Aucbvax.1390 fa.sf-lovers utzoo!duke!decvax!ucbvax!JPM@MIT-AI Fri May 22 06:04:10 1981 SF-LOVERS Digest V3 #128 SF-LOVERS AM Digest Friday, 22 May 1981 Volume 3 : Issue 128 Today's Topics: SF Books - "There Will Come Soft Rains", SF Movies - Jason and the Argonauts & Outland, SF Topics - Price of Books & Anti-Sugar & Children's stories (Freddie the Pig and Tom Swift) & Children's TV (Felix the Cat and 8th Man and Japanese animation) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 22 May 81 1:21-PDT From: mclure at Sri-Unix Subject: quick Delphi poll What do you think will be the price of an "average" American paperback book 20 years from now in 2001? Currently the average seems to be about $2 to $3. I'll collect the responses and send the result back to SF-Lovers. Replies to mclure@sri-unix. [ NOT to SF-LOVERS directly. -- Jim ] ------------------------------ Date: 21 May 1981 16:05 PDT From: Drysdale at PARC-MAXC Subject: Re: SF-LOVERS Digest V3 #127 The story about the death of a house with robot mice is "There Will Come Soft Rains" from \Martian Chronicles/ by Bradbury. Also, as I remember the Asimov robot series (\I Robot/?) introduces robot birds and other creatures to make people feel comfortable about being around robots, but none are major characters. Scot ------------------------------ Date: 21 May 1981 13:10:03-PDT From: CSVAX.upstill at Berkeley Subject: sf-lovers--emergency entry Sorry for not sending this in sooner, but fantasy film freaks should know about Ray Harryhausen's appearance on the Berkeley campus this Saturday (the 23rd), along with a showing of Jason and the Argonauts. It's being done as part of a tribute by the Pacific Film Archive, a worthy cause in itself, and costs $3. Wheeler Auditorium at 8 PM. Steve ------------------------------ Date: 21-May-81 11:02:49 PDT (Thursday) From: Hamilton.ES at PARC-MAXC Subject: Another review of OUTLAND Definitely \not/ SF. An attempt at a sort of surrealist Western (one might make a very stretched analogy to Eastwood's "The Gauntlet"). Unfortunately, the surreal often comes dangerously close to the camp. Sean Connery, in a Clint Eastwood/ Gary Cooper role, is the befuddled Marshall, and Peter Boyle is his rather wooden foe. The dialog is awful, and the plot not much better. And don't bother to ask what a titanium mine is doing on Io, whose surface consists largely of molten sulphur volcanoes. "Designer" spacesuits light up each character's face like a Times Square marquee. The best aspect of the film is an interesting score from Jerry Goldsmith. Is anyone else as sick and tired as I am of CRT's that run at 110 bps, and even \sound/ like Teletypes? --Bruce ------------------------------ Date: 21 May 1981 19:57 PDT From: Newman.ES at PARC-MAXC Subject: OUTLAND It's unfair to accuse OUTLAND of being sexist and retrogressive just because the society it portrays is sexist. By this line of argument, "1984" is a fascist book because it portrays a totalitarian society, and "All Quiet on the Western Front" is a war-mongering movie because it shows the atrocities of World War I. Nonsense. Clearly it's possible for an artist to use the depiction of evil as a statement against that evil. I found OUTLAND's portrayal of "future sociology" on the frontiers of space quite believable: more believable, in fact, that the utopian scenarios put forth by our current crop of space-colony advocates. I don't like the society shown there any more than you do, but current events in the U.S. demonstrate that technological advances need not go hand-in-hand with social progress. /Ron ------------------------------ Date: 21 May 1981 2316-EDT From: Dave Touretzky at CMU-10A Subject: Re: OUTLAND We have made *significant* social progress towards eliminating sexism, although it's true that we have a long way to go before the problem is solved. To ignore this progress, and depict a distant future in which people are as deeply welded into nonproductive sexual stereotypes as they were ten years ago, is to deny the existence, and even the validity, of movements that are trying to bring about the necessary changes. Be realistic: do you really think the makers of Outland wanted to make a pessimistic statement about how "technological advances need not go hand-in-hand with social progress"? I don't think they're capable of such deep thought; certainly they haven't demonstrated it anywhere else in the movie. Outland presents the sociological picture it does because that picture contains the timeworn macho, violent, sexist elements that Hollywood thinks are necessary ingredients for a good western. Nowhere in the movie does anyone make the statement that sexism in the Outland society is a bad thing. They don't even appear aware that it is there at all! Outlands makes no statements whatsoever. It's a cheap, trashy shoot-em-up movie with wooden characters and no conscience. To compare it to such great works as 1984 is ludicrous. ------------------------------ Date: Thursday, 21 May 1981 17:43-PDT Subject: Re: Outland and sexual stereotypes From: mike at RAND-UNIX Dave Touretzky finds Outland implicit predictions offensive because, among other things, there are hookers on a mostly male planet. Whether or not prostitution is sexist or offensive, as a prediction it is probably as safe as any prediction could be. Prostitution is as old as history. (Or, at least, Western history. I know very little really about the East). For whatever reason it exists, I do not see it going away today or tomorrow, unless human nature changes. And it is a premise of the movie that human nature is very recognizable in the future. Predicting prostitution in the future is as safe as predicting violence in the future. ------------------------------ Date: 21 May 1981 15:42:17-EDT From: cjh at CCA-UNIX (Chip Hitchcock) Subject: Outland technicalities There have been a number of questionable remarks about the technology shown in OUTLANDS. I'd like to put in my two cents worth: 1. Of \\course// a shotgun will work in vacuum, just like the shuttle boosters work in vacuum (or near enough to it by the time they burn out). It's true that explosion is extremely fast combustion; in fact, it's so fast that most explosives are mostly (by weight) oxidizer to provide to provide the oxygen for the fuel to burn in (e.g., gunpowder (per Piper's LORD KALVAN OF OTHERWHEN) is 75% KNO3 (oxidizer), 15% C (fuel), 10% S (catalyst); the shuttle booster fuel is 70% NH4ClO4). [ A series of messages from ihnss!karn at BERKELEY, icl.redford at SU-SCORE, and Obrien at RAND-UNIX also touched upon this point. Thanks are due to each and everyone of them. -- Jim ] 2. Shotguns versus tranquilizers--trank darts are usually designed with short points to minimize damage to internal organs. Through any sort of space suit this would be a problem, as would strength (I'm told that the darts are pretty fragile). Finally, trank darts are expensive, as are the rifles to shoot them, and who ever heard of a rough frontier spending money to be gentle? (Note with reference to point 1 that trank darts may also rely more on aerodynamic stabilization than bullets, which are ballistically stabilized). 3. Very slow transmission on CRT's is endemic to Hollywood (as are CRT's with large screens but short lines); this is partly a camera problem and partly acknowledgment of the fact that lots of moviegoers have to move their lips when they read. 110 baud is a reasonable speech rate for the average person, while 300 is tongue-twisting and unintelligible. Clacking? The public electronic mail terminal in my office clacks (although I think that's partly a key function). 4. I'm familiar with some security systems; most of them choose controllable videocameras in preference to color. Both control and color are getting cheaper, but control was cheaper to begin with. (Again, iit can be a question of cost--how much use would color be, given what people were wearing/would wear on a frontier?). Not that I'm defending the film; I expect to snicker when I see it. But I like to pick at reasonable nits. ------------------------------ Date: 21 May 1981 16:07-EDT From: "Kenneth W. Haase, Jr." A bicycle ride down memory lane! I remember RODOF's books fondly. Freddie the Pig was an old standard, along with the Mad Scientists Club.... I too tried building some of the things in the Mad Scientists Club, but my technical competence was not really up to it. Freddie the Pig was about an intelligent barnyard, and the intellectual of the place, a pig named Fredrick was a detective, a pilot, and half a dozen other things. Great stuff! Alvin Fernald is an old favorite too - Disney made the Alvin Fernald books into a series of tv-movies which were pretty good (considering....) Anybody remember them? Ken Haase ------------------------------ Date: 21 May 1981 08:22-EDT From: Brian P. Lloyd Subject: Nostalgia (Tom Swift and Felix the Cat) Ah yes...The good old days. Such greats as Tom Swift and Felix the Cat. When I was twelve I decided to amass the entire Tom Swift Jr. collection and was successful (TSj by Victor Appleton III). You remember such greats as Tom Swift Jr and his... ...Flying Lab - Atomic powered Aircraft ...Atomic Jetmarine - Atomic powered two-man Sub ...Atomic Earth Blaster - mining equipment ...Outpost in Space - Space Manufacturing of efficient solar battery ...Electronic Retroscope - "Restores" old cave writing et al ...Triphibian Atomicar ...Trip to the Moon - Repalatron (sic) powered Spacecraft I could go on and on as I collected 36 of these things. They did turn me on to SF however (hooked at only nine years old [Damn! that was almost 20 years ago]). For you Felix the Cat lovers: Felix the Cat The wonderful, wonderful Cat When ever he gets in a fix he reaches into his bag of tricks Felix the Cat The wonderful, wonderful Cat You'll laugh so hard your sides will ache Your heart will go pitter-pat Watching Felix the wonderful Cat. Righteeeeooooo!!! Brian Lloyd [ Another message from duke!unc!smb at BERKELEY also provided the theme song for FELIX THE CAT. -- Jim ] ------------------------------ Date: 21 May 1981 06:02:01-PDT From: decvax!duke!unc!tyg at Berkeley Subject: 8th Man As i recall, 8th Man also had recharging problems. His way of getting a recharge was to suck on energy cylinders or some such which looked like cigarettes. A common problem was using these in no smoking areas. Also, didn't he work as a P.I.? With a secretary. Also, i remember Rocket Robin Hood. While ok it was never one of my favorites since even at age 8 i saw a basic inconsistency in using bow and arrows against advanced technology. Nostalgically tom galloway ------------------------------ Date: 21 MAY 1981 1638-PDT From: PEDERSEN at USC-ECL Subject: Japanese Animation (Censorship) In response to some questions re Japanese Animation, particularly "censorship": First, understand the basic difference between animation in this country and overseas (particularly Japan). In Japan (and Europe), animation is considered a respectable art form and the "content" of the material determines its audience. Some very adult cartoon series (violence, sex, etc) are telecast in Japan. One is the James Bond-style "Lupin" series, another is the kid series "Devil Man" which has people dying, heads chopped off and some pretty horrible monsters. In this country we tend to consider anything animated as "kid stuff". This is beginning to change somewhat ("Fritz the Cat", "Lord of the Rings", "Watership Down", etc) but very, very slowly. Japan (which, touch of irony, is about the safest country in the world - I would not be afraid to walk through downtown Tokyo after midnight, which I hesitate to do the same in Los Angeles) puts a lot of violence in all their cartoons - and some not-too- subtle bits of sex - all of which must be eliminated for fear of harming American children. Japanese cartoon series also tend to be syndicated in the early morning or late afternoon hours, when small children are supposed to be the prime audience. The series were originally intended for much older audiences and thus the American censors and executives- in-charge feel that not only violence and sex must be eliminated, most of the story also has to go. The Japanese try to tell stories in their cartoons, where we have been conditioned to changing the scene every half minute, no matter what else is going on. (Try to outline a few American tv episodics - you'll find lots of scene changes, very little continuity in the story.) What you see in the way of Japanese cartoons (excepting the early shows of the '50's and '60's when we hadn't learned the fine art of censorship) bares very little relationship to the originals. Which is too bad, since so much of their work (particularly in science fiction) is very good and deserves to be seen uncut. Ted Pedersen ------------------------------ Date: 21 May 1981 1509-PDT From: Dolata at SUMEX-AIM Subject: Sugars, whisk(e)y and reversals There are two different approaches to 'fat free' sugars now under examination; wrong isomers, and plastic bound. The wrong isomer approach is the simplest, and is exactly as described so far, the wrong sugar is indigestible to the body (sort of like cellulose) and so goes right out with the urine. The second approach actually chemically binds sugar 'residues' to plastic backbones in a fashion remaniscient to sugars on a DNA backbone. The sugars are free to bind with the taste receptors, but cannot pass membranes and slide right through the GI tract, thus they cannot be metabolized, and provide no energy. It is expected that several years of testing will be necessary before acceptance of this product will be forthcoming. However, this cannot have anything to do with the taste of 'reversed' whisk(e)y, since sugars do not distill. The main flavorings in Uesgebaugh are various low molecular weight aldehydes (bad guys) ketones, esters, acids, and other alcohols. Complete analysis of the composition of these side products is not generally released (proprietary info) but those analysis I have seen indicate that of these, less than 2% (which themselves comprise only 1-3%) are optically active, i.e. can be changed by 'reversal'. Of course, all bets are off if the hero was using cheap colored pot whisk(e)y. Nobody knows what they put in that junk... Dolata@sumex-aim ------------------------------ End of SF-LOVERS Digest *********************** ----------------------------------------------------------------- gopher://quux.org/ conversion by John Goerzen of http://communication.ucsd.edu/A-News/ This Usenet Oldnews Archive article may be copied and distributed freely, provided: 1. There is no money collected for the text(s) of the articles. 2. The following notice remains appended to each copy: The Usenet Oldnews Archive: Compilation Copyright (C) 1981, 1996 Bruce Jones, Henry Spencer, David Wiseman.