Monday 23 July 2018

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

I just finished reading this book by Philip K. Dick (yes, that's his actual name).  The book is the "inspiration for [the movie} "Blade Runner", but I don't remember much from the original "Blade Runner" except the scenes of Harrison Ford's hovercar wending its way through all the electronic billboards.  I did see the new "Blade Runner 2049" and I liked it, but this book hasn't got much to do with that either.

Anyway, I really enjoyed the book.  It is also about a bounty hunter who tracks down and destroys androids.  Shockingly, it is set in 2021, which isn't long from now, and of course, we don't have androids or hover cars or things like that, but the book also still has us with telephone booths and technologies that have long since almost completely disappeared.

It is pretty exciting with his search and discovery of the androids {driven by his need for money and the idea that people in this time will spend vast amounts of money on live animals as pets, because there aren't very many animals left, thanks to the fallout from WWT (World War 3)}.  There are lots of great characters, like J. R. Isadore, a "chickenhead" -- they don't actually explain why he's a "chickenhead" and other people are "antheads", and Iran, Rick's girlfriend, and Luba Luft, the android opera singer.  And I liked how it suggested that one difference between us and the androids is their lack of empathy (I hope we have that) and that some people, because of their circumstances, lack empathy and that makes them more like androids than the tests are comfortable with.

I would recommend the book if you're looking for something good to read (which I'm sure you are).

I am going to the UBC Botanical Garden today.  I just finished a book about The Golden Spruce and apparently they have clippings from the tree at the garden and so I'm going to go and see.  On a hot day, some time spent in a beautiful garden seems like a good route to go.

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