Analog Science Fiction and Fact - 2014-08

by Penny Publications

  Critics contend that drone strikes frequently cause civilian casualties, are too easily kept from the public, and the lack of risk for the operators increases the willingness to see military intervention as a solution in the future. Those are reasonable concerns.

  But are those risks specific to drones? Perhaps. Reports on civilian casualties are difficult to confirm either way, since much information remains classified. But perhaps not—there's long been reason to be concerned about civilian casualties from traditional bombing campaigns, and the risk to pilots of manned aircraft hasn't acted as a deterrent to military action yet. To those killed, it makes little difference whether it was in a war or in a "peacekeeping action," and I suspect it would matter just as much to them whether it was by drone, manned AC-130 flying overhead, or a shell the size of a Cadillac fired from a ship off shore.

  That's not to say there isn't any room for reasonable concern about the potential for governmental, corporate, and private abuse of drones.

  Drones are not currently automated beyond flight software, as sometimes calling them "robot planes" might imply; they don't actually make any decisions. But work on just that kind of automation is currently taking place at the University of Pennsylvania, and it's easy to imagine the SFnal implications of it. Landmines are restricted under the Geneva Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons, and for good reason: they're persistent and indiscriminate, apt to kill civilians years after being buried. If a truly autonomous drone were to make a bad decision, who's held accountable? The programmer?

  One also probably doesn't have to think very hard about how readily available flying cameras are likely to affect our privacy; professional paparazzi must be champing at the bit.

  But as with concerns about combat drones, we already have tools in place to shape how they should be used in day-to-day life. It's all too often ignored these past 13 years, but we have the Fourth Amendment and the reasonable expectations of privacy that flow from it. We shouldn't need much drone-specific legislation tacked on to what we already have, in spite of many states passing anti-drone specific bills: if it's illegal to peek over my fence to take photos of me sunbathing (I'd be flattered, but I'm a hairy Mediterranean; save yourself the trouble), then it should be illegal to fly a quadrotor over my fence to do the same.

  There's a proverb attributed to Seneca that says, "A sword by itself does not slay; it is merely the weapon used by the slayer." 3 That's true enough, but one might then reasonably ask, "Must we make the swords as sharp as possible to give the slayer as easy a time with his business as we can?" Why should we put up with the possibility of misuse?

  In this case, these "swords" also have other purposes beyond simply slaying. Amazon.com has serious plans to begin delivering packages by drone within the next few years; drones are a big part of the tech giants at Internet.org bringing affordable internet to developing nations; and we're on the cusp of drone-mounted cameras and lights achieving otherwise impossible shots for films.

  Drones also patrol borders, monitor traffic, detect fires and tornadoes, do agricultural work in challenging terrain, bring humanitarian aid to hard-to-reach areas, and even deliver pizza and beer.

  In many ways, the cat is already out of the bag. The FAA estimates that there will be ten thousand commercial drones in use by 2020. Fifty-five countries use them in some capacity, and the number is growing. However comfortable we might be with our own use of drones, it's only a matter of time before others are using them just as regularly, and for the same reasons. (Distaste for a tool or strategy usually only lasts until one sees how useful it is for themselves: early snipers were often seen as "unfair," partly because they shot at the officers behind the enlisted men up front, but it wasn't long before dedicated sharp-shooters were commonplace specialists.)

  And that's all the more reason to make sure we're seeing the issues as clearly as possible.

  This is neither a critique nor a defense of any military action, past, present, or future; that's largely its own issue. But treating drones as substantially different from manned aircraft would be a mistake. A fear of drones as a unique category of particularly ethically dubious new technology seems unfounded: matters of "collateral damage" or the unlawful killing of American citizens or issues with transparency and secrecy aren't inherent to drones any more than the possibility of being used in a terrorist attack is a problem inherent to airplanes. The flaws with the argument that drones are too advantageous because they keep operators safe would be more obvious if it was leveled at, say, body armor.

  But the lack of transparency that allows these fears to grow is also a mistake, and why it's so important there be more oversight of the military, law enforcement agencies, and corporations who plan to use drones. Flouting the rule of law is more damaging than any external threat could be, and fears of what happens under the veil of secrecy cast shade on the positive potential of the technology. If anti-drone fears are largely unfounded, secrecy only helps to foster those misconceptions, so it's in everyone's best long-term interests that those who can be open and frank about how we use drones, do so. As ever, focusing on a specific device or technology misses the forest for the trees: how to better think about what people actually do with the technology.

  For more on the various developing uses for drone technology, I heartily recommend the Popular Science blogs, available at: http://www.popsci.com/category/tags/dron es.

  Footnotes:

  1 A portmanteau of "celebrity" and "debutante," typically used to describe a reality TV star "famous for being famous."

  2 http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/military/riseof-the-drones.html

  3 "Quemadmodum gladius neminem occidit: occidentis telum est."

  * * *

  THE ALTERNATE VIEW

  MYERS-BRIGGS AND I (AND YOU) Jeffery D. Kooistra | 1843 words

  When I first sat down to take the Myers-Briggs assessment (or the MBTI for Myers-Briggs Type Indicator—I encourage you to look it up for a deeper discussion of the details; it's a classification tool for telling a person what his personality is like and what it may mean for his life at work and play) I was skeptical that a fill-inthe-dot paper and pencil "test" was up to the task of revealing my personality. I would not have taken it at all if it hadn't been required for one of my education graduate classes. Since it was, with a sigh, I soldiered on through the hundreds of personal questions of the "Would you rather fish or cut bait?" variety.

  When the results came back I found out that I was an INTP. I'll get to what the letters mean in a minute, but four pairs of letters (E-I, S-N, TF, J-P) are used yielding 16 personality types. The result delighted my professor, Corinne Kass (later Dean Kass), because she was also an INTP and I was the first student she'd ever had during her long career who shared her personality measure. We INTPs are relatively rare. No doubt our similarities was one reason I liked and respected her more than most, but I became a believer in the usefulness of the test when I read the list of characteristics of the INTP.

  The packet that came with my test results listed 25 characteristics, almost all of which fit me, but three of them nailed my personality in ways that I hadn't noticed myself until I read the pithy descriptions. You would rather analyze your world than run it. Certainly true—I never wanted to grow up to be president, either of a country or a corporation. You are not easily impressed with authority of any kind. No surprise there to readers of my "Alternate Views." You tend to be quite flexible and adaptable until one of your ruling principles is violated. At that point, you stop adapting. This last was the most eye opening, but I immediately recalled instances where my near-instantaneous shift from pliable to inflexible really caught people off guard (and still does).

  The letter combinations, briefly, mean the following. E is for Extraversion and I for Introversion, and most people understand that dimension already. More formally, E-types "focus on the outer world of people and things," and I-types "on the inner world of ideas and impressions." S-N is for Sensing and iNtuition, with S-types foc
using on "the present and on concrete information gained from their senses," and N-types "on the future, with a view toward patterns and possibilities." T-F means Thinking and Feeling respectively, the former basing their decisions on "logic and objective analysis of cause and effect," the latter "primarily on values and on subjective evaluation of person-centered concerns." Finally, the J-P pairing has the J-type who likes a "planned and organized approach to life and prefers to have things settled," over against the P-type who likes a "flexible and spontaneous approach to life and prefers to keep his options open." (I paraphrased this a bit from the report that came with my results, copyright 1988 from Consulting Psychologists Press. You may find the wording somewhat different online, but the underlying meaning is the same.)

  I took the test back in 1989, before Internet search engines, and long before Facebook was littered with links that would take you to ten-question "What's your personality?" tests. This was certainly for the best—if I had been anything other than ignorant about the Myers-Briggs, I likely would have tried to skew my answers so that I'd come out as an INTP. How could anyone not want to be independent and original and ingenious? How could a childhood science geek not want to be in the same company as Einstein, Newton, and Galileo? How could a man who finds deep thinking deeply pleasurable not want to share his per sonality type with Thales, Aristotle, and Aquinas?

  Yes, I am proud to be INTP, and the only downside I wish I could change is the "absentminded professor" aspect, because it is a damn nuisance!

  Since in fairness I can't keep referring to a packet only I have from 25 years ago, here's a link to a page I find useful, and I'll use it for the rest of this essay— http://www.personality-page.com/. I don't know if it's the best or the worst, or where it falls along the relative quality line of personality pages, but I like it.

  From the homepage, clicking on the "Portraits" icon takes you to a list of the 16 personality types. Click on the one you want and it takes you to a thousand words or so, rather than an actual picture, of description of what that particular type is like. Click on INTP and it says that people like me are "The Thinkers" who "live in the world of theoretical possibilities," usually inside our own minds, and that we "highly value intelligence and the ability to apply logic to theories to find solutions." True enough in my case. It goes on to say we "approach problems and theories with enthusiasm and skepticism, ignoring existing rules and opinions and defining their own approach to the resolution." That's me again. On (what some may consider) the downside, the "INTP has no understanding or value for decisions made on the basis of personal subjectivity or feelings," which means we "don't understand the importance or relevance of applying subjective emotional considerations to decisions." Also true of me, but I've gotten better at not acting this way. I quibble with the choice of words, though. I do understand the relevance, but I don't appreciate it the way most people do.

  And so it goes. SF is loaded with brilliant scientist loners like this. My own James Christian Dykstra is INTP. If you want an alien example, I'd label Niven's Pak Protectors as acting like INTPs most of the time (think of "Tunesmith" from Ringworld's Children). However, when they decide something needs to be done, it's INTJ all the way.

  One very important aspect to keep in mind when you read these portraits, however, is that not all INTPs (or any of the other types) are created equal. That is, the relative strengths of the particular attributes can vary widely even within the same type. In my case, my "preference scores" (these show how consistent the test taker is in selecting one preference over the other) are 13 for I, 23 for N, 27 for T and 39 for P, the higher the score meaning the stronger the preference. So on any given day, I might seem more like an ENTP than an INTP, but it is much less likely that I'd act like an INTJ. (Here's a story idea. What about a person who scores only one or two on each preference? What would he be like? Would he seem boring, having no personality at all? Or would he be exceptionally popular, the perfect "everyman," sharing similarities with anyone he meets?)

  Since my weakest preference is on the E-I scale, I should be quite similar to ENTPs. Jumping to their portrait, we find that these folks are "Visionaries," their "primary interest in life is understanding the world they live in," and they are "usually extremely quick and accurate in their ability to size up a situation." That's close. However, since they are "less interested in developing plans of action or making decisions than they are in generating possibilities and ideas," they find that "the implementation of an idea is usually a chore." So unlike the typical INTP procrastinator who finishes a project late, the ENTP is less likely to finish at all. But they're a lot more fun at parties. Maybe at one party out of five I'll act like an ENTP.

  With my strongest preference being P over J, a look at the INTJ portrait reveals marked similarities and stark differences. An INTJ is "The Scientist" who "lives in the world of ideas and strategic planning." INTJs "value intelligence, knowledge, and competence, and typically have high standards in these regards," and I track with that. However, though like the INTP "they are tremendously insightful and usually they are very quick to understand new ideas," unlike them, "their primary interest is not understanding a concept, but rather applying that concept in a useful way." In other words, I'm a guy who wants to know why, while the INTJ just wants to know how.

  I get to compare myself to an INTJ every day because my son is one, and with a vengeance. In tenth grade, Joshua will finish AP Calculus this semester at the top of his class. He will be dual-enrolled this fall, taking more calc at the junior college. He also arranges and composes music for the school orchestra (he plays cello), and worries that he'll have no classes left to take his senior year. His homework is finished early, his GPA perfect, and he is always looking to test out of classes. None of this happens with prodding from me. At his age, I didn't plan anything, homework was done in study hall and put off to the last minute, and I'd spend days trying to design an antimatter bomb or figure a way around the speed of light limit, but not a minute contemplating my future.

  Now I compared my personality type to others herein because I know from the inside what INTPs are like. But even an SF story can be populated with only a few of them, and here is where the Myers-Briggs can help. The personality most opposite mine is the ESFJ, so if I wanted a character of that type in one of my stories, reading the portrait of the ESFJ would be a good place to start. This type is "The Caregiver" and reading about them reminds me of horoscope descriptions of the "born on this day" variety, all of which can be paraphrased as "Born on this day you have many admirable qualities." So even I, an INTP reading about an ESFJ, can appreciate that it's good to be "warmly interested in others," and that being "extremely good at reading others, and understanding their point of view" is a useful ability to have. But ESFJs are "not likely to enjoy having to do things which involve abstract, theoretical concepts, or impersonal analysis." (That rather cuts out physics, doesn't it?) And ESFJs are "traditional, and prefer to do things in the established way." Why? Because other people do it that way, that's why!

  They might just as well be aliens to me.

  My initial skepticism about the Myers-Briggs was unfounded because it's more like a ruler than a psychiatrist. Just as you know a girl five feet tall is shorter than a boy of six feet, the Myers-Briggs will help you understand why scientists almost always share personality types with an NT in the middle. For the writer, the test can be a means for keeping your major players consistent with real people, and can certainly serve as a cheat sheet for manufacturing minor characters.

  And if you put the letters in a blender, you can pour out enough alien personalities to fill a galaxy.

  * * *

  IN TIMES TO COME

  198 words

  We're not ones to miss an opportunity for some seasonal stories, so our October issue has a host of fitting fiction, both light-hearted and more sinister.

  First up, we're proud to present something that hasn't graced the pages of Analog for far too long: new fiction by
Joyce and Stanley Schmidt. Not everybody really "gets" Halloween, but when "Opportunity Knocks," you just have to answer.

  Then an installment of Edward M. Lerner's popular "science behind the stories" series serves as our fact article, this time about one of the Big Questions of SF: "Alien AWOLs: The Great Silence."

  We'll also have a particularly white-knuckle Mike Christopher story from Dave Creek, "The Jenregar and the Light."

  And there's a bunch more great content where that came from, like David Brin's unsettling piece of biological SF, "Chrysalis"; Tony Ballantyne's story of limits reached, "Threshold"; an unusual adventure from Andrew Barton in "Each Night I Dream of Liberty"; a close look at the ways biology and society intertwine in Mary E. Lowd's "The Hand-Havers"; and the Nietzche quote about gazing into the abyss exemplified in Ron Collins' "Unfolding the Multi-Cloud."

  As well as, of course, all our usual top-notch columns. See you next month!

  All contents subject to change

  * * *

  THE REFERENCE LIBRARY

  Don Sakers | 2442 words

  Romance has been part of science fiction since... well, forever. The list of romantic couples in SF is long and broad: John Carter & Dejah Thoris, Kim Kinnison & Clarissa MacDougall, Lessa & F'lar, Princess Leia & Han Solo... it just goes on and on.

  Yet in another sense, "romance in SF" is a current, burning issue entangled in considerable controversy and strong emotions. It all depends on what meanings people attach to that word, "romance." Let's explore.

  To begin with, lit-crit folks make a distinction between "romantic" and "modern" literature. Romantic fiction (with its roots in the eighteenth century Romanticism movement) is primarily focused on plot and narrative as expressed by characters; modern fiction (dating from the post-World War I Modernist era) is more concerned with perception and meaning as expressed by introspection. In this scheme, SF (like most other genre fiction) is in the romantic camp—although the New Wave of the 1970s brought some crossover from the modern side.