THE TENACIOUS GRASS
How are the new machines changing the relationships of loyalty, citizenship, partisanship, solidarity, and religiosity?
How have machines changed and how will they change the relationships between parents and children, between rulers and citizens, between the faithful and priests?
How will the enormous structures (social, economic, industrial, political, technological) necessary for these machines to continue to exist and then give way to others that we cannot even imagine today, change the relationships between citizens and governments?
Politics is a fundamental presence in science fiction. The two works that are universally recognized as being of the genre, Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World and George Orwell’s 1984, are among the most influential political discussions of the 20th century and are undoubtedly among the most profound reflections on the human heart.
That science fiction is considered a second-rate genre can only be attributed to ignorance or laziness. Both attitudes, on the other hand, perfectly normals.
Those of us who have been struck by science fiction never stray far from it. To point out the power and influence of Plato, the Romans said that when they went out for a walk (to reflect) with their minds, they always came back to… Plato. Science fiction fans are a bit like that. Something their geniuses and prophets tell us that makes them not something of the same kind. Something unavoidable.
Today and here, in my global neighborhood of social networks, electronic media, and satellite-digital, telepathic-mechanical communications, I see that science fiction is like a tenacious weed.
I see up close at least one group (today modest and small, but who knows the future?) that by dint of pure enthusiasm has managed to sustain a network of proto-writers and writers, of proto-readers and readers who are step by step becoming interesting literary voices. What excites them is, well, yes: science fiction.
This network, the Great Speculative Text Collider, has all against it. They are all amateurs, they all have to work on other things and dedicate a few stolen hours to reading and writing. They are natives and political members of Mexico, a country with one of the worst reading rates in the world. But… they have been doing this for six years, a little more, maintaining a constant and disciplined exercise of reading and writing science fiction.
Tenacious, like the grass they eat and care for.
Politics worries me. Each one of us risks his life to understand when, how, and why we should or should not obey. Should the Russians continue to obey Putin? Will the Americans get what they dream of by obeying Trump? Politics is that serious. Science fiction is one of the most important sources of ideas and reflections for understanding the phenomenon of politics.
So I will work on those two topics: politics and science fiction. The study will have that limit, we will not work on political philosophers other than those who have done political philosophy using the vehicle of science fiction. Of course, we will not read everything that needs to be read (humans cannot meet that goal) but everything we read will be important.
The idea and the initiative were not mine. The Critical School of Political Philosophy in Bolivia invited me and while talking, it appeared.
In this blog, I will be putting notes, logs, material, etc.
The activity will be online, open, and free.
The activity is for now only in Spanish, but this blog will have the same notes, texts, and materials in English. If the public is interested in English, it will be stupendous to reach them and make it in that language.
