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10:49 am
October 31, 2010
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Andrea_A
| | Germany | |
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Post edited 3:02 pm – November 6, 2010 by Andrea_A
Watts' appearances at the Utopiales in Nantes (http://www.utopiales.org/):
Thursday
11:00 Will we go and visit the stars?
14:00 Does the universe have a limit?
19:30 Communalism : new imaginary frontiers?
Sunday
14:30 Transportation in the future
Big question: Are the scientific discussions held in English?
Besides Watts some other interesting authors will appear, e.g., China Mieville, Ian Mc Donald, Larry Niven and the French author Bernard Werber (I recently read his "Empire of the Ants").
Update: Watts' signing hours:
Thursday, 12:00, 15:00
Friday, 14:00, 15:00, 17:00
Saturday, 13:00, 16:00
Sunday, 13:30
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9:02 am
November 15, 2010
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Hljothlegur
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Check out this link just posted on Peter's Facebook page:
http://www.actusf.com
Sur ActuSF, le site web de l'actualite de la Science Fiction. Retrouvez Les critiques, les dossiers, les interviews du magazine mais aussi chaque semaine toutes les nouveautes de la Science Fiction.
Wherein he is asked to explain the meaning and genesis of Blindsight, Blampires, The Things, and Starfish, all through a slightly baffled translator. Peter comes off a little nervous, but very interesting in the set of three videos.
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1:29 pm
November 15, 2010
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sheila
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Thanks, I saw this before the facebook post (facebook is annoying with how it orders things. I have tweaked it so many ways to try and help).
I've seen the first interview so far. Too bad I do not know French. I would like to see what the corresponding idioms are to some of the ones we use in English. ("throw in the towel" for example).
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2:23 pm
November 15, 2010
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Hljothlegur
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Post edited 2:24 pm – November 15, 2010 by Hljothlegur
Dude, how about: "It's a wank. I don't know how you'd translate 'wank' – it's like literary masturbation?"
AHHAR HAR HAR HAR HAR. That poor translator guy, trying to keep up.
Also, I hadn't thought how abstract it sounded to say aloud that Blindsight asks what the Darwinian necessity and function of consciousness might be, and after the author thought about it for ten years, decided there probably is none, and isn't that scary, so he wrote a book about it.
It's true, but when you say it aloud it sounds weird, and kind of familiar to me? Do you find you spend a certain amount of time in your own head, reading kind of abstract stuff and thinking about it seriously, the way other people think about stuff more grounded in the tangilble, and then you blurt out what you've been reading or thinking and you suddenly hear how you sound?  Not crazy, but like a parody of an absent-minded professor? I am so relieved and a little delighted when someone in front of a microphone holds forth on points of something as abstract as the intersection of Darwin and consciousness.
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3:59 pm
November 27, 2010
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Andrea_A
| | Germany | |
| Member | posts 147 | |
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Congress Report
Somewhat (too) late, and mainly recycling a mail to "Sheila". A little congress report about Utopiales.
Watts took part in four discussions. In "will we go and visit the stars?" he mentioned the problem of Blueshifting and that, even if the crew is in hibernation, they have to be wakened from time to time so that cellular damage could be repaired. Next had been a cosmological topic about the universe having an end or not (got a little bit over my head; I have to re-read an article at Spiegel first). The last on Thursday had been a discussion about communalism — criteria which are splitting up people into groups. Language is a major one, but Peter stated, that extreme religious groups last very long. ((Because of having strict rules as borders to the rest of society? — maybe think of the Amish.))
On Sunday there had been a discussion about "Transport in the Future". Peter first noticed that there may be travelling restrictions due to quarantine. ((My personal opinion is that at the moment he is breaking his own rule — good luck for not bringing a bedbug starter kit to his new apartment …)) He also said some words about invasive species. And he stated that it would be better to transport informations than persons. That in a couple of years we will have VR indistinguishable from reality and will be able to meet in virtuality. A major result from the discussion had been that travelling far (and individual transport) will become much more expensive in the future. Somewhat "Back to pedestrian, back to bike, back to train".
Other interesting talks had been interviews with Larry Niven (about daydreaming stories together) and very impressive to me with Scott Westerfeld, who has written "Leviathan", an illustrated juvenile steampunk novel. He talked about the collaboration with his illustrator Keith Thompson. The second book of this series is called "Behemoth" — hope, this won't lead to confusion … Westerfeld posted about Utopiales in his blog — with even more amazing photos from the Elephant — and a link to the 'Crawl ( http://scottwesterfeld.com/blo…..ampunkery/ ).
I also watched four movies. Three in English language:
– "Earthling", a story about alien larvae bred out in humans — but nothing is as it seems to be ( http://www.moviestrailer.org/e…..ailer.html )
– "Mars" crazy cartoon about very special life on Mars ( http://vimeo.com/9027701 )
– "Hunter — Prey" about the fight (and talk) of an alien and his escaped human prisoner on a desert planet ( http://www.moviestrailer.org/h…..ailer.html ).
Earthling won the award at the festival.
Last I watched a silent movie (first version of "20 000 Leagues Under the Sea") with live piano music. State of the art in special effects at 1916((?)) — a giant squid puppet!
On the above linked page with the video there is also an English transcript of the interview ( http://www.actusf.com/spip/art…..-8477.html ).
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3:36 pm
November 28, 2010
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Hljothlegur
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Thank you for your report back on the events!
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