Cory Doctorow: "I, Row-Boat" (Flurb: 2006); "When Sysadmins Ruled the Earth" (Jim Baen's Universe: 2006)
(Student response to either/both of these short stories are due by 4/16/08)
On "I, Row-Boat":
Both stories are in this collection:
To read the story: Click Here
To listen to the story: Click Here
My first reaction when I read it a month ago:
Just when I thought my course long research and teaching of the history of Science Fiction short stories this semester was leaving me somewhat jaded... I came across Cory Doctorow's fascinating short story "I, Row-Boat" (2006), originally published in the first issue of Flurb, and which I found in Gardner Dozois's The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Fourth Annual Collection. Robbie the Row-Boat is one of my all-time favorite characters and Doctorow's story through it's vision of uniquely uplifted sentiences, AI avatars and downloaded humans gives us another opportunity to ponder the meaning of it all.
Then I popped online to do some research and I come across this report:
Constructing Life Creates Questions of Ethics
Talk of the Nation (NPR)
Scientists are getting closer to creating artificial life in the lab. But is society ready for custom-made organisms? Synthetic biology has the potential to dramatically change fields from agriculture to medicine to zoology. But how will society cope with the ability for a lone researcher to — for example — build a polio virus from scratch in a private lab?
Paul Rabinow, author of Making PCR: A Story of Biotechnology, and Drew Endy, an MIT professor of biological engineering, talk with guest host Joe Palca about the promise and potential perils of synthetic biology. What protections need to be in place as research proceeds?
To Listen to the Episode
More on biotechnology
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On "When Sysadmins Ruled the Earth":
Our copy is from:
I also noticed it is in my copy of this book:
Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse
for the audio fans: listen to it here
and if anyone is fluent in french you might want to read it in translation: French Fan-Translation
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More about Cory Doctorow:
Information want to be free—and so does writer Cory Doctorow, who celebrates the new technologies that will change science fiction forever (Interview in Sci Fi Weekly: 2006)
Tim O'Reilly: Piracy is Progressive Taxation, and Other Thoughts on the Evolution of Online Distribution (Cory Doctorow recommends this article and is also an advocate of Creative Commons)
Cory Doctorow and JT discuss copyright issues (Kottke.org: 2007)
Boing Boing Cory Doctorow co-edits this popular and important online journal.
Craphound Doctorow's personal website which includes this bio (scan down and check out the organizations he serves)
Metacrap: Putting the torch to seven straw-men of the meta-utopia (Well: 2001)
Wikipedia: Cory Doctorow
Microsoft Research DRM talk (Redmond, CA: 2004)
Video Talk About his Short Story Collection Overclocked
Also here:
posted by Michael Benton @ 2:09 PM
6 comments
6 Comments:
“When Sysadmins Ruled the Earth”
Cory Doctorow
Overall, this was an enjoyable story. Several funny parts, some touching, many unsettling. I certainly don’t like the idea of mass destruction and chaos that occurs in the story. It is possible that the situations described in the story could happen. But all at once… that would truly be something!
I found the story fairly easy to follow. The “geek” talk was mostly decipherable, although I am not familiar with every reference made. (Perhaps if I worked at an Apple Store?) I enjoyed the banter between Felix and the various characters: Felix and Queen Kong, Felix and Van, Felix and Rosa. They used both traditional English mixed with what I will call ‘Cyber-English’. I find some of it annoying, but, I do love an abbreviation.
I liked the real aspects of the story. It gave a very personal overtone that I think could allow many to connect with the story. The death of the wife and child, Van’s need for medicine, etc, all make for realistic situations in which we could all find ourselves. In regards to the computer connection, and how we rely on so much of our world to run on these boxes of plastic and metal, I am torn. I love computers. I think they do many great and wonderful things. But I also think they can be used for harm. The fact that systems crash daily, viruses, worms and such wreak havoc….. It’s all a little disenchanting.
Paul W. Holland
ENG 230
Sentience is such a hard thing to conceive, it is kind of like thinking your thoughts. With a limited knowledge of sentience, it is hard to tell who/ what is a sentient being and who determines if this if a quality unique to being human? Further, does being a sentient being or being a human endow someone/ something with rights? Humans certainly have rights, but we are giving birth to a new moral dilemma. What about artificial intelligence. Even if we produce intelligence, that being may resemble humans, be intelligent, and suffer. It seems like all of the arguments given for why humans are unique, always prove false. You can’t say that intelligence makes humans unique, what about retarded humans who have very simple minds? The argument that AI is everlasting doesn’t work, because the duration of a life should have no measure in its quality. In the 1800s people lived half as long as they do now; the life expectancy given to humans now would shock those of the 1800s. Also, most humans have compassion, a quality that can also exist with AI. I know I wouldn’t have the ability to view a robot who looked like me, and who was being hurt. I would have to interfere. When I watched Artificial Intelligence I cried, it was one of the saddest movies I have ever seen, I strongly desired that the robots in the movie weren’t treated so badly. But I guess that very often in history, humans have let other humans be murdered, enslaved, and abused, so why would they spare a second glance for a being with artificial intelligence?
Robbie the Row-boat is a sentient being, just like humans. This is a very scary thing for humans, what if AI surpasses our own intelligence and robots outlive humans? Is that thought really that threatening, we all die anyway? The row-boat possessed all of the characteristics of a human, so I don’t see why he shouldn’t enjoy the same rights as humans, unless we can prove what makes humans unique. -alyssa mckinney
I really enjoy any post apocalyptic story, so “When Sysadmins ruled the Earth” was my kind of thing. I guess it makes me rethink the importance and fragility of life, and forces me to ask “what would I do?” At times, this story made me really nervous but at other times, I was disgusted. Although some of the gross things were funny, like when he mentions the room smelling like a dingle berry. I would go crazy in an environment like that. This story followed system administrators, people I see as unlikely survivors of disaster. Yet, they survive with their computers and the internet. The internet continued to exist, kind of like cockroaches who can survive radiation. I know this is true because I saw it on Myth busters.
Personally, I wouldn’t have wasted my time on the computer if the world had practically ended, I would focus my attention on finding survivors, finding food, shelter, and reestablishing life without the use of computers. Computers haven’t always been around, they aren’t necessary to survive, begin a government, or reproduce. However, maybe there is something to using a network to survive because all of the sysadmins lived by running to their computers. Cory Doctorow realizes the importance of the internet, and the wealth it brings to the world; he sees the internet as underrated.
Cory Doctorow said this of his collection of stories in “Overclocked”, “They are a collection of stories that explore the problem space of the singularity, technological liberty and the social impact of technology, which I think is the purest example of what science fiction is for.” Technology, much to my dismay, is becoming more and more important. Technology is changing the world, and came sometimes be for the worse or the better. Science Fiction predicts many issues that will eventually become a reality.
-alyssa mckinney
I really enjoyed "When Sysadmins Ruled The Earth". I thought it was very easy to read and it was a good story. My first thought when the CN Tower was falling was the Twin Towers and 9-11. The chaos that everyone seemed to feeling with the phones not working and Felix's family dying reminded me of what some people went through with 9-11. I kind of find it hard to believe that they decided to stay in the building and keep working with the computers instead of going out and looking for their families. But I guess that is just a choice you make when the time comes. I do not really know what I would do until I was actually put in that situation. I would like to say that the story seemed kind of far fetched, but I really do not think that it is.
I really enjoyed reading I Row-boat. I really felt sorry for Robbie though through out the story because it kind of seemed like he was not sure of himself. Although he was very sweet to the humans and followed the three rules that he had to follow, he seemed to lack self-confidence. This story made me think of the movie I, Robot when all the robots were treated bad. It kind of made me sad and in this story Robbie kind of made me sad to. It just really made me think that if robots like Robbie actually existed I am not sure that humans could handle it. I think that it would upset them because there was something else out there that was almost as smart as them. Even though the robots were only there for the humans benefit, i think that they would still be mean to them and not let them have to much feeling because humans do not want to create something that could possibly have more power than we do.
"When Sysadmins Ruled the Earth" was a pretty interesting story to read! In most stories ive read about world destruction or seen it in movies the main content is based on the human emotions involved throughout the process, so this was pretty interesting in the fact that the utmost important aspect to be saving while destruction ensued was technology. Felix claimed to be feeling sick at the loss of his wife and child, but decided not to go check on them but rather continue to help try and save the internet. I felt as if this story might have taught a lesson: the world does not need to rely solely on technology, specifically computers and the internet. The internet has become a part of most peoples daily lives and it really does make you wonder what would happen if it began to completely crash one day? I think this story revealed that technology and the internet are also preventing people from relating in a human way. For instance, when Felix decides to stay to help save the internet rather than his family, clearly his emotional bond seems to be with the internet and not his family. It seems as though this story may be an extreme idea of where our world could be headed with the ever growing reliance on the comuter and internet.
Jessica Crawford
Eng 230
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