Category Archives: Podcast

Philip K Dick’s The Man In The High Castle is a novel about one of the most complex ideas in our world. The way stories shape perception, and the war between narratives. This long-form audio commentary builds on ideas in the video essay Lady Gaga in The Man in the High Castle. Members of the Science Fiction community can listen to the full commentary on the member RSS podcast feed.

Watch the video essay here https://youtu.be/8pSP0iXlruI

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Subscribe to the Science Fiction podcast feed for long-form commentaries on these video essays

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Subscribe to the Science Fiction channel for the short video essays

https://youtu.be/AQG3UVaR2cw

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What would a metamodern Batman movie look like? Find out in this audio commentary to accompany the Incel Batman video essay on the Science Fiction channel.

Become a member of the Science Fiction community to continue the discussion

Website – https://damiengwalter.com
YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/c/DamienWalter/membership
Patreon – https://www.patreon.com/DamienWalter

Subscribe to the Science Fiction channel for the short video essays

https://youtu.be/AQG3UVaR2cw
Join the Science Fiction community on Facebook

https://www.facebook.com/groups/324897304599197/

Get all-you-can-eat audiobooks with a free month of Audible+

https://amzn.to/3Hb1R0P

Watch the video essay on the Science Fiction channel

https://youtu.be/CYDpD5skkvM

Subscribe to the Science Fiction podcast feed for long form commentaries on these video essays

https://damiengwalter.com/podcast/

Join the Science Fiction community on Facebook to continue the discussion

https://www.facebook.com/groups/324897304599197/

Become a member of the Science Fiction channel on youtube for full access to all content

https://www.youtube.com/c/DamienWalter/membership

Or join for any monthly donation and all the same benefits via the website

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PATREON COMING SOON

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Access the full podcast archive and all my courses as a member for ANY monthly donation…

Advanced Scifi & Fantasy Writing
https://damiengwalter.com/advanced-scifi-and-fantasy/

The Rhetoric of Story
https://damiengwalter.com/the-rhetoric-of-story/

Join the discussion on the Science Fiction community https://www.facebook.com/groups/324897304599197

Psychohistory is among the most important ideas born in science fiction.

A science that allows us to predict the future of human civilisation.

It’s tempting to ask…could Psychohistory be real? Algorithms can control masses of humankind. Complexity science and agent based modelling are already predicting mass human behaviour.

And as we face our civilisational “Seldon Crisis” can we learn a less from Isaac Asimov about the future of humankind?

00:00 We are in a Seldon crisis
01:48 Isaac Asimov’s Foundation
03:51 Why do civilisations collapse?
06:17 What is the Foundation saga about?
12:12 Psychohistory
17:50 The Metacrisis
26:07 Psyche & Civilisation
39:28 Resolving the Metacrisis

Follow the the Science Fiction podcast and become a member
https://damiengwalter.com/podcast/

Advanced Scifi & Fantasy Writing
https://damiengwalter.com/advanced-scifi-and-fantasy/

The Rhetoric of Story
https://damiengwalter.com/the-rhetoric-of-story/

Join the discussion on the Science Fiction community https://www.facebook.com/groups/324897304599197

The best book to understand Ken Wilber https://amzn.to/3NSwBnu

Read the Foundation saga https://amzn.to/3yp65MN

Transhumanism makes grand claims about the future of humankind, from genetic engineering and artificial wombs to immortality and uploading humanity to the cloud.

Lead by pseudo-scientific thinkers like Ray Kurzeil, Transhumanism has become a popular ideology among Silicon Valley tech leaders including Elon Musk and Peter Thiel.

In recent years it has also become the focus of conspiracy theorists from Anti-Vaxxers to Qanon, who claim the ultimate goal of the “global elite” is to turn humans into post-humans.

The truth is that Transhumanism is a fantasy born in the pages of science fiction. While authors like Bruce Sterling and William Gibson warned against the terrors of Transhumanism, today’s Transhumanists see it as an inevitability, and have transformed the fantasy of Transhumanism into an anti-human religion.

00:00:00 The Torment Nexus
00:01:34 Welcome to the Science Fiction podcast
00:04:06 Beyond our ape brained meat-sacks – a profile of Elise Bohan
00:08:23 We are in a time between worlds & Transhuman conspiracy theories
00:13:14 Understanding Transhumanism as narrative, storytelling and modern mythos
00:19:15 ONE – Transhumanism is Utopian
00:24:06 TWO – Transhumanism assumes fundamental change
00:26:00 THREE – Transhumanism is a pseudo-science
00:29:34 FOUR – Transhumanism is a religious vision of transcendence
00:34:38 FIVE – Transhumanism is authoritarian
00:39:12 SIX – Transhumism wants to liberate us from our human bodies
00:44:38 SEVEN – Transhumanism is science fiction
00:48:04 EIGHT – Transhumanism believes technology is the force of progress
00:51:40 NINE – Transhumanism devalues the human
00:55:58 TEN – “We’re building God you know.”
01:06:53 ELEVEN – Transhumanism is a power structure
01:13:01 TWELVE – Transhumanism is dystopian
01:16:20 THIRTEEN – Transhumanism is anti-humanism

Beyond Our Ape Brained Meat Sacks – https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/jun/04/beyond-our-ape-brained-meat-sacks-can-transhumanism-save-our-species

Jonathan Rowson on Zak Stein and our time between worlds – https://twitter.com/Jonathan_Rowson/status/1532318004071084034

Follow the the Science Fiction podcast and become a member
https://damiengwalter.com/podcast/

Advanced Scifi & Fantasy Writing
https://damiengwalter.com/advanced-scifi-and-fantasy/

The Rhetoric of Story
https://damiengwalter.com/the-rhetoric-of-story/

Join the discussion on the Science Fiction community https://www.facebook.com/groups/324897304599197

When did Superman get so “Dark”?

He’s as American as apple pie, coca-cola and black-ops interventions in the politics of other sovereign nations.

Superman is the symbol of all that is best about the United States of America. An indefatigable powerhouse, an Apollonian sun deity, child of the gods but raised by mortal man, and the archetype of post-WW2 American self image.

But as America has re-learned its own history, so Superman has changed and mutated.

From shining demigod hero.

To dark underworld evil.

00:00 Superman gets a ride in a London cab

00:59 Have we had enough of Dark Superman?

03:50 Content Warning

05:30 Superman is a strange hero

07:55 Superman as Apollonian archetype

11:12 A brief history of Dark Superman

15:42 THE ARCHETYPAL BEING

26:39 Shadow & Ego of Carl Jung

31:54 A shadow-work exercise

39:33 Integrating the Shadow of the Superman

Follow the the Science Fiction podcast and become a member https://damiengwalter.com/podcast/

Advanced Scifi & Fantasy Writing
https://damiengwalter.com/advanced-scifi-and-fantasy/

The Rhetoric of Story
https://damiengwalter.com/the-rhetoric-of-story/

Join the discussion on the Science Fiction community https://www.facebook.com/groups/324897304599197

Why does science fiction not get the respect it deserves…from literary fiction?

It’s the East coast vs West cost gangster rap rivalry but fiction writers (except without the drive-by shootings…that I know of?) An ancient feud between the Realists and the Fantasists.

But beneath the surface of the LitFic vs SciFi argument is a more serious issue, about the power of storytelling, and the duty of storytellers.

Are we just the people paid to cast shadows for your entertainment, or is it the storyteller’s job to lead you out of the cave?

Follow the the Science Fiction podcast and become a member https://damiengwalter.com/podcast/

Advanced Scifi & Fantasy Writing
https://damiengwalter.com/advanced-scifi-and-fantasy/

The Rhetoric of Story
https://damiengwalter.com/the-rhetoric-of-story/

Join the discussion on the Science Fiction community https://www.facebook.com/groups/324897304599197

Read my top science fiction to rewire your consciousness https://amzn.to/3gQqfGR