After you’ve beaten death, disease and poverty where do you go to while away the hours? What can you do to fill up the value void left in the wake of abandoned humanism?
Cory Doctorow, a brilliant Canadian short story author with plenty of promise, sets forth his own answer in his first novel, Down and Out in the Magic Kindgdom. You go to Disneyworld.
Brighter minds than mine will probably see Disneyworld as a metaphor for post-human reality. It’s a classic example of a group of humans finding meaning in going through the motions. Is the charade of characters and guests at mouseland any less real than the charade of walking around being “yourself”?
When we’ve opted for backups of our experiences that can be loaded into fast grown clones, when whatever you want can be poured out of a faucet for the asking, what’s left that we can find meaning in?
SFRevu
