Jack Calverley

Original science fiction short stories of tomorrow. From AI to aliens, from time travel to telepathy, from the conscious mind to what comes after, it's all here: On planet Ptolemy III, why is McGeeza's ultra-smart brain implant removed? What does Gary do when his diarized future goes blank? Why is Terri grateful that alien telepathy is only one-way? All civilisations end, but what ends the Age of AI? Aside from which: Is honesty the best policy in a community that lies? Would coagulated happy conscious substance make for a perfect world? And what does UITSU mean? Journey from the satirically dark to the fizzy and light while the future comes at you non-stop-the time to read is now

Consciousness is real. It exists at least for me when I assert that it exists. It is thus, at the very least, at those times, a thing in the universe. Consciousness comes and goes. There must be a change in some other aspect of the universe that makes at least the first of these transitions happen. Any change that induces either transition must involve energy of some kind (although if consciousness is an emergent property more elaboration is required). Furthermore, whatever causal role we may ascribe to it, consciousness interacts with the physical world, at the very least to the extent that the brain governs the content of experience. We take the physical world to be made up of fundamental particles (quarks, electrons, and so on). The candidates for the mechanism whereby consciousness comes about are such as: special arrangements of physical particles and changes in those arrangements (including e.g. emergence), OR transitions in the states and energy levels of those particles, OR interactions between particles of different kinds. Interactions, transitions, or establishing particular arrangements, as well as receiving content from the brain, all involve energy (although emergence demands more elaboration). Even the collapse of a wave function in quantum entanglement involves the energy of the interaction that triggers the collapse. Since consciousness comes about through an energetic transaction, it must at least for some time appropriate some part of that energy for itself (i.e. the energy from the interaction, process or whatever that brings it about). While energy is transmuted to underpin consciousness it is its own distinct form of energy (available to interact with like-energies in some characteristic way). Blakelaw posits that consciousness is a fundamental property of the universe, meaning we need look no further than this energy field, and the particles and interactions that might arise in it, for an explanation of consciousness. After this text establishes this baseline, it goes on to explain how we arrive at the rich multi-sense, multi-feeling psychological life that we experience, including the 3D world-building that accompanies it. Which is to say, the putative homunculus (or inner eye) in our heads is rendered redundant.

Murder is a Message MOE STONE The newspaper hack who lost his Fleet Street job after asking the wrong questions. Searching for a skeleton in a closet, he finds numerous bodies instead. Not one of them is the one he wants... LINDA TURNBULLOne time lead singer with the phenomenon known as Rap Banter, she is determined to pay off her moral debt to Vic Victor senior. Having sacrificed love for a sense of duty, love catches up with her. SANDY AMADEUS The Musical Theatre Company wants a true crime story to adapt for the stage. Three years out of music school, Sandy has stars in his eyes, but when he finds his story, the witnesses start killing each other. ANGELA MISTRAL The once child star of a Brazilian soap has left the stage to turn her hand to fashion in London. But first she must get back the royalties that are hers by right. These four driven characters converge on three houses in Morricone Crescent at the heart of London's Notting Hill in August 1997. Four carefully staged deaths tie them together just before the turmoil erupts over the death of Diana, Princess of Wales. They compete to make sense of the carnage in their attempts to escape back to normality.