# Funny Moments in Far-Flung Futures in Fiction **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 11, 2010, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414 "2010-09-11T16:16:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![RikWriter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/49beb7/32.png) [@RikWriter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RikWriter)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/41 "2010-09-13T13:49:51Z")
> [@Chimera](#): > > Since the hijack persists: I’m still waiting for someone to show me this space mining and manufacturing technology. It currently does not exist. Yes, it does. The equipment to do it could be built today. It’s simply very, very expensive and no nation is currently willing to spend the money on it. It would be, in the long run, very lucrative, but it would take years, perhaps even a couple decades for it to pay off the investment and most people aren’t willing to wait that long on a return. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/42 "2010-09-13T14:48:48Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > > [@](#): > > > > – remember, it’s not limited to cities -in New York State-. The political boundaries are irrelevant, including the international ones. You have to factor in -all- the cities. > > Political boundaries are irrelevant, but geographic ones aren’t, and all the cities that close to upstate NY are across major rivers or lakes. And even at that, you still haven’t covered the entirety of the state. Not only that, but in Book 5 or 6, Stirling introduces a civilization that was formed in the suburbs of Chicago. Clearly, he realizes that Death Zones are idiotic, but he keeps referring to them as the series continues. Although now Book 7 is out and it supposedly completes the saga, so I guess we’ll see after I read it. ---
**Author:** ![RikWriter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/49beb7/32.png) [@RikWriter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RikWriter)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/43 "2010-09-13T15:38:15Z")
Book 7 is out, but it doesn’t complete the series. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/44 "2010-09-13T15:58:54Z")
> [@RikWriter](#): > > Book 7 is out, but it doesn’t complete the series. You’re joking? First it was going to be two trilogies. Then a fourth book got added to the second trilogy. And now it’s going to be a trilogy and a quintology of books? Book 6 Spoiler: I know Stirling couldn’t make it back across America and have a big ass battle in one book, I just knew it. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Excellent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f19dbf/32.png) [@Mr.Excellent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Excellent)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/45 "2010-09-13T16:07:20Z")
> [@Leaper](#): > > > [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > > > The first half of the book takes place in 2020 (before the vampire apocalypse) and features a little girl showing an aptitude for math when watching the “shopping for prizes” part of Wheel of Fortune. But Wheel of Fortune hasn’t used the “shopping for prizes” format since 1990. > > Strictly speaking, this won’t be “wrong” until 2021, because WoF could reintroduce the prize shopping round at any time between now and 2020, and MAKE the book correct. And by a similar token, St. Petersburg could well be renamed to Leningrad by the 23rd century. The Russians seem to be suffering from a serious case of nostalgia for the Soviet system, and are already bringing back rather a lot of it - for example, they aren’t a democracy any more. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/46 "2010-09-13T17:02:39Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > Clearly, he realizes that Death Zones are idiotic, but he keeps referring to them as the series continues. Judging from his posts, he doesn’t appear to be conceding the issue. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/47 "2010-09-13T18:32:11Z")
> [@Evil\_Captor](#): > > In “Fatal Conflict” an SF film starring Kari Wuhrer, Kari is sent as a spy to the Argos Prison Colony. A subtitle in the screen says: “2030: Argos Womens’ Colony.” So, not only will we have interstellar colonies in 30 years (the film was made circa 1990) but among the very FIRST things we’ll do is build women’s prisons on them! That’s silly. If you’ve seen [_Soldier,_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soldier_(film)) you know that what we’ll be using Earthlike planets for is garbage dumps. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/48 "2010-09-13T20:01:33Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > Finally, Cory Doctorow’s **Little Brother** takes place in the far off time period of 2010… In the end, a Republican President (a thinly veiled John McCain) advocates the torture of American citizens, including a trio of teenagers. You know, John McCain, one of the few Republicans who openly fights torture and promised to close Guantanamo if elected? :smack: How is this something Doctorow “got wrong”? In the actual time period of 2010, John McCain is demonstrating his credentials to serve as a poster boy for the following observation: [QUOTE=H. L. Mencken] The typical lawmaker of today is a man wholly devoid of principle – a mere counter in a grotesque and knavish game. If the right pressure could be applied to him, he would be cheerfully in favor of polygamy, astrology or cannibalism. [/QUOTE] ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/49 "2010-09-13T20:28:42Z")
> [@Steve\_MB](#): > > > [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > > > Finally, Cory Doctorow’s **Little Brother** takes place in the far off time period of 2010… In the end, a Republican President (a thinly veiled John McCain) advocates the torture of American citizens, including a trio of teenagers. You know, John McCain, one of the few Republicans who openly fights torture and promised to close Guantanamo if elected? :smack: > > How is this something Doctorow “got wrong”? In the actual time period of 2010, John McCain is demonstrating his credentials to serve as a poster boy for the following observation When the book was written and edited (Early - Spring 2008), the three frontrunners for the 2008 Presidential Election were Hilary Clinton, Barack Obama and John McCain. As McCain was the only Republican, and the book posits a Republican President who looks like a shriveled old man, you have to assume Doctorow is talking about McCain. The McCain of early 2008 railed against torture whenever he got the chance. If he was elected, I have no reason to believe he would have flip-flopped on that position. Beyond that, the idea that the government would tap four teenagers as possible suspects in a bombing just because they were in the area (and two of them were injured in the blast to boot) is ridiculous. The book is like one long error and how it won so many awards is beyond me. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/50 "2010-09-13T20:43:47Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > As McCain was the only Republican, and the book posits a Republican President who looks like a shriveled old man, you have to assume Doctorow is talking about McCain. The McCain of early 2008 railed against torture whenever he got the chance. If he was elected, I have no reason to believe he would have flip-flopped on that position. You think John McCain would stand on principle. Doctorow (assuming that he is in fact modeling the character on McCain) thought he would blow with the prevailing political wind. Score, based on the facts on the Arizona primary ground in 2010: Justin Bailey 0, Cory Doctorow 1. > [@](#): > > Beyond that, the idea that the government would tap four teenagers as possible suspects in a bombing just because they were in the area (and two of them were injured in the blast to boot) is ridiculous. The notion that the government would not resort to the use of convenient scapegoats strikes me as… overoptimistic. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/51 "2010-09-13T20:48:34Z")
> [@Steve\_MB](#): > > > [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > > > As McCain was the only Republican, and the book posits a Republican President who looks like a shriveled old man, you have to assume Doctorow is talking about McCain. The McCain of early 2008 railed against torture whenever he got the chance. If he was elected, I have no reason to believe he would have flip-flopped on that position. > > You think John McCain would stand on principle. Doctorow (assuming that he is in fact modeling the character on McCain) thought he would blow with the prevailing political wind. > > Score, based on the facts on the Arizona primary ground in 2010: Justin Bailey 0, Cory Doctorow 1. Meh. The book is so full of mustache twirling villains that it’s hard for me to take any of it seriously. At one point, a room full of high level government officials start cackling because they think that if anyone raises a stink about the government is doing in San Francisco, they can just blame the gays and the whole thing will go away. The book also features the first terrorist bombing in history that doesn’t have anyone claim responsibility for it (which is very convenient for the government types who think torturing a tubby 16 year old with a giant knife sticking out of his gut is the key to solving the mystery). ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/52 "2010-09-13T20:51:20Z")
> [@Steve\_MB](#): > > [QUOTE=Justin\_Bailey] > Beyond that, the idea that the government would tap four teenagers as possible suspects in a bombing just because they were in the area (and two of them were injured in the blast to boot) is ridiculous. The notion that the government would not resort to the use of convenient scapegoats strikes me as… overoptimistic. [/QUOTE] A fair point, but let’s be realistic here, throwing up a bunch of honors students (two of whom are white as white can be and are the children of a retired high ranking army official and a pair of professors) is a tad far-fetched. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Excellent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f19dbf/32.png) [@Mr.Excellent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Excellent)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/53 "2010-09-13T21:03:38Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > When the book was written and edited (Early - Spring 2008), the three frontrunners for the 2008 Presidential Election were Hilary Clinton, Barack Obama and John McCain. As McCain was the only Republican, and the book posits a Republican President who looks like a shriveled old man, you have to assume Doctorow is talking about McCain. The McCain of early 2008 railed against torture whenever he got the chance. If he was elected, I have no reason to believe he would have flip-flopped on that position. > > Beyond that, the idea that the government would tap four teenagers as possible suspects in a bombing just because they were in the area (and two of them were injured in the blast to boot) is ridiculous. The book is like one long error and how it won so many awards is beyond me. Yah. Doctorow’s a fine blogger and activist, and those are good and valuable things. But he’s a weak novelist - he’s so enamored with the civil liberties issues and gee-whiz tech that drive his blogging and activism that he allows them to drive his plots as well. That’s a problem, because good fiction is really meant to be driven by the characters and the logic of their situations - which Doctorow can’t quite pull off, because there are Points he wants to make. But he gets a lot of buzz - in part, because BoingBoing is popular, and in part because the Creative Commons distribution means his stuff is accessible to lots of readers. And since the Hugos tend to be popularity contests, he does very well in them. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2010, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/54 "2010-09-13T21:21:19Z")
> [@Mr.Excellent](#): > > > [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > > > When the book was written and edited (Early - Spring 2008), the three frontrunners for the 2008 Presidential Election were Hilary Clinton, Barack Obama and John McCain. As McCain was the only Republican, and the book posits a Republican President who looks like a shriveled old man, you have to assume Doctorow is talking about McCain. The McCain of early 2008 railed against torture whenever he got the chance. If he was elected, I have no reason to believe he would have flip-flopped on that position. > > > > Beyond that, the idea that the government would tap four teenagers as possible suspects in a bombing just because they were in the area (and two of them were injured in the blast to boot) is ridiculous. The book is like one long error and how it won so many awards is beyond me. > > Yah. Doctorow’s a fine blogger and activist, and those are good and valuable things. But he’s a weak novelist - he’s so enamored with the civil liberties issues and gee-whiz tech that drive his blogging and activism that he allows them to drive his plots as well. That’s a problem, because good fiction is really meant to be driven by the characters and the logic of their situations - which Doctorow can’t quite pull off, because there are Points he wants to make. Yeah, one of the other pieces of gee-whiz tech popular in Little Brother is gait recognition cameras. Which don’t even exist in commercial application, let alone are they cheap enough to be used by a public high school. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2011, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/55 "2011-02-27T00:27:22Z")
> [@Koxinga](#): > > I remember after Case has an encounter with one of the AIs he describes it as so advanced, it’s not just RAM, it’s full-on “ROM.” Which makes me wonder whether William Gibson really understood what RAM and ROM were in the first place. > > ETA: I had it backwards: I got to see William Gibson speak about 15 years ago, and he was hilariously self-deprecating. He talked about how “cyberspace” exists today: it’s the Internet. Which means that Case, having crossed the wrong criminals, was infected with a fungus that prevented him from surfing the web. Case “yearned for” his email. ---
**Author:** ![Bill\_Door](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@Bill\_Door](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bill_Door)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2011, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/56 "2011-02-27T12:21:03Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > Meh. The book is so full of mustache twirling villains that it’s hard for me to take any of it seriously. At one point, a room full of high level government officials start cackling because they think that if anyone raises a stink about the government is doing in San Francisco, they can just blame the gays and the whole thing will go away.(snip) Well, it’s not like they haven’t tried it before. Remember the [Iowa](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Iowa_turret_explosion)? The initial report from the navy was that a couple of gay sailors got into some kind of a tiff over the last bottle of coral pink nail polish. Something like that, anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2011, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/57 "2011-02-27T15:39:20Z")
About three months ago I realized that joatsimeon was S.M. Stirling and that I had been arguing with the actual S.M. Stirling about his own books. Now that I’m finally reading the High King of Montival I’ll have something new to complain about! ---
**Author:** ![Koxinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/4af34b/32.png) [@Koxinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Koxinga)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2011, 4:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/58 "2011-02-27T16:35:11Z")
> [@Justin\_Bailey](#): > > About three months ago I realized that joatsimeon was S.M. Stirling and that I had been arguing with the actual S.M. Stirling about his own books. [“Boy, if life were only like this . . .”](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wWUc8BZgWE) ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2011, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/59 "2011-02-27T16:44:19Z")
I’m sure I’ve seen Stirling admit that the “death zone” concept was mostly a way to clear the stage for the aftermath. It seems to me that even in densely populated areas, SOME people will survive if they have a hidden stash of food and stay hidden. Or by forming gangs and taking the food from other survivors. The theory is that people start eating, and in three weeks all the food is gone and everyone is dead. Except distribution of food isn’t going to be equal, and the ability to hold onto or expropriate food won’t be equal. And once large numbers of people have starved to death, or died of exposure, or been killed for their food, the small amount of food left might be enough for the few survivors to continue. Stirling just wrote off the cities because he wasn’t interested in another urban survival story. And anyone who survived in the cities would have to start farming pretty quickly. I guess if you’re farming without machinery having your plots broken up by houses and roads and parking lots is less of a concern–you don’t have combines, or even horse-drawn plows. The problem would be lack of seeds and infrastructure. You can farm in Central Park, but where are you going to find the wheat to sow? And even if you could find it, it would already be eaten by starving people. If you’re in Iowa most of last year’s grain is going to rot in the silos, there’s plenty of food this year, the hard part is planting enough for next year. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2011, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414/60 "2011-02-27T17:13:01Z")
> [@Mr.Excellent](#): > > And by a similar token, St. Petersburg could well be renamed to Leningrad by the 23rd century. The Russians seem to be suffering from a serious case of nostalgia for the Soviet system, and are already bringing back rather a lot of it - for example, they aren’t a democracy any more. FWIW trivia-wise, the oblast (province) around St. Peter City itself is \*still \*named “Leningrad”, probably now officially referent to the battle rather than to Mr. Ulyanov; and a Starship \*Leningrad \*would most likely be itself named after the battle (e.g.: 20th century ships named Coral Sea or Kursk) rather than the location. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/funny-moments-in-far-flung-futures-in-fiction/553414.md?page=4)