Vernor Steffen Vinge (born February 10, 1944 in Waukesha, Wisconsin, USA) is a mathematician
(retired Professor of Mathematics at San Diego State University), computer scientist,
and science fiction author. He is best known for his Hugo award-winning novels A
Fire Upon the Deep and A Deepness in the Sky, as well as for his 1993 essay
"The Coming Technological Singularity", in which he argues that exponential growth
in technology will reach a point beyond which we cannot even speculate about the consequences.
(more can be found on Wikipedia)
Speaking of science fiction looks to be more difficult today than in the
past. What are the topics that you think sf authors, including you, will be
focused on from now on?
The most difficult issue for most sf subgenres is simply staying
ahead of the everyday changes occurring in our real world!
This has always been an issue, but I think the problem is becoming
more serious, in particular the impact of the Internet on social
interactions.
(At a more mundane level, competition within our industry seems ever
more intense. This is probably good news for readers, but it can be
uncomfortable for the writers! (On the other hand, a similar situation
is true for many professions nowadays :-))
Sf and classical culture: do you think it can be a good compromise for an
author, or do you rather see a "marriage" between sf and scientific culture?
"Hard sf" has a mostly friendly relationship with scientific
culture. In principle (though not in practice) fantasy and science
fiction are large enough to _contain_ most of classical literary
culture. As we move into the twenty-first century -- assuming we avoid
global disasters -- it will be interesting to see how the arts
accomodate and change, as the deepest classical problems of humanity
become concretely addressable.
What do you think of Greg Egan's works and inspiration in comparison with
yours?
Greg Egan is probably the most powerful concept-oriented sf writer in the
world today.
You look both focused on science contradictory push: a step towards
future, two steps towards chaos. Or it is just my impression?
I am at the cautious end of the spectrum of wild-eyed, raving
technophiles. I think disasters are possible, but that radical
optimism may also be realistic (so radical and so optimistic as to be
frightening in itself :-)
Cyberpunk showed in the '90's that the interaction between computer and
people could be exciting, after all. Is this also your meaning?
Since 1960 or so, I've felt that the interaction of computers and
people is the first or second most important thing about our future.
(The other important thing is human survival and the extension of
life into space).
How far could technology bring this relationship on your opinion? Are we
really going to become mostly cyborgs?
If physical disaster is avoided, then eventually we and our
descendents should become more potent than our present physical
substrate can support. So ultimately, not only the mental but the
physical nature (and location) of mind should be quite different from
what we see in biology alone.
In one of your works, The ungoverned, you develop the theme of society.
Which society can be possible in the future of a world where "performance"
seems to be the only parameter in order to judge both machines and
people?
Actually, "The Ungoverned" is my attempt to show how economic freedom
could produce a society much more happy and liberal than our present
(just as our present-day democracies are much more happy and liberal than the
societies of the Middle Ages). For a non-fiction version of this, I highly
recommend David D. Friedman's book, _The Machinery of Freedom_.
Human intelligence, superuhuman intelligence and the end of human era. You
wrote your essay about this in 1993,
http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/faculty/vinge/misc/singularity.html
Do you still recognize yourself in it?
Oh yes. In fact, there is very little I would change about that essay.
Could supporting free software against commercial monopolies be a way to
avoid this loss of democracy, and at last, loss of humanity in our
civilization?
The free software movement is one of the happiest auguries for our time.
Free software -- and the broader notion of Creative Commons -- could and
should be the enabler of the explosion of intellectual activity coming
from hundreds of millions of creative people who -- for the first time
in history -- are in deep communication with each other and with the
computing and data resources of the Internet.
This year you published Rainbows End. Do you plan to write other stories
based in the same universe as Fast Times at Fairmont High?
Yes, I definitely want to write a sequel novel to _Rainbows End_. I have
lots of ideas about that. However, it will not be next novel.
What are you working to at the moment?
I am planning for a novel back among the Tines, a sequel to _A Fire
Upon the Deep.
