<
https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/the-collapse-is-coming-will-humanity-adapt/>
"I’ve known Dan Brooks for 40 years now. Somehow we’re still talking to each
other.
We’ve followed radically different trajectories since first meeting back in the
’80s. Dan built a truly impressive rap sheet of over 400 papers and book
chapters, seven books, and too many awards, fellowships, and distinctions to
count on your fingers and toes. I, in contrast, left academia in a huff
(industry funding came with, shall we say, certain
a priori preferences
concerning the sort of results we’d be reporting) and became a science fiction
writer. It’s a position from which, ironically, I’ve had more influence on
actual scientists than I ever did as an academic — admittedly a low bar to
clear.
And yet our paths continue to intersect. Dan offered me a post-doc in his lab
around the turn of the century (DNA barcoding — I really, really sucked at it).
A few years later I helped him relocate to Nebraska, leading to an encounter
with the armed capuchins of the U.S. Border Patrol and eventual banishment from
that crumbling empire. The protagonist of my novel “Echopraxia” is a
parasitologist suspiciously named Daniel Brüks. And I once ended up one creepy
handshake away from Viktor Orbán, when Dan finagled a speaking gig for me at
Hungary’s iASK Symposium.
The dance continues. Sometimes we hug like brothers. Sometimes we feel like
punching each other’s lights out (also, I suppose, like brothers). But one
thing we never do is bore each other — and whenever Dan’s in town, we manage to
meet up at a pub somewhere to reconnect. What follows is an edited record of
one such meeting, more formal than most, which took place shortly after the
publication of “A Darwinian Survival Guide.”"
Via Kenny Chaffin.
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
