Links die. Life does not happen in alphabetical order. Entropy increases. And as if that weren't bad enough, several reputable authorities have recently concluded that entropy increases at a faster rate in my immediate vicinity than it does in the rest of the known universe. These links are in no kind of order, for which I apologize. I will fix it. Sometime. In the meantime, make yourself at home, rummage around, and be entertained . . . .

'It was hot and the height of the silly season, when nothing, but positively nothing, happens, when there are no politics, when there is not even a European crisis. Yet even then the newspaper readership -- sprawled out on sandy beaches of in the dappled shade of trees, demoralized by heat, by nature, by the rural tranquility and just by the simple healthy life of being on holiday -- expects, with hopes dashed anew every day, that at least in their paper they'll find something new and refreshing. Some murder perhaps, or a war or an earthquake. In short, Something. And if they don't find it they throw down their papers and angrily declare that there isn't a thing, not a damned thing, in the paper, and it's not worth reading at all and they'll stop taking it. And meanwhile there are five or six lonely people sitting in the editorial office because all their colleagues are also on holiday, angrily throwing down their own papers and complaining that there isn't a thing, not a damned thing, in the paper. Until the printing shop foreman emerges from his cubbyhole and says reproachfully, 'Gentlemen, gentlemen! We haven't got tomorrow's leader yet!" - Karel Capek (War With the Newts)

SCIENCE FICTION

Karel Capek What can you say about Capek? Except maybe that no one has written an original science fiction story since R.U.R. came out in 1923. We are all just copying Capek, and the best we can hope for is the occasional beneficial mutation or transcription error.
More Karel Capek
An R.U.R. Site

A nice essay on War with the Newts

'Karel Capek had already been a candidate for the Nobel Prize, several years before, but his last book, The War with the Newts, was too aggressive and made too clear a reference to the Leader of a certain Political Movement. Word came to him to furnish a novel of about three hundred pages attacking nothing and no one. 'Thank you for your kindness,' he told the man who was serving as go between, 'but I finished my dissertation long ago.'' - Olga Scheinpflugova

Some Alfred Bester Information Sadly it is very difficult to find much information about Bester, whose book The Demolished Man is one of the great classic SF novels of the 1950s. If I ever have a lot more time than I do right now I will add an Alfred Bester page to this site.
Bester's SF Hall of Fame Page

'My philosophical affiliation, if I were to put it in terms of accepted nomenclature, is in a large measure with the skeptics . . . The way I feel about it, the task of a writer is not to dish out quick and easy recipes for ultimate solutions, but to signal certain problems and pose questions about them.' - Stanislaw Lem

Solaris: Stanislaw Lem on the Web This man is so skilled at insulting people that his site would be worthy reading even if he weren't one of the greatest science fiction writers of all time.

The details of the cataclysm are not known . . . Papyralysis ruined a great deal more than the economy. The entire period is rightly called the Era of Papyrocracy, for not only did papyr regulate and coordinate all group activities, but it determined in some obscure way the fate of individuals (for example, 'identity papyrs'). The functional and ritual roles of papyr in the folklore of that time . . . have yet to be fully catalogued. While we do know the meaning of some expressions, others remain empty phrases (cheks, dok-ments, ree-seets, etc). In that era one could not be born, grow up, obtain an education, work, travel, marry or die except through the aid and mediation of papyr. Only in light of these facts can one appreciate the full extent of the disaster which struck Earth. The quarantine of whole cities and continents, the construction of hermetically sealed shelters -- all such measures failed . . . . Panic hit the cities; people, deprived of their identity, lost their reason; the supply of goods broke down; there were incidents of violence; technology, research and development, schools -- al crumbled into nonexistence; power plants could not be repaired for lack of blueprints. The lights went out and the ensuing darkness was illumined only by the glow of bonfires.'- Stanislaw Lem (Memoirs Found in a Bathtub)

Brian Aldiss Another great one . . . you may have to hunt about a bit to get your hands on some of his books, but believe me it's worth it.
Vernor Vinge on the Singularity A hugely influential essay that any fan of hard sf should take a look at.
The SF Site
SFCrowsnest
Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame
World Science Fiction Society

'It is easy to say that society is bad, but try to find essentially bad people. Try to judge the world without brutal generalizations - in no time your principles will turn to nothing.' - Karel Capek

Definitions of SF
Science Fiction Studies On-Line Journal
Science Fiction Foundation, University of Liberpool
PoMoSF
Kansas University Center for the Study of Science Fiction
Mat McIrvin's SF Pages Good sf materal and a very interesting essay on . . .
The Pleasures of Made Up Science
Neal Stephenson's Website where Neal tells us to go away. Loudly. Several times. This site should be surfed in conjunction with . . .
Neal Stephenson's Publisher's Website where Neal's publisher sweetly bids us to come hither. Apparently this tactic works almost as well on sf readers as it does on underage smokers.

'Everyone comes to know by means of his own individual mind, but the truth he hopes to find is valid for all. What is valid for only one side, one faith, one nation is not the truth that is the eternal goal of the human spirit. The entire truth lies in the endless human striving for truth.' - Karel Capek

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE/AUTOMATA

MIT Artificial Intelligence Course, Spring 2003 (see below for more MIT courses on-line)
AI on the Web
Knowledge-Based Systems
Hebrew University Multi-Agent Systems Lab
U. Mass Multi-Agent Systems Lab

'No matter what domain of human inquiry we might consider, there are no unequivocal solutions in black and white. The conviction, often entertained by humanists, that in the hard sciences (e.g., physics) everything must be lucid and transparent, simply does not correspond to reality. That is not only because there are endless controversies in physics just as in anything else, but because the pinnacle of human cognition simply does not exist. The sciences are always in the process of climbing those peaks of knowledge that are hidden above the clouds, making errors as they go. The only systems that can pronounce their infallibility are religious dogmas. . . ." - Stanislaw Lem

COMPUTER SCIENCE AND ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING

Historic Computer Images This is one of my very favorite websites. Nirvana for your inner geek!
History of Computer Languages Another big favorite.
A History of UNIX from the same person who wrote the history of computer languages page. If you are delusional enough to still need further proof that UNIX is the ultimate source of all that is good in the world, here it is.
Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs The textbook for MIT's undergrad CS introductory course and one of the best programming texts ever written. Full text on-line.
Lecture Notes and Course Materials for the course Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs. See below for more MIT course materials
Computational Structures, MIT Fall 2002

MIT OPEN COURSEWARE

This is a fantastic site which has become one of my favorite places on the web. MIT has put on-line the reading lists and even lecture notes of many courses. I've linked to the homepage of the program and to some of the best documented and (well, to me) more interesting courses.
MIT Open Courseware Home Page
Anthropology of Computing
History of Technology 1450-2000
Fundamentals of Ecology Fall 2003
Geobiology Spring 2003

'There are no answers, only cross-references.' - Norbert Wiener

NORBERT WIENER LINKS

NW is one of my great heroes, not only as a scientist but as an ethical thinker and political maverick. His collected works are to be found on the shelves of any mathematics library worth its salt. Volumes 1-3 contain dozens of groundbreaking essays that charted the road forward for an entire generation of mathematicians, physicians and computer scientists. Volume 4 contains a collection of essays on cybernetics, politics, ethics that ought to be required reading for American civics classes. Are you getting the impression that admire the guy? Well, I do. How could anyone not admire the man who said: There are no answers, only cross-references?
Leon Tabak essay on NW. I put this link first because Tabak's essay, which deals with both NW's scientific contributions and his ideas about the ethical use of technology, is one of the best brief introductions around to NW's work and life.
International Institute for Systems Sciences NW Page
A Review of the posthumously published Invention
The Human Use of Human Beings one of NW's most overtly political books.
Dark Hero of the Information Age NW's recently published biography
Norbert Wiener Center for Harmonic Analysis and Applications
Make what you will of it . . .
Norbert Wiener a site with numerous quotes and links
NW Quotes
More NW Quotes
NW Jokes

All nationalists have the power of not seeing resemblances between similar sets of facts . . . . Actions are held to be good or bad, not on their own merits, but according to who does them, and there is almost no kind of outrage—torture, the use of hostages, forced labour, mass deportations, imprisonment without trial, forgery, assassination, the bombing of civilians—which does not change its moral colour when it is committed by ‘our’ side. - George Orwell

GEORGE ORWELL LINKS

A George Orwell Site, Saint George, patron of cumudgeons, contrarians, anarchists, Trotskyites, and every other idealistic sap who's ever gone down fighting dragons. If you haven't read 1984 and Homage to Catalonia, read them both. Now. 1984 may only be one of the four or five best sf novels I've read; but Homage to Catalonia is definitely the single best piece of war reporting.

'The Spanish war and other events in 1936-37 turned the scale and thereafter I knew where I stood. Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism, as I understand it. It seems to me nonsense, in a period like our own, to think that one can avoid writing of such subjects. Everyone writes of them in one guise or another. It is simply a question of which side one takes and what approach one follows. And the more one is conscious of one's political bias, the more chance one has of acting politically without sacrificing one's aesthetic and intellectual integrity.' - George Orwell

Orwell's Essays This Gutenberg Project listing is not complete, but it does span his career, moving from the cogent critique of colonialism in early essays like "A Hanging" and "Shooting an Elephant," through the marxism of his Spanish Civil War writings, and his eventual idiosyncratic allegiance to "democratic socialism as I understand it." ("Why I Write," 1946)

The degree of freedom of the press existing in this country is often over-rated. Technically there is great freedom, but the fact that most of the press is owned by a few people operates in much the same way as State censorship . . . . the relative freedom which we enjoy depends of public opinion . . . . If large numbers of people are interested in freedom of speech, there will be freedom of speech, even if the law forbids it; if public opinion is sluggish, inconvenient minorities will be persecuted, even if laws exist to protect them . . . . The notion that certain opinions cannot safely be allowed a hearing is growing . . . . even those who declare themselves to be in favour of freedom of opinion generally drop their claim when it is their own adversaries who are being prosecutued.' - George Orwell

Orwell's controversial essay Spilling the Spanish Beans
Orwell's [censored] original introduction to Animal Farm
Politics and the English Language. A guerilla attack on cliche, euphemism and hypocrisy . . . and perhaps the closest Orwell ever came to a definitive political manifesto. Another Orwell Site
Yet Another Orwell Site
Yep, More Orwell

NOISE IN THE CHANNEL

Miscellaneous stuff that fits nowhere in particular but is worth wasting your time on . . . unless your time is worth more than my time, which is a distinct possibility.

Starbucks Delocator This is a favorite site of mine, especially useful for travellers. Tired of being forced to go to Starbucks for coffee whenever you're away from home? Wish you could do something to stop the Starbucks Death Star from driving your favorite independent locally-owned coffee shop out of business? I got the site for ya. The Starbucks Delocator locates independently owned local coffee shops all over America. Enter your favorite place or find a new one.

Kill Your Television You can't say it better than Edward R. Murrow: "We as a country are wealthy, fat, comfortable, and complacent, with an apparently built-in allergy to unpleasant or disturbing information. Our mass media reflect this. Unless we get up off our fat surpluses and recognize that television in the main is now used to distract, delude, amuse, and insulate us, television and those who finance it, as well as those who look at it and those who work at it, are going to see a totally different picture . . . our industry's motto . . . 'Look Now, Pay Later'" Of course Murrow was writing in 1958. The 'fat surpluses' are gone now . . . because while we were all busy watching television, kids in places like France, India and China were doing their math and physics homework. Guess where the top 10 engineering companies in the world are. (Hint: America ranks number one worldwide in hours of television watched per capita, number in literacy ... and a miserable number in math literacy.) Turn the freakin' thing OFF! Then check out the full text of Murrow's Speech.

Kung Foo Their motto is 'let us waste your time,' and they've certainly wasted plenty of mine. It's been fun, guys.

Ants Everything you ever wanted to know about them, all in one searchable database. With photos!

Eyal Teler's HomePage Possibly the single funniest science fiction writer's page I've seen. Check out Eyal's cute chicks . . . but only if you're over 18!