I'm really interested to see how you will respond is science fiction writ large, colonizing space and these things to me seem energy and ecology blind from a biophysical perspective. So I suppose books about an earth track future where humans are using 80% less material throughput and it's a tougher material existence wouldn't actually be in the sci-fi genre. But do you have any thoughts on that? No, that would be a science fiction story. And it's a good one. It's often a scam because anybody who claims to know what the future is bringing is making a false claim. There's an interesting side case to be made that Mars, if we were to be in a good
On this episode, Nate is joined by climate science fiction author Kim Stanley Robinson to discuss how he contributes to the discussion of climate and pro-social changemaking through writing. There have been many calls to improve the communication of scientists to the general public in hopes it will help people understand the severity of the various global threats we face. A key component to such communication comes from art and literature. Even further, the humanities help us think about the type of future and culture we want to have given the information that science brings us. How can we incorporate fiction into our set of tools to bring more people into awareness of the pressing systemic dynamics underpinning global events?
About Kim Stanley Robinson:
Kim Stanley Robinson is an American science fiction writer. He is the author of over twenty books, including the internationally bestselling Mars trilogy, and more recently Red Moon, New York 2140, and The Ministry for the Future. He was part of the U.S. National Science Foundation’s Antarctic Artists and Writers’ Program in 1995 and 2016, and a featured speaker at COP-26 in Glasgow, as a guest of the UK government and the UN. His work has been translated into 28 languages, and won awards including the Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy awards. In 2016 asteroid 72432 was named “Kimrobinson.”
To watch this video episode on Youtube: https://youtu.be/Xc53KPv7flk
Show Notes & Links to Learn More: https://www.thegreatsimplification.com/episode/66-kim-stanley-robinson