THE MT VOID
Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society
02/07/03 -- Vol. 21, No. 32
Big Cheese: Mark Leeper, mleeper@optonline.net
Little Cheese: Evelyn Leeper, eleeper@optonline.net
Back issues at http://www.geocities.com/evelynleeper
All material copyright by author unless otherwise noted.
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Topics:
Earth is Flat (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
Acceptable Risk (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
The Stars Our Destination (letter of comment by
Joe Karpierz)
LONG LIFE, HAPPINESS, AND PROSPERITY (film review
by Mark R. Leeper)
DIPLOMATIC IMMUNITY (book review by Joe Karpierz)
This Week's Reading (THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN
EMPIRE, HIDDEN HISTORY, "Stars & Stripes" trilogy,
THROUGH THE ALIMENTARY CANAL WITH GUN AND CAMERA,
and KICK ASS) (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
===================================================================
TOPIC: Earth is Flat (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
I wanted to share this delightful piece. I read an article
referring to a humorous story by Rudyard Kipling. One does not
think of Kipling that much as a humorist. Actually the story
itself is very hard to find. I would say there are two things that
make the story worth looking for. One is the title, "The Village
that Voted the Earth Was Flat." The other is the hymn in the
story. As relevant today as when it was written, we still have
religions trying to dictate what can and cannot be considered
scientific fact.
The following is a hymn, so read it slowly and if possible make up
a melody.
Hear the truth our tongues are telling!
Spread the light from shore to shore!
God hath given Man a dwelling,
Flat and flat forevermore!
When the primal dark retreated,
When the deeps were undesigned,
He with rule and level meted
Habitation for Mankind!
Hear the truth our tongues are telling!
Spread the light from shore to shore!
Oh, be faithful! Oh, be truthful!
Earth is flat forevermore!
(C), 1917, Rudyard Joseph Kipling
[-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: Acceptable Risk (comments by mark R. Leeper)
People have been talking about the shuttle accident. A shuttle
has failed in flight and seven astronauts have been killed. It
had been seventeen years since that last happened. People,
especially science fiction fans, can recognize what a terrible
tragedy this is. Right? Well, I have to say my reaction is a
little unusual. What is that reaction? It's unfortunate.
That's all? How can I be so callous? Isn't this a tragedy?
Well, it's no more a tragedy than if the astronauts had died in a
traffic accident. Isn't it a much bigger tragedy because people
have died for space exploration? Isn't that a lot worse than dying
in a traffic accident? No it is actually less tragic. They died
for a worthwhile and important cause. They died for something they
believed in. And more will die for space exploration in our
lifetimes hopefully. Hopefully? Yes. Because if nobody else
dies for space exploration we are cheating humanity. We are
just not trying hard enough to get off this planet and into
space. I firmly believe that moving into space is really
important to the future of my species. We are going to
penetrate space and become a space-faring race or we are going
to stagnate and pass on. Getting into space is going to be
expensive. Exploration always is. But if we are not paying
that price, we are shirking our responsibilities.
Right now my entire species is totally dependent on the well-
being of Planet Earth for its continued existence. That's just
fine. I expect my home planet is going to be here supporting
them for a good long time. There were all kinds of threats from
weapons of mass destruction, even just over the past year. And
that is okay. I think we are going to get by these problems and
be all right. And we will probably be okay in the next big
crisis, whatever it is. But if we start to think on scales of a
hundred years, we may not so well off this time next century. If
we start thinking in terms of three hundred years, this planet
may not be so large and safe. We are going to need more
resources. We are going to need to be able to survive if
anything happens to this home planet. Frankly, it is a long, long
road ahead to get to the point where we are sure that humanity is
safe in the face of threats like we are seeing this year alone.
What has to happen is that we have to become a space-faring race.
If we want to assure the continuance of the species, we have to
spread in space sufficiently that our home planet is not
absolutely necessary for our survival. That is going to take a
long, long time. And it is going to be expensive in lives.
Exploration is dangerous. Ferdinand Magellan was the first
person to lead an expedition around the world. He didn't
actually make it around himself. He died in the Philippines.
People could have decided at that time that exploration was too
dangerous and it had to stop until it was made safer. That
would have been a big mistake. Living was considered more
dangerous then and life was not so dear that it had to be
protected at the cost of discovery.
When the Challenger exploded, people were really upset about it.
There were national inquiries. It was more than thirty-nine
months before the next shuttle mission to space took off. And that
was really the biggest misfortune of the Challenger disaster. The
United States lost about three years from the effort to get
humanity into space. It also lost seven brave people. I don't
mean to be unfeeling about that loss and what it means to their
families and what it means to the country. But roughly seven
million people now die yearly worldwide as victims of tobacco-
related disease. 70,000 people die from air pollution in the
United States alone each year. 40,000 die in US traffic accidents.
Seven people have died as a result of the last fourteen years of
United States space exploration.
I was already about halfway into this editorial when I saw the
Locus site with Gary Westfahl's argument
to put off space exploration until we are more ready. I think he
could not be more wrong. Westfahl says, "Someday, it would be
nice to have some humans living in space, to keep the species
alive should Earth be rendered uninhabitable, but it will be
decades, if not centuries, before people in orbit or on other
planets can be genuinely self-sufficient." That is true. But it
will not be accomplished by waiting for the emergency and then
figuring how to survive in space. Nobody knows how much
preparation it will take or when that emergency might occur.
Westfahl says that science fiction has made space exploration
seem safe and simple. He gives examples of what he calls "cozy
dramas of science fiction's space adventures" like SPACE
COWBOYS. Actually, I can think of few science fiction films that
portray pioneering spaceflight that do not portray it as being
highlydangerous. From FRAU IM MUND to MISSION TO MARS, it is hard
to find examples in which it does not prove (or nearly prove)
fatal to someone.
Westfahl says, "Given the technology we have today, space travel
is just too darn difficult. We've been stretching our
capacities to the limit, and we've been doing our damnedest, but
America has still launched over 150 space missions and has
watched three of them end in catastrophic failure. A 2% failure
rate just isn't acceptable; would trains or jets be in use today
if there was a 2% chance that every trip would end in disaster?"
First, I am aware of only two launched missions that ended in
catastrophic failure. Apollo I ended in failure in the
development phase. Apollo XIII was not a catastrophic failure,
though admittedly neither was it a total success. Trains and
jets are not experimental exploratory craft so, of course, they
have a better safety record.
Westfahl says that space exploration is not necessary at the
moment because there is no immediate need for space resources.
But how much exploration of our planet waited until it was nice
and safe or until there was an immediate need for what would be
found? And unlike the exploration of previous centuries space
exploration can be done without any question of harm to any
people indigenous to the places explored. The only people who
are endangered or harmed understand and accept the risks.
That brings us to the issue of acceptable risk. Part of what we
lost on February 1 was, I am certain, seven of the world's best-
informed authorities on the subject of the risks of flying the
space shuttle. They knew extremely well the probability of
danger on their flight. Seven of the world's best experts
believed enough in the value of the mission that they bet their
lives on it. They went not because science fiction movies or
NASA convinced them it was safe. They went because they felt
the cause of exploration was worth taking what they considered
an acceptable risk. It may not be for me to say, or for Westphal,
but I think they were right. [-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: The Stars Our Destination (letter of comment by Joe
Karpierz)
I was also fond of The Stars Our Destination, and have many of
the same memories that Bill has. Unfortunately, the move to
Evanston killed it for me and my wife. We live in the far
western suburbs of Chicago, and don't get to the city much.
However, when TSOD was located on Belmont Avenue (and Clark
Street before it), it was within walking distance of Wrigley
Field. Being an avid Cubs fan who attends half a dozen games a
year, I always went there after a game. Additionally, my wife
had clients in that part of the city, so she always went there
after seeing her clients. The move to Evanston made it
impractical to go there. Still, we're sad to see it go.
I have one outstanding memory of going there. I made a special
trip one Saturday for some reason. It was September 1996. I
was still driving my Trans Am then, which was 11 years old and
had 165,000 miles on it. I walked from the parking lot to the
store with Algis Budrys, talking sf. After I came out of the
store, there was antifreeze under my car - my radiator had sprung
a leak. I bought a new car two days later, and the day after
that, the company I work for, Lucent Technologies, was spun off
from AT&T.
I'll *always* remember TSOD. [-jak]
===================================================================
TOPIC: LONG LIFE, HAPPINESS, AND PROSPERITY (film review by Mark
R. Leeper)
CAPSULE: In the Vancouver Chinese community, a twelve-year-old
girl discovers Taoist magic and how to make it work. She tries
using enchantments on friends and acquaintances, but never gets
quite the effect she had hoped for. Mina Shum has made better
films in the past, but here she just did not have very much to
say. The film has some moments, but mostly it does not click.
It might make a nice children's film on cable. Rating: 5 (0 to
10), low +1 (-4 to +4)
Director Mina Shum previously made DOUBLE HAPPINESS. That was
the story of an unemployed actress and was probably based on
real experience. It had ideas that she probably wanted to
express. Somehow it is hard to believe that LONG LIFE,
HAPPINESS, AND PROSPERITY was really a story that anyone had
much of a burning desire to tell. After studying traditional
Chinese magic, a Canadian Chinese girl tries to use it, but
finds it goes awry. The idea goes back to "The Sorcerer's
Apprentice" and was pretty much mined out by the time
Shakespeare used it in "A Midsummer Night's Dream." In this
case the girl's magic touches the lives of her single mother
(Sarah Oh), whom we know should be married. The little girl
tries to make a match for her mother using a love potion, but
the wrong person gets the love potion.
Another plot line tells the story of an elderly watchman who has
lost his job and needs work as much for his self-respect as for
the money. And a third line tells of a butcher who has decided
unilaterally that his son will also become a butcher. Each of
the sub-stories involves the magic in some tangential way.
Each, however, is handled in cliched style, and none goes
anywhere that is a particularly interesting place to be. The
stories are simply hackneyed. Of some note is the fact that the
female psychic was played by Colin Foo, a man.
With this film Mina Shum is keeping her hand in as a director,
but is rather marking time. She will need to find better
material for her next film. I rate LONG LIFE, HAPPINESS, AND
PROSPERITY a 5 on the 0 to 10 scale and a low +1 on the -4 to +4
scale. It gets that high mostly for a few good performances.
[-mrl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: DIPLOMATIC IMMUNITY by Lois McMaster Bujold (ISBN
0-7434-3533-8, copyright 2002, Baen Books, SFBC edition, 307pp)
(book review by Joe Karpierz)
I give up. For years I've been complaining about Bujold writing
nothing but Miles Vorkosigan books when she's writing SF. I've
complained that she's limiting herself, or that she doesn't seem
to be able to come up with any other kinds of ideas.
I give up.
Why? I guess I've decided that reading a Miles Vorkosigan novel
is light and fluffy enough that it's like getting together with
an old friend for awhile to talk about nothing important or
particular. You just get together and blow off a few hours
while forgetting about your troubles. When reading a Miles
book, I can get away from the super serious (and thus completely
boring and uninteresting) world that much of the currently
acceptable SF has become. I've said it before, and I'll say it
again: if I wanted to read "literatoor", I'd read that stuff
that everyone says is literatoor. With apologies to all those
who've tried to bring SF out of the ghetto, and apparently
succeeded to some degree, I don't want my SF to be literatoor.
I want it to be fun and adventurous, with the occasional *deep
thought* to make me think. Literatoor is boring--SF shouldn't
be.
Okay, down off the soapbox. Diplomatic Immunity is fun--pure
and simple. It doesn't pretend to be anything else, and doesn't
try. It's also not a major entry in the Vorkosigan saga, but
that's okay. Who cares, as long as you're having fun.
Miles and Ekaterin, married in the last book, are on their way
home from their honeymoon, eager to get back to their
replicators which have their first two children in them, a boy
and a girl. They don't have much time left, because the
children are due to be born soon. Well, as you might guess,
things aren't that easy. Apparently, there's a diplomatic
problem developing in Quaddiespace. Long time reader of the
Mile saga will remember the Quaddies from the novel Falling
Free. Quaddies are the genetically engineered humans who have
four arms and no legs. What appears, at first, to be a simple
case of one man disappearing and another deserting turns out to
be much more complicated than that, involving bioweapons, the
Cetagandan haut ladies, a ba servitor, Miles' old friend Bel
Thorne, and a host of other very complicated issues.
The only thing missing from this story is the humor. Oh, there
are some funny lines, but there aren't any gutbusting laughs in
this one. There is one very superb line, however. Miles notes,
while talking to Bel, that "we're history". Yes, I suppose they
are. The Vorkosigan clan, and all the Vor relatives, have been
through a lot, shaping that particular universe. Miles and his
exploits are legendary, even his guise as Admiral Naismith
(which even comes into play here). However, this one really
doesn't add to the Miles mystique. It's just another story in
his life, but that's okay. I suppose every thing in a person's
life can't change history.
In any case, it's fluff, but it's fun. I recommend it. [-jak]
===================================================================
TOPIC: This Week's Reading (book comments by Evelyn C. Leeper)
I'm currently embarked on one of those projects one can undertake
only when retired--I'm reading Edward Gibbon's DECLINE AND FALL OF
THE ROMAN EMPIRE. I've gotten as far as Severus Alexander, and a
sorry lot they are. Which is, of course, Gibbon's point.
And why am I reading Gibbons? Because I read Daniel J. Boorstin's
HIDDEN HISTORY, and he praised Gibbon, along with explaining why
Americans have a sense of community not found in Europe, and why
the Adams family went into rapid decline after its early
prominence.
I finished Harry Harrison's "Stars & Stripes" trilogy (STARS &
STRIPES FOREVER, STARS & STRIPES IN PERIL, and STARS & STRIPES
TRIUMPHANT). The premise is that an actual event at the start of
the American Civil War triggered a genuine rift with England, who
then sided with the Confederacy, although their attempts to aid
the Confederacy backfired. I have two complaints about the
trilogy. One, the whole progression of events seems a bit
simplistic, and rather biased in its politics. And two, if one
were to remove the parts that served to remind readers of events
in previous volumes, and to tighten up the writing, this could
easily be one book instead of a trilogy for which readers had to
wait two years and pay three times as much for the whole thing.
This may be a sad side effect of all of Harry Turtledove's
alternate history series--publishers and authors now feel that all
alternate histories should be series.
If you have any friends who are doctors, you should point them
towards George Chappell's THROUGH THE ALIMENTARY CANAL WITH GUN
AND CAMERA, an older novel (or possibly novella) of a tour of the
human body written in the style of late 19th century travelogues.
Carl Hiaasen's KICK ASS is a collection of his columns about South
Florida politics, and if we had all read this in early 2000, we
would have just sawed the whole state off and let it float out to
sea before the election--or at least not been surprised at how
badly the whole thing was run there. The best line, though, is
in regard to the story of how a lot of expensive homes fell apart
during Hurricane Andrew, while the inexpensive homes built by
Habitat for Humanity didn't lose so much as a shingle. When asked
about this, Habitat for Humanity leader and former President Jimmy
Carter said, "Well, we use nails in ours." (Apparently the
expensive homes were merely stapled together. True.) [-ecl]
===================================================================
TOPIC: And did you notice...? (comments by Mark R. Leeper)
For more on the subject of today's editorial there are discussions
about the value and future of space exploration in the New York
Times at and .
Nanotechnology fears also get a turn at .
All things die eventually and it may well be that the "Star
Trek" franchise is reaching the end of its popularity. Hard to
believe. The article from the Australian "Courier-Mail" at
gives a quick thumbnail history of
"Star Trek" and talks about its flagging popularity (and the
horrible error of having that wretched theme song for the
current series). Of course, this isn't the first time that
"Star Trek" has died for lack of ratings.
An interesting variation on the Scopes Trial is brewing in
Texas. A science teacher has a stated policy that he will not
write letters of recommendation for students who do not believe
in evolution. On one hand he probably has no right to impel
people actually to believe evolution, only to know about it. On
the other hand a recommendation is a personal thing. It is not
like the school issuing a diploma. He has not contracted to
recommend everyone who fulfills a set of fairly determined
requirements. The law cannot impel someone to make a
recommendation. See the cbsnews.com story at
.
Prolific science book writer Clifford Pickover is moving into
the science fiction field, sort of following in the footsteps of
writers like Fred Hoyle and Carl Sagan. Actually, I am
surprised I hear as little about him as I do. He seems to
generate science books at an Asimovian rate. I like the fact
that he does not avoid mathematics the way many science writers
do and in fact it seems quite central to his thinking. Do
you readers, those who know of him, think he is a positive force or
a pop fad? You can readabout him in a Westchester Journal-News
article at . His home page is at
. [-mrl]
===================================================================
Mark Leeper
mleeper@optonline.net
If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe
you had better go back home and crawl under your
bed. It's not safe out here [in space]. It's
wondrous, with treasures to satiate desires both
subtle and gross. But it's not for the timid.
--Q (John de Lancie) from the "Star Trek:
The Next Generation" episode "Q Who?"
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