World Jones Made

This book is wild. WILD. After a series of devastating wars, a Federal Government (FedGov) is instituted along with the Secret Police. Employing rhetoric of absolute opinions are now illegal, as these are seen as what have caused all previous armed conflicts & devastation. These absolutes range from the religious (Christian) or the lack of religious (Atheist) to economic ideals. As Wikipedia succinctly states, “In this particular dystopia,..CONT“

vivastory Relativism (a social and philosophical theory having originated with Albert Einstein's theory of General Relativity in Physics) emerged as the governing political orthodoxy. Relativism is said to be an ethical philosophy that states everyone is free to believe what they wish, as long as they don't make anyone else try to follow that principle.“
Into the picture enters Jones, who has the ability to see one year into the future. When strange *CONT* 7mo

vivastory beings start landing on Earth from outer space, Jones uses peoples fear to start a new movement & grab power. This one had much to say about the dangers of rhetoric, political manipulation, free will vs fate, freedom all in PK Dick's wild (& at times mind bending) explorations. A fantastic read. 7mo

Bookwomble PKD never stops being relevant! 7mo

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vivastory @Bookwomble Truth! 7mo

Bookwomble Sad truth, when you think about it! 🤔😏🫤 7mo

vivastory @Bookwomble He's been one of the most frequently adapted authors that I have to ask: what is your favorite adaptation? 7mo

Bookwomble @vivastory He is, and it's rather poignant that he died just before all that sweet Hollywood dollar would have solved his financial issues. I guess my favourite would have to be Blade Runner, even if it's more of a riff than an adaptation, but it's iconic. Then A Scanner Darkly, which is the most faithful adaptation I've seen. Then Minority Report. Total Recall is mainly fun, but getting into B-grade, and it's kinda downhill from there ... 7mo

Bookwomble ...Next, Paycheck, Imposter, etc. I don't think Cameron ever credited PKD for the backstory of Terminator, which I thought on first viewing was a rip-off of Phil's short story, Second Variety. I had great hopes for the Electric Dreams series, but thought it was fairly disappointing. And Blade Runner 2049 🤮 7mo

vivastory @Bookwomble My favorites mostly align with yours. I think that Blade Runner is the very rare one where I pref the movie over the book. The book is my least favorite that I have read by him so far. I have yet to watch Electric Dreams, but Id read the collection that contained all of the stories that were adapted in the series. It seemed like they were trying to ride the popularity of Black Mirror. Have you seen the Man in the High Castle? 7mo

vivastory @Bookwomble It seemed strange to me that they managed to stretch that one out for 4 seasons. 7mo

Bookwomble @vivastory Yes, they were definitely going for a Black Mirror vibe when they should have stayed true to the OG. I have seen the first series of TMITHC and enjoyed it even with the mainly understandable changes made. Then I came to watch the second series and found that I wasn't that interested and never finished it. I love the book, and that its structure was built around PKD consulting the I Ching at crucial plot points to decide is direction ☯️ 7mo

Bookwomble Yes, it would definitely have been better if they'd kept it tighter and shorter, but they do like to milk their electric sheep, don't they! 😄 7mo

vivastory @Bookwomble 😂 👏 7mo

The_Book_Ninja @Bookwomble I only know this as I‘ve been on an Ellison deep dive recently, but Harlan got an out of court settlement and an added credit to subsequent prints of Terminator after successfully claiming it was a plagiarism of an Outer Limits story he wrote called Soldier. I‘ve not seen that episode or read Second Variety but I‘m keen to investigate both 7mo

Bookwomble @The_Book_Ninja I read that about Ellison's legal action (after you posted about him the other week), and I also haven't seen that episode, so I can't comment on it, but Second Variety is about autonomously manufactured robots designed to pass as people so they can infiltrate & destroy the few surviving human resistance cells - this is stated near the beginning of the story, so not a spoiler 😊 It was made into a good awful '90s film, Screamers 😱 7mo

The_Book_Ninja @Bookwomble I must jump on some Dick 🤭I‘ve only read Man in the High Castle but I think I was too young to appreciate it. I remember being baffled. I like the sound of Valis…I might give it a go. 7mo

Bookwomble @The_Book_Ninja I'm not sure I'd recommend VALIS as a starting point.Then again, jumping into the deep end of the weirdest of weird weirdness might be the ultimate initiation! From PKD's subjective pov, VALIS is the barely fictionalised account of a theophany he had in 1974 in the form of a pink laser revealing an omniscient alien entity Zebra that told him our perceived reality is actually a construct of the Roman Empire, in which we still live! 7mo

The_Book_Ninja @Bookwomble yeah…sounds fun!🤣 7mo

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