Category: Pure Speculation

  • The Illuminating and Enigmatic Daisyworld Thought Experiment

    Daisyworld Simulation I’ve previously written about James Lovelock’s Daisyworld, a thought-experiment meant to support the Gaia Hypothesis. This is the idea that complex ecosystems create a self-regulating environment conducive to perpetuating life. Examples of this include increased plant growth reducing CO2 in the atmosphere or bacteria drawing salt out of the oceans stabilizing salinity levels.…

  • Mass Effect as Great Science Fiction

    Cerberus For 106 hours (24 ME1, 33 ME2, 59 ME3) over the last six months, I have been exploring the epic science fiction worlds of Mass Effect (ME). I could have easily only spent 60 hours there, since that’s enough time to get through the game, but I was genuinely engaged with the universe and…

  • Flash Fiction: Buying Out

    I missed a flash SF, 600-words or less story, I got published to 365Tomorrows. You can check it out here. Kheen stared out the window of his top-floor corner office, completely oblivious to the hustle and bustle of his city stretching off into the horizon below. Planes, spacecraft, gliders, unicorns, and more were cruising right…

  • 42 More Years of Star Trek

    “Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations; to boldly go where no man has gone before.” – Introduction to each episode of the original Star Trek series USS Enterprise model used in theoriginal Star…

  • Flash SF: Cartesian Creation

    Is up at 365tomorrows. It’s about a programmer who writes an application capable of inferring a universe from the laws of reality. Director Almod peered at the computer screen frowning in contemplation, “I don’t get it.” “It’s a star,” Jaed offered helpfully. “I know it’s a star,” Almod gaze never broke from the image. “So…

  • Flash Fiction: Entropy Quest

    Saasnoah hesitated before stepping purposefully into the abyss. Once she had passed the rift nothing was visible except the light from the lab behind her, and, as that slowly sealed, all was darkness. As far as she could tell, she was still alive. This fact she could once again credit to the mathematicians back at…

  • Flash Fiction: Dreams of Conceptua

    Is up at 365tomorrows. Go read it now. : ) As I lie in bed at night, I practice going from a waking state directly into REM sleep. It’s a meditative practice. You simply stare into the afterimages dancing in the darkness behind your eyelids, and suddenly your brain makes something solid out of them.…

  • Why You Should Watch Battlestar Gallactica

    Note: If you watch BSG, but haven’t seen the last episode (aired on 20090213), skip this post as a spoiler. If you don’t watch BSG, take this post as an example of what you are missing (the quote’s edited so as not to reveal anything). If you saw the episode, enjoy the blockquote. Now that…

  • Flash Fiction: The Peacock’s Tail

    Is up at 365 Tomorrows. “Watch this,” Alea smirked at Trin and turned to the four-legged creature dumbly munching on some flamegrass nearby. “Oti,” Alea chirped to the thing, and a few dozen eyes opened to look at her. “Oti, what is pi?” A half-dozen orifices sprinkled amidst the eyes opened to emit a flurry…

  • Flash SF: The Prototype Sanctuary

    Is up at 365Tomorrows. An orangutan and a brain in a vat were playing chess across the room from me. It was a joke I hadn’t figured out the punch line to in five years of working here. The disembodied brain was Philo, and, lacking eyes, I had no idea how it understood the game.…

  • Flash Fiction: Our Benevolent Enemies

    I don’t think the attack was really an act of hostility, not when you look at the way it changed the world. I get to see stars every night now, in the sky above my head. For real stars. I don’t have to navigate to a satellite telescope web address or anything. I just go…

  • Flash Fiction: A Moment of Uninspiring Clarity

    Maybe we don’t see extraterrestrials all over the night sky because they all get absorbed in the virtual worlds they create? Check it out here. Wyndallo took an unexpected breath of cold, sterile air. He opened his eyes and saw his exhale condense against the glass door to the capsule, which was smoothly lifting away…