Mirror Worlds: or the Day Software Puts the Universe in a Shoebox...How It Will Happen and What It Will Mean
With evangelical fervor, Gelernter's book-length essay paints a future where software technology, now isolating people, brings them into impersonal proximity through "mirror worlds." These computer models of reality let users descend to greater depths of detail at will, meet other explorers, and generally get the "big picture" of what's going on. However, Gelernter's own appraisal of the value of computers seems inconsistent and extreme: he claims they are valuable just sitting unused on the coffee table but then insists that the uninitiated will be forced to "sink or swim" (i.e., learn to use computers) in the information sea computers create. His casual style gives the book the feel of a lecture transcript, and his metaphors (e.g., "jettisoned floating landscapes in tuple space") demand considerable hardware and software knowledge to link them with reality. For collections emphasizing computer science.- Doug Kranch, Ambassador Coll. Lib., Big Sandy, Tex.Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.