Sci-fi

In September, 2021, while working at his desk in Philadelphia, Samuel R. Delany experienced a mysterious episode that he calls "the big drop." His vision faded for about three minutes, and he felt his body plunge, as if the floor had fallen away. When he came to, everything looked different, though he couldn't say exactly how.

Octavia Estelle Butler was named after two of the most important people in her life: her mother, Octavia Margaret Guy, and her grandmother, Estella. Her grandmother was an astonishing woman. She raised seven children on a plantation in Louisiana, chopping sugarcane, boiling laundry in hot cauldrons, and cooking and cleaning, not only for her family but for the white family that owned the land.  Read more

On November 11, 1922, one of the all-time greatest American writers was born in Indianapolis: the hilarious, kind, and wise Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

As anyone who has ever had to pry bits of shattered Pyrex out of the walls can attest, experiments do not have to be successful to be interesting or worthy of attention. Publishing, for example, has seen any number of innovative ideas that for one reason or another failed to thrive. Failure does not necessarily reflect poorly on the creator-sometimes, it's just not steam engine time.  Read more

Military planning is a complicated endeavour, calling upon experts in logistics and infrastructure to predict resource availability and technological advancements. Long-range military planning, deciding what to invest in now to prepare armed forces for the world in thirty years' time, is even more difficult.  Read more