An Atemporal Feynman Method for Pre-Distressed Antique Futurity Now

Bruce Sterling on “the pre-distressed antique futurity,” etc. He explains that William Gibson was saying that, “if you have a genuinely avante garde idea, something that’s really new, you should write about it or create about it as if it were being read 20 years from now. In other words, in order to do it, you want to strip away the sci-fi chrome, the sense of wonder. You want it to be antiqued, before it hits the page or the screen. Approach it from that perspective. No longer allow yourself to be hypnotized by the sense of technical novelty; just refuse to go there. Accept that it’s already passe, and create it from that point of view; try to make it news that stays news. Refuse the awe of the future, refuse reverence to the past. If they’re really the same thing, you need to approach them from the same perspective.”

Bruce Sterling explains "atemporality for artists" Boing Boing - Watch more Tech Videos at Vodpod.

More Exceprts

“Becoming multi-temporal rather than multi-cultural. I think we’re approaching a situation where the outlooks and perspectives of our own age make very little sense; they just don’t bind us to anything in particular. We don’t really have a coherent outlook or interest that can enslave us. This means we’re closer to a potentially objective history than anybody’s ever been.”

“A personal museum economy. Why not designer fiction as life? Just invent the whole thing. Why not just go ahead and make yourself a personal public testimony for a future that doesn’t exist? Why not just carry it out with a kind of Ghandian dedication and see what happens?”

We’ve been trying this last part for about twenty years, now. We’ll keep trying, Bruce. Thanks for the encouragement! ;-)