Michael Tinker Pearce's Blog, page 4

The Matrix Has You.

Here’s something to chew on- a few years ago there was a study done concerning the beliefs of liberals and conservatives. The questions were carefully formulated to avoid partisanship and political buzzwords. The study found two interesting things- the first being that the beliefs of self-proclaimed ‘Liberals’ and ‘Conservatives’ were 80% similar. This means that we have four time as much in common as we disagree on.

The second thing was that among these groups on average there was only roughly 87% agreement with other people of their own self-proclaimed affiliation.

Think about that.

Other studies since have shown that both sides dramatically exaggerate the negative qualities of people on the other side of the political spectrum.

Here’s the thing- the internet encourages this; people ‘narrowcast’ to only view things that they agree with. I have friends from all across the political spectrum, and I read, consider and fact-check the memes they post. Over 70% of these posts are distortions if not outright lies- on both sides of the political divide.

So, my friends on the Left and the Right, it seems that if we abandon our prejudices we have hugely more in common than we thought. We keep ourselves from seeing this by focussing only on things that support our beliefs and ignoring anything that we disagree with. We disregard out of hand anything that does not support our ‘party line.’ This is helped along by the leadership on the left and right, because blind prejudice keeps us at each other’s throats and keeps us from thinking about what is really happening to this country. Make us fight over the 20% difference in our beliefs instead of focussing on the 80% we have in common, because if we do that we might see through the veil of lies and bullshit and move to stop them.  We live in virtual worlds based on lies and illusions as surely as the people in the movie ‘The Matrix.’

It’s a lot easier to simply demonize the other side. Equate ‘Liberal’ with communists and socialists. Equate ‘Conservative’ with redneck sensibilities, ignorance and facism. It’s easier to spend all our energy hating each other than to look for common ground and compromise. And while we do this our country has been stolen out from under us.

This country has had Liberals and Conservatives since the very beginning. For two hundred years they achieved workable compromises and generally kept the country moving forward. This is no longer the case. Ask yourself- who benefits? Who gains from us being at each other’s throats instead of working together, compromising and moving the country forward?

Follow the money.

The only way we are going to be able to take back this country is if we can all put aside the 20% difference, open our eyes and hearts to the truth and stop being sheep and believing without question. Stop the bastards that are taking our country and our freedom. Get the country moving forward again, rebuild the middle class, always the strength of this great nation.

Sure, we quibble about the details- but for now we have bigger problems. Fix those and we’ll have the luxury of all the time we need to argue about our differences.

Moving Ahead into 2015: Crafting the Next Phase of Life

I had a bit of an epiphany the other day, but there’s some background that goes with that.

I had some unpleasant experiences in the military and while we don’t need to go into details it resulted in some issues for me- things that I could not deal with because I could not talk about the source of those issues. I also had migraines because of those experiences, so I found it difficult to maintain a normal job. I found ways around that eventually, like becoming a self-employed knife and sword maker. But the issues related to my service became a ticking time bomb.  It finally detonated in October 2011, and I experienced what could only be called an emotional collapse.

My wife is a fantastic person. She supported me through that period when I could barely function and made sure I got the help that I needed from the VA and other sources. The VA has become rather good at dealing with PTSD in recent years and knew how to help. I also found a therapist through Washington State’s own veterans aid programs. In October 2013 the VA agreed that I was partially disabled and assigned me a modest disability pension.

Never in my adult life have I felt ‘normal.’ Whatever that is. I always felt isolated to some degree. Broken. But I did the best I could and all in all have to say that it was if nothing else a pretty interesting life, at least from my point of view. I also achieved significant success in my chosen profession. But since my collapse I have felt disabled.  At least unconsciously. I have still managed to accomplish things and returned my life to a semblance of normality, but inside I was always conscious that I was broken.

Now for the epiphany: Yes, I am in some ways broken. So what? I’ve basically been broken my entire adult life. Driving a race car? Broken. Flying a plane? Broken.  IPSC competition, learning historic swordsmanship, riding horses, teaching martial arts, becoming a world-renowned sword maker? Writing tens of thousand of words of articles, working on classic cars, writing books? Broken. The whole time. So what if I’m still broken?

Arguably after years of therapy and treatment I am less broken now than I was when I did and accomplished all of those things.  I could finally get everything out in the open, understand and integrate it. Most importantly forgive myself.  Yes, I am partially disabled, but that isn’t new. The only difference is that now I am aware of it and have done something about it.

I can’t go back, nor would I want to. What I can do is move ahead. Craft the life we want to live now, with all the care and attention I would give to crafting a sword or a novel. That’s what 2015 is about for us- moving ahead with the life we want to live.

I think we’ll skip the resolutions this year- we’ll have our plate full enough.

Interstellar Flight- In the Near Future?

Last year a group of very smart people launched something called ‘The Hundred-Year Starship’ program. The purpose of this was to identify and develop key technologies that would allow us to launch the first starship, about a century from now.  The project envisions sending a fusion-powered robotic probe on a decades-long flight to a nearby star system.  It’s ambitious far-sighted… and possibly already obsolete.

This article is all about ‘maybes.’ I’m a science-fiction writer, so that seems appropriate enough. The thing is that there are some very promising technologies on the horizon that may radically change our capability to travel interplanetary and even interstellar distances.

First, let’s talk about power. No matter what type of propulsion system an interstellar vehicle uses it’s going to take power. A lot of it.

Well, a lot of spacecraft use solar power. How about that? No. First off you would need really big solar panels.  The second problem is dust. Not getting all over the panels- destroying them. At ten percent of the speed of light even a particle of dust is going to hit like a cannon shell.  Your solar panels would be a shredded mess long before you got to your destination. Whether you are using an electromagnetic or plasma shield or just a bug hunk of metal it’s pretty easy to shield the ship.  Make the ship long and thin so it has less frontal area and protect it. Not something that is easy to do for honking great big solar arrays.

No, you need a power source that is compact, puts out a lot of power and will keep doing so for years. That means nuclear power. That’s not really bad news though; what most people don’t realize is that the reactors they are most familiar with are forty-to-fifty year old designs, and the people that build reactors have not been sitting on their laurels. Modern fission reactors are hugely safer, smaller and more efficient than they were when we stopped building nuclear power-plants.  They have a lot of advantages for long-duration spaceflight.

Now looming on the horizon however are genuinely practical fusion reactors. Lockheed-Martin’s Skunkworks claims that by 2017 they will have a working 50 megawatt fusion reactor that would fit in a semi-trailer. This is to be followed in 2020 by a 100 megawatt reactor. By the time we’re ready to build a starship powering it may not be an issue.

So what about the engines? The best rocket- a fusion drive- that we can currently envision would require tens of thousands of tons of fuel and take 80-100 years to reach a nearby star system. That’s actually really fast. The Matter-Antimatter annihilation drive might shave a few years off that, but it’s highly problematic and ruinously expensive.

Reaction engines, whether they are chemical rockets, plasma or ion drives, nuclear or antimatter, are at the heart of it devices for throwing away fuel. You eject the fuel in one direction and the reaction pushes you the other direction. You need to either throw vast amounts of fuel or small amounts very, very fast. It’s a Newtonian thing.

Of course you aren’t just using the fuel to push the ship; you need to push the fuel too. The more fuel you need the more fuel you need to push the fuel. The Space Shuttle carried fifteen times it’s own weight in fuel just to get into orbit. Don’t forget that you need to slow down at the other end and you need to carry fuel for that, too. There are real diminishing returns involved. You cannot carry enough fuel for a chemical rocket to accelerate to a useful interstellar speed. Nuclear or plasma engines might be able to, but it’s still going to take a lot of fuel.

Wouldn’t it be nice if you could do away with that reaction mass? Of course that would violate the rules of physics. Or would it? Two new types of propulsion systems are showing great promise.  They appear to violate the laws of physics, or at least go around them. For one of these drives we have a very good idea of how it works, but we’re not quite sure that it is possible.  The other apparently works, but we’re not sure how.

The second of these was invented more or less at the same time by researchers in the USA and England. For convenience we’ll refer to these as ‘Quantum Thrusters.’  We don’t need to get into a lot of detail here, but basically you feed it electricity and it turns it into thrust.  What it doesn’t do is create exhaust; it’s not a rocket and we’re not sure exactly what it is doing.  But tests at NASA and a laboratory in China indicate that it seems to work. This could be the key to interplanetary travel, possibly even interstellar travel.  If everything works out this drive could propel a spacecraft to Mars in a matter of a few weeks instead of eight to twelve months, and to a nearby star in thirty years instead of eighty to one hundred years. It would also do so more efficiently because you aren’t pushing a ludicrous amount of reaction mass.

The other option is Warp Drive. I’m not kidding. How does it work? The short answer is ‘just like on Star Trek.’  You engage the drive, it creates a ‘warp bubble’ around the ship and you zoom off at faster-than-light speeds.  How fast? How about a week or two to reach a nearby star instead of a century?  This has been the subject of science fiction for quite a long time, and now it seems to be a real possibility. The method for doing this was originally described in 1991 by a physisist named Alcubierre. The problem was that the amount of energy required was prohibitive. Like the amount of energy you’d get if you converted the mass of Jupiter directly into energy. Since then the calculations and design have been refined to the point that NASA says if the theory is correct it will still require massive amounts of energy, but it’s do-able.

In the fall of 2013 NASA reported ‘significant non-negative results’ in their attempt to create tiny space-warps and measure them. In scientist-speak this translates to, “We’re pretty sure it works.” Tests have continued and other institutions are working to verify the results. Several labs around the globe now have or are building ‘warp-field interferometers’ to measure space-warps. How’s that for science fiction coming true?

NASA even revealed a concept design for a warp-drive spacecraft.  Yeah, it’s a publicity stunt as much as anything, but still… NASA showed us an idea of what a real starship could look like, and they think they have the goods to back it up. We are living in interesting times indeed!

A warp drive does get us around a major problem that most people overlook when talking about robotic probes that take decades to reach their destination. Can we even build a super-complicated machine that can operate for thirty to a hundred years? Without maintenance?  Frankly this is a greater technological hurdle than making an engine that can get it there.  The answer is ‘Probably someday.’  After all we’ve got a rover trundling around on Mars that was supposed to have given up the ghost years ago.  A starship is a lot more complicated, or course.  But it’s doable eventually.

That’s the real cause for celebration and hope. For the first time serious scientist are looking at interstellar travel and they have gone from saying ‘It’s possible’ to ‘It’s do-able.’  And if it’s do-able you can bet that sooner or later we will do it.  Maybe sooner than we think…

The High-Tech Luddite

I don’t think this is going to come as a big surprise to anyone, but the older I get the more I find myself appreciating old stuff.  What is surprising is that while this preference has an element of nostalgia about it that isn’t what it’s all about. Some old stuff is just better than new stuff, because new products don’t necessarily mean better products.  Often products change because the new way of doing it is more profitable, not better.

Disposable, multi-blade razors are an example.  These were invented not because we needed better razors; the manufacturers needed more profitable razors.  There was nothing wrong with double-edged safety razors.  Generally speaking they offer a better shave and are hugely more economical to use. They simply didn’t make as much money as the manufacturers wanted, so they offered a ‘new, improved’ product that wasn’t an improvement.

Major appliances, we have discovered, aren’t better unless you pay a huge premium.  When we went to buy a new stove we were told that the anticipated lifespan of stoves for under a thousand dollars was three to five years. Sadly this was consistent with our own experience. While pondering our options we ran across a circa 1950 Hotpoint stove that worked and was in very good condition. “What the hell,” I told Linda. “It’s worked for the last sixty years, it isn’t likely to quit tomorrow.” In fact it has served us quite well for the last four years.  When we can afford it we’ll have the wiring modernized to make it safer, but other than that were quite happy with it.

I shoot recreationally and sometimes hunt, and I’ve always had a thing for double-barreled shotguns. Now people make some damn nice shotguns these days.  The problem is the price of admission is pretty high– the low end, good quality utilitarian guns start at around $800 and prices go up rapidly. How far up? How much have you got? If you really want to it’s not even difficult to drop 30-40 thousand on a shotgun.  Obviously I am not going to be doing that short of winning the lottery. Honestly probably not even then.

Fortunately there is once again a ‘but…’ If you know what you are doing, shop carefully and are willing to accept some limitations you can pick up a damned nice antique double for a few hundred dollars.  You will want to avoid modern Magnum and Express loads, but most of these guns are as usable today as they were a century ago when they were made. If you have any doubt you can always have a gunsmith look it over. Many of these weapons cross the line between craftsmanship and artistry, and the sheer joy of handling and examining these firearms is an exceptional value… not to mention you can actually shoot them.

Don’t get me wrong- the computer that I am typing this on is state-of-the-art. There are some areas where older is most definitely not better. Automobiles are an example. I love classic cars and I’ve owned and driven more than a few.  I like the details and style, the feel of driving them and of having something special.  But I don’t delude myself- modern cars are better. Period. A stock Honda Civic will eat a 1970’s vintage Ferrari Dino alive on a racetrack. Many old cars need the engine rebuilt every fifty thousand miles (or less.) Most modern cars will go further than that before they even need a tune-up.  New cars accelerate better, go faster, stop quicker, use less fuel and have a host of safety systems undreamed of even a couple of decades ago.

Televisions, telephones, anything electronic is better now than it has ever been. We can keep a library on a device the size of a pack of cigarettes, and our entire ‘record’ collection will fit on a device the size of a matchbook- and the only reason it’s that big is to accommodate controls and a head-set. Information technology is advancing and it pays to keep up.

So I take my nostalgia with a grain of salt, but if something old is better I don’t go for something new just because it’s the latest and greatest, and I don’t go for something old just because it’s old. Moderation and a thoughtful level of balance… another old-fashioned idea.

What is Science Fiction?

Science Fiction is simply speculative fiction with deals with events dictated by science and technology. It is usually set in the future, but the defining characteristic is that the story could not occur without the intervention of a particular scientific or technological development.

That’s the classic definition. The largest division is between Hard and Soft science fiction.  ‘Hard SF’ or ‘Hard Science’ SF attempts to be rigorously accurate in it’s descriptions of science and technology.  ‘2001: a Space Odyssey‘ could not happen without the sentient computer HAL, interplanetary spacecraft etc. The main technologies of the book, while not existing at the time it was written, are rendered in accordance with the best scientific understanding of the time in which it was written.  Many early science fiction stories were predicated on things like orbital mechanics and other scientific principles or emerging theories.

Soft SF maintains scientific underpinnings but is not rigorous in it’s descriptions of science and technology and is often focussed on ‘soft’ sciences like sociology. Star Wars could not happen without interstellar flight, blasters and light-sabers but none of these technologies are explained or even necessarily accurately depicted.  In War of the Worlds the aliens have heat-rays and giant tripodal war machines which are central to the story but again, not explained in scientific terms.

Of course a lot of SF straddles the line between these two divisions, and even Hard SF will generally allow for at least one technology (often Faster-than-light travel) that is not rigorously explained. Sub-genres also frequently cross over between the categories as well.  Military Science Fiction is a good example of this; frequently having a firm underpinning in existing technology can give the story an enhanced sense of reality, but some authors manage the same feeling of reality be rigorously adhering to ‘made-up’ science.  David Weber’s Honor Harrington series fits this well; the universe feels real because the tech and scientific principles are well understood and consistent even if they do not necessarily represent rigorous accuracy.

Speculative fiction often starts with a scientific idea based on an emerging technology or scientific theory and explores the social ramifications of that technology. ‘Beggars in Spain‘ by Nancy Kress explores the potential ramifications of genetic engineering by creating humans that do not sleep and discussing how this affects society. Mind you the central element of the plot did not represent the best scientific thinking of it’s day, but it’s well thought out, well written and compelling. Well worth reading.

Our own novel ‘Diaries of a Dwarven Rifleman‘ could be described as Hard SF set in a medieval fantasy world.  The central technology that enables the story to occur (Large-caliber air-guns) is rigorously researched, and every technology in the story is fully consistent with modern scientific understanding. Even the one departure from this rule, magic, operates in a science-like fashion and follows scientific principles. The creation of the dwarves is ambiguous- was it magic or science? Or both? Is there a difference and does it matter?  Not to the story, so it’s never really addressed.

Our second novel ‘Rage of Angels‘ is both Hard SF and Military SF. It was especially cool for me because for the first time we could use warp physics and ‘reactionless’ thrusters as Hard Science. How cool is that?  Mind you while I did a lot of research and very, very complicated math to insure that everything would work as advertised we only explain things in the book that are relevant to the story.  The reader doesn’t need to see the math to feel it’s presence.

The point, I suppose, is that the term ‘Science Fiction’ takes in a lot of territory, and means a lot of different things but science, good, bad or indifferent, is always at the core.

I am a Badass?

Recently I published an excerpt from the upcoming sequel to ‘Diaries of a Dwarven Rifleman,’ ‘Lord of the North.’ One reader responded, “Engvyr is a badass!”  I was, I confess, a bit surprised.  It had never occurred to me that my main character could be characterized that way. After thinking about I realized, “Oh my God– He is a badass!”  I wondered how I could ever have missed it…

I commented on this to Linda and she said, “Of course he’s a badass– he’s you.”

*blink*

Wait– I’m a badass? Um… I don’t think so… really?

The thing is all of our characters have something of us in them. As a writer you can’t help but inject yourself into a character. But you don’t have to be a badass to write a badass. You don’t have to be evil to write an evil character and you don’t have to be a genius to write a genius.

I can’t do the things Engvyr does.  Not just because I’d go to jail, either. Engvyr is not a badass because I am; he’s a badass because he is. As I am writing I am not thinking, “What would I do?” I’m thinking, “What would I do if I lived in his world, had his skills, upbringing and life-experience?”  Those are the things that make Engvyr a badass, not me. To one extent or another we writers do that with every character we write; we think, “What would I do in this situation if I were them?”  The better you ‘get’ the character the more successful this is.  The reader never gets jolted out of the story because someone does something inconsistent.  This means of course that you need to really grasp your character, the world they live in and how they interact, how they have been shaped by the history of that world and their personal history.

One of the things that affects Engvyr and all the dwarven characters is their lifespan.  They live up to three hundred years and this shapes them, and their culture, in ways that are not immediately obvious. They speak of decades the way we speak of years. For example dwarves tend to be environmentally responsible. When a human looks at something that is going to be a problem in a hundred years he shrugs- it won’t be his problem. But a dwarf is still going to be there and it will be his problem.  When a dwarf makes something, from a weapon to a footstool, he builds it to last decades because if it doesn’t he’ll have to replace it.

It really changes everything.  Our dwarves know about mass-production but generally apply it only to things like military gear. Why? Because things are made to last because they have to be.  If a dwarf buys a chair from you and it wears out in fifty years he’ll buy the next one from someone else. Mass production doesn’t work for dwarves because the market forces created by their long lives changes their definition of what constitutes a ‘quality’ product, and their definition does not allow for a ‘disposable’ consumer society.

Gillette looks at the idea of a razor and says, ‘This needs to cost enough that we can make a profit while still being cheap enough that our customers won’t mind throwing it away and buying another one.’ It doesn’t matter that if everyone throws away three razors a month in a hundred years they will be buried under them. They’ll be dead and it will be someone else’s problem.

A dwarf looks at the idea of a razor and says, “How can I make this so that my customer will still be happy with it in a hundred years?” Because that customer is still going to be around in a hundred years, and if all his customers were throwing away three of them a month he would personally be buried in them.  Since he is not mass producing them he doesn’t need to sell huge quantities to justify ‘tooling up’ to mass produce them.  Yes, they cost a lot more than the disposable item… but buying one is an investment; you can justify spending more if it is going to useful for decades or centuries.

When writing our dwarves we have to always take the long view.  Not because dwarves are wise, but because they have learned through bitter experience that if they don’t take the long view they, personally, will have to deal with the consequences.  It changes everything from the way they view consumer goods to foreign policy. As their writers we have to bear that in mind.

This rubs off on us.  Earlier this fall I was looking for some disposable razors and chanced across an old-fashioned double-edged safety razor. I decided to try it even though it was great deal more expensive than a pack of disposables.  The result? Quality. The ‘new’ razor was designed to last. A blade lasts a month instead of a week, and it produces an excellent shave. Because if it didn’t I would buy a different brand of blade next time, so market forces have insured that these blades will be as good as the manufacturer can make them. As for the handle I’ll probably still be using it until I die- because it works and will keep working and it’s cheaper than buying inferior disposable razors.  I have a better shave and over the next few decades will save a small fortune.

Those Dwarves may be on to something here…

Universal Background Checks for Handgun Sales in Washington State

Should anyone wishing to purchase a handgun or other firearm have to submit to a background check, whether it is a private or commercial sale? The fact is all commercial sales require this already.  All the larger gun shows require that you be a member of the sponsoring organization to make a purchase of a firearm- and membership requires a background check. I am told there are gun shows in this state that do not require this, but certainly most the larger shows in western Washington do.

But a private citizen can contact another private citizen and purchase a firearm with no formality at all. This could and perhaps does allow people not legally allowed to own a firearm to obtain them.  Mind you I haven’t seen any documentation of this but I have no difficulty believing that it happens.  If I were a criminal and wanted to obtain a firearm illegally that’s certainly what I’d do- pose as a respectable, law-abiding citizen and purchase one privately.

This fall we are waiting to see if a citizen’s Initiative requiring background checks for all transfers of firearms will be required by law.  While I see the value of such a law I did not vote for it. Why? Because the law was badly written in my opinion, but more importantly because I disagree with the Initiative process. We hire (elect) people to represent our interests in government. I do not believe that we should usurp their prerogatives by taking that process into our own hands.  If they are not willing to enact the laws that we feel are needed then we can elect someone else next time around.  If enough of our fellow citizens agree with us we can effect change.  In theory at least.

That’s all as may be- but what about background checks for every transfer of possession? What it comes to is this- we want to keep guns out of the hands of people who are not legally entitled to own them.  As adults I am pretty sure that we can all agree on that.  So will universal background checks accomplish that?  People get their hands on illegal drugs easily enough.  Make no mistake, this is not an argument against trying, just a reminder that we’re not going to enjoy complete success no matter what we do. Criminals will get their hands on guns if they want them badly enough; universal  background checks just put another hurdle in their way. That hurdle may stop the less motivated but make no mistake the really serious criminals will still get their hands on them.

Let’s face it- a gun is an inanimate object; a tool. It is without volition and is incapable of independent action.  A gun is perfectly safe until you inject human beings into the equation, which means that this is a human problem, not a gun problem.  Until or unless we address the human side of the equation all we are doing is slapping on band-aids and taking placebos.

The Supreme Court has established that law-abiding citizens have the Constitutional right to own firearms ‘for all lawful purposes’ including self-defense. It also cautioned that this right is ‘subject to regulation for the public good.’  But like it or not firearms ownership is a right, not a privilege. Like all rights it also carries responsibilities. So let’s approach the problem as a human problem, and an issue of the responsibilities that go with the right.

What if we held people accountable for how they distribute firearms? Institute consequences for failing to exercise ‘due diligence’ when transferring possession of a firearm.  What would constitute due diligence?

If I know someone personally and have every reason to believe that they are a law-abiding citizen, with no pressing reasons to believe that transferring a firearm to them will unduly endanger innocent persons that should be enough. But what if I don’t know someone, transfer a firearm to them, they are not legally entitled to own a firearm, and they subsequently commit a crime with that weapon? Is this morally any different from selling a car to an alcoholic with a suspended license? People seem to think so, to the point that they want to pass laws.  OK then, what would constitute ‘due diligence’ in transferring a firearm to an unknown person?  There are any number of mechanisms that should normally be considered a sufficient exercise of ‘due diligence’.

It’s very easy to get a carry permit in this state. Pay a fee, go through a background check and it’s yours. The state has no discretion; if you qualify for a permit they must issue one if you pass the background check. Likewise the Washington Arms Collectors Association requires a background check for membership, and to purchase any sort of firearm at one of their shows. Verifying that a person has a permit or is a member of WAC seems like ‘due diligence’ on the part of a private seller.

Another option is to place the item for sale on consignment in a gun shop; this is what we usually do.   Then it falls under all of the same regulations that a normal firearms purchase from a licensed dealer does.

Rather than requiring a background check simply require that people be responsible, exercise due diligence and institute and enforce penalties for when a failure to do so results in avoidable harm. People will get the message eventually.

The Future is a Little Late, but it may Finally be Here.

Ever since I was in school practical fusion power was ‘twenty years away.’ Fusion power is ‘clean,’ abundant energy. Inventing a practical, useful fusion reactor would rank somewhere in the neighborhood of inventing fire or the wheel. As of April a group of scientists achieved a tiny but measurable net energy gain- for the first time a fusion reactor produced more energy than it used. Very little and very briefly, but it’s a start, right? A scientist associated with the project said that practical fusion power might be, guess what, only twenty years away. Yeah, we’ve heard that before. And he was wrong, just like scientists have been for the last thirty-plus years.

How can I say that? Because Lockheed/Martin’s Skunkworks has announced that they expect to have a prototype reactor working by 2017 that will produce 50 Megawatts of power. That’s enough energy to power 150,000 homes. They expect to double that output by 2020. And their reactor is a fraction of the size of a conventional Tokomak fusion reactor- you could pretty much fit two of them in a semitrailer.

This isn’t some starry-eyed researcher or basement inventor making extravagant claims. It’s the people that brought us the SR71 Blackbird and Stealth technology. They are not given to making wild claims that they can’t back up. Odds are they are not blowing smoke. If they say they are going to do something it’s because they are damned sure they are going to do something.

What this would mean is that the first time they fire up this reactor every energy-producing system in the world will become obsolete overnight. Of course it won’t work quite that way; it takes time to implement any new technology. Naturally the fossil-fuel industry won’t go down without a fight. You can anticipate massive lobbying campaigns to put up regulatory hurdles, oil-funded disinformation campaigns touting ‘the dangers of fusion’ and every dirty trick in the book being thrown at this new technology to slow or stop it’s implementation. But it’s cheap, clean and abundant energy; it’s going to win in the end.

Even when it inevitably wins out we’re still going to need oil. Lubricants, plastics… there are endless things that use petrochemicals and they still will. Maybe not millions upon millions of barrels a day, but we will still need it for the foreseeable future. That’s before you take into account that it would take decades at least to implement a fusion economy.

We’ve seen claims before and been disappointed so I’ll watch and wait and see what happens. But if the men and women at Lockheed are correct the future may just be arriving in 2017. It’s about time!

‘Gamer Culture’

Why am I inclined to believe the worst about #Gamergate? Because I am a gamer, primarily playing MMOs. Maybe this is unfair of me, and there is no doubt whatsoever that I am predisposed to think the worst of them because of my own experience online.

Play a few games of World of Tanks and keep an eye on the chat. You will see the most appalling language, sexism and homophobia. ‘Gay’ is frequently used as an insult meaning ‘weak and pathetic’ (from context.) Rape is frequently used as a threat, or in phrases like “I hope your dad rapes you until you die.” This is an actual quote. Threats of rape in an online war-game aren’t serious from the perspective that there is any danger of the person actually tracking you down and raping you. But the way that the use of these insults and threats is tolerated is shocking.

Then there is the racism… not the casual ‘Wassup niggahs?’ either. Messages that anywhere else would be considered hate speech are common… and tolerated. They ARE specifically in violation of the terms of use of the games, and I report them when I encounter them but it’s impossible to know if it actually does any good.

Don’t even get me started on ‘World of Warcraft,’ where I permanently keep general chat and Trade chat turned off. If I reported every ‘Terms of Use’ violation I saw there I’d never do anything else in the game.

It’s easy to see why someone looking at ‘gamer culture’ from the outside would form a negative opinion about gamers in general. At a glance we appear to be a bunch of foul-mouthed, racist, mysogynist homophobes.

The thing is that those people fouling the waters are only a tiny percentage of the people actually playing these games. Most gamers, like me, just want to play and have fun. We find all the BS that people spew offensive, and report it. I don’t have any way of knowing how many people are reporting bad behavior, but of the thousands of people on my home server there are probably less than a dozen being dicks in Trade Chat at any given time.

The simple fact is that most ‘gamers’ are just people, most of whom have lives and game like they watch television- as a diversion; a casual entertainment that they use to unwind and have fun. THAT’s the real ‘Gamer culture.’ People like everyone else enjoying a hobby. Many gamers deride us as ‘casuals,’ but in fact the hard-core gamer that lives to excel and compete at games are the outliers. So are the hate-spewing, misogynistic homophobes, but too often these are the people that outsiders use as examples that define us. Why? Simply put it’s because scum floats. Just remember that pond scum is just the surface of something much larger and deeper, and very different than what you see at a glance.

I have to remind myself of this frequently…

“Deer Diary…”

So it’s that time again; time for a lovely walk in the autumn woods that I might spoil by shooting a deer.  So this morning I rose at 3:30 AM, showered, had a cup of coffee and hit the road. Just after 6:30 AM I pulled up at the Happy Hunting Grounds, enjoyed another cup of coffee with my lovely hostess and then it was light enough to take a stroll in the woods.

The ranges at which I actually see deer at the HHGs is usually relatively short, so I had armed myself with my trusty N.R.Davis & Sons 12-gauge double. Despite being around a century old the gun will reliably place a Brenneke Slug pretty much where I aim it.  I had a slug in the left barrel (front trigger) and Buckshot in the right barrel (rear trigger.)  Just in case of the unforeseen I had a 1911A1 .45 in a flap-holster that I made yesterday for the occasion.

Since I had given my hunting knife to a friend as a present I had my newly-made hunting knife, a 5-1/2 inch Puuko with an antler handle in a traditional sheath riding just behind the .45.  On the theory that my feet will not under any circumstances stay dry anyway I was wearing desert combat boots with wool socks, jeans, a long-sleeved green flannel shirt and my stylish ‘Please-Don’t-Shoot-Me-Orange vest’ with a couple of extra shells in the pockets. I was ready to go.

I quickly rediscovered that walking on uneven ground toting a shotgun is a far cry from strolling through the local mall.  The uneven ground was unexpectedly tricky, but proved the value of a good pair of tightly-laced boots that probably saved me from a turned ankle or two. I also quickly developed a gut-level appreciation for just how out of shape I am these days.

It was a beautiful morning with the sun rising in a nearly cloudless sky and the temperature hovering in the mid-fifties, just cool enough for the air to have a crisp autumn feel.  The trees had largely shed their leaves to show off their winter attire of something very like Spanish Moss. The vegetation was thick and lush, and fat robins flitted through the trees, eyeing me suspiciously for a moment then, with the avian equivalent of a shrug, going about their birdly business.  Along the southern fence-line of the property I could see numerous places that deer had come and gone over the wire.  It’s marshy down there, and a bullfrog was announcing his presence to the world despite the late season.  Totally worth the trip.

After about twenty minutes I heard a startled deer take off through the (to me) impenetrable brush a bit up the hill.  I was never going to see that one, but was undismayed.  There are parts of the Happy Hunting Grounds where it just doesn’t pay to bother and he or she was right in the middle of one of them. I took it as evidence that the deer were out there and with a good-natured mental tip of my hat to the unseen critter moved along.

Shortly thereafter I found myself looking at a deer’s butt through the brush at a distance of about twenty yards. He was fairly large for a black-tail and from my perspective conspicuously male. Un fortunately all I could see was his hindquarters and shooting a deer in the behind is a bad business. It crossed my mind that if I fired a load of buckshot over his ass I would probably hit something important enough to bring him down, but I don’t shoot at things I can’t see and hope for the best.  That’s how bad things happen while hunting. He was moving slowly away from me so I followed, hoping for a shot.

I kept him in sight as he was moving quite slowly, picking his way along with care.  My feet were squishing in the marshy grass, but he apparently couldn’t hear me over the noise he was making himself.  I found out why he was moving so carefully when my foot suddenly plunged knee-deep into mud and I pitched forward suddenly.  I managed to swing my other knee forward and catch myself so I didn’t go face-first, but only at the cost of wrenching my back. I swallowed a gasp of pain and a litany of words unsuitable for broadcast television. The deer left. Probably giggling at me.

So there I was, sitting on my ass, my left leg curled under me in the mud, my right extended and throughly mired, holding the shotgun up while my back spasmed.  That got old rather quickly, but there was a bit of a problem; I couldn’t get up.  The mud in that corner of the Happy Hunting Grounds is thick and viscous, and once it has latched on it is reluctant to let go.  More than one boot has been entombed there for eternity.  I couldn’t get my other leg into position to lever myself up and there were no branches within reach to pull myself up. I didn’t want to set the gun in the muck and get gooey black mud all over my hands and arms so I considered my dilemma for a moment. Probing carefully with the butt of the shotgun I discovered a seemingly solid hummock a couple feet to the right, so I unloaded the shotgun, dropped the shells in my shirt-pocket and was label to lever myself up enough to get my left leg into position to slowly withdraw my right foot from it’s muddy prison.

It’s amazing how that mud hangs on.  Even though the boot was laced tightly I still had to work carefully not to lose it.  A minute or two and a whole lot of back spasms later I was free.  Hunched over like Quasimodo and feeling like a ninety-year old cripple, but at least I wasn’t a ninety-year old cripple sitting on my butt and stuck in knee-deep mud.  I forced myself upright and reloaded the shotgun, mainly as an antidote to all the deer coming out to laugh at me as I slowly hobbled back to the house.

My hostess was kind enough to bring me a handful of aspirin and some coffee to help down them, and I managed to get my boots, socks and muddy pants off before going inside to change. I’ve hunted around here enough that despite this being intended to be a day-trip I had not one, but two changes of clothing along. The five-minute process of donning clean socks was sufficient to make it obvious that there would be no more hunting today.  I gathered my gear and with the help of my hostess got it all back into the truck, resigned that despite the fact that it wasn’t even 10 AM I was heading for home.

On the good side as I twisted to get down out of the truck at a rest-stop something clicked in my lower back and I felt immediate relief.  My truck is a Chiropractor- who knew? By noon I was home letting the dogs out and icing my abused back.  Not a roaring success.

So the score stands at Deer 1, Hunter 0.  In a week or so I’ll try it again… but next time I am going to sit in a nice, comfortable blind with a cup of coffee and let the deer come to men if they will.  Let younger, hardier souls brave the bushes and mud.