Category: Science Fiction and Fantasy

Charlie Stross on The Panopticon Singularity: How the convergence of computing and communications technologies will enable the ultimate police state. Links to some responses are in his blog.

Also from Stross, an explanation why US President Bush’s Mars expedition initiative makes much more sense as an extension of his administration’s defense policy:

• We believe
  the Martians posess weapons of mass destruction (heat rays,
  tripod death machines, red weed).
• …
• It is
  possible that Osama bin Laden is on Mars. (Image enhancement
  of the background to bin Laden’s videotapes rebroadcast via Al
  Jazeera are suggestive of a boulder-strewn desolate wasteland.
  We know that Osama bin Laden cannot be found in Afghanistan,
  and Mars is also a boulder-strewn wasteland, so Osama bin
  Laden may indeed be on Mars.)
• …
• Tony Blair has asked us to allow time for
  diplomacy to work, but the Martians have stubbornly refused to
  talk to the British Beagle 2 lander.

Someone mailed me a question about what is the name of the biggest dragon?

The obvious answer is that the biggest dragon is the Midgard Serpent, Jormungund, who is literally world-spanning (he encircles the earth).

Looking up more info (and a better answer) i ran across Phil Hine’s meditation on Thor, a scientific article about animal size, the promising but quite incomplete Dracopedia (which I found by looking up Ancalagon the Black – searching for Dragons+Size just gives a ton of pages selling Dragon brickabrack). Best of all (as usual) are the loony sites.

In the end it occurs to me that the Biggest Dragon is the constellation Draco, which is light-years across…

The Doc Savage Method of Self-Development:

For 23 issues, the editors of Doc Savage Magazine let readers in on the secrets of Doc’s physical and mental exercise regimen. I get tired just reading them, but I’m sure some kids out there took them to heart, or at least tried to raise their little brother as a herculean genius.

Strange things you bump across if Google(*) department: Charlie Stross (now finally achieving success as an SF author) is the creator of those infamous 1st Edition D&D monsters, the Githyanki, Githzerai, Slaadi, and Death Knights, of Fiend Folio fame.

Now, he appears slightly embarrassed of his high-school contribution to the Mythos of RPG fantasy, as evidenced in this interview on a Planescape fan-site.

(Actually, I was looking for the Stross interview/slowtime chat from The Well, but the one on Rakkama certainly illuminated a side of Stross that you won’t easily find by reading his website…)

A Primer In
SF Xenolinguistics – LET’S SPEAK ALIEN – In Ten Easy Lessons:

LESSON THREE

Initial K is especially popular (Kazon, Klendathu, Krell, K’kree). Incidentally, there’s a good reason for this (and one I’ll credit to Steve Mowbray): aliens are obsessed with triangles, a particular shade of green, the number three, and the letter K because they learned everything they know from our TV broadcasts. To be more specific, from a particular episode of "Sesame Street".