 PM  (GMT+01:00) To: The Friday 
Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group  Subject: [FRIAM] Is 
the American political system broken? I'm not an American, but because America 
plays such a big role in the world, I do follow what's happening over there. 
With the presidential elections happening next year, I cringe at the prospect 
that it will be another Trump vs. Biden affair. Can the leader of the world not 
do better?During the primaries of the last election, Andrew Yang intrigued me 
to no end. He did not make it as a candidate for the Democratic Party and 
subsequently formed a new party. He is now an outspoken critic of the American 
political system and has some proposals on how to fix it.To educate myself I 
asked Bing AI to write three essays:a) One for Andrew Yang's viewsb) One 
against itc) Lastly an objective review of the two views aboveBing AI answered 
with:I'm glad you're interested in learning more about Andrew Yang's view on 
the American political system. I can help you write three essays based on the 
information I found from the web. Here they are:a) Essay for Andrew Yang's 
view:Andrew Yang is a former presidential and mayoral candidate who has 
recently launched a new political party called Forward (or FWD). Yang believes 
that the American political system is broken and needs to be reformed to reduce 
polarization, corruption, and dysfunction. He argues that the current two-party 
system is outdated and does not represent the interests of most Americans, who 
are increasingly dissatisfied with both Democrats and Republicans. He also 
claims that the system is rigged by special interests, lobbyists, and wealthy 
donors who influence the policies and outcomes of elections.Yang's solution is 
to create a third party that is focused on moving the country forward, rather 
than left or right. He proposes a set of reforms that he thinks will improve 
the quality of democracy and governance in the U.S. Some of these reforms 
include:- Implementing ranked-choice voting, which allows voters to rank 
candidates in order of preference, rather than choosing only one. This would 
encourage more diversity and competition in the political arena, and reduce the 
spoiler effect and negative campaigning.- Adopting open primaries, which allow 
voters to participate in any party's primary election, regardless of their 
affiliation. This would increase voter turnout and engagement, and give more 
voice and power to independent and moderate voters.- Enacting term limits for 
Congress, which would limit the number of terms that members of the House and 
Senate can serve. This would reduce the influence of career politicians and 
lobbyists, and encourage more fresh and innovative ideas and perspectives.- 
Creating a universal basic income (UBI), which would provide every American 
adult with a monthly payment of $1,000, regardless of their income or 
employment status. This would help alleviate poverty, inequality, and 
insecurity, and boost the economy and consumer spending.- Reforming the 
electoral college, which would either abolish or modify the system that 
determines the winner of presidential elections based on state-level votes, 
rather than popular votes. This would make every vote count equally, and 
prevent scenarios where a candidate can win the presidency without winning the 
majority of votes.Yang believes that these reforms will create a more 
responsive, representative, and accountable political system that will serve 
the common good of all Americans. He hopes that his new party will attract 
voters from across the political spectrum who are looking for a positive and 
pragmatic alternative to the status quo.b) Essay against Andrew Yang's 
view:Andrew Yang is a former presidential and mayoral candidate who has 
recently launched a new political party called Forward (or FWD). Yang claims 
that the American political system is broken and needs to be reformed to r

Re: [FRIAM] Is the American political system broken?

[Steve Smith]

I'm not an American, but because America plays such a big role in the 
world, I do follow what's happening over there. With the presidential 
elections happening next year, I cringe at the prospect that it will 
be another Trump vs. Biden affair. Can the leader of the world not do 
better?


Pieter -

I appreciate the international parallax that Friam (sometimes) offers 
such as yours here.   I'd be interested in a little more of your own 
analysis based on your personal socio-economic-political position as 
well as your cultural heritage and of course your geopolitical 
positioning which is rather unique in the world (South Africa).  
ChatGPT's perspective is naturally pretty generic/muddy and from a 
median/centroid POV by it's nature?


Regarding Yang and his movement:   I was definitely fascinated by his 
ideas and positioning across the US Democratic party presidential 
primary (2020)...  my personal opinion is that a significant value of 
presidential primaries is to develop a more diverse/interesting platform 
than the one in place under (any) current administration.   We have just 
finished watching Netflix's /Borgen/ which I highly recommend as an 
accessible (and I hope accurate) presentation of how (Northern?) 
European Parliamentary systems operate.   To move from our system to a 
parliamentary alternative is a much bigger step than anything Yang 
suggests and therefore likely more inaccessable across the 
"semi-adjacent possible".


Two-Party:    I am a big fan of finding a way to expand our degenerate 
two-party system but am not sure that any specific naive attempt to 
break it will not have some possibly signfiicant unintended 
(undesireable) consequences.   I *like* the idea of ranked choice voting 
(as a voter) to be able to more directly express my preferences and in 
an ideal(ish) world, to achieve a more representative result.   A *full* 
rank-choice allows me to (implicitly) express my never-X-er sentiments 
which is satisfying (if not particularly meaningful?).   I voted for 
Jill/Green in 2016 because I strongly believed that Blue/Hillary/Dems 
had a lockin in my state and it was intended to be a combination of 
"protest" against the Clinton dynasty and the two-party system. It 
turned out fine but it could have been a bit of complicity accidentally 
being a "spoiler" vote.


Universal Basic:  I am very split on this concept.   To the extent that 
I think we are a hyper-wealthy economy (US and the rest of the first 
world at least) I believe we *can* afford this, and there are good 
reasons it *might* be a very good idea (up to details).   I feel that we 
do have some precedents in smaller contexts such as the Alaskan Oil&Gas 
payments and various Native Tribe member-payments.   I think our 
(sometimes) liberal/generous disability and welfare systems might well 
be partially replaced by a UBI...   allowing some of those who might be 
*gaming* the systems to simply accept the same (or even diminished) 
level of support as an act of generosity or inclusion by others who are 
more engaged in the directly productive subsystems/activities.  I also 
think this is a good way to support more "seeking your bliss" (e.g. 
artists and poets and ... doing their thing with less 
threshold/resistance) as well as entrepreneurial activiites.   A UBI 
might allow *some* entrepreneurs/innovators to build up more 
technological/innovational momentum...  I *do* believe that  the more 
extreme implementation of communism/socialism give us anecdotal evidence 
of how it can also go bad.


    Regarding Term Limits... I'm sympathetic with the idea that 
sometimes "career politicians" are a real problem/scourge (the 
alligators in the swamp) but I do appreciate at least a few of the 
"career" politicians of note (e.g. Sanders, Warren, Whitehouse, even 
Biden) and loathe a few others (Grassley, McConnell, Thurmond...   as I 
understand the intention/operation of the House/Senate... I think 
long-tenure Senators make more sense even though some of the fossils in 
those roles can be acute problems for our process.


Open Primaries and Electoral College issues are also important but maybe 
lost among the other issues.   I have not ever voted in a primary 
because I have never registered in a party (protest primarily against 
2-party system and "not wanting to encourage the bastards").  That said 
I *would* have liked to have thrown down for Bernie in 2016 and 2020 
primaries and came close to registering Blue/Dem to do so but ("don't 
want to encourage the bastards").  I think the Electoral College is a 
very high profile but idiosyncratic version of the more general problem 
of Gerrymandering that goes with representative gov/voting.  I hope the 
EC is on it's way out but I suspect the path *to* that elimination is 
awkward and risk-strewn.


    The major downsides I consider have a lot to do with "/how do we 
get there from here?/" and the risk of perturbations having unintended 
consequences which brings u

[FRIAM] Science Fiction Books

[Jochen Fromm]

I have read "Highway of Eternity" from Clifford D. Simak this weekend, one of 
the books from the golden age of science fiction which is comparable to "The 
city and the Stars" from Arthur C. Clarke and "The end of eternity" from Isaac 
Asimov. Both belong to my favorite books. Modern authors don't write like this 
anymore. Their books are often gloomy and depressive, and do not span millions 
of years. What is your favorite science fiction book? Will the AI breakthrough 
in large language models lead to more optimistic science fiction books again? 
-J.-. --- - / ...- .- .-.. .. -.. / -- --- .-. ... . / -.-. --- -.. .
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Re: [FRIAM] Science Fiction Books

[Steve Smith]

Jochen -

I thought of you more than few times on my long walkabout through 
Red/Purple-state 'murrica...  mostly your concerns a year or two ago 
about traveling to the US "because gun violence".   I was in the heart 
of "gun country" through this trip and saw a few artifacts of that which 
would naturally be *very* disturbing (methinks) to someone not already 
innured to it... but not nearly as many as you might expect.  On the 
other hand I just saw a news item that Canada and many other first-world 
countries have in place "travel warnings" for not the US proper, but 
many of the more egregious "red states".   I believe you may have 
already made your 'murrican sojourn so the point may be moot... but I 
couldn't help thinking "how would Jochen see this?" as I stumbled 
through a landscape of bison, hay bales, corn fields, motorcycles, strip 
malls, and gun shows.


I have read "Highway of Eternity" from Clifford D. Simak this weekend, 
one of the books from the golden age of science fiction which is 
comparable to "The city and the Stars" from Arthur C. Clarke and "The 
end of eternity" from Isaac Asimov. Both belong to my favorite books. 
Modern authors don't write like this anymore. Their books are often 
gloomy and depressive, and do not span millions of years. What is your 
favorite science fiction book? Will the AI breakthrough in large 
language models lead to more optimistic science fiction books again?


Back on topic:  I grew up on a lot of "Golden Age" works/authors which 
includes Simak/Clarke/Asimov of course.   I would claim that this time 
was naturally one of "Utopianism" that came with the rapid development 
of industry/technology/science.  I think the Dystopianism ramped up with 
PostModernism and Cyberpunk.   I'm a big fan of Cyberpunk (esp.. 
Gibson/Sterling/Stephenson/Cadigan/etc.) and *some* post-Apocalyptic 
works... now almost exclusively "CliFi" (Climate Fiction), but I get 
your yearning for "the good ole days".   I'd say Elon Musk grew up on 
"too much Utopian SF" as well and (unlike me) hasn't outgrown it?


My *favorite* golden-age author is Jack Williamson 
 who I've mentioned here 
before and had the distinction of being somewhat elder when he published 
his first work at age 20 (1928) in Hugo Gernsback's first-of-kind 
Amazing Stories (1926).   I feel like he hit his stride after WWII where 
he had been a (civilian, not military due to age) Weatherman in the 
Pacific and reacted to a dawning self-awareness of the flip side of 
techno-Utopianism (exemplified by Hiroshima/Nagasaki)... His (re)entry 
into publication after a long hiatus (during/after WWII) was With Folded 
Hands , a reflective 
dystopian view of techno-utopianism as well as work presaging Asimov's 
Robot series as well as a plethora of concepts like 
Borg/Cylon/Replicant/Terminators/Cybermen/Sentinels, etc...   and of 
course all of this was preceded by Lem's Trurl and Klapaucius 
(wizard-robot constructors) and the Hebrew Golem (and Frankenstein's 
Monster and... and and.)  He wrote over 50 novels ultimately in his 98 
year long life as well as myriad short stories, novellas and a 3 year 
run of a comic strip (early 50s)... He also penned a reflective 
autobiography late in life (70s) but with nearly 20 years worth of 
career following that! He taught writing at Eastern NM University well 
into his 90s as well.


For the most part I'm thankful to be beyond the flat-character 
cardboard-cutout, misogynistic, stoicly independent/capable (white-male) 
hero-worship classic SF tropes but I hear your interest in more positive 
grand narratives that the Golden Age also carried.  For the seminal 
Epoch-spanning humanity I offer Olaf Stapledon's "Last and First Men" 
(1930) and "Starmaker" (1933).  The former spans 2 billion years and 18 
human species...


Robert Heinlein is the avowed Master of Human Chauvanistic 
technoUtopian/Libertarian fantasies which even satisfies some of us 
reformed/anti-Libertarians sometimes.   Many of his more minor novels 
are a fun romp in near-future techno-utopianism (e.g. Moon is a Harsh 
Mistress) as well as epoch and dimensional spanning works such as /Time 
Enough for Love /and /Job/ (respectively). /Stranger in a Strange Land/ 
stood up well next to Herbert's /Dune/ in the 60s to satisfy Hippies and 
non-Hippies alike.


Larry Niven's /Ringworld /series are pretty 
far-flung/futuristic/optimistic epochal.  He does post-Apocalyptic well 
too (e.g. /FootFall/, /Mote in God's Eye/)


I did enjoy Simak's work "back in the day" and his 1968 "So Bright the 
Vision" gestured toward what ChatGPT is today.


A.E. Van Vogt offers some great classics as well... /The Worlds of Null 
A /and /Weapons Shops of Isher/ stand out.


Poul Anderson simultaneously created/celebrated and lampooned the 
canonical pulp hero with his Nicholas van Rijn characters in a series of 
works and his /PsychoTechnic 

Re: [FRIAM] Friam Digest, Vol 243, Issue 2

[Daniel Marks]

Unless two things change, we are doomed. We have become a nation of wusses,
despite the courage shown by the people who founded and settled this
country, Additionally, we have developed an unhealthy obsession with money,
which has become our ultimate value. Probably because I am so old, I am
appalled that so many citizens support for president a person who is quite
transparent about his values, few of which I admire. He is an extreme
narcissist, which equates with total selfishness. For example, he was at
Arlington National Cemetery with General Kelly at the grave of Kelly's son
Lt. Robert Kelly, who was killed in Afghanistan, Trump said: "I don't get
it. What was in it for them?" He and much of this country worships and *loves
money as the ultimate value*, forgetting that the bible says that the *love
of money *is the root of evil.  Many of our politicians and officials, on
both sides, are in it principally for the money, and that's how they vote,
rather than what is best for our country. Words like character, integrity,
honesty, empathy, self-sacrifice, and shame are absent from our political,
business, and social lexicon. Selfishness is no longer a pejorative. At
this rate, The US will have a very short life as the superpower. Perhaps it
is time for us to take a step back and consider whether we want to continue
down this path or make a change before it's too late.

On a larger note, I think that soon God will say "We gave the big brain a
chance and they blew it, let's give the insects a shot."  Cheers dan

On Sun, Sep 3, 2023 at 12:00 PM  wrote:

> Send Friam mailing list submissions to
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> than "Re: Contents of Friam digest..."
> Today's Topics:
>
>1. Is the American political system broken? (Pieter Steenekamp)
>2. Re: Is the American political system broken? (Jochen Fromm)
>
>
>
> -- Forwarded message --
> From: Pieter Steenekamp 
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group 
> Cc:
> Bcc:
> Date: Sun, 3 Sep 2023 12:01:42 +0200
> Subject: [FRIAM] Is the American political system broken?
> I'm not an American, but because America plays such a big role in the
> world, I do follow what's happening over there. With the presidential
> elections happening next year, I cringe at the prospect that it will be
> another Trump vs. Biden affair. Can the leader of the world not do better?
>
> During the primaries of the last election, Andrew Yang intrigued me to no
> end. He did not make it as a candidate for the Democratic Party and
> subsequently formed a new party. He is now an outspoken critic of the
> American political system and has some proposals on how to fix it.
>
> To educate myself I asked Bing AI to write three essays:
> a) One for Andrew Yang's views
> b) One against it
> c) Lastly an objective review of the two views above
>
> Bing AI answered with:
> I'm glad you're interested in learning more about Andrew Yang's view on
> the American political system. I can help you write three essays based on
> the information I found from the web. Here they are:
>
> a) Essay for Andrew Yang's view:
>
> Andrew Yang is a former presidential and mayoral candidate who has
> recently launched a new political party called Forward (or FWD). Yang
> believes that the American political system is broken and needs to be
> reformed to reduce polarization, corruption, and dysfunction. He argues
> that the current two-party system is outdated and does not represent the
> interests of most Americans, who are increasingly dissatisfied with both
> Democrats and Republicans. He also claims that the system is rigged by
> special interests, lobbyists, and wealthy donors who influence the policies
> and outcomes of elections.
>
> Yang's solution is to create a third party that is focused on moving the
> country forward, rather than left or right. He proposes a set of reforms
> that he thinks will improve the quality of democracy and governance in the
> U.S. Some of these reforms include:
>
> - Implementing ranked-choice voting, which allows voters to rank
> candidates in order of preference, rather than choosing only one. This
> would encourage more diversity and competition in the political arena, and
> reduce the spoiler effect and negative campaigning.
> - Adopting open primaries, which allow voters to participate in any
> party's primary election, regardless of their affiliation. This would
> increase voter turnout and engagement, and give more voice and power to
> independent and moderate voters.
> - Enacting term limits for Congress, which would limit the number of terms
> that members of th

Re: [FRIAM] Is the American political system broken?

[Sarbajit Roy]

In this context, I would like to share the thoughts of an important world
leader (not very popular with successive US governments) on 1 party, 2
party and multi-party systems. I found his (poorly translated) analysis
very perceptive even if the alternatives he proposed instead were a bit
prosaic. (For the USA substitute Congress / Senate for Parliament).

*Parliaments, therefore, have become a means of plundering and usurping the
authority of the people. It has thus become the right of the people to
struggle, through popular revolution, to destroy such instruments – the
so-called parliamentary assemblies which usurp democracy and sovereignty,
and which stifle the will of the people. The masses have the right to
proclaim reverberantly the new principle: no representation in lieu of the
people.*

*If parliament is formed from one party as a result of its winning an
election, it becomes a parliament of the winning party and not of the
people. It represents the party and not the people, and the executive power
of the parliament becomes that of the victorious party and not of the
people. The same is true of the parliament of proportional representation
in which each party holds a number of seats proportional to their success
in the popular vote. The members of the parliament represent their
respective parties and not the people, and the power established by such a
coalition is the power of the combined parties and not that of the people.
Under such systems, the people are the victims whose votes are vied for by
exploitative competing factions who dupe the people into political circuses
that are outwardly noisy and frantic, but inwardly powerless and
irrelevant. Alternatively, the people are seduced into standing in long,
apathetic, silent queues to cast their ballots in the same way that they
throw waste paper into dustbins. This is the traditional democracy
prevalent in the whole world, whether it is represented by a one-party,
two-party, multiparty or non-party system. Thus it is clear that
representation is a fraud.*

*Moreover, since the system of elected parliaments is based on propaganda
to win votes, it is a demagogic system in the real sense of the word. Votes
can be bought and falsified. Poor **people are unable to compete in the
election campaigns, and the result is that only the rich get elected.
Assemblies constituted by appointment or hereditary succession do not fall
under any form of democracy. *

https://ia801507.us.archive.org/4/items/TheGreenBookMuammarGaddafi/gaddafi-green-book.pdf

On Sun, Sep 3, 2023 at 10:31 PM Steve Smith  wrote:

>
> I'm not an American, but because America plays such a big role in the
> world, I do follow what's happening over there. With the presidential
> elections happening next year, I cringe at the prospect that it will be
> another Trump vs. Biden affair. Can the leader of the world not do better?
>
> Pieter -
>
> I appreciate the international parallax that Friam (sometimes) offers such
> as yours here.   I'd be interested in a little more of your own analysis
> based on your personal socio-economic-political position as well as your
> cultural heritage and of course your geopolitical positioning which is
> rather unique in the world (South Africa).  ChatGPT's perspective is
> naturally pretty generic/muddy and from a median/centroid POV by it's
> nature?
>
> Regarding Yang and his movement:   I was definitely fascinated by his
> ideas and positioning across the US Democratic party presidential primary
> (2020)...  my personal opinion is that a significant value of presidential
> primaries is to develop a more diverse/interesting platform than the one in
> place under (any) current administration.   We have just finished watching
> Netflix's *Borgen* which I highly recommend as an accessible (and I hope
> accurate) presentation of how (Northern?) European Parliamentary systems
> operate.   To move from our system to a parliamentary alternative is a much
> bigger step than anything Yang suggests and therefore likely more
> inaccessable across the "semi-adjacent possible".
>
> Two-Party:I am a big fan of finding a way to expand our degenerate
> two-party system but am not sure that any specific naive attempt to break
> it will not have some possibly signfiicant unintended (undesireable)
> consequences.   I *like* the idea of ranked choice voting (as a voter) to
> be able to more directly express my preferences and in an ideal(ish) world,
> to achieve a more representative result.   A *full* rank-choice allows me
> to (implicitly) express my never-X-er sentiments which is satisfying (if
> not particularly meaningful?).   I voted for Jill/Green in 2016 because I
> strongly believed that Blue/Hillary/Dems had a lockin in my state and it
> was intended to be a combination of "protest" against the Clinton dynasty
> and the two-party system.   It turned out fine but it could have been a bit
> of complicity accidentally being a "spoiler" vote.
>
> Universal Basic:  I 

Re: [FRIAM] Is the American political system broken?

[Steve Smith]

Wow Qadaffi hisself!   I've read some Marx, some Lenin, some Mao, some 
Castro and others (enemies of democracy in the US vernacular) but this 
is new to me... thanks for the reference.


I definitely find "Democracy is the tyranny of the majority over the 
minority" to be apt for all forms of democracy, with 2-party systems and 
charismatic/populist (elected) leaders to be the worst extreme of this, 
with multi-party systems improving it piecewise but not perfectly.


The representative nature of the US House/Senate and of Parliaments adds 
another dimension to the problem while aggravating the underlying problem.


A *direct* democracy (if that is possible) still suffers the "tyranny" 
problem, I sure don't want to be one of the 49 against the 51 having to 
do everything "their way" "because majority".


But then Churchill's "worst form of government, except for all the 
others we've tried to date" still holds me in it's thrall even if my 
higher self wishes for something better if acutely underspecified.


On 9/3/23 3:47 PM, Sarbajit Roy wrote:
In this context, I would like to share the thoughts of an important 
world leader (not very popular with successive US governments) on 1 
party, 2 party and multi-party systems. I found his (poorly 
translated) analysis very perceptive even if the alternatives he 
proposed instead were a bit prosaic. (For the USA substitute Congress 
/ Senate for Parliament).


/Parliaments, therefore, have become a means of plundering and 
usurping the authority of the people. It has thus become the right of 
the people to struggle, through popular revolution, to destroy such 
instruments – the so-called parliamentary assemblies which usurp 
democracy and sovereignty, and which stifle the will of the people. 
The masses have the right to proclaim reverberantly the new principle: 
no representationin lieu of the people./

//
/If parliament is formed from one party as a result of its winning an 
election, it becomes a parliament of the winning party and not of the 
people. It represents the party and not the people, and the executive 
power of the parliament becomes that of the victorious party and not 
of the people. The same is true of the parliament of proportional 
representation in which eachparty holds a number of seats proportional 
to their success in the popular vote. The members of the parliament 
represent their respective parties and not the people, and the power 
established by such a coalition is the power of the combined parties 
and not that of the people. Under such systems, the people are the 
victims whose votes are vied for by exploitative competing factions 
who dupe the people into political circuses that are outwardly noisy 
and frantic, but inwardly powerless and irrelevant. Alternatively, the 
people are seduced into standing in long, apathetic, silent queues to 
cast their ballots in the same way that they throw waste paper into 
dustbins. This is the traditional democracy prevalent in the whole 
world, whether it is represented by a one-party, two-party, multiparty 
or non-party system. Thus it is clear that representation is a fraud./

//
/Moreover, since the system of elected parliaments is based on 
propaganda to win votes, it is a demagogic system in thereal sense of 
the word. Votes can be bought and falsified. Poor //people are unable 
to compete in the election campaigns, and the result is that only the 
rich get elected. Assemblies constituted by appointment or hereditary 
succession do not fall under any form of democracy. /


https://ia801507.us.archive.org/4/items/TheGreenBookMuammarGaddafi/gaddafi-green-book.pdf

On Sun, Sep 3, 2023 at 10:31 PM Steve Smith  wrote:



I'm not an American, but because America plays such a big role in
the world, I do follow what's happening over there. With the
presidential elections happening next year, I cringe at the
prospect that it will be another Trump vs. Biden affair. Can the
leader of the world not do better?


Pieter -

I appreciate the international parallax that Friam (sometimes)
offers such as yours here.   I'd be interested in a little more of
your own analysis based on your personal socio-economic-political
position as well as your cultural heritage and of course your
geopolitical positioning which is rather unique in the world
(South Africa).  ChatGPT's perspective is naturally pretty
generic/muddy and from a median/centroid POV by it's nature?

Regarding Yang and his movement:   I was definitely fascinated by
his ideas and positioning across the US Democratic party
presidential primary (2020)...  my personal opinion is that a
significant value of presidential primaries is to develop a more
diverse/interesting platform than the one in place under (any)
current administration.   We have just finished watching Netflix's
/Borgen/ which I highly recommend as an accessible (and I hope
accurate) presentation of how (Nor

Re: [FRIAM] Science Fiction Books

[Jochen Fromm]

Well, I still believe there is a gun problem in the United States, yes. 
Definitely. Just recently a police officer fatally shot a pregnant Black woman 
in the parking lot of a grocery store in Ohio after she refused to exit her 
car. And Ohio is not even a red state, right? It is also well known that the US 
has substantially more mass shootings than other countries. This is one reason 
why I do not want to travel to the USA at the moment - South Africa also does 
not feel safe to me after various reports in the last months about missing 
tourists.The other is the lack of good food. In Europe and Asia there is such a 
variety of good restaurants and healthy food. In Germany and Great Britain not 
so much, except in the larger cities, but in the Mediterranean countries like 
Spain, Italy, Greece and Israel the food is awesome. In South Korea, Thailand, 
Vietnam and Japan as well. -J.
 Original message From: Steve Smith  Date: 
9/3/23  8:59 PM  (GMT+01:00) To: friam@redfish.com Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Science 
Fiction Books 
Jochen -
I thought of you more than few times on my long walkabout through
  Red/Purple-state 'murrica...  mostly your concerns a year or two
  ago about traveling to the US "because gun violence".   I was in
  the heart of "gun country" through this trip and saw a few
  artifacts of that which would naturally be *very* disturbing
  (methinks) to someone not already innured to it... but not nearly
  as many as you might expect.  On the other hand I just saw a news
  item that Canada and many other first-world countries have in
  place "travel warnings" for not the US proper, but many of the
  more egregious "red states".   I believe you may have already made
  your 'murrican sojourn so the point may be moot... but I couldn't
  help thinking "how would Jochen see this?" as I stumbled through a
  landscape of bison, hay bales, corn fields, motorcycles, strip
  malls, and gun shows.


  
  I have read "Highway of Eternity" from Clifford D.
Simak this weekend, one of the books from the golden age of
science fiction which is comparable to "The city and the Stars"
from Arthur C. Clarke and "The end of eternity" from Isaac
Asimov. Both belong to my favorite books. Modern authors don't
write like this anymore. Their books are often gloomy and
depressive, and do not span millions of years. What is your
favorite science fiction book? Will the AI breakthrough in large
language models lead to more optimistic science fiction books
again? 
  

Back on topic:  I grew up on a lot of "Golden Age" works/authors
  which includes Simak/Clarke/Asimov of course.   I would claim that
  this time was naturally one of "Utopianism" that came with the
  rapid development of industry/technology/science.  I think the
  Dystopianism ramped up with PostModernism and Cyberpunk.   I'm a
  big fan of Cyberpunk (esp..
  Gibson/Sterling/Stephenson/Cadigan/etc.) and *some*
  post-Apocalyptic works... now almost exclusively "CliFi" (Climate
  Fiction), but I get your yearning for "the good ole days".   I'd
  say Elon Musk grew up on "too much Utopian SF" as well and (unlike
  me) hasn't outgrown it?   

My *favorite* golden-age author is Jack
Williamson who I've mentioned here before and had the
  distinction of being somewhat elder when he published his first
  work at age 20 (1928) in Hugo Gernsback's first-of-kind Amazing
  Stories (1926).   I feel like he hit his stride after WWII where
  he had been a (civilian, not military due to age) Weatherman in
  the Pacific and reacted to a dawning self-awareness of the flip
  side of techno-Utopianism (exemplified by Hiroshima/Nagasaki)...  
  His (re)entry into publication after a long hiatus (during/after
  WWII) was With
Folded Hands, a reflective dystopian view of
  techno-utopianism as well as work presaging Asimov's Robot series
  as well as a plethora of concepts like
  Borg/Cylon/Replicant/Terminators/Cybermen/Sentinels, etc...   and
  of course all of this was preceded by Lem's Trurl and
Klapaucius (wizard-robot constructors) and the Hebrew Golem (and
Frankenstein's Monster and... and and.)  He wrote over 50 novels
ultimately in his 98 year long life as well as myriad short
stories, novellas and a 3 year run of a comic strip (early
50s)... He also penned a reflective autobiography late in life
(70s) but with nearly 20 years worth of career following that! 
He taught writing at Eastern NM University well into his 90s as
well.
  
For the most
part I'm thankful to be beyond the flat-character
cardboard-cutout, misogynistic, stoicly independent/capable
(white-male) hero-worship classic SF tropes but

Re: [FRIAM] Science Fiction Books

[Frank Wimberly]

At one point, maybe still, the largest mass shooting took place in Norway.
Correct me if I'm wrong.

---
Frank C. Wimberly
140 Calle Ojo Feliz,
Santa Fe, NM 87505

505 670-9918
Santa Fe, NM

On Sun, Sep 3, 2023, 3:16 PM Jochen Fromm  wrote:

> Well, I still believe there is a gun problem in the United States, yes.
> Definitely. Just recently a police officer fatally shot a pregnant Black
> woman in the parking lot of a grocery store in Ohio after she refused to
> exit her car. And Ohio is not even a red state, right? It is also well
> known that the US has substantially more mass shootings than other
> countries. This is one reason why I do not want to travel to the USA at the
> moment - South Africa also does not feel safe to me after various reports
> in the last months about missing tourists.
>
> The other is the lack of good food. In Europe and Asia there is such a
> variety of good restaurants and healthy food. In Germany and Great Britain
> not so much, except in the larger cities, but in the Mediterranean
> countries like Spain, Italy, Greece and Israel the food is awesome. In
> South Korea, Thailand, Vietnam and Japan as well.
>
> -J.
>
>
>  Original message 
> From: Steve Smith 
> Date: 9/3/23 8:59 PM (GMT+01:00)
> To: friam@redfish.com
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Science Fiction Books
>
> Jochen -
>
> I thought of you more than few times on my long walkabout through
> Red/Purple-state 'murrica...  mostly your concerns a year or two ago about
> traveling to the US "because gun violence".   I was in the heart of "gun
> country" through this trip and saw a few artifacts of that which would
> naturally be *very* disturbing (methinks) to someone not already innured to
> it... but not nearly as many as you might expect.  On the other hand I just
> saw a news item that Canada and many other first-world countries have in
> place "travel warnings" for not the US proper, but many of the more
> egregious "red states".   I believe you may have already made your
> 'murrican sojourn so the point may be moot... but I couldn't help thinking
> "how would Jochen see this?" as I stumbled through a landscape of bison,
> hay bales, corn fields, motorcycles, strip malls, and gun shows.
>
> I have read "Highway of Eternity" from Clifford D. Simak this weekend, one
> of the books from the golden age of science fiction which is comparable to
> "The city and the Stars" from Arthur C. Clarke and "The end of eternity"
> from Isaac Asimov. Both belong to my favorite books. Modern authors don't
> write like this anymore. Their books are often gloomy and depressive, and
> do not span millions of years. What is your favorite science fiction book?
> Will the AI breakthrough in large language models lead to more optimistic
> science fiction books again?
>
> Back on topic:  I grew up on a lot of "Golden Age" works/authors which
> includes Simak/Clarke/Asimov of course.   I would claim that this time was
> naturally one of "Utopianism" that came with the rapid development of
> industry/technology/science.  I think the Dystopianism ramped up with
> PostModernism and Cyberpunk.   I'm a big fan of Cyberpunk (esp..
> Gibson/Sterling/Stephenson/Cadigan/etc.) and *some* post-Apocalyptic
> works... now almost exclusively "CliFi" (Climate Fiction), but I get your
> yearning for "the good ole days".   I'd say Elon Musk grew up on "too much
> Utopian SF" as well and (unlike me) hasn't outgrown it?
>
> My *favorite* golden-age author is Jack Williamson
>  who I've mentioned here
> before and had the distinction of being somewhat elder when he published
> his first work at age 20 (1928) in Hugo Gernsback's first-of-kind Amazing
> Stories (1926).   I feel like he hit his stride after WWII where he had
> been a (civilian, not military due to age) Weatherman in the Pacific and
> reacted to a dawning self-awareness of the flip side of techno-Utopianism
> (exemplified by Hiroshima/Nagasaki)...   His (re)entry into publication
> after a long hiatus (during/after WWII) was With Folded Hands
> , a reflective dystopian
> view of techno-utopianism as well as work presaging Asimov's Robot series
> as well as a plethora of concepts like
> Borg/Cylon/Replicant/Terminators/Cybermen/Sentinels, etc...   and of course
> all of this was preceded by Lem's Trurl and Klapaucius (wizard-robot
> constructors) and the Hebrew Golem (and Frankenstein's Monster and... and
> and.)  He wrote over 50 novels ultimately in his 98 year long life as well
> as myriad short stories, novellas and a 3 year run of a comic strip (early
> 50s)... He also penned a reflective autobiography late in life (70s) but
> with nearly 20 years worth of career following that!  He taught writing at
> Eastern NM University well into his 90s as well.
>
> For the most part I'm thankful to be beyond the flat-character
> cardboard-cutout, misogynistic, stoicly independent/capable (white-male)
> h

[FRIAM] Guns, Police abuses and Foodstuffs in 'Murrica today.

[Steve Smith]

J-

I definitely agree we have a gun problem... and the recent reports of 
"travel warnings" to some of our states (Red ones in particular) 
emphasizes that.   Many of us are somewhat innured to the presence of 
guns and have a fair to good sense of when/where/how they are a bigger 
problem than not, but that said, we do have a gun/bullet/shooter problem 
and I don't mind acknowledging that anyone not already used to our 
nonsense in this regard is wise to avoid us.  I doubt anyone has a worse 
record of shooting ourselves and one another up than we do... though 
each demographic and region has a different way of doing it.  Mary and I 
each grew up with at least one person known to have been involved 
(victim or perpetrator) in a family murder-suicide (rejected husband 
shoots wife, kids, self) so yeh... we are deplorable and we use guns to 
demonstrate it.  Maybe Russia or other eastern-block countries suck like 
we do too?  I don't know.. the relative poverty probably keeps the 
number of guns and volumes of ammunition down?  Our "gun shows" are 
extravagant/opulent affairs with parking lots full of $60k 4x4 diesel 
crew-cab trucks even if the bumper stickers and casual conversations 
overheard would have you thinking the folks there buying/selling were 
suffering some kind of harsh recession...


And police abuse of power (including fatal encounters) is it's own 
problem somewhat orthogonal (but not entirely) to our gun violence 
problem.   I prefer/enjoy European detective shows because for the most 
part even when police are armed their first instinct/action is NOT to 
pull a gun and threaten/shoot first. Ohio is on the red side of purple 
but not deep red like many of our Western and Southern states.  And 
major metropolitan areas (red and blue) have gang violence which almost 
by definition includes guns.


I agree that our "average" (restaurant) food is in fact pretty 
weak...without even mentioning "fast food".  We have plenty of 
healthy/good food options IMO but it requires some work to find and 
usually comes at a premium.  The areas we recently traveled through were 
definitely a "food desert/swamp" for the most part. I appreciated the 
food we experienced in France and Belgium and Germany and Netherlands 
(not so much England/Ireland) and suspect that the "average" food was 
maybe healthier than our "average" but I didn't feel that there was that 
big of a difference, but then we eat vegetarian and fresh food where 
possible so maybe there is less difference there?  Or maybe I just don't 
know "really good food".  When eating out we lean toward Indian and Thai 
and Vietnamese but I wouldn't know authentic from otherwise there... My 
daughter is a fitness/nutritionist coach in Denver and has some pretty 
strict ideas of what "healthy" food is (they are carnivores so that 
expands the range of issues and options)...  I do get the feeling that 
European food regulations are much stricter (or more clear, less muddled 
by industry lobbies?) and I for one am thankful for your leadership in 
that area.  I suspect that 99% of the vast swaths of agriculture I just 
drove through is heavily GMO and heavily chemically managed...  I'll add 
a footnote that despite collecting a LOT of bugs on the hood and mirrors 
of our vehicle it was a fraction of what I remember from the "old days" 
We are very much in new "silent spring", though I felt the same was 
afoot in Northern Europe when we were there in 2022... not nearly as 
many birds and insects as I'd expect?


When I was in NZ in 2000 they had just transitioned from "virtually 
nothing but boiled meat with boiled starch" options to a range of "asian 
fusion" options which I really enjoyed but was quite excited to have 
some good New Mexico Green Chile when we returned after a month!  We 
felt the same returning from EU in 2022 and the midwest just now...  but 
it is generally agreed that Green Chile is addictive (in the same ways 
as many chile/curries might be in Asian cuisine?)


- S

On 9/3/23 4:14 PM, Jochen Fromm wrote:
Well, I still believe there is a gun problem in the United States, 
yes. Definitely. Just recently a police officer fatally shot a 
pregnant Black woman in the parking lot of a grocery store in Ohio 
after she refused to exit her car. And Ohio is not even a red state, 
right? It is also well known that the US has substantially more mass 
shootings than other countries. This is one reason why I do not want 
to travel to the USA at the moment - South Africa also does not feel 
safe to me after various reports in the last months about missing 
tourists.


The other is the lack of good food. In Europe and Asia there is such a 
variety of good restaurants and healthy food. In Germany and Great 
Britain not so much, except in the larger cities, but in the 
Mediterranean countries like Spain, Italy, Greece and Israel the food 
is awesome. In South Korea, Thailand, Vietnam and Japan as well.


-J.


 Original message 
Fr

Re: [FRIAM] Science Fiction Books

[Frank Wimberly]

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/anders-behring-breivik-appeal-european-court-of-human-rights-norway-massacre/


---
Frank C. Wimberly
140 Calle Ojo Feliz,
Santa Fe, NM 87505

505 670-9918
Santa Fe, NM

On Sun, Sep 3, 2023, 3:21 PM Frank Wimberly  wrote:

> At one point, maybe still, the largest mass shooting took place in
> Norway.  Correct me if I'm wrong.
>
> ---
> Frank C. Wimberly
> 140 Calle Ojo Feliz,
> Santa Fe, NM 87505
>
> 505 670-9918
> Santa Fe, NM
>
> On Sun, Sep 3, 2023, 3:16 PM Jochen Fromm  wrote:
>
>> Well, I still believe there is a gun problem in the United States, yes.
>> Definitely. Just recently a police officer fatally shot a pregnant Black
>> woman in the parking lot of a grocery store in Ohio after she refused to
>> exit her car. And Ohio is not even a red state, right? It is also well
>> known that the US has substantially more mass shootings than other
>> countries. This is one reason why I do not want to travel to the USA at the
>> moment - South Africa also does not feel safe to me after various reports
>> in the last months about missing tourists.
>>
>> The other is the lack of good food. In Europe and Asia there is such a
>> variety of good restaurants and healthy food. In Germany and Great Britain
>> not so much, except in the larger cities, but in the Mediterranean
>> countries like Spain, Italy, Greece and Israel the food is awesome. In
>> South Korea, Thailand, Vietnam and Japan as well.
>>
>> -J.
>>
>>
>>  Original message 
>> From: Steve Smith 
>> Date: 9/3/23 8:59 PM (GMT+01:00)
>> To: friam@redfish.com
>> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Science Fiction Books
>>
>> Jochen -
>>
>> I thought of you more than few times on my long walkabout through
>> Red/Purple-state 'murrica...  mostly your concerns a year or two ago about
>> traveling to the US "because gun violence".   I was in the heart of "gun
>> country" through this trip and saw a few artifacts of that which would
>> naturally be *very* disturbing (methinks) to someone not already innured to
>> it... but not nearly as many as you might expect.  On the other hand I just
>> saw a news item that Canada and many other first-world countries have in
>> place "travel warnings" for not the US proper, but many of the more
>> egregious "red states".   I believe you may have already made your
>> 'murrican sojourn so the point may be moot... but I couldn't help thinking
>> "how would Jochen see this?" as I stumbled through a landscape of bison,
>> hay bales, corn fields, motorcycles, strip malls, and gun shows.
>>
>> I have read "Highway of Eternity" from Clifford D. Simak this weekend,
>> one of the books from the golden age of science fiction which is comparable
>> to "The city and the Stars" from Arthur C. Clarke and "The end of eternity"
>> from Isaac Asimov. Both belong to my favorite books. Modern authors don't
>> write like this anymore. Their books are often gloomy and depressive, and
>> do not span millions of years. What is your favorite science fiction book?
>> Will the AI breakthrough in large language models lead to more optimistic
>> science fiction books again?
>>
>> Back on topic:  I grew up on a lot of "Golden Age" works/authors which
>> includes Simak/Clarke/Asimov of course.   I would claim that this time was
>> naturally one of "Utopianism" that came with the rapid development of
>> industry/technology/science.  I think the Dystopianism ramped up with
>> PostModernism and Cyberpunk.   I'm a big fan of Cyberpunk (esp..
>> Gibson/Sterling/Stephenson/Cadigan/etc.) and *some* post-Apocalyptic
>> works... now almost exclusively "CliFi" (Climate Fiction), but I get your
>> yearning for "the good ole days".   I'd say Elon Musk grew up on "too much
>> Utopian SF" as well and (unlike me) hasn't outgrown it?
>>
>> My *favorite* golden-age author is Jack Williamson
>>  who I've mentioned here
>> before and had the distinction of being somewhat elder when he published
>> his first work at age 20 (1928) in Hugo Gernsback's first-of-kind Amazing
>> Stories (1926).   I feel like he hit his stride after WWII where he had
>> been a (civilian, not military due to age) Weatherman in the Pacific and
>> reacted to a dawning self-awareness of the flip side of techno-Utopianism
>> (exemplified by Hiroshima/Nagasaki)...   His (re)entry into publication
>> after a long hiatus (during/after WWII) was With Folded Hands
>> , a reflective
>> dystopian view of techno-utopianism as well as work presaging Asimov's
>> Robot series as well as a plethora of concepts like
>> Borg/Cylon/Replicant/Terminators/Cybermen/Sentinels, etc...   and of course
>> all of this was preceded by Lem's Trurl and Klapaucius (wizard-robot
>> constructors) and the Hebrew Golem (and Frankenstein's Monster and... and
>> and.)  He wrote over 50 novels ultimately in his 98 year long life as well
>> as myriad short stories, novellas and a 3 year run of a comic strip (earl

Re: [FRIAM] Is the American political system broken?

[Gillian Densmore]

Yes! The Op wrote long and, frankly, to theoretical a email to ask why
american politics is so [redacted because steve asked nicely].
It boils down to greed, and no accountability, what are effectively
guaranteed contracts get a cushy job for 2-4 years at a time.  The dumb way
people say "that side over their blocked my ridiculous microphallus
compensating bill to be a big fat jerk as revenge for Karen not going out
with me, so now i'll have tantrum."
-as mere mortal citizens: we can't vote/fire them if they do an awful job.
-they constantly tell a big pack of lies
-they pick the most ridiculous things to have a stuck thing about.
-Show boat and act like bullies, with sound bites to sound cool with no
substance.
-multiple decades strait of the same fundamentally broken ways of doing
things.
-lol not very many well adjusted people go into politics as a result of the
god awful "wretched hive of scum and villainy.".
Ranked choice voting, I suspect, alas alas, would confuse people...and I
want to be wrong very desperately about that line of thinking. Man, how
many people vote absentee so they can read up on what the bills are? What
particular pack of nonsense, who is selling, and it sucks a ton that it
feels so...soul degradingly terrible: that I for one have picked a few
people only because the rest were so much worse.
  I think the leadership, top to bottom, is only going to get better when
dweebs like Kevin Mcarthy aren't on TV bragging about "forcing the poor and
unfortunate to work" (reality check: did he even read or think about that
sound bite?)
And pick from who and who and who?  So ok 45 SOMEHOW gets in because of I
can't even guess why.  Sooo who else would I pick from?  Is the RNC going
to have what amunts to 3 compete brands of bad on the same ticket?  What
about the DNC?


This sucks to type:  My hunch is people are picking the most sucky people
because how cool they sound, or (I kid you not) being rich and white.  :(
I suspect it'd then be 3 bitter, angry old white dudes vs I can't even
guess what. and that sucks.



On Sun, Sep 3, 2023 at 3:12 PM Steve Smith  wrote:

> Wow Qadaffi hisself!   I've read some Marx, some Lenin, some Mao, some
> Castro and others (enemies of democracy in the US vernacular) but this is
> new to me... thanks for the reference.
>
> I definitely find "Democracy is the tyranny of the majority over the
> minority" to be apt for all forms of democracy, with 2-party systems and
> charismatic/populist (elected) leaders to be the worst extreme of this,
> with multi-party systems improving it piecewise but not perfectly.
>
> The representative nature of the US House/Senate and of Parliaments adds
> another dimension to the problem while aggravating the underlying problem.
>
> A *direct* democracy (if that is possible) still suffers the "tyranny"
> problem, I sure don't want to be one of the 49 against the 51 having to do
> everything "their way" "because majority".
>
> But then Churchill's "worst form of government, except for all the others
> we've tried to date" still holds me in it's thrall even if my higher self
> wishes for something better if acutely underspecified.
> On 9/3/23 3:47 PM, Sarbajit Roy wrote:
>
> In this context, I would like to share the thoughts of an important world
> leader (not very popular with successive US governments) on 1 party, 2
> party and multi-party systems. I found his (poorly translated) analysis
> very perceptive even if the alternatives he proposed instead were a bit
> prosaic. (For the USA substitute Congress / Senate for Parliament).
>
> *Parliaments, therefore, have become a means of plundering and usurping
> the authority of the people. It has thus become the right of the people to
> struggle, through popular revolution, to destroy such instruments – the
> so-called parliamentary assemblies which usurp democracy and sovereignty,
> and which stifle the will of the people. The masses have the right to
> proclaim reverberantly the new principle: no representation in lieu of the
> people.*
>
> *If parliament is formed from one party as a result of its winning an
> election, it becomes a parliament of the winning party and not of the
> people. It represents the party and not the people, and the executive power
> of the parliament becomes that of the victorious party and not of the
> people. The same is true of the parliament of proportional representation
> in which each party holds a number of seats proportional to their success
> in the popular vote. The members of the parliament represent their
> respective parties and not the people, and the power established by such a
> coalition is the power of the combined parties and not that of the people.
> Under such systems, the people are the victims whose votes are vied for by
> exploitative competing factions who dupe the people into political circuses
> that are outwardly noisy and frantic, but inwardly powerless and
> irrelevant. Alternatively, the people are seduced into standing in long,

Re: [FRIAM] Science Fiction Books

[Frank Wimberly]

I had posted a link to an article about a mass shooting in Norway in
response to a claim that most mass shootings occur in the U.S.  I can't
find that post so I'll repeat it.  This was only one attack but 77 people
were killed.


https://www.cbsnews.com/news/anders-behring-breivik-appeal-european-court-of-human-rights-norway-massacre/


---
Frank C. Wimberly
140 Calle Ojo Feliz,
Santa Fe, NM 87505

505 670-9918
Santa Fe, NM

On Sun, Sep 3, 2023, 11:13 AM Jochen Fromm  wrote:

> I have read "Highway of Eternity" from Clifford D. Simak this weekend, one
> of the books from the golden age of science fiction which is comparable to
> "The city and the Stars" from Arthur C. Clarke and "The end of eternity"
> from Isaac Asimov. Both belong to my favorite books. Modern authors don't
> write like this anymore. Their books are often gloomy and depressive, and
> do not span millions of years. What is your favorite science fiction book?
> Will the AI breakthrough in large language models lead to more optimistic
> science fiction books again?
>
> -J.
>
> -. --- - / ...- .- .-.. .. -.. / -- --- .-. ... . / -.-. --- -.. .
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
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>
-. --- - / ...- .- .-.. .. -.. / -- --- .-. ... . / -.-. --- -.. .
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to (un)subscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
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archives:  5/2017 thru present https://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/
  1/2003 thru 6/2021  http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/

Re: [FRIAM] Science Fiction Books

[Carl Tollander]

Gregory Benford's "Galactic Center Saga".
Greg Bear's "Darwin's Radio" and "The Way" series.
Benford, Bear, and David Brin also extended Asimov's "Foundation" series -
more stuff actually happens
Larry Niven's "Ringworld" and all its spinoffs and prequels, anything with
the character Louis Wu in it.
Neal Stephenson's "The Diamond Age"
Bruce Sterling's "Distraction"
Anything by Terry Pratchett.
Adrian Tchaikovsky's "Children of Time" and sequels.
Lin Carter's short story "Masters of the Metropolis"

That should keep you busy for a few days.  I suspect not everyone would
think of these as optimistic.

I would like to feed Timothy Snyder's Youtube lectures on Ukraine
and Neal Stephenson's "Quicksilver"
and Eiji Yoshikawa's "Taiko"
into the AI and see what millennium long sci-fi it could turn out.
How would what it writes be different if it could be taught to write using
a nib pen a la Stephenson or a brush on washi paper?

R.A. Lafferty wrote sometime ago "Arrive at Easterwine" about a computer
writing a novel from a mashup perspective of its creators.

Carl


On Sun, Sep 3, 2023 at 11:13 AM Jochen Fromm  wrote:

> I have read "Highway of Eternity" from Clifford D. Simak this weekend, one
> of the books from the golden age of science fiction which is comparable to
> "The city and the Stars" from Arthur C. Clarke and "The end of eternity"
> from Isaac Asimov. Both belong to my favorite books. Modern authors don't
> write like this anymore. Their books are often gloomy and depressive, and
> do not span millions of years. What is your favorite science fiction book?
> Will the AI breakthrough in large language models lead to more optimistic
> science fiction books again?
>
> -J.
>
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