The Folded Sky (White Space)
We evolved to reproduce, not to thrive. Thriving was aspirational, and then it was accessible but perceived as a luxury, and then we were barely existing as a species, hanging on by our fingernails amid those same disasters that nearly took out the aspen forests.
Elizabeth Bear • The Folded Sky (White Space)
A more predatory syster might need rightminding to control their urge to eat their coworkers. And we need rightminding to prevent our desire for a narrative from spawning endless conspiracy theories and justifications for things we were going to do anyway.
Elizabeth Bear • The Folded Sky (White Space)
Entropy requires no maintenance. Order and intelligibility do. Sentient life—all life—is just organized information. Disorganized information is the buzz of static. Decay to the signal increases with distance, with time (which is just another kind of distance), and with interference.
Elizabeth Bear • The Folded Sky (White Space)
Information doesn’t want to be free. Information wants to vanish without a trace. It wants to slurp down the drain like soapy water planetside, a slick Coriolis whirl and then—gone. Vamoosed. Kaput.
Elizabeth Bear • The Folded Sky (White Space)
We evolved to reproduce, not to thrive. Thriving was aspirational, and then it was accessible but perceived as a luxury, and then we were barely existing as a species, hanging on by our fingernails amid those same disasters that nearly took out the aspen forests.
Elizabeth Bear • The Folded Sky (White Space)
A more predatory syster might need rightminding to control their urge to eat their coworkers. And we need rightminding to prevent our desire for a narrative from spawning endless conspiracy theories and justifications for things we were going to do anyway.
Elizabeth Bear • The Folded Sky (White Space)
Entropy requires no maintenance. Order and intelligibility do. Sentient life—all life—is just organized information. Disorganized information is the buzz of static. Decay to the signal increases with distance, with time (which is just another kind of distance), and with interference.
Elizabeth Bear • The Folded Sky (White Space)
Information doesn’t want to be free. Information wants to vanish without a trace. It wants to slurp down the drain like soapy water planetside, a slick Coriolis whirl and then—gone. Vamoosed. Kaput.