Two years, two bingos, two Five SFF Shorts, both by Ted Chiang.

Man I love his shorts.

This one goes more scifi and deals more with time travel and parallel realities than the other (which had more scifi interacting with religion), but I love them both.

In particular, I The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate and Anxiety is the Dizziness of Freedom were my favorites. The eponymous Exhalation was an interesting look at entropy. And The Lifestyle of Software Objects, by far the longest, had the time to go even more through the development of the idea over years (in universe).

It’s interesting, I think that especially from this book, I find that I enjoy scifi more in shorts–you have time to explore many more ideas there–and longer form in fantasy–really digging into the worlds and characters more than the ideas.

Thoughts on each short–spoilers should be minimal at worst.

The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate

An Arabic merchant… and closed time loops.

One helps.

One steals.

One cheats.

And one listens–and perhaps learns.

Coincidence and intention are two sides of the tapestry, my Lord.

The author’s note mentions that the recursion of time travel matches well with the Arabian tail of 1001 nights. I have to agree.

Exhalation

Lungs. Air. Entropy.

Aluminum lungs that last a day and are then replaced and recharged.

The idea of immortality making the study of anatomy difficult is a fascinating one.

Autodissection was the only option.

What’s Expected of Us

A button that lights up one second before you press it.

Always.

Surprisingly existential.

The Lifestyle of Software Objects

Evolving artificial life in a simulated environment that can then be applied to the real world. I always love reading about these sorts of experiments.

Taking it a step further to see just how weird life could have been? Awesome.

And then throw that all in to the occasional chaos of the software startup world.

And then it goes so much further than that…

Daveys Patent Automatic Nanny

From an anthology based around placards on artifacts at a fictional museum.

Museum Exhibits of Imaginary Artifacts by Jeff Vandeneer

The Truth of Fact The Truth of Feeling

An introduction of writing to a village and the people that had never done so before.

Life logging as a perfect memory… and how that might just not be so great for relationships.

Forgive and forget.

In both cases, it’s a world changing. Some for the better and some not so much.

A very interesting contrast.

In Tiv, you have two words: “mimi” means truth in the literal sense - what is true. “Vough” is used when something is correct.

And an interesting concept.

People are made of stories.

The Great Silence

What if the answer to the Fermi Paradox is… the aliens have always been here.

Omphalos

The arguments for Young Earth Creationism… in a world tree rings and growth plates have an obvious point of creation. And what happens when you discover a direct counterpoint.

Anxiety is the Dizziness of Freedom

Instead of time, it’s parallel realities. Devices that can cause a fork in reality … and then allow communication between the two.

That’s neat.