Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy, comp.society.futures, rec.arts.sf.written rec.arts.sf.science, sci.space.policy, alt.history.future Subject: Deep Future according to Stephen Baxter. Author: Simon Laub Date: April 23 2002 It seems to me that science fiction guru Stephen Baxter is obsessed with time, trying to get a handle on it. Figuring out what it really is. But a heroic attempt it is amidst frail human complacency. Stephen Baxters "Time" has one of the best time- jumping sequences in recent SF, during which the protagonist witness the entire future of the universe. Even better though is the hints concerning how "our unimaginably distant descendants". The far downstreamers (= our god-like descendants), who are reaching back through time, shaping our current world in order to create more mind and more intelligence. For thats the purpose of Time and Space, setting the stage for intelligence. The more of it the better. In the Manifold series Baxter describes the future of a number of universes (the multiverse) that are in fact all our universe. An infinite number of universes connected by a common origin. In manifold 1, Time, genius kids, receives knowledge from "our unimaginably distant descendants", the far downstreamers (through a Feynman "radio" where you listen to the future and, by detecting coded quantum waves traveling back through time, divine the fate of human "downstreamers"?) I.e. Eventually the kids transform the structure of space, via the vacuum collapse, where they destroy the current reality but produce a universe where more intelligent species exist. Creating a storm of mind. Manifold 3, Origin, is a little different. The idea is the same though? Again it seems to me that Baxter imagines that humans survives indefinitely and that our unimaginably distant descendents, distressed with the finitude of time, eventually reaches back and triggers changes which results in a universe with an infinite number of parallel branches, yielding an infinite amount of subjective time? Pretty close to saying G*d? The idea is the same though. More space and more time equals more mind. If the purpose of time and space is more mind we are led to the Fermi's Paradox, which asks the simple question, if there are other creatures in the universe like us, where are they? In Manifold 1, Time, the answer was that we are alone - with these genetically engineered intelligent squids. The genius kids "enlarges" our universe though, with the possibility of more mind as a result. In Manifold 2, Space, it turned out that the other technological civilizations just hadn't gottan here yet, Finally, Manifold 3, Origin, states that our universe was made without aliens, by ourselfes/downstreamers, for protection. But always with the far downstreamers sitting there in the future making sure that we arive at the optimum condition for mind. The goal seems clear, something like the Omega Point of Chardin. The trip less clear - but something like a handshake between them, our children, the far downstreamers and us across time with a mind explosion as the hoped for result. I feel that Stephen Baxters new book "Deep Future" (published 2002 in Great Britain) works as a kind of background information to the Manifold series. Starting with the close future. Stephen Baxters starts out easy with some neat gadgets. E.g. the "recording angel" - that sits on your shoulder and transcribes your meetings, the evolution of your thoughts etc. - It will of course be a brilliant thing for the authorities - Later individuals are joined together in an "internet of the mind", to make an extension of our present selfes,- to me, it seems rather inevitable. But, actually I don't think we are presented with that many surprises by Stephen Baxter in the immediate future. The deep future is that more exciting. Great nations (companies?) should afford something more than welfare programmes (if they want to survive). And surely if the dinosaurs had had a spaceprograme they might have been around today. So space bound we must be.... It might even be, as David Brin has suggested, that humanity is currently being farmed by alien "space-friends" for an interstellar future. Though, I imagine, Stephen Baxter would say that our own children, the far downstreamers, are doing the farming. But off we go to the very deep future and the heath death of the universe. Where our very distant descendants will try to survive there in a "universe in ruins", when the stars are long gone. Here Stephen Baxters presentation also seem rather inevitable. Rather disappointing though, Stephen Baxter doesn't attempt to describe the far downstreamers in any detail. Personally I think there are a number of possibilities for creating these godlike children. - Where, In Western religions God is described as omniscient and omnipotent. - Moore's law of computer power tells us that computer power is doubling every 18 months. According to Ray Kurzweil, in the book "the age of spiritual machines", computational power will appear nearly infinite (i.e. omniscient) as early as 2050. When, if, this happens it will make the previous 100.000 years of evolution seem like something going at a snails pace. Somehow approaching science to religion ? At least these beings would appear to us as omniscient and omnipotent. A neutron star is the superdense remnant of a supernova explosion. The original star collapses to a state where gravity overcomes repulsion between electrons and protons, forming a sea of neutrons. According to Hans Moravec life there could exist as a pattern of bounded neutrons. With a breakneck speed of metabolism. Where organisms live and die within 10e-15 seconds. entire civilisations might be formed within a fraction of a second. Advanced civilisations might create such neutron stars in order to use them as computers. Some 10e30 more powerful than the human brain. My own addendum to this is that it would be neat to press things even further and install computers in the fabric of spacetime itself. Smash the neutron star a bit further and create a black hole, which explodes into a new universe (big bang) with the new order (computer) installed in its very fabric of space and time. According to Stephen Baxters "Time" you would be listening to the future, by detecting coded quantum waves traveling back through time in your Feynman radio. And our distant descendants (?) would inform you that a vacuum collapse is what is needed (at least, according to Stephen Baxter)? This seemed a bit "easy" to me though - wouldn't you rather get something like the Omega digits? Where the first n digits of Omega represent the probability that a program that's less than n bits long will stop (when translated into binary from whatever programming language being used). As most problems can be recast as a halting problems, Omegas first few thousand digits contains the answer to more (mathematical) questions than can be written down in the entire universe. Problems in math, physics and elsewhere would be settled by knowing Omega. But of course knowing Omega might still prompt you to make a vacuum collapse :-) Still, maybe we could actually be a bit practical about it here - why not ask the SETI folks to listen for Omega now? Maybe our friends out there have started the Omega broadcast? The only problem is of course that the (apparently) random Omega digits would look a whole lot like random noise! But surely Omega will tell you all you want to know about time. -Simon ------------------ Simon Laub www.silanian.subnet.dk