Kim Stanley Robinson, The Mars Trilogy

Terraformer · 2015-02-11 13:59:50

What?

louis · 2015-02-11 14:06:06

RobertDyck wrote:

Rail? On Mars? Are you serious? Mars has as much surface area as all dry land on Earth. You want to build a rail infrastructure from nothing on a planet that large? Are you nuts? Any reasonable system will not include any such infrastructure: no rails, no roads, no nothin'. Just rovers driving across undeveloped land, aircraft, and rockets. So no infrastructure for any thoroughfare.

I basically agree Robert.

We might possibly develop ice roads (as there are on Earth) to enable land vehicles to travel more quickly over the surface. Ice roads should be fairly easily constructed in Mars conditions I would suggest. But initially it would simply be a question of sat nav robot vehicles following paths cleard of boulders.

For faster transport, I would think Mars colonists will use rocket transport.

Terraformer · 2015-02-11 15:29:06

What are you guys on about? When did the conversation go back to talking about Mars?

Mark Friedenbach · 2015-02-12 02:15:03

Wow, can we get back to Kim Stanley Robinson?

JoshNH4H wrote:

I just read 2312, also by KSR, and I've got to say that I found the novel profoundly disappointing. Not because of any failure in writing, per se, more because I felt like I expected more. Firstly, I was left wondering (perhaps hoping is a better word) that the world in which the book was set was the same as the Mars Trilogy. The general themes in that world-- longevity treatments, terraformed Mars, communal organization, the replacement of capitalism, overpopulated Earth, and even a city on Mercury called Terminator that works in just the same way as Terminator as described in Blue Mars. I think that he was trying to place the book in the Uncanny Valley, which is itself a theme in the book: As someone who is a great fan of the Mars Trilogy, the similarity-but-difference of the world in which this novel is set is somewhat distressing. It's the same reason why I've never read The Martians cover to cover: When I see a "Roger Clayborne", and when the Mars Project is "cancelled", it feels like the hundreds of years that I've gone through with these characters have been taken from me.

Josh, have you read Icehenge? It’s also set in a parallel universe and the book predates the Mars trilogy.

You could say this is a defining characteristic of KSR’s space fiction – he reuses a roughly similar but not identical timeline in multiple, sometimes unrelated stories. I have to say I much prefer this over the assumption that all plots happen in the same universe. This is fiction after all., and each story is told to accomplish some purpose. If there are adjustments to be made that allow him to better accomplish his story telling, so be it.

The complaint about the pace of technology development is dead on though. Like almost all science fiction, KSR uses the linear view of history in projecting forward. The simultaneously joyous and sad reality is that we will have transcended biology and reached physical limits of computation before the first cities are being built on Mars.

Mars is more likely to be used as a staging point for the construction of the first Jupiter brain than colonized by us primates. But that makes for less accessible science fiction.

Terraformer · 2015-02-12 10:55:32

Well, that presumes our software and algorithms grow exponentially, rather than just our hardware. I don't think Windows on a pocket supercomputer is going to be taking over the universe.

We could, I think, end up with a situation where everyone is carrying around the entirety of human knowledge in their pockets, accessed by a powerful but non-sophont AI, but there are no rampant hyperturings we have to worry about. Indeed, I don't know if the possibility of a red queens race for self-improvement been ruled out, where a seed AI has to grow logarithmically rather than exponentially, due to each additionally improvement increasing complexity and thus requiring more power to be devoted to improving it.

I'm not convinced by the singularity argument. I think we're headed for a period of rapid, profound change, but what will come out of it will still be recognisably human. Exponential growth has always ended at some point, which is why we're not all dead, Christian, Muslim, living among trillions of other people, American... I'm sure all those things were growing exponentially at some point. But they generally became logarithmic after a while, much like a bacterial sample, or a species introduced into a new habitat. I expect the coming changes to be much the same - exponential growth followed by logarithmic growth.

Mark Friedenbach · 2015-02-12 16:12:16

Terraformer, well exponential growth won't happen forever, but there is plenty, plenty of room for growth when looking at physical limits. I find it far more likely that the point where progress begins to become sub-exponential is at a technology level far more advanced than mainstream authors like KSR tend to portray as our future. Equally important, none of the advances so far have significantly affected the limitations of biology -- the human brain and human body. We've seen minimally super-exponential progress with regular technology development. Once that technology starts affecting our intellectual capabilities -- e.g. true artificial intelligence or bionic brains -- we'll see that super-exponential term grow as well. Until we hit physical limits of course, but as I said that's pretty far away from our current position.

That's the argument at least, although we have gone significantly off topic now. I'd be happy to debate it elsewhere.

JoshNH4H · 2015-02-13 09:19:15

I would add that none of what Tom is saying is particularly hard... When left turns are prohibited during rush hour it's usually nearly impossible to make them anyway. Typically one can simply drive to the next intersection where there will often be a left-turn arrow. Nor is reading parking signs all that difficult, it's just something you do before you leave your car somewhere, just like putting it in park or locking your doors. They're not super complicated, and they never change so once you know the ones in your area you know them, and that's the end of it. Really, it sounds like you're just annoyed that you sometimes park illegally and get ticketed. I can sympathize: It's happened to me, (among other times) when I assumed that all 2 hr parking in Baltimore would be 2 hr 7am-7 PM M-F (what it is in my neighborhood), when near Baltimore Penn it's 2 hr 7 am-7 pm. $42 ticket. But I paid it and moved on with my life. At the time that was the price of one tank of gas.

Parking in Manhattan, of course, sucks. But that affects visitors more than residents. If you live in Manhattan, chances are you won't have to walk more than 5 blocks to get to your neighborhood bodega (which will have most of the food a grocery store would), a pharmacy, somewhere you can buy clothes, a bank, several restaurants of varying price levels, probably about 10 starbucks, etc. This is to say, you don't really need a car. Between walking, bus, and subway one can get anywhere one would want to go. Even the beach.

JoshNH4H · 2015-02-13 09:23:36

I've tried, at times, to write/develop worlds 100+ years in the future. I've never really been able to do so to my satisfaction. Things are just changing too quickly these days for that to be possible. I've no idea what the world will be like then, and I can't really build a world with any kind of meaningful justification for why it is the way I write it to be.

For the most part, I'm ok with KSR's choice of semi-parallel realities. But I couldn't handle The Martians. I'd grown quite attached to those characters, and something about taking their worldlines and keeping some but not others in a fundamentally similar universe-- well, I didn't like it.

Terraformer · 2015-02-13 10:33:16

Perhaps it's the uncanny valley of worldlines,

Sometimes, I'll try to write about something in the future, only to reflect on the ramifications of what I've written and realise that the world would be significantly different.

JoshNH4H · 2015-02-13 14:11:25

There's certainly something to be said for requiring that a character ought to exist in one universe, which is to say that their life ought to be self-consistent through all plotlines in which they're involved.

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-02-15 18:54:21

JoshNH4H wrote:

I would add that none of what Tom is saying is particularly hard... When left turns are prohibited during rush hour it's usually nearly impossible to make them anyway. Typically one can simply drive to the next intersection where there will often be a left-turn arrow. Nor is reading parking signs all that difficult, it's just something you do before you leave your car somewhere, just like putting it in park or locking your doors. They're not super complicated, and they never change so once you know the ones in your area you know them, and that's the end of it. Really, it sounds like you're just annoyed that you sometimes park illegally and get ticketed. I can sympathize: It's happened to me, (among other times) when I assumed that all 2 hr parking in Baltimore would be 2 hr 7am-7 PM M-F (what it is in my neighborhood), when near Baltimore Penn it's 2 hr 7 am-7 pm. $42 ticket. But I paid it and moved on with my life. At the time that was the price of one tank of gas.
Parking in Manhattan, of course, sucks. But that affects visitors more than residents. If you live in Manhattan, chances are you won't have to walk more than 5 blocks to get to your neighborhood bodega (which will have most of the food a grocery store would), a pharmacy, somewhere you can buy clothes, a bank, several restaurants of varying price levels, probably about 10 starbucks, etc. This is to say, you don't really need a car. Between walking, bus, and subway one can get anywhere one would want to go. Even the beach.

I kinda do need my car to do my job, which involves driving people in and out of the city, usually to airports, but often enough to Manhattan. I can't really take the Subway, the hard part is picking people up in Manhattan, dropping them off is easy enough, but to pick them up, I have to wait somewhere near to where I will pick them up, usually a block or two away. You can never tell how long it will take to get someplace in Manhattan by car, so you try to get there early and wait, and often the only place you can wait is somewhere that is illegal to park, and I'm not going to plunk $20 to put my car in a garage, it takes time to get it out of a garage as well, especially if it has car elevators. So I sit in the car and wait and look out for cops giving tickets. Usually cops have other things to do, unless they are driving around in those small three-wheeled "ticketmobiles" I call them!, The moment I see one of them I move and go around the block until they disappear and I can finally wait someplace again and wait for the customer to call to be picked up.

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-02-15 19:15:37

JoshNH4H wrote:

I've tried, at times, to write/develop worlds 100+ years in the future. I've never really been able to do so to my satisfaction. Things are just changing too quickly these days for that to be possible. I've no idea what the world will be like then, and I can't really build a world with any kind of meaningful justification for why it is the way I write it to be.
For the most part, I'm ok with KSR's choice of semi-parallel realities. But I couldn't handle The Martians. I'd grown quite attached to those characters, and something about taking their worldlines and keeping some but not others in a fundamentally similar universe-- well, I didn't like it.

I can probably get a good sense of what things will be like in 10 to 20 years. There are some interesting developments going on this year. For example Microsoft is releasing its Hololens, a virtual reality 3-d visor which merges projected images onto the real world. http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-hololens/en-us
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There are flying cars set to go on sale this year.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/ … years.html

SpaceX is developing reusable rocket boosters.
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So I could envision something like this in 20 years.
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It seems things are starting to fall together, and of course robots and computers would be more sophisticated in 20 years.
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As for 100 years from now, I can't imagine unless civilization collapses, in which case I can imagine it.
Its starting to look more and more like the 21st century as I imagined it to be in the 20th century. Too bad I'll be an old man when it finally comes together. I have waited nearly my whole life since the Apollo Moon Shots for society to finally move out into space, who could have forseen it would take an entire human life since the first footprints on the Moon for human society to finally get into gear and migrate en mass into space?

Last edited by Tom Kalbfus (2015-02-15 19:20:01)

Terraformer · 2015-02-16 11:57:27

If you look at the predictions for the early 21st century made in the Victorian era... well, some of the ones I've seen were much more accurate than anything Kurzweil has written. I suspect it's something to do with the margins of error - if your predictions are accurate +-20 years, you won't be able to predict what's going to happen in the next few decades very well, but a century hence (80-120 years in the future) isn't as hard.

I still haven't seen anything to suggest that computer science is growing at anything like the rate of computing power. Having enough power to (theoretically) run a human brain would be enough to provide powerful expert systems, but unless the information science is there, you won't be able to construct a seed AI.

Mark Friedenbach · 2015-02-16 12:38:09

Terraformer, Kurzweil would say that you're still thinking linearly. The pace of progress has increased considerably since Victorian times. The equivalent unit of progress of a few decades in Victorian times would probably be a few years today. Predictions a few years forward are still pretty accurate.

Regarding AI, the most powerful supercomputer in the world today, the Tianhe-2 in China, is powerful enough by some estimates to perform whole-brain emulation of a human. The limit on that pathway is our understanding of neurobiology, not computer hardware or software. As for de novo AI, the field is finally receiving significant interest and funding, after a many-decade winter. I would use progress over the last few years -- which has been rapid -- as a reference point rather than the past 20-30 years, during which time nearly nobody was throwing money at the problem.

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-02-17 12:24:16

Think they will elect the computer as Chairman of the Communist Party in China? We don't want them too advanced of course, but just advanced enough so they have a "seat at the table", kind of like the way they are depicted in Star Wars. I think once we have a real live "C3P0" or "R2D2", people will panic because they don't know what is going to come next, and it won't be long! I think Computers will help us get into space, and I think computers that are smarter than humans will help us reach for the stars, the trick is using them to get out of here before they start taking over. I think there will be a period of time when AI still obeys us, but is smarter than us, they have evolved as tools however, so they will probably continue to be tools for some time after that. Imagine a computer running a company and generating profits for stock holders. Imagine a computer running a country and keeping its campaign promises, where so many humans have previously failed. Imagine we had the most advanced AI and we elected it President of the United States! Humans are deceitful and can't always be trusted after all.

Mark Friedenbach · 2015-02-17 12:39:03

Be wary of such anthropomorphisms. I would be much more worried about such a system having internal drives out of alignment with our own morality. We should harness the power of artificial intelligence to move the wheel of progress forward at ever more rapid rates, but machine intelligences should never be put in control or "have a seat at the table."

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-02-17 13:38:54

Some humans lack ethics, there are many variations in what a human can be for good or for bad. Many humans get caught up I power games as well, they are more interested in keeping their power than in serving the people who put them there. A Machine can be programmed, we can look into its thought processes since we built it, and human being you can't tell. Some will use trickery or deceit to get into power, make promises they don't intend to keep and then break them, and use the levers of power to eliminate competition. It happens all the time in human history.

Mark Friedenbach · 2015-02-18 19:58:04

I think you may still be falling short, Tom. The concern is not that some AI bot might be evil like Hitler, but it might be beyond evil like Cthulu or an arachnid intelligence. Amoral can sometimes be more scary than evil.

EDIT: You may find this article and its sequel relevant and enlightening.

Last edited by Mark Friedenbach (2015-02-18 20:10:34)

Void · 2015-02-18 23:41:23

Thanks for cheering me up
Good chances I will be dead first anyway. Feel sorry for everyone else. Yes there could be a chance, but have you had a look at the best and brightest? Granted I am closer to 85 than 130, but as the article says, that won't matter much.

On the bright side, I have taken a look at the whole human race, it's history, and the patterns I see indicate a guiding force. I won't go any further than that. But I look at who is at the rudder and indeed how they (Don't) self limit, always find a reason to violate self restraint, As I said, maybe it won't be my problem.

I feel kind of sorry for the little ones though. I hope that pattern I think I noticed will feel sorry for them also.

Last edited by Void (2015-02-18 23:43:06)

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-02-19 10:00:02

Mark Friedenbach wrote:

I think you may still be falling short, Tom. The concern is not that some AI bot might be evil like Hitler, but it might be beyond evil like Cthulu or an arachnid intelligence. Amoral can sometimes be more scary than evil.
EDIT: You may find this article and its sequel relevant and enlightening.

If we can engineer a machine to be superior to us in intellect, why nor superior in morality as well? We can set up a machine that is more intelligent than us to work on solving the problem of how humans are to survive in the face of machines that are superior to them. Do you think a sufficiently smart AI can come up with an answer?

Tom Kalbfus · 2015-02-19 11:24:38

The first task of ASI would be to spread humanity far and wide across the Galaxy and beyond, that way each ASI can be contained by the light years, and not be a singleton. Also we might want to build several Earth's where we might separate humans from AI in case its going in the wrong direction, and also the AI might mutate in such a way as to destroy itself, as the Fermi paradox might indicate, maybe it destroys its creators and then destroys itself, basically improves itself to death.

louis · 2015-02-19 17:08:20

Mark Friedenbach wrote:

Terraformer, Kurzweil would say that you're still thinking linearly. The pace of progress has increased considerably since Victorian times. The equivalent unit of progress of a few decades in Victorian times would probably be a few years today. Predictions a few years forward are still pretty accurate.
Regarding AI, the most powerful supercomputer in the world today, the Tianhe-2 in China, is powerful enough by some estimates to perform whole-brain emulation of a human. The limit on that pathway is our understanding of neurobiology, not computer hardware or software. As for de novo AI, the field is finally receiving significant interest and funding, after a many-decade winter. I would use progress over the last few years -- which has been rapid -- as a reference point rather than the past 20-30 years, during which time nearly nobody was throwing money at the problem.

I think you can make a strong argumnet for saying the pace of change in 1780-1830 and 1890-1940 was much greater than what we have seen between 1965-2015. Between 1890 and 1940 we saw the introduction of cars, planes, radio, TV, freeways, electric trains, skyscrapers, mechanised warfare, quantum mechanics, and universal education.

Mark Friedenbach · 2015-02-19 18:53:04

Nope, don't buy it. Between 1965-2015 we put 12 men on the Moon and interconnected humanity to such extent that every person has or has access to a device that puts them in contact with every other human being and the totality of human knowledge.

Terraformer · 2015-02-20 08:59:03

We interconnected humanity during a brief period of time in the late 19th century, as well.

There are plenty of segments of history which can be looked at, where something or other was growing exponentially. So far, none of them have led to singularities.

JoshNH4H · 2015-02-20 11:44:55

Usually, the singularities are the bad kind, e.g. the kind that results in catacylsms. These are seen in a limited way in stock market and economic crashes, and more drastically in the form of plagues and climactic changes that kill large portions of humanity.

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#26 2015-02-11 13:59:50

Re: Kim Stanley Robinson, The Mars Trilogy

#27 2015-02-11 14:06:06

Re: Kim Stanley Robinson, The Mars Trilogy

#28 2015-02-11 15:29:06

Re: Kim Stanley Robinson, The Mars Trilogy

#29 2015-02-12 02:15:03

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#30 2015-02-12 10:55:32

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#31 2015-02-12 16:12:16

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#32 2015-02-13 09:19:15

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#33 2015-02-13 09:23:36

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#34 2015-02-13 10:33:16

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#35 2015-02-13 14:11:25

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#36 2015-02-15 18:54:21

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#37 2015-02-15 19:15:37

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#38 2015-02-16 11:57:27

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#39 2015-02-16 12:38:09

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#40 2015-02-17 12:24:16

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#41 2015-02-17 12:39:03

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#42 2015-02-17 13:38:54

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#43 2015-02-18 19:58:04

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#44 2015-02-18 23:41:23

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#45 2015-02-19 10:00:02

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#46 2015-02-19 11:24:38

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#47 2015-02-19 17:08:20

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#48 2015-02-19 18:53:04

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#49 2015-02-20 08:59:03

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