There is growing concern that the proliferation of generative AI will remove humans from the equation of creativity because eventually most art will be AI-generated images based on previous AI-generated images until all art is simulacra with no connection to reality. But in a way, this has already happened—before the invention of AI art.
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This is a fascinating book about the type of precognition often experienced in dreams, built off the work of J.W. Dunne. Author Eric Wargo provides numerous famous examples of precognitive dreams, often about traumatic events such as plane crashes or the sinking of the Titanic. Wargo claims such cases of precognition are actually “prememory”: your unconscious mind remembering a future memory, not of the event itself, but of your emotional reaction to learning news of the event. Both the author and I are aware of how crazy and “woo” this all sounds, but Wargo’s research is scientifically rigorous, and he walks a fine line of being both skeptical about paranormal claims but also open-minded to their possibilities (something I wish more on both sides of the paranormal/skeptical debate were willing to do).
Television:
The Mandalorian (seasons 1&2 on Disney+)
I heard great things about The Mandalorian when it premiered a couple years ago and had been wanting to see it, but I did not have Disney+ (until this past year). So I finally got around to watching the first two seasons of the show and really enjoyed it. I normally prefer movies over TV series, but The Mandalorian was better than the recent Star Wars film trilogy. That’s probably because the showrunner (John Favreau) had more creative freedom since he wasn’t working with the core franchise characters. There were likely too many cooks in the kitchen for the movies, with producers, studio execs, marketing experts, toy manufacturers, and Disney brand advisors all having a say in the plot and characters. Plus there were different writers and directors for the three movies and they apparently didn’t plan together. Beyond that, so much was on the line for the Disney mega-corporation with those movies because of the production and marketing budgets. The Mandalorian had a relatively high budget (~$120 million per season), but the budgets of each Star Wars movie were 2-3x that. They surely saved a lot on marketing by just dropping the show on Disney+ (while people were stuck at home during a pandemic with nothing else to do but watch TV).
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Finding older movies is surprisingly difficult in the age of online streaming. Netflix has severely cut down on their movie catalogue, focusing on their own original television series, and most other streaming services do the same. Amazon has a decent collection of movies, as does the new HBO Max, and I’ve also found some rare gems on Vudu and Tubi, streaming services that are free with ads. JustWatch has become essential in figuring out where and how to watch any given movie. I wish the streaming services would focus more on making original movies rather than television series, but it’s in their economic interest to create addictive TV series that will keep you watching longer. Just as it is in the Hollywood movie studios’ interest to make $100+ million tentpole blockbusters based on pre-existing material.
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Hi, my name is TZ Barry, and I’m a story addict…
Story Addict is a collection of 27 short stories written between 2010 and 2018, spanning a variety of genres including science fiction, fantasy, horror, crime, thriller, literary, magical realism, dark humor, and satire. There’s time travel, telepathy, parallel universes, aliens, robots, artificial intelligence, hackers, spies, invisibility, dinosaurs, wizards, talking jellyfish, and more. The lengths of the stories vary from 300 words to over 6,000 (60,000 words in total). Eight of the stories have been previously published while nineteen are new to this collection. The stories are not connected and can be read in any order. Continue reading
Elon Musk’s appearance on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast will go down in history and be rewatched forever by whatever form of humans/AI exist in the future. I love podcasts and have listened to thousands over the past dozen years, but this one may be my favorite yet. It’s better than the best science fiction movies because it’s not science fiction. High-speed maglev tunnels, self-driving electric cars, solar-powered roofs, AI brain interfaces, space exploration, Mars colonization, and VR simulations are the reality of our present and future. Continue reading
I recently had a short (flash fiction) story published in Daily Science Fiction. This was my first professional publication (though I’ve self-published before). The story is available to read for free on their website. (Which you should do before continuing to read this.) Continue reading
T.Z. Barry 