Seldon Crisis: Beyond Foundation

I bask in the afterglow of the KSR episode and indulge in a special treat; a reading from Robinson's 2015 novel Aurora. I follow that up with some thoughts on the utopia - dystopia divide and introduce the ideas of some notable utopians I've run into lately.

Transcript: Web (Read/Listen) | PDF | MS Word

David Grinspoon: Earth in Human Hands: Long Now Foundation (YouTube)

Johanna Hoffman: Speculative Futures: Long Now Foundation (YouTube)
Johanna Hoffman: Speculative Futures of Cities: (Sean Carroll's Mindscape podcast)

Rebecca Solnit: Why Climate Despair is a Luxury (New Statesman)

Matt Oja: Let's Imagine the Coastside Skyway (Half Moon Bay Review)

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An illuminating conversation with one of our greatest living science-fiction writers on topics as diverse as AI, climate change, interstellar travel, new forms of finance needed to avert catastrophe, memorable characters and plot lines in his novels, the debate between settling Mars now vs fixing Earth first, utopia and dystopia, and his love of ultralight backpacking.

Transcript: Web (Read/Listen) | PDF | MS Word

YouTube Version

Kim Stanley Robinson at the Long Now Foundation (YouTube)

• Origins of the Red Mars Trilogy — The Interval, 02016
• Climate Futures: Beyond 02022
• Learning From Le Guin
• How Climate Will Evolve Government and Society
• Ursula Le Guin: Call it Greatness
• Science Fiction is the Realism of our time
• Speculative Science Non-fiction

The 2015 Paris Agreement

• What is the Paris Agreement (Website)
• Original Text (27pg PDF)

KSR - Paying Ourselves to Decarbonize (NOEMA)

Special drawing rights (Wikipedia)

A safe operating space for humanity (Nature - Johan Rockström, et al )

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What does our Milky Way really look like? Kevin Jardine is a cartographer working to answer that question by building galactic maps from ESA's Gaia space telescope data. Here he explains a little bit about his process and some of the amazing places he's found and mapped.

Transcript: Web (Read/Listen) | PDF | MS Word

Kevin Jardine's Galaxy Maps:

• Galaxy Map poster
• Gaia DR3 Hot Star Density Map (zoomable)
• Fantasy Map poster
• High Resolution Fantasy Map (zoomable)
• The 10 parsec sample in the Gaia era (our solar neighborhood)

European Space Agency Gaia website

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Dr. Robert Zubrin, President of the Mars Society, talks about his revolutionary Mars Direct proposal, along with the value of Mars settlement for science, industry, government, and for the human spirit.

Transcript: Web (Read/Listen) | PDF | MS Word

Robert Zubrin (wikipedia)

Mars Direct (wikipedia)

The Mars Society (website)

Mars Analog Research Stations:

• Flashline Mars Arctic Research Station (FMARS)
• Mars Desert Research Station (MDRS)

Panspermia:

• Wikipedia
• Interplanetary Podcast #48 - Robert Zubrin - Panspermia - Equinox

Planet and Sky (Rock Opera and Podcast)

• Website
• Album
• Podcast review at Discover Pods

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Our first returning guest to Seldon Crisis is the first ever, philosophy professor Nathaniel Goldberg. We discuss some of the prominent themes of the series introduced in the first three novels of Foundation, including the lone prophet against the advocates for the status quo, the great man of history against psychohistory, altruistic - and not so altruistic - martyrdom, and some strong comparisons with Plato's Republic.

Transcript: Web (Read/Listen) | PDF | MS Word

Nathaniel Goldberg, Professor and Chair of Philosophy

Paul Levinson: Foundation, Dune, and Laplace's Demon: The Invigoration of a Philosophic Issue in Science Fiction: How Laplace's Demon Finds a Stage in the Foundation and Dune Trilogies

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It all comes together at last. The war begins, looking bad for the Foundation, but morale turns the tide against Kalgan. In the aftermath, Homir Munn and the others debate the true location of the Second Foundation with many false turns and a final, startling revelation. The First Speaker has the last say in the matter.

Transcript: Web (Read/Listen) | PDF | MS Word

Script by Joel McKinnon
Voices by Megan Skye Hale, Jon Blumenfeld, Amanda Kreitler, Zac Kreitler, and Joel McKinnon
Theme Orchestration by Tom Barnes
Sound Design by Jeremy MacKinnon
Art by Mike Topping – despotica.com

Music by:
Scott Buckley - Juggernaut

Scott Buckley - Permafrost

Scott Buckley - Celestial

Additional music by Musictown on Pixabay

Scott Buckley's twitter: @musoscientific

Based on the novels of Foundation by Isaac Asimov.

Podcasts and other links for voice talent on this episode:

Amanda Kreitler

• Severed Fate
• Dimension Door
• @MargeGunderson4 on Twitter

Jon Blumenfeld

• Stars End Podcast
• @jblumenfeld100 on Twitter

Megan Skye Hale

• Professional website
• @skyesidhe on Twitter

Joel's personal Twitter handle is @joelgmckinnon and the SeldonCrisis official account is @SeldonCrisisPod.

Also, please visit SeldonCrisis.net and the Seldon Crisis YouTube channel for the video trailer, intro promos, and video versions of the podcast episodes.

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I couldn't wait to tell the rest of the story, covering the last four songs of Planet and Sky, a cosmic love story. Things take a darker turn as the relatively small planet lacks sufficient gravity to hold onto its atmosphere. First we hear from the Travelers again as they gradually become frozen below the surface, then Sky sings her mournful aria to Planet informing him of their demise. We then get an empty, barren world, until the scientists come up with a plan. I share some background on my favorite song and feature it at the end of the episode.

Transcript: Web (Read/Listen) | PDF | MS Word

Planet and Sky on Bandcamp

Planet and Sky, album and podcast

Planet My Love with Nomi Harper and Colyn Fischer performed at an Open Mic

Friedrich Edelmann and Rebecca Rust website

Video recordings of Friedrich and Rebecca

Literature and History Podcast

Theme Orchestration by Tom Barnes
Art by Sophia Valko

Planet My Love written and performed by the Max Wyvern Band:

• Max Wyvern (aka Joel McKinnon): Bass and vocals, words, music
• Melissa Olsen: Keyboards and vocals
• Byron Bellamy: Vocals and Sound Engineering
• Lance Tabor: Guitars
• Darryl Dardenne: Drums
• Mastering: Tom Barnes

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A little diversion to introduce a true labor of love, my rock opera entitled "Planet and Sky, a cosmic love story." Written and recorded in the first decade of this millennium and inspired by my experience as a member of the Mars Society. It's a creation myth wrapped in a sci-fi story in which scientists investigate a strange phenomena on a small arid planet and discover something truly astonishing. The album also has an accompanying podcast which you'll hear more about in Part II in a few weeks.

Transcript: Web (Read/Listen) | PDF | MS Word

The Mars Society Website

Planet and Sky on Bandcamp

Planet and Sky, album and podcast

Literature and History Podcast

Theme Orchestration by Tom Barnes
Art by Sophia Valko

Such is Love written and performed by the Max Wyvern Band:

• Max Wyvern (aka Joel McKinnon): Bass and vocals, words, music
• Melissa Olsen: Keyboards and vocals
• Byron Bellamy: Vocals and Sound Engineering
• Lance Tabor: Guitars
• Darryl Dardenne: Drums
• Mastering: Tom Barnes

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Arkady Darell and Homir Munn arrive on Kalgan and get involved in high level intrigue in the palace of the First Citizen, Lord Stettin, who has eyes on following in the Mule's footsteps to master the galaxy. It seems he also has eyes on Arkady. Stettin's apparently dimwitted mistress Lady Callia befriends Arkady and tries to save her from a horrible fate. An unlikely pair of travelers from distant Trantor appear at a fortuitous moment. But where is the Second Foundation?

Transcript: Web (Read/Listen) | PDF | MS Word

Script by Joel McKinnon
Voices by Megan Skye Hale, Jon Blumenfeld, Amanda Kreitler, Zac Kreitler, and Joel McKinnon
Theme Orchestration by Tom Barnes
Sound Design by Jeremy MacKinnon
Art by Mike Topping – despotica.com
Additional music by Musictown from Pixabay

Based on the novels of Foundation by Isaac Asimov.

Podcasts and other links for voice talent on this episode:

Amanda Kreitler

• Severed Fate
• Dimension Door
• @MargeGunderson4 on Twitter

Jon Blumenfeld

• Stars End Podcast
• @jblumenfeld100 on Twitter

Megan Skye Hale

• Professional website
• @skyesidhe on Twitter

Joel's personal Twitter handle is @joelgmckinnon and the SeldonCrisis official account is @SeldonCrisisPod.

Also, please visit SeldonCrisis.net and the Seldon Crisis YouTube channel for the video trailer, intro promos, and video versions of the podcast episodes.

Want to help me make these shows? Please consider becoming a patron!

Illustrator and science fiction connoisseur Danielle Pajak describes her ideas on the art of sci fi, the means of communicating truth and beauty to the readers and watchers of science fiction books, movies, and TV shows. We talk about some of her major inspirations as an artist and many of her favorite sci fi writers, directors, of course Star Trek and her newest discovery, The Orville. We'll also talk a lot about her impressions of legendary figures in Sci Fi like Asimov, Herbert, Clarke, Hal Clement and Ted Chiang, and the importance of cinematic masters like Tarkovsky, Kubrick, and Denis Villeneuve. We'll sadly say goodbye to one of the great modern icons of the medium, Nichelle Nichols – Lt. Uhura of the Enterprise in Star Trek, the Original Series.

Transcript: Web (Read/Listen) | PDF | MS Word

Danielle Pajak

• Website
• Patreon
• @SayyadinaHeresy

Artists

• Makoto Fujimura
• Yoshitaka Amano
• Wassily Kandinsky

Cinema

• Andrei Tarkovsky
• Denis Villeneuve (IMDB

Sci Fi authors

• Hal Clement
• Ted Chiang
• Isaac Asimov
  • Foundation series
  • Robot series
  • The End of Eternity
  • The Gods Themselves
  • Nemesis
• Frank Herbert
  • Dune
• Robert Heinlein
  • Time Enough for Love
  • Stranger in a Strange Land
• Michael Flynn
  • In the Country of the Blind

Planet and Sky

• Rock opera (Bandcamp)
• Podcast (Apple Podcasts)
• Website

Open Pike Night (Twitter)

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