12.2: Semiosis post-read w/ Nate Spence: Budding Utopia or Mutualist Dystopia?
Matt, Nate, & Adrian have a long, rollicking conversation about Semiosis, by Sue Burke (https://amzn.to/2JGYm6C). We all really loved the book, but also have a lot of criticism of it, and we get really in-depth on what it all means to us.
The only other books we really mention are Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovski and Dark Eden by Chris Beckett. Look for our 8.1 & 8.2 episode numbers for discussion on CoT, and look out for our episodes on Dark Eden next month!
In addition, if you want to go deeper on how ecologies aren't stable and why thinking so leads to bad utopias, the 2nd episode in the documentary All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace will be right up your alley. You might also enjoy the book Seeing Like A State by James C. Scott.
Finally, big thanks to Nate for suggesting this book and talking to us about it for over 3 hours over these two episodes. Find his videogame on Steam Early Access by searching Ectolibrium. Also thanks to Nate's wife, Amanda, for the artwork this month, she's at @@amandalamandala on Instagram.
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Many thanks to Dubby J and Noah Bradley for doing our music and art.
