Free Surfing the Gnarl by Rudy Rucker Page B

there’s a new set of options—society has moved to a new strange attractor. Although there’s been no change in the underlying rule for the social computation, some parameter has altered so that the range of currently possible behaviors has changed.
    Society’s switches to new chaotic attractors are infrequently occurring zigs and zags generated by one and the same underlying and eternal gnarly social computation. The basic underlying computation involves such immutable facts as the human drives to eat, find shelter, and live long enough to reproduce. From such humble rudiments doth history’s great tapestry emerge endlessly various, eternally the same.
    I mentioned that SF helps us to highlight the specific quirks of our society at a given time. It’s also the case that SF shows us how our world could change to a radically different set of strange attractors. One wonders, for instance, if the World Wide Web would have arisen in its present form if it hadn’t been for the popularity ofTolkien and of cyberpunk science fiction. Very many of the programmers were reading both of these sets of novels.
    It seems reasonable to suppose that Tolkien helped steer programmers towards the Web’s odd, niche-rich,fantasy-land architecture. And surely the cyberpunk novels instilled the idea of having an anarchistic Web with essentially no centralized controllers at all. The fact that that the Web turned out to be so free and ubiquitous seems almost too good to be true. I speculate that it’s thanks to Tolkien and to cyberpunk that our culture made its way to the new strange attractor where we presently reside.
    In short, SF and fantasy are more than forms of entertainment. They’re tools for changing the world.

RAPTURE IN SPACE
    D ENNY B LEVINS WAS A DREAMER who didn’t like to think. Drugs and no job put his head in just the right place for this. If at all possible, he liked to get wired and spend the day lying on his rooming house mattress and looking out the window at the sky. On clear days he could watch his eyes’ phosphenes against the bright blue; and on cloudy days he’d dig the clouds’ drifty motions and boiling edges. One day he realized his window-dirt was like a constant noise-hum in the system, so he knocked out the pane that he usually looked through. The sky was even better then, and when it rained he could watch the drops coming in. At night he might watch the stars, or he might get up and roam the city streets for deals.
    His dad, whom he hadn’t seen in several years, died that April. Denny flew out to the funeral. His big brother Allen was there, with Dad’s insurance money. Turned out they got $15K apiece.
    â€œDon’t squander it, Denny,” said Allen, who was an English teacher. “Time’s winged chariot for no man waits! You’re getting older and it’s time you found a career. Goto school and learn something. Or buy into a trade. Do something to make Dad’s soul proud.”
    â€œI will,” said Denny, feeling defensive. Instead of talking in clear he used the new cyberslang. “I’ll get so cashy and so starry so zip you won’t believe it, Allen. I’ll get a tunebot, start a motion, and cut a choicey vid. Denny in the Clouds with Clouds. Untense, bro, I’ve got plex ideas.”
    When Denny got back to his room he got a new sound system and a self-playing electric guitar. And scored a lot of dope and food-packs. The days went by; the money dwindled to $9K. Early in June the phone rang.
    â€œHello, Denny Blevins?” The voice was false and crackly.
    â€œYes!” Denny was glad to get a call from someone besides Allen. It seemed like lately Allen was constantly calling him up to nag.
    â€œWelcome to the future. I am Phil, a phonebot cybersystem designed to contact consumer prospects. I would like to tell about the on-line possibilities open to you. Shall I continue?”
    â€œYes,”