ConFusion 2006 Report

ConFusion was sublime. On Friday I was given a temporary tatoo of Tux the penguin, which I put on the back of my hand with the inked inscription, "0wnz0r3d!!1!"

Why did ten people sign up for a "Coffee With Vernor Vinge" in order to hear themselves talk for an hour? GRRRRRR.

Mr. Vinge is so polite. In this respect he's the inverse of a guest of honor from a previous year who talked so much that no one else could get a word in sideways. That previous guest, who will remain nameless, was the ... ahem ... sterling example of rudeness. But Karl Schroeder noted on the panel about the Singularity that we had Vernor Vinge, the inventor of that name, the author of the seminal paper on the topic, whose presence justified the panel discussion... and for the last fifteen minutes he has been sitting here silently taking notes on what the rest of them were saying about it!

He took a lot of notes. However, he was always ready with something brilliant and visionary when asked, and only when asked. I told him I was bound and determined to attract him to Penguicon one of these days. He is intrigued by the concept.

He gave glowing recommendations for the novels of Karl Schroeder and Charlie Stross. If only I could persuade Penguicon to invite Charlie Stross... I've started carrying the Stross banner as strongly as I carried the Doctorow banner, but the others consider him to be Doctorow part two, and they just gave me Cory Doctorow last year. Trans-atlantic plane fare ain't cheap, so we can't cater all the time to frighteningly advanced cutting-edge futurics. Room must be made for easier, more introductory tastes.

Fortunately North America has among its precious few literary futurists not only Vernor Vinge, but Karl Schroeder. I got Mr. Schroeder to sign my copy of Ventus, and invited him to Penguicon as a Nifty Guest, which he accepted! Karl Schroeder is the most challenging SF author that I read, in the sense that he is a thorough skeptic and iconoclast about the mainstay philosophical positions that most SF authors and readers take for granted. He is incredibly persuasive about it, even when I don't agree with him, and commands my respect and attention. Did you know in addition to being an award winning SF novelist, he has a career in technology? In CafePenguicon, he and I and the author Tobias Buckell had a fascinating discussion of e-books, GURPS Transhuman Space, and the emergence of computer technology to layer itself onto our real world, such as a device that uses GPS and the internet to hail the nearest taxicab. (Gotta have a panel at Penguicon with Mr. Schroeder about "technology as legislation.")

CafePenguicon had a lot of throughput but slightly fewer regs than normal. OpenCola was produced by the inestimable , and consumed in mass quantities. We collected more feedback questionnaires than I could count. Even Karl Schroeder taste-tested and approved it, and he used to work for OpenCola! I provided RoboSapien and provided party favors, all very well received. Eric Raymond discussed how awesome it would be to get Charlie Stross at Penguicon, and said he would work with me to attempt to persuade the concom and the board. I introduced him to a hard-SF TV show -- which only had four episodes, needless to say -- called Century City. I didn't realize Eric was looking forward to playtesting another of my innovative game designs. He has a wonderful idea for a game of his own, and when he found out I did the graphic design for Attack Vector Tactical: Core Rules-- which he loves-- he brought me on board the project to do art. :)

My brother Andy's pants were stiched to a chair in the gaming room for almost the whole convention. He had a great time! Thanks to Eric Raymond for teaching us to play Puerto Rico. Thanks to anyone who befriended Andy! Of course I found him sitting in consuite reading. It was Perelandra from C.S. Lewis' space trilogy, which sparked a discussion about the anti-modernity stance of C.S. Lewis and Tolkien, since that trilogy ends with scientists being hideously slaughtered by wild animals. Someone recommended that I get the anthology "Flights" and read Neil Gaiman's story "The Problem With Susan," which is a response to Lewis. Speaking of stories that respond to the author of Narnia, on Sunday in the dealers room I always buy a book, and this time it was a book I've wanted for a long time, "Galileo's Children: Tales of Science Vs. Superstition", an SF anthology edited by Gardner Dozois. It contains "Oracle" by Greg Egan, a time-travel alternate history in which C.S. Lewis debates Alan Turing. It's free on Egan's website, and have you read it yet?

The Chuck Roast was incredibly fun. and Freon both demonstrated their genius, as a tent-revivalist and a paranoid conspiracy theorist who had to be carried off the stage, respectively. No doubt you have heard of the all-singing, all-dancing musical extravaganza with , , , and . At the end, won the auction for "the last chance to get in Chuck's pants." It was an auction for the shorts he wore under the Bubble Man costume.

Late on Saturday night, John graciously accepted my apology for using inflammatory word choices on his blog that sparked an ugly backlash, which I think he neither remembers nor cares about. He offered twenty bucks to buy me from her if she would throw in a goat. He referred to us as husband and wife no less than three times, but given that he instructed in how to disembowel me with a hair stick, I knew of no important need to disabuse him of that notion, or any other notion, ever. :)

Went with lots of people to dinner on Sunday and shared a nice chicken pasta with . Most of us went hot-tubbing and swimming afterward, which was divine. Also I got to meet and chat with , who might come to Penguicon. Later I SMOFed with in the Dead Dog party, who is probably going to be conchair next year, and she promised not to try to recruit me to return to the concom again. But I said, by all means, anybody can try to recruit me!

Other than smashing my precious coffee grinder on the pavement while loading the car, it was a splendid weekend all around.

Comments

mjwise on Jan. 23, 2006 8:27 PM

Perelandra is a good book, though not my favorite of the trilogy (I prefer Out of the Silent Planet). I think you misunderstand That Hideous Strength though. It was not a simple anti-modern slaughter of scientists at the end -- they were people involved in a thorough deception (science was the last thing the Institute cared about) who thirsted for little more than absolute power, and basically attempted to put in a call to Satan to meet their ends.

Good con though (even though I only was around long enough to see party suites...oh well!)

matt-arnold on Jan. 23, 2006 8:30 PM

Then why fight them with magic and animals instead of with science?

mjwise on Jan. 24, 2006 4:33 AM

Because it wasn't C.S. Lewis's strong point I imagine -- he always dealt more with fantasy and allegory. Science isn't all "bad" in the series either. It is through it in Out of the Silent Planet (through the form of a space ship/space travel to Mars) that the ball is set into motion that will reconnect the Earth with the rest of the Universe. What he decries is the baser instincts politics and power masquerading as science (For example, I'm fairly sure C.S. Lewis would have thought little of intelligent design.)

matt-arnold on Jan. 24, 2006 4:39 AM

You thought Out of the Silent Planet wasn't anti-science? Do you remember the scene at the end in which the villianous scientist attempts to persuade the angel that mankind's efforts in establishing modern society are a good thing? He has to speak through the protagonist as an interpreter into Malacandrian, and by translating it into simple language each statement is made to sound horribly bad. It was painfully obvious where Lewis was going with that.

In fact, I'll go one better and get the book down off the shelf and create a new LJ entry about this.

matt-arnold on Jan. 24, 2006 5:16 AM

I was going to type the entire text into a new LJ entry, but I didn't realize how long it was. Presumably you have a copy. I refer you to chapter 20, specifically pages 135 through 140 of OotSP in the Scribner boxed set of the trilogy. That speech and pidgin translation is a characature of human acheivement as presumptuous arrogance. It plays to the typical prejudices about what motivates scientists and engineers and humanists. There is nothing I can do to illustrate it more vividly than the text itself.

I have always been fond of the idea of doing Out of the Silent Planet as an animated film. Perhaps someday I will adapt it as a new screenplay, if only to turn the nature of the book on its head.

mjwise on Jan. 24, 2006 5:36 AM

Unfortunately I don't have my copy with me -- it was a non-essential so it didn't come with me when I moved. I'll have to read that passage again. I think you overextend the passage though. I always thought that passage was to caricature Weston (a thoroughly unethical scientist, if nothing else) but it is clear the books as a whole do caricature academia (which is not the same or a proxy for science IMO) quite a bit. C.S. Lewis was a man intimately familiar with British academia and perhaps he simply wrote what he felt about a number of his contemporaries. You may have a point, but I still never read that much into it.

matt-arnold on Jan. 24, 2006 5:44 AM

I'll leave a copy with Brendan next time I'm over there.

tammylc on Jan. 25, 2006 8:33 PM

Later I SMOFed with rmeidaking in the Dead Dog party, who is probably going to be conchair next year, and she promised not to try to recruit me to return to the concom again. But I said, by all means, anybody can try to recruit me!

Not even as GoH Liaison to the Science GoH *you* suggested?

matt-arnold on Jan. 25, 2006 8:35 PM

Maybe she didn't know that. I presumed she was referring to the publications, but ConFusion has that job adequately covered. Again, anybody can try to recruit me for whatever position. I will not guarantee success, or failure, in doing so.

jeffreyab on Jan. 25, 2006 9:25 PM

What does a Nifty Guest get other than a free membership and getting to be on panels?

matt-arnold on Jan. 25, 2006 9:28 PM

They get access to the green room, and a short bio in the Nifties section of the program book and website.

jeffreyab on Jan. 25, 2006 10:18 PM

So you have guests that do not get access to the Green Room?

matt-arnold on Jan. 25, 2006 10:22 PM

No. Access to the Green Room is provided to Guests of Honor, Nifty Guests, other program participants if they run enough events to qualify for the reduced admission rate, and Concom/Staff.

avt-tor on Jan. 29, 2006 1:24 AM

I took a class on writing science fiction taught by Karl Schroeder at George Brown College back in the '90s.