What would you do if your actions would change the course of history? Lydia, Charlotte, Sorana and Jess take the spotlight on the podcast this month in this episode, recorded for International Womens’ Day. They discuss Marge Piercy’s Woman on the Edge of Time, a classic of feminist science fiction which centres on the actions of Connie, whose confrontation with the future has radical consequences.

Contributors:

Common misconception that; that fun is relaxing. If it is, you’re not doing it right.

Would you like to play a game? This month, we read the Player of Games, by Iain M. Banks, and follow one of the Culture’s Master-game-players to a gaming competition that has little, if any, relationship to play. On the way we discuss our relationship to games, how Yvonne manages to teach using games, and whether victory is important.

Participants

Alex ‘Failstate’ Hoseason

Matthew ‘Blood Bowl’ Campbell

Yvonne ‘Papers Please’ Rinkart

John ‘Probably playing XCOM’ Wood

We are all susceptible to the pull of viral ideas. Like mass hysteria. Or a tune that gets into your head that you keep humming all day until you spread it to someone else. Jokes. Urban legends. Crackpot religions. Marxism. No matter how smart we get, there is always this deep irrational part that makes us potential hosts for self-replicating information.

This month, we dive deep into Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson. One of the quintessential cyberpunk novels, it follows the hacker Hiro Protagonist as he navigates the complex relationship between the real and virtual worlds on the trail of a conspiracy that threatens the metaverse. We discuss how the novel navigates the divide between the two, how we ‘exist’ online (and why Alex’s parents haven’t quite figured it out yet), and how mobility defines social standing.

Participants

Alex Hoseason

Matthew Campbell

Sorana Jude

John Wood

I have told my sons that they are not under any circumstances to take part in massacres, and that the news of massacres of enemies is not to fill them with satisfaction or glee. I have also told them not to work for companies which make massacre machinery, and to express contempt for people who think we need machinery like that.

This month, we discuss Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut. Chosen by Alex, the book attempts to deliver on the idea of a non-linear narrative and was provoked by the bombing of Dresden in World War II. Join us as we try to figure out if Billy Pilgrim is the author, argue over whether it is an anti-war book and discuss whether the Tralfamadorians are real or not.

Participants

Alex Hoseason

Matthew Campbell

Gillian McFadyen

Dyfan Powel

It’s been a rough month here at Social Science Towers, and we were unable to record a new episode. Luckily for you, we have an interview with friend of the podcast Georg Loefflmann instead. We found Georg walking around a hotel in Sicily, and managed to coax him into chatting a little about Man in the High Castle by Phillip K. Dick, which has recently been made into a series by Amazon Studios.

“No one would have believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man’s and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they were scrutinised and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinise the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water.”

Bleddyn chose War of the Worlds for this month, and we decided to deal with the book rather than the musical, which was his original idea. What ARE the chances of anything coming from Mars? How is the novel symptomatic of colonialism? And whatever happened to the Torpedo Ram? Join us as we discuss these questions and more.

Contributors

Never compromise. Not even in the face of Armageddon. That’s always been the difference between us, Daniel.

Today, we deal with Watchmen, because Matt had the bright idea of doing a graphic novel on an audio-only podcast. We talk over whether we consider the characters heroes, inevitability in the story, and whether Dr. Manhattan is God. Also Able Archer, and Sarah’s adventures through the medium of graphic novels.

Contributors

It’s conference season, and we dispatched our one-man-army Matt to interview a series of scholars studying science fiction at the British International Studies Association 2015 conference in London. This time it’s Dr. Georg Loefflmann, on the Pentagon vs. Aliens.

Contributors

I have thus endeavoured to preserve the truth of the elementary principles of human nature, while I have not scrupled to innovate upon their combinations.

Today we discuss Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus, quite possibly the first work of science fiction. Beginning with its importance to science fiction, we work through many of the themes that have come up again and again in our readings of more modern science fiction novels, and discuss how and why these are so important. What is it that makes Frankenstein’s creation so terrifying, and is it possible to portray that today?

Contributors