Stranger Than Fiction
The Future is Dark.
Welcome to Dark Spiral Publishing.
From ancient times, we have been a society of storytellers. Even before we had the written word, stories were told around the campfire and a mythology was established that passed from generation to generation. Fiction extends that tradition into the modern day, and helps us to create our own myths and explore ideas that can have far-reaching consequences. The author is given a forum where he can craft a world that is different from ours in subtle or dramatic ways, as he chooses. The world he creates can serve as a backdrop for discussing cultures, relationships and how our technologies may develop in the future.
The future comes with no promises or guarantees, and therefore it is important to contemplate the possible consequences that come with introducing new technologies. The author allows us to examine a scenario from different angles and consider the potential social and moral issues. Some experts predict a time in the coming decades when our computer technology may exceed the power of the human brain, leading to a rise of artificial intelligence in an event they refer to as The Singularity. Our genetic research and nano-technology may offer society benefits or open a Pandora's Box that cannot be closed. As our technology advances, it can affect more people more dramatically and quickly spread across the globe. Thus, the dystopic story provides us an opportunity to explore the extremes that could come with the improper application of technology.
Stories also become a way to take on another point of view, and expand our minds. We can experience in fiction what we could or would not be able to experience in real life. We can gain perspective in many ways, by entering another's mind or by traveling to another planet or a galaxy only slightly different, by a single beat of a butterfly's wing. We can learn from the lives of great men and great events in our history, but if we want to be prepared to face the future, we need to acknowledge the important role fiction plays.
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Dark Spiral - dark future blog Future Tense - dark future novel Short Stories - by John Johnson
