We've read Children of Time (https://amzn.to/2QqYKII), and boy do we have a lot to say about it! This episode we discuss the structure of the book, whether novels need strong characters, how animal consciousness might differ from our own, and how to stock a ship designed to re-seed the human race on another planet. Adrian gets to jabber on about the Baldwin Effect & octopuses, and Matt makes some sharp points about the importance of empathy. Truly this podcast represents the future liberals want. 

As always, here's a list of stuff we discuss in the episode. If the links don't show up in your podcatcher, they will on spectology.com. All links are referral links.

Startide Rising by David Brin 
The Bees by Laline Paull 
* The White Bone by Barbara Gowdy 
* Watership Down by Richard Adams 
* The Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov 
* Goedel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter 

And finally, a few books on consciousness, language, and evolution that weren't mentioned by name, but which Adrian recommends:

Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness by Peter Godfrey-Smith (octopus researcher mentioned)
* Adam's Tongue by Derek Bickerton (language evolution & the Baldwin Effect)
The Crucible of Consciousness by Zoltan Torey (language & consciousness) 
* The Perplexities of Consciousness by Eric Schwitzgebel (essays on the difficulty of introspecting consciousness) 
The Ego Tunnel by Thomas Metzinger (laying out the ideas behind the phrase "consciousness is an illusion" for a lay audience)

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We'd love to hear from you, either by chatting with us on twitter at @spectologypod, sending us an email at mailbox@spectology.com, or submitting the episode to r/printSF on reddit. We'll reply, and shout you out in the next podcast when we talk about your comment.

And if you like the episode, subscribe at spectology.com or whever you listen to podcasts, and share it with your friends!

Many thanks to Dubby J and Noah Bradley for doing our music and art.

This November we're reading Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky. Woo Adrians!

This episode we discuss what the "science" in science fiction means. What other books portray science well? What does it mean to write a book about science? Should science fiction try to be "realistic"? 

In addition, we give you the book facts, and discuss a number of other works. Links are at spectology.com if they don't show up in your podcatcher:

Blindsight by Peter Watts
* Ursula K. Le Guin
Foreigner by CJ Cherryh
The Mote in God's Eye by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle
The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell (also see episodes 2.1 & 2.2 of Spectology for further discussion thereof)
* The Dark Eden Trilogy by Chris Beckett
* The Mars Trilogy by KSR
Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang
* The Arthur C. Clarke Awards

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We'd love to hear from you, either by chatting with us on twitter at @spectologypod, sending us an email at mailbox@spectology.com, or submitting the episode to r/printSF on reddit. We'll reply, and shout you out in the next podcast when we talk about your comment.

And if you like the episode, subscribe at spectology.com or whever you listen to podcasts, and share it with your friends!

Many thanks to Dubby J and Noah Bradley for doing our music and art.

Two quick announcements today, since we weren't able to get our usual pre-read episode recorded in time.

The first is that our November book will be Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky. This is a book neither of us has read, but won the Clarke award and has themes that we're both interested in. Should be a good time.

The second is that Adrian guest hosted on the Hugos There Podcast (https://hugospodcast.com) a few days ago to talk about Ursula K. Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness. It was a great conversation about one of his favorite books, so check that out if you need something to tide you over before our Children of Time pre-read drops next week. 

Final bonus announcement for our Americans who read the show notes: VOTE! This is voting day, and there are a bunch of important local elections on the ballot, from your state legislators to various criminal justice ballot reforms to just your local sheriffs & judges. We live in a dystopian hellscape, but you can make it mildly better by voting. And you can listen to me talk about Le Guin while you wait on line. 

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As always, we'd love to hear from you, either by chatting with us on twitter at @spectologypod, sending us an email at mailbox@spectology.com. We'll reply, and shout you out in the next podcast when we talk about your comment.

And if you like the episode, subscribe at spectology.com or whever you listen to podcasts, and share it with your friends!

Many thanks to Dubby J and Noah Bradley for doing our music and art.

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