Re: Worst SF/F book you've read


"James Nicoll" <jdnicoll@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:ddnv2a$ss2$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> In article <ddnnk2$4e9$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
> James Nicoll <jdnicoll@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>
>> Simple extrapolations are always wrong but if human energy use
>>grows over the next 50 years until the whole planet uses energy at
>>the Canadian rate, then grows at 1% a year, then somewhere between
>>AD 2600 and 2700, heat will force us to limit the growth in energy
>>usage or to move portions of our economy off Earth. I fear this lacks
>>something in area of instant gratification but on the scale species
>>operation is rather fast.
>
> Mind you, you could cut the time until we are forced by physics
> to industrialize space if we could open up the bottlenecks on the
> production of human beings. Until recently baby production was largely
> dependent on slave labour; as soon as women are allowed to answer the
> question "Would you like to squeeze as many objects the size of a
> watermelon out of your body as it takes to kill you?" they generally
> answer "No, thank you." This leads to falling birthrates everywhere
> women are not kept enslaved and ignorant of the alternatives.

True. Y-chromosomally-challenged keep insisting on not being treated like
chattle or cattle. Blast their free will and self-esteem. If only we can
change their self-opinions from breast size, mini-skirts, climbing the
corporate ladder to number of children . . . .

> The answer is to come up with a better way to make babies,
> one not dependent on the involuntary servitude of half the human
> race. Whatever it might be, it needs to create in the care-givers
> the same affection for the product as biobabies create in their
> parents, since the statistics for foster kids are awful (There
> are sound biological reasons why it's evil _step-moms_ in fairy
> tales: by killing their husband's previous children, they free
> up resources for their own kids).

Roboparents.

It worked for post-Crisis Kryptonians.

> We also need a good way to turn babies into adults: simply
> creating the contents of adult minds in new bodies won't do, I suspect,
> because the resulting society might be very conservative, impoverished
> in mental variation (For an unbiased example, compare the creativity of
> the US at present with the creativity of a US populated by 300 million
> copies of Fred Phelps).
> --
> http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/immigrate/
> http://www.livejournal.com/users/james_nicoll

VR helmets.

Shaped like goldfish bowls, place the VR helmets on babies and babies would
see and hear what the parents wanted them to, while filtering what what
parents didn't want them to. For the babies, a special bottle nipple
attachment would be available to feeding and fluoride-treated pacifier
attachment to negate the damage done to teeth by babies abusing the
pacifier.

Thus while conscious the vr helm could constantly be educating the children
while protecting them from objectionable content. Adults would also have the
option of vr helms since in a world where it's up to you to filter out
content ... well, let's just say that Superbowl halftime show a few years
ago would be tame by comparison.

Meanwhile kids could also be entertainment from the humdrum of mundane life
with virtual backgrounds superimposed over reality. Or as I once suggested a
decade ago on GEnie: they could be watch virtual dragons while kids used the
bathroom.

Of course more pragmatic uses to virtual overlays would be access to
information--thus ending the steady stream of "Why", "Why", "Why"--maps to
school and home, while avoiding child molestors, bars or video arcades, maps
to their current destination--so they can see with exacting detail that not
only are we NOT "there yet", but how long it will take before we are indeed
there yet.

Also depending on the options the parents activate the kids could be taught
and constantly have positive reinforcement to be kinds, courteous, tactful
and / or free-thinking, question authority, be independent, etc.

Also the helmet would be soundproofable so parents can argue in front of
kids and kids' unnecessary shouting can be muted, lowered, simply converted
to a soothing beeping noise or an automated soothing calm voice notify the
parents that the child is agitated and not responding the to vr helm's
attempts to calm down.

-- Ken from Chicago (who laughs at Doctor Spock)



.

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