sci fi blog: 'Ilsa changed herself to meet the empty centuries'

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November 22, 2006

'Ilsa changed herself to meet the empty centuries'

'Long Shot' by Vernor Vinge

This is one of the few SF stories I can think of that's based on problems and speculations from Computer Science rather than the traditional hard sciences. (Although some Engineering and Astrophysics do enter into it.) This makes sense: Vernor Vinge is a CS Professor and it is difficult to know where to begin in saying more about him - so much else has been written about him and I could fill up the length of this entry with link after detailed and well-written link about him. (See below!) His published work spans the mid-60s through the present.

'Long Shot' is a relatively early story (1972), but the problems it is based on hold up well. (I can think of plenty other computer-based SF that might as well print its decade (or half-decade) on a neon sign.) Vinges story is also an interesting exploration of the thought process of an AI (rather than a human adapted to run a space ship as in Anne McCaffreys The Ship Who Sang) and how damage to an AIs system or software would affect that very throught process. (Just as organic damage to the brain affects the human abilities and consciousness.)

I wont spoil the surpise in this story, it's a series of such intriguing 'hows' that one forgets to ask 'why', and it is also a meditation on the feminine characterization of ships: an AI has no intrinsic gender. (Arguments about stereotypes and essentialism can be added to our upcoming discussion of Daughters of Earth, an anthology of feminist SF. ;)

Big List O' Links:

Web Page: http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/faculty/vinge/misc/

Audio: http://www.itconversations.com/shows/detail711.html

Bio: http://www.answers.com/topic/vernor-vinge

Works: http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ch.cgi?Vernor_Vinge

Awards: http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/eaw.cgi?Vernor_Vinge

Interview: http://www.farsector.com/quadrant/interview-vinge.htm

Salon Article: http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/1999/04/05/vinge/

Observer Article: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/magazine/story/0,11913,865638,00.html

An Appreciation: http://mindstalk.net/vinge/

Another Appreciation: http://members.aol.com/tishede/vvinge.htm

More Background: http://www.kurzweilai.net/bios/frame.html?main=/bios/bio0007.html?

A Coversation on His Work (including this story):
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.fan.heinlein/browse_thread/thread/8d47b88e5da202c3/28ad96840d93f2a2?lnk=st&q=%22Vernor+Vinge%
22&rnum=19&hl=en#28ad96840d93f2a2