So Charlie and my other lucky friends get to go to a spaceship conference while I lie here recovering from a medical adventure. And they complain of jet lag? For me just a trip to Oxford Street (from rural Ohio) would be worth the jet lag.
I’ve enjoyed Charlie’s books, especially Rule 34, and it is extremely generous of Charlie to invite me to post here. My new book The Highest Frontier has proven more controversial than expected. Greg Benford and Don Sakers loved The Highest Frontier; but out on the blogs, someone feared the book would make him "actually ill," while someone else wanted to see "if the test readers live."
Jennie Ramos Kennedy is a Cuban-American student-athlete and medical first responder, going to Frontera College in a cylindrical space habitat. Before heading up (on an elevator using anthrax bacteria) she spots an invading extraterrestrial ultraphyte (UV-photosynthetic plant) and calls Homeworld Security to take it out. Ultraphytes are all over Earth by now, a convenient scapegoat for climate change that has flooded coasts and half thawed Antarctica. The US government has canceled space exploration because biblical space ends at a "firmament" just beyond the moon. However, orbital spacehabs are ok; in fact, that is where the faithful will go to survive Earth’s demise. Jenny doesn’t want to give up on Earth, and she hopes her professors can help. But her politics professor is a baraminologist, and her biology professor is nuts about two-headed snakes. And as for her roommate . . . well, there’s a start.
Could an orbital spacehab really get made by 2100? I don’t know, but from the Wright brothers to commercial jets took 50 years. I think the key is funding. From what I’ve seen of Vegas, that’s where I think the cash will come. Once the born-agains outlaw vice on Earth, they’ll need someplace off-world to put it--and tax it.
What interests me more is future biology. Could we grow carbon nanotubes as bacterial cell walls? Bacillus subtilis bacteria already grow thread-like macrofibers, which genetic engineering might convert to nanotubes. They’d be self-healing, amid all that Kessler debris. Could photosynthetic bacteria power fuel cells and make hydrogen? This is no longer fiction, it’s science today. Could solar microbes someday power a space habitat? One thing is clear: We need off-world power, the sooner the better, because all large-scale energy sources threaten our biosphere.
Some other ideas in my book:
--HIV: Aside from AIDS, why is this virus a great gift to medicine?
--Plant neurobiology: If plants had brains, what would they do with it?
--Creation theories: They don’t work here, but could an alien biosphere actually evolve in 6,000 years?
--Sex with animals: When might it be a good idea?
--If we each had two heads, would we be twice as wise?
And, just for the record, since none of my reviews mentioned: Jenny is cloned from a lesbian American president, and the Frontera College president is married to the college chaplain, both of whom are guys.
Let me know if the test readers live.
I’ve enjoyed Charlie’s books, especially Rule 34, and it is extremely generous of Charlie to invite me to post here. My new book The Highest Frontier has proven more controversial than expected. Greg Benford and Don Sakers loved The Highest Frontier; but out on the blogs, someone feared the book would make him "actually ill," while someone else wanted to see "if the test readers live."
Jennie Ramos Kennedy is a Cuban-American student-athlete and medical first responder, going to Frontera College in a cylindrical space habitat. Before heading up (on an elevator using anthrax bacteria) she spots an invading extraterrestrial ultraphyte (UV-photosynthetic plant) and calls Homeworld Security to take it out. Ultraphytes are all over Earth by now, a convenient scapegoat for climate change that has flooded coasts and half thawed Antarctica. The US government has canceled space exploration because biblical space ends at a "firmament" just beyond the moon. However, orbital spacehabs are ok; in fact, that is where the faithful will go to survive Earth’s demise. Jenny doesn’t want to give up on Earth, and she hopes her professors can help. But her politics professor is a baraminologist, and her biology professor is nuts about two-headed snakes. And as for her roommate . . . well, there’s a start.
Could an orbital spacehab really get made by 2100? I don’t know, but from the Wright brothers to commercial jets took 50 years. I think the key is funding. From what I’ve seen of Vegas, that’s where I think the cash will come. Once the born-agains outlaw vice on Earth, they’ll need someplace off-world to put it--and tax it.
What interests me more is future biology. Could we grow carbon nanotubes as bacterial cell walls? Bacillus subtilis bacteria already grow thread-like macrofibers, which genetic engineering might convert to nanotubes. They’d be self-healing, amid all that Kessler debris. Could photosynthetic bacteria power fuel cells and make hydrogen? This is no longer fiction, it’s science today. Could solar microbes someday power a space habitat? One thing is clear: We need off-world power, the sooner the better, because all large-scale energy sources threaten our biosphere.
Some other ideas in my book:
--HIV: Aside from AIDS, why is this virus a great gift to medicine?
--Plant neurobiology: If plants had brains, what would they do with it?
--Creation theories: They don’t work here, but could an alien biosphere actually evolve in 6,000 years?
--Sex with animals: When might it be a good idea?
--If we each had two heads, would we be twice as wise?
And, just for the record, since none of my reviews mentioned: Jenny is cloned from a lesbian American president, and the Frontera College president is married to the college chaplain, both of whom are guys.
Let me know if the test readers live.
