The Anti-Singularity Propaganda has begun...

The God Emporer of Dune

Another in a long line of Frank Herbert books The God Emporer of Dune is the chronicle of a time three thousand years after Paul took the Imperial throne. Paul is not very involved in the story as he has evolved into something other than human, controlling the universe from his spice gas chambers. His decedent Leto Atredies is the presiding lord of Arrakis, a world that has been transformed from a barren wasteland to a lush tropical paradise. The book follows a band of smugglers, one of which is apparently a descendant of Paul, and the rightfull heir to the Arrakan throne as well, as they try to supplant Leto despite his tyrannical hold on the planet. Their struggle is similar to Paul's in the first Dune book, as they are exiled individuals of enormous potential power, who are hunted by a despotic force.

Foundation Trilogy: Book 2

Reading the second book of the Foundation Trilogy, I noticed a change in Asimov's writing style. Rather than follow a detached story line which is based around the planet Terminus, book two follows actual characters and develops them to progress the story line. The First part relates the story of the Mule, the dictator of the galaxy who uses mind control to re-enforce his power, as he hunts, and is hunted by the Second Foundation, that Hari Seldon created. This story is different from other Asimov books I've read, it focuses on the characters and operates almost as a physiological thrill, for only at the end of the first half do we figure out who has maneuvered whom. The second half focuses on a little girl in the center of a conspiracy by the telepaths of the second foundation. While this story is a necessary part of the Foundation universe, it was a disappointment.

Final Anthology post

Anthology Title:

I, Robot

I'm reading I, Robot by Issac Asimov. This book is not that long (like 200 pages) and maintains a middle diction throughout. Asimov skips from story to story, but holds the book together with the narrator Dr. Susan Calvin, the aging chief robopsychologist of U.S. Robotics and Mechanical Men. This format is similar to Asimov's Foundation Trilogy, where the story line skips forward time, sometimes by hundreds of years, but is always based around the planet Terminus and it's Foundation. In spite its brevity, I, Robot accomplishes far more through commentary on the social issues of Asimov's time, and in the abstraction of a potential future scenario, than the top sci-fi novels from the past several years combined. The 1940's and 50's, during which I, Robot was written, were a significant time for the advancement of civil rights. Asimov uses robots to symbolize African Americans; by examining the questions "What constitutes sentience?" and "Does sentience necessitate treatment as a human?" , Asimov hopes to convince the reader that the robots of I, Robot are sentient and therefore human (or should be treated as humans). By suggesting that a being, of equal intelligence and value to a human, that is subservient to humans should be considered a human, he attempts to persuade 1950's society to accept african americans as equal to european americans. This abstract social commentary is common in science fiction and is substantially more effective than any amount of marching, occupying, or viral video making because it removes the issues from our reality and places them in a foreign universe where they can be observed objectively.

Dune- Book Trailer

If it doesn't work, here is a link to the version I put on youtube

This is a book trailer I made for Dune

Note #3

Because I could not stop for Death,
He kindly stopped for me;
The carriage held but just ourselves
And Immortality....

    In The Chariot, Emily Dickinson expounds upon the process of death and what she thinks life after death will hold. Her light, almost conversational tone portrays death as an old friend, rather than the harbinger of pain and evil. Dickinson's informality with death gives a sense of nostalgic familiarity that  can only be achieved after a lifetime of friendship. Dickinson's impression of Immortality is starkly different from that of many other poets who believe that death will be relief, she implies death as only a stepping stone in her soul's travels.

Note #2

This is supposed to be a video^, if not Here's a link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-NrvnoD8zE
      In this avant-garde scene from the movie Quiet Earth, Zach Hobson, the mentally distraught protagonist, has just discovered that he is not only the last man alive on earth, but also the man responsible for the end of humanity.
      Director Geoff Murphy underscores the depravity of Hobson's mental condition by having him dressed in a woman's silk nightgown, sitting with a shotgun across his lap, watching a recording of a Cold War newscast. Suddenly becoming enraged by the anchorman's speech, Hobson yells at and shoots the TV as if he is attempting to escape his guilt by destroying all evidence of it. Proclaiming himself ruler of Quiet Earth, Hobson then tries to explain himself in his inaugural address to a distinguished crowd of cardboard cut-outs, forcing them to cheer in agreement with an array of recordings that he set up amongst them.
      In the course of his speech, Hobson visibly displays strain under the weight of 5 billion souls. Though he did not intentionally destroy the human race, he was fully aware of the potential evil that could be done by his work. He ignores his conscience, which screams warning, in order to indulge in the resulting status and power. He knowingly turns over power that no man should wield to "mad-men". He falls victim to the human tendency to abandon ones own virtues in inexpedient attempts at immortality, thus he is the one that is "commended to live".
   While The Quiet Earth does not actually involve immortality directly, the themes of the corruptibility of man and man's avaricious desire to become his own God are concurrent and serve to teach man kind that the scientific path to immortality will have no short-cuts.

Immortality Vs Mortality Movie

Quiet Earth
http://youtu.be/qeg6C2Q5QTI?t=2m31s

Foundation- Asimov

    Isaac Asimov is one of the most prolific writers of the 20th century, producing close to five-hundred stories from 1950 to 1991. His works include I. Robot, the Gods Themselves and countless other best sellers. His Foundation series, which began as a trilogy and was later expanded to contain six books, was the most widely read space epic for decades.
           Foundation, the first book that Asimov wrote in the Foundation series, focuses on the legacy of Harry Seldon, a mathematician who has discovered a way to predict the future. It is a new science that he calls "psycho-history" that involves crowd psychology and certain indexes that represent different aspects of humanity to mathematically predict significant social, political and economic events. When the Galactic Empire collapses, Seldon's Foundation (and its twin on the other side of the galaxy) is the only remaining stronghold of scientific progress.
         Asimov's choice to shy away from a character driven storyline, along with his signature writing style are the just some of the reasons that this book so successful. The sheer immensity of the universe that he creates evokes a childish sense of wonder with each turn of the page, leaving you utterly convinced that a tiny speck on the edge of the galaxy could be so important.

New photoblog post

http://dreamingsofawanderersmind.blogspot.com/2012/03/spring-rain.html

Dune: Lord of the Rings in Space

       Dune by Frank Herbert is the epitome of sci-fi and fantasy. This book brings together aspects of unity, brotherly love, family ties, competition, survival, good and evil and love. From top to bottom and beginning to end, this novel will keep you on the edge of your seat as unpredictable turns in the plot make the story more like a puzzle than a timeline.  Frank Herbert is the Tolkien of Scifi, where Tolkien excels through the grandeur of his environment, Herbert generates that feeling of actually being in his world. Reading Dune, one can taste the spice-laden air, walk the sands as one of the Fremen, and breathe the hot, acrid air of Arrakis. A paragon of an accomplishment in the world of fiction, a true testament to the creativity of man. Herbert is a veritable Titan with a pen, and his work shall long be remembered as a tribute to unparalleled imagination and the power of the written word.

Excercise #3- Book Reviews

• Curve Ball
• A Million Suns: An Across the universe novel
• BZRK

 Parts of a review:
- An intro which outlines the general topic, indicates what the book's demographic is,  and places the book in its field.
-An outline of the content in the book(short Summary)
-A highlight of a particularly interesting part of the book which the reviewer evaluates and uses to argue it's theme.
-Closer- continuing to evaluate the book, indicating how it meets the reader's literary needs, recommending whether one should purchase the book or not, justifying the claims made previously in the review.

Note #1

(Tithonus)

...Man comes and tills the earth and lies beneath
 And after many a summer dies the swan.
 Me only cruel immortality Consumes:
I wither slowly in thine arms,
 Here at the quiet limit of the world.

    - - Alfred Lord Tennyson

     In Tithonus , Alfred Lord Tennyson paints a bleak portrait of a solitary being who walks the earth after the light of humanity has long been extinguished. Tennyson's darkly musical flow conveys the loneliness of Tithonus, while accentuating the melancholia of his surroundings. Tithonus' lamenting about his regrettable past serves as a cometary on the voracious nature of humanity's desire for immortality and the regrettable fact that when offered the possibility of having anything in the world, man's ultimate fear--the fear of death-- is, so easily, able to overcome him and cloud his mind. When Aurora offers Tithonus anything he should want, he rashly chooses eternal life on earth. Upsetting the god, Tithonus is damned to age forever and to forever carry the onus of his deeds "at the limit of the world".

Excercise 2

In this scene of Stardust, Gaiman utilizes a bold, pedantic style language along with lyrical description to evoke a sense of monumental immaculateness which surrounds the town. (Weakness #6)

Even as the the main character, Roberta, is grounded till September 8, 1972, she writes a "cruddy book of her cruddy life."  (3)

"Once upon a cruddy time on a cruddy street on the side of a cruddy hill..." the repetitive use of cruddy creates a negative feel for the place she is describing. "...which bubbles up very weird smells that evil genie themselves up through the cruddy dark rain..."(5)

Good Post: 99 bottles

Excercise 1

         The Mud Below is a dusty, mellifluous abstraction of the phenomena known as bull riding. Author Anne Proulx's work accentuates the gritty eccentricities of that generically backward town. The alternation of slow and fast wording gives the feel of a fast cutting action montage, akin to work of Micheal Bay, and the image of "the back of bull 82N" creates the momentary effect of a macro, close up shot where everything save branding "82N" out of focus. She begins another paragraph with the interjection by Rito of some obviously insightful observation of the bull, though it appears to be gibberish to the uninformed ear. This draws the focus out to encompass the protagonist and his surroundings and the aforementioned cycle begins again.

The Children of Húrin

        Everyone is familiar with J.R.R. Tolkien's  The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, and anyone who has read these can sense the passion he has for fantasy. Tolkien spent most of his life writing, rewriting, reorganizing and tinkering with the vast mythology of Middle Earth and the tip of the iceberg is The Simarillion, a collection of epic history, primarily dealing with the fate of the Noldor (a group of elves). In The Simarillion there is a summarized version of the tale of a great hero named Húrin and his kinsman. J.R.R. Tolkien's son Christopher Tolkien published the unabridged version in 2007. In The Children of Húrin, Tolkien departs from the typical fantasy structure where "the truth will out" and good will always conquer evil. This story is tragedy. In The Children of Húrin, Tolkien follows Húrin's son, Túrin, and does a great job of drawing the reader in so they become emotionally invested in the characters and then everyone dies. However, rather than being disappointed, Tolkien ends the story in a way that leaves you thinking that every thing is as it should be.

Anthology: Theme Statement

               I considered several topics for my anthology, I thought Winter would be a good choice because it is my favorite season, but I have never been able to describe why I like Winter so much. Rather than read or write about winter I'd rather experience it. I also thought about doing fear or dreams, but went further and decided to explore the things that people fear and dream about most. So, the theme I intend to focus on is Mortality vs. Immortality.
             Because mortality is a popular topic in literature, I've found lots of texts to use for this anthology. Some examples are T.S. Elliot's Whispers of Immortality, C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, and almost every other scifi/fantasy writer incorperate immortality as a motif in thier writings, the band Alphaville is largley known for their song Forever Young, and the list goes on. Odds are that if you gave somone three wishes, one would be that they live forever.

Reading Requirements

• Finish a book every other week.
• Read at least 2000 pages over the quarter
• Read while falling at 125 mph

Claim review for Sub #4

1.   The radical range of color schemes, discombobulating object scale, unusual item combination, and drastic angling of geometric shapes combine to form a divine harmony in the middle of a flustering discord. --Vivir Sonar Leer


"The shots of the model seemingly jumping spontaneously serve a purpose of tricking the eyes and mind." - No Trust In Tomorrow 

2.  Lunch Bag Art is a tumblr that is very unique and worth looking at.

Set in the 16^th century were pirates are despised and Will Turner, a humble black smith’s assistant, doesn’t realize his whole life is connected to pirates but when he runs into one his whole life is changed. 

(Book Log) Ayn Rand is a philosophical genius... that is all.

Due to constant interruptions, I am only half way through this book. Ayn Rand's The Virtue of Selfishness is the explanation of a concept called Objectivism. Objectivism is the philosophy which holds that man can only do for himself and should out of his rational self-interest as long as the action he takes does not infringe upon another’s rights. This philosophy is an interesting combination of Natural Rights and Classical Republicanism, oddly though she appears to incorporate the drawbacks of each philosophy into her's. At this point in the book it seems like she takes an altered version of enlightened Self-interest (The ability to act in your own interests follows on from self-acceptance and confidence.) that the "Big Three" religions teach; she calls this rational self interest.
     Brilliantly conceived and eloquently worded, Rand captures the very essence human nature, which is to value one life above all things, when you think about it, it makes sense. One example from this book was a situation in which someone had to decide whether to save his drowning wife and risk his own life or to let her die. At first one might think that according to Rand's philosophy one should let the wife drown, but thinking deeper you realize that it is in ones interest to save the wife because without her the husband would live a life of endless sorrow, so the risk to the husband's life is acceptable.
             Despite Objectivism's sound logic, one can tell that Rand did not gather this information from years of experience or interviews with wise old men, while reading this book it becomes apparent that she just made it up. Its not that it has any flaws in it's logic, but she the whole thing feels a bit off. However, some of the doubts that I had from the beginning of the book are beginning to be answered, so I assume that the doubts I have now will be cleared up later on in the book.

Powerful Asylum Photos Sub #4

The term “mental illness” conjures up images of degradation, impoverishment, unhappiness, frenzy and chaos. In this beautiful collection of gripping photos, Christopher Payne catalogs the decay of state mental hospitals across the country. 
Asylum

Few Americans realize these institutions were once monuments of civic pride, built with noble intentions by leading architects and physicians, who envisioned the asylums as places of refuge, therapy, and healing. -Payne

 Photographer Christopher Payne spent six years documenting the decay of state mental hospitals like these, visiting countless institutions across America. Through his lens we see grand, impressive exteriors and crumbling interiors—chairs stacked against walls with peeling green paint in a grand hallway; brightly colored toothbrushes still hanging on a rack; stacks of suitcases, never packed for the trip home.

For more than half of the nation's history vast mental institutions were prominent features of America's landscape. Now all but gone, it is a reminder that society's ideals deteriorate more rapidly than the structures built to facilitate them. Asylums for the insane, which started with high intentions, usually ended in horror and neglect. Christopher Payne has captured the soul of the asylums themselves through his extraordinary photographs.

Fixed it

dreamingsofawanderersmind.blogspot.com/

I guess the dynamic view wasnt working so i changed the template

Short List #4

1: Movie Review- Gentlemen Broncos

I just saw this movie this weekend and it was funny. Made by the same people that did Napoleon Dynamite, it definitely has some of the same themes like its setting of a backwards town somewhere out west, and it's highly unrealistic plot. Its one of the best comedies I have seen recently.

2:  Powerful Asylum Photos

"If you've ever seen a film involving a mental hospital then you'll probably assume they're all dingy and nightmarish pits of squalor. But, as photographer Christopher Payne has discovered, there's a lot more to them than we've seen on the big screen."-the Short list


3. Pop culture math

When you boil all of America's favorite things down to three elements this is what you get... the most recent addition makes the plot lines of superhero movies seem kind of dumb.

pics

sooo... yup..... uhh...yeah its a bike

pictures...

http://dreamingsofawanderersmind.blogspot.com/ 

This American Life:455(submission #3)

This American Life is a radio show that NPR has tasked with liming the "quirky facets of Americana." Broadcasted from WBEZ(in chicago), host Ira Glass takes the listener on an hour-long "journalistic non-fiction" trip through... whatever the show's writers find interesting.

I listened to episode 455, which is titled Continental Breakup. In this show, Ira Glass interviews Alex Blumberg, a writer at the blog Planet Money(another NPR affiliate), and attempts to put the credit crisis in Europe into layman's terms. And they do a pretty good job. They take you back to 100 years ago and the euro's inception and bring you through the events that lead up to today's problems. The relationship between France and Germany is perhaps the most interesting part of this episode:

Chana Joffe

Germany no longer wanted to dominate Europe. It wanted the opposite, actually. It wanted to be a team player, a peacemaker. Germany wanted to be the nicest guy at the European table.

Zoe Chace

Of course, France didn't want Germany to dominate either. Germany would always be bigger, more powerful. So France wanted to link its economy to the German economy. That way Germany's strength would be France's strength.

Chana Joffe

And also, a united Europe would be big enough and rich enough to become the world's other superpower and rival the United States, which both countries liked. All this was making a once-poetic dream much more appealing.

Surprisingly, the host and guest host kept my attention through the entirety of the program. I know that's the point, but if you have the slightest interest in economics you should give this a listen.

Spartan Reader- Post #2

           This tumblr feed, self described as a Field Guide to the Passionate Opinions of the Indifferent, gives an entertaining look into the world of the Hipster. Featuring posts such as "Why Hipsters hate Christmas Decorating", and "People Who Show Their Uncool Cousins Around the City", this tumblr allows this sub-cultural group to publicly display everything they dislike.
 http://stuffhipstershate.tumblr.com/
The question "What is a hipster?" is answered by this tumblr. Through careful consideration of and immersion in the ethos of the subculture known as "hipsterdom," the authors have gathered a collection of both observations and found documents demonstrating the disposition and character of the modern-day hipster. One notable post is called "Country Music". In this post the author describes their experience at a local bar when a country song came on. She expresses her disdain for her friend Micaela's "gettin all nostalgic" and asking if she knew this country song. The author then goes on to describe another situation in which her friend made a fool of her self by admitting she likes country music. Finishing up the post she states that bluegrass is "kinda rad" and describes the subtle differences between the two genres that make country intolerable. This tumblr has something for everyone; due to the fact that hipsters tend to hate everything everybody can get a new and interesting viewpoint on the things that they know and love.
             

Short list addition

http://stuffhipstershate.tumblr.com/


This is a really funny tumblr feed

(Book log) The Sirens of Titan

The Sirens of Titan is probably my favorite novel of Vonnegut. It contains all of the various elements that are usually associated with Vonnegut: dark humor, wry observations, a protagonist who is swept up in an adventure of galactic importance, discussions of free will and destiny, and nothing less than the revealing of the ultimate purpose of the entire human race. With a description like that you’d think the book was a thousand word treatise on philosophy (or something equally as boring). Instead, what we get is a brightly colored carnival ride through time, space and the solar system in which we meet a host of characters whose seemingly insignificant actions end up having an effect on the course of human civilization.
       Where some might see Vonnegut’s ultimate revelation of civilization’s purpose as an absurdist slap in the face to those who want to believe in humanity’s central place in the cosmos, I tend to think of the final reveal as less important to the true aim of the book, which is to poke fun at all of the things we take too seriously in our lives – whether it’s religion, money, patriotism, beauty, or even love to some extent. Similarly to Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy Vonnegut spends most of the time in this book poking fun at everyone and everything in ways that not only serve to make us laugh, but also to ponder why the things we hold sacred are even sacred at all.
    Although searching for meaning and order in the universe is a hobby as old as time, the rituals and stories that we come up with to make sense of it all can be as detrimental to our personal well being and spiritual evolution as the emptiness and meaninglessness that they serve to mask. Vonnegut isn’t telling us that our lives have no meaning. Instead he is trying to warn us to be skeptical about the things that we assign meaning to and the conclusions that we draw from the meanings we give them.

Short List #2

1. It would be fun to do a photo-spread on a local band or get photos of a concert. Or make profiles for homestead's "Rappers".

2. Best of Memes week 2- Basically the same thing as the first one, just different memes.

3. Top 5 gaming videos?- A collection of the five most impressive gaming videos from YouTube. Though a majority of gaming videos on are from Call of Duty,

Spartan Reader- Best of Memes- Feb 2

The Best of Memes:
The Leo Strut-

A Meme is "An element of a culture or behavior that may be passed from one individual to another by non-genetic means, esp. imitation." They most commonly consist of photo-shopped screen shots from movies, and pointless YouTube. They are the "inside jokes" of the internet.

Stuff that caught my attention

Here are some things that caught my attention:
http://bygonebureau.com/2011/02/18/being-and-nothingness/

http://www.theselby.com/10_10_HennessyBarrels/


http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2008/11/09/60-beautiful-examples-of-night-photography-2/



http://www.alfaromeo.com/com/#/home

(Book Log) Disappointment

I'm starting to wish I had stopped reading the Space Odyssey series after 2001, for some reason I thought a sequel to one of the best Scifi books I've read would also be good. 2010 was written a little differently than 2001, but the suspense of the story kept me reading it. Now on 2061, the book seems pointless, the characters do exactly what you expect them to do, and the plot is stagnant. On top of that Clarke adds in misplaced and odd social commentary. Rather than the constant rising action that I saw in 2001, 2061 was filled with uneventful and un-inspiring descriptions of space-age life. Eventually I got tired of it and skipped 3 or 4 chapters and found that there actually a climax to this book. However, it was a short climax and it was followed by close to 150 more pages of boringness. So, I guess I have to find a new book series.

The "Short List"

 These are my options for the Spartan Reader blog-

Stuff similar to this.

Option#1) The Photo Essay: I have a DSLR so this shouldn't be too difficult. I would just need to find a good place to do it. I was thinking about doing one on Night.


Option#2) Best music of the week: I listen to a lot of music. Usually by the time something makes it to the iTunes featured page, I've already been listening to the band for a couple of weeks.

Option#3) Best of memes: Just random stuff from the internet that's funny or going viral. Examples: Nyan Cat, Arrow to the knee, "Ya don't say" ect, most of them consist of photo-shopped pictures. They're pretty much self explanatory.

Best Post

A Good Blog: There is nothing in the world but the mind its self; this blog actually feels like a real blog. Most people are still kinda figuring it out (including me), so a lot of posts feel disingenuous, (comparing them to someone giving a speech) it feels like they're proclaiming what ever they are saying with the utmost confidence and at the same time sweating profusely and shaking. On the other hand There is nothing in the world but the mind its self seems more honest and straight forward.

I'd rather be in the snow than inside reading...

A Scottish Tune

  

Peter Weir's 1989 classic, Dead Poets Society gives an ephemeral look into the world of the student at Welton Academy. The film begins with the year’s opening ceremony. A procession of students enters a stone chapel filled with family members as bag pipes drone in the background. Each student holds a banner bearing words like "EXCELLENCE", "VIRTUE", and "TRADITION". The Scottish tune played by the bag pipes gives the watcher a sense of the importance of this ceremony, as if the school is comparing its self a Scottish castle of old. While exuding this sense of self importance, the physical appearance and gait of the banner bearers have an ironic entropy to them that contrasts their environment. Combined with the pompous expression of the head master and the standards upon the walls, these elements contribute to the establishment of the setting in this first scene, from which, the rest of the movie can continue.

(Book Log) The Crystal Slab-- an MRI?

In the first few chapters of 2001: A Space Odyssey, Clarke covers the initial spark of humanity by telling the story of an Ape-Man named Moon-watcher and his group, which is on the verge of extinction. One day while scavenging, the group comes across a 15ft high transparent crystal slab which mesmerizes the group and somehow taps into their brains. It tests them and evaluates them, trying to get them to do and understand simple tasks. Finally after several days, Moon-watcher completes the task of throwing a rock, this is the initial spark of humanity that, according to Clarke, grew into what it is today. While the idea of mind reading technologies has been widely used in Sci-Fi, Clarke says that the Slab creates new, artificial pathways with-in the brain. Essentially, creating familiarity with task or idea so there is little to no learning curve. After Moon-watcher successfully completes the Crystal Slab's task, he gradually begins to exhibit signs of higher thought. This shows that the Slab created the necessary neural pathways to support higher thought. 

The idea of achieving anything like this was previously unheard of, but as of December 11th 2011 this technology is officially no longer fiction. The NSF (National Science Foundation) released a video describing a technique called Decoded Neural Feedback using a fMRI and its potential uses (see bottom for video). An article posted with the video said that it is:

 ...possible to use brain technology to learn to play a piano, reduce mental stress or hit a curve ball with little or no conscious effort... Experiments conducted at Boston University (BU) and ATR Computational Neuroscience Laboratories in Kyoto, Japan, recently demonstrated that through a person's visual cortex, researchers could use decoded functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to induce brain activity patterns to match a previously known target state and thereby improve performance on visual tasks...Think of a person watching a computer screen and having his or her brain patterns modified to match those of a high-performing athlete or modified to recuperate from an accident or disease...

It is interesting to see yet another technology predicted or imagined by a Sci-Fi author made into reality. We've seen the Trans-coder turn into the smart phone and countless authors predict inter-planetary travel. If you want to see technology that will be released in the next fifty years, look at the Sci-fi from the past hundred and fifty years. If someone has thought of it, it going to be invented.

While man tirelessly searches the skies, looking for some sign of  life, the idea that he and his intelligence are alone in this universe looms in the back of his mind. If at some point in the future, man looks at the sky and decides nobody is looking back, he may just forget his loneliness and abandon his search; or he may find that reality unbearable and take matters into his own hands. Who knows, maybe someday man will send his own probe to some far off planet and pass on the spark of intelligence that was given to him long ago.

Autobiography

I've been reading since before I can remember, but not seriously until I was in 3rd grade. At my elementary school there was a point based reading program, called Accelerated Reading, that gave you rewards if you earned a certain amount of points. The bigger and more complex books you read, the more points you got. While most kids were reading fifty page abridged versions of popular novels, a small group in my school began reading larger books to get more points. I read the Hobbit, the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and several of the Chronicles of Narnia, which put me in first place. This experience created several habits which I continued until very recently. First, starting in 3rd grade and continuing through 7th grade, I read every night until I fell asleep, this allowed me to read a large volume of literature because as time went on and my endurance got better. I could read from 9pm to 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning. The next thing that the Accelerated Reading program instilled in me was the hunger for knowledge. I learned a lot from the books I read, but as I exhausted all of the bookshelves in my house, I had to find another way to read. My solution was the Internet. Much of my reading on the Internet has consisted of tech blogs and finance sites like Investopedia.com. These sites have shaped my interests to include Science-Fiction. I have always liked Sci-Fi, but until recently, I hadn't realized its importance. Sci-Fi authors are modern day prophets, every day more things imagined by people like Clarke and Bradbury become reality thanks to Silicon Valley and Moores law. In addition to being a good place to look for the future of man kind, Sci-Fi tells us a lot about the present. By moving social and political issues to a different time and place, Sci-Fi gives us a different perspective on the problems that effect us and removes our preconceived notions.