The Wednesday night program on the science channel, The Prophets of Science Fiction, 10:00PM est, will be on Philip K ****. A main theme continually recurring with **** was what is identity in relation to machines being conscious, or genetically crafted "humans", as in the film Blade Runner. Other films based on his works: Next, Paycheck, Minority Report, Total Recall, The Adjustment Bureau, Imposter.

(PKD was also essentially a mystic, not-by-choice, written about in his 8,000 page Exegesis [1,000 pages just published] but I'm sure that won't be covered).

The writings of PKD are probably the best thing that temporal lobe epilepsy every brought us. He's one of my favorite writers. Now if they could only get the Radio Free Albemuth movie into a theater near me or at least onto DVD/Blu Ray, I'd appreciate it.

Nov 19, 2011 -- 1:30AM, JimRigas wrote:

I always considered science fiction as escape literature.  

Then you're not reading the right kind of science fiction. Have you read Octavia Butler's Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents? The second one, Parable of the Talents, is particularly relevant, I think. It tells the story of a flegling religious movement that follows a non-personal God in a post-secular United States with a President who belongs to a very conservative Christian Church that is also a new political party. Non-Christians, homosexuals, etc. are rounded up and put into "re-education camps" run by the president's Christian church/political party, where they are forced to work, and where the women are routinely raped by the men running the camps. The children of the people in the re-education camps are also put into acceptable Christian foster homes so they can be raised with proper American, Christian family values. All the while, the environment is going to hell, and the U.S. is involved in a war with Canada. (The book was written before 9/11 and so in this future, the U.S. is not at war with Muslim terrorists.) Good science fiction should not be escapism but be a commentary on contemporary issues or on a potential immediate future. 

Nov 21, 2011 -- 1:23AM, rangerken wrote:

Comments about the author, Philip K ****, is perfectly fine! I assume this is who is being mentioned.

www.philipkdick.com/

I thought it a good idea to settle this, which is also why some posts were removed without comment since they were short one liners arguing about whether or not this man's name can be used.

Of course it may!

Rangerken

Except that it can't. I'll try to post it right now. Philip K. ****. See?

This is stupid. Treating a man's name as though it were an obscenity might be grounds for a lawsuit.