It’s the end of the world, but you might hardly know it. Sure, there’s the inconvenience of being mostly stuck at home, making do with a bit less and rationing a bit more, and foregoing most of our exterior social interactions. But let’s face it: for many people right now, our streaming services are
It all started about a decade ago with that massive petrol rig explosion that darkened the skies over the entire hemisphere for about a month. Actually, it had started even before that, thought Dom, but I was too young to realize what was really happening. Still, that substrate conflagration set off a chain of
I’ve noticed a not-too-subtle shift in recent years that seems relatively minor but is perhaps quite revealing of larger trends. People rarely seem to ask the question anymore, “what do you do for a living?” Instead, it’s usually expressed in more transactional terms as, “where do you work?” or “what’s your job?” By itself
Well, it was “fun” while it lasted! Sure, we tried to impose our will on the world and render the biosphere uninhabitable… But everyone makes mistakes now and then. Still, despite the judgment by Blue-Ribbon titans that we fell short of the mark (mainly because we had made so many marks that it was
A few months ago I was having a conversation with an old friend on the sidewalk outside of a bar that was just closing (a setting where, historically speaking, many important philosophical discussions surely have been held). The topic was one that is on the mind of many these days, namely whether Artificial Intelligence
“Pass the salt.” “Wha-a?” “I said, pass the salt. I can’t eat this crap without it.” “SO picky. How did you even survive the Upheaval?” “Very funny. You know that I carried your sorry carcass out of the gates of hell and into this even worse version of a world.” “Tsk. You’d think one
The sign blinked insistently, making Fredd really anxious. Not that he needed any help — the whole stupid affair had him on serious edge already anyway. But that damn sign, over and over again: “Please insert 20 cents to continue the session.” Without this, the gate would close and the drones would arrive. He had
The pumps were working day and night, emitting a low (and not unpleasant) humming sound and the faint stench of rotting flesh. Since the discovery three years ago of the first large deposit, thousands were attracted here by the promise of steady work and maybe even a chance to become wealthy fast. For those
we’re sleepwalking through the apocalypse building castles with sand from the hourglass catching rays from a sun gone supernova drinking manmade water from a dry well cheering for teams when the game is over buying all the lies when it’s time to sell making believe while refusing to grieve group thinking while the ship