Lunar stations collect solar energy and beam it as microwaves to rectennas on Earth where computer-guided and machine-tended technocomplexes grow any artifact atom by atom in processes controlled by giant molecules. Nanotech exactly duplicates, then undersells, anything handmade. Computers continually generate new concepts of art. Everyone lives an indefinitely extended lifespan, re-growing teeth every century or replacing them with something harder. Everyone receives an income called "'...basic share...'" (p. 459) Virtual realities are indistinguishable from reality.
Tu Shan, one of the eight mutant immortals who have survived from ancient times, finds it hard to adjust...
It sounds to me as if everyone has the opportunity either to find/create meaning or to conclude that life is meaningless and terminate it. Some - enough - will do the former, just as enough human beings have always adjusted to every previous environmental and social change brought about by themselves.
2 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I'm skeptical of some of this, esp. computer programs "imaginative" enough for creative art. And the fact Anderson shows us restlessness and discontent among some in this far future society indicates his belief not everything will be well. Iow, humans will continue to muck up things!
Ad astra! Sean
Kaor, Paul!
I recognized the illustration you chose, it's the Easton Press edition of THE BOAT OF A MILLION YEARS. Easton specializes in providing high quality, leather bound editions of many kinds of classical books. Very nice, but expensive. Easton did two others of Anderson's works: THREE HEARTS AND THREE LIONS and TAU ZERO. I actually got very good copies of these two at very low prices. It pays to look around!
Ad astra! Sean
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