Geek Week

Last week I had a particularly interesting few days that catered to my utter geekitude.

Wednesday
Sue and I went to the second session of the class on ancient Egypt that we're taking. It's just for fun and it's the utter antithesis of a rigorous educational experience -- it only meets once every two weeks and there's no homework except for some optional reading. Like I said, it's just for fun (believe me, I don't have time in my schedule to do homework).

It's quite interesting and taught by a professor who seems to really know what he's talking about. It focuses pretty heavily on religion (and thus pyramids, mummies -- you know, your basic cool Egypt stuff). The thing that has struck me in both sessions of the class that we've attended so far is the idea of cultural arrogance. Cultural arrogance is when you judge the deeds of another culture based on the assumptions and predominant mores of your own culture. Now, even putting aside the implications this has for modern cultural exchange, this kind of arrogance can really trip you up when you're studying history. (History -- with an emphasis in ancient history -- was one of my majors in college, so this is something that I've had impressed upon me pretty strongly.)

If we look back at a historical culture and base our assumptions on our own modern outlooks, we can easily get things wrong, or at least get confused. For example, unlike any modern religion, the polytheistic religion of the ancient Egyptians didn't have an inherent ethical or moral code built in. They had no concept of being good because God wants you to. Now, this doesn't mean that ancient Egyptians had no ethical or moral codes. They did, very much so. They had a concept called ma'at, which sort of implied the greater order of all things. Promoting ma'at -- order, peace, structure, etc. -- was good, and promoting chaos, violence, destruction, and so on was bad (this should seem pretty familiar to Moorcock fans). But in their view, this wasn't a dogmatic set of rules enforced by the gods. It was, in a way, a higher order that the gods and people both served. Obviously, I'm oversimplifying to make the point that this isn't much like what we think of as religion today at all. If we overlook the difference, we misunderstand these people entirely.

This distinction is interesting from a roleplaying gamer's perspective as well. Too often I see people passing judgment on the "realism" of a fantasy setting based on purely modern sensibilities. Or, perhaps worse yet, writers and designers who base their fantasy settings solely on those same modern sensibilities. I'm not saying every game session has to be a lesson in history and anthropology, but I am saying that it's a roleplaying game. Sometimes you need to look beyond yourself and your own real-world point of view. I suspect that I'll be writing more on this topic at some point.

Thursday
Sue and I went to a Yes concert. As I've written previously, being a Yes fan is about the equivalent of being a D&D fan in geekiness. Not that all geeks are Yes fans, or that all Yes fans are geeks, but among the general population, if you announce you are a fan of either, most people won't know what you're talking about. Those that do likely will think you're weird, or they'll be surprised to find out that the game/band is still around.

For example, after the concert, our ears still ringing because we had great seats in the 7th row of the arena, we went to a local restaurant. This is a place we frequent often enough that the waitress knows our names and we know hers (and it was one of three entirely non-game-related places where I was recognized and asked for my autograph, but that's another story). Anyway, Sue mentioned to her that we'd just come from a concert and the waitress asked who we saw. When we said "Yes," she just kind of paused and said, "Oh, yeah. I've heard of them. My uncle is really into them." The implication was that this was her older, kinda kooky uncle, I'm sure. Oh well.

The concert was really good.

Friday
Okay, nothing much happened on Friday.

Saturday
On Saturday, Sue and I attended the Nebula Awards, which were held in Seattle this year. I wasn't entirely sure I wanted to go, because being a game designer in a room full of novelists is kind of like, well, being a Yes fan. But Sue really wanted to go, and I figured, "How often is this going to be right here in my hometown?" And I decided that it's good for someone who's achieved a little notoriety in one field to go and participate in a function for another field that he cares about but in which he is no one. It gives a person a little perspective. I don't know about your field, but in the game industry, perspective is something in very short supply.

So we got all dressed up and went to the banquet, and I'm really glad we did. The entire affair was put together by Astrid Anderson Bear (wife of author Greg Bear), and it ran extraordinarily smoothly. The toastmaster was Neal Stephenson, who was as literate and witty as you might expect if you've read any of his books. In fact, throughout the banquet and ceremony, a thought kept occurring to me regarding the Origin Awards, the game industry's "big" awards. Everyone always suggests ways to make the Origins Awards more like the Oscars, but they probably should look more closely at ceremonies like the Nebulas, which went off really well. The whole thing was a nice mix of formality and fun.

I think every time I've ever been to a science-fiction-related banquet -- which has been all of three times, two of which were at conventions -- author Harlan Ellison has been there. Now, you may already know this, but Ellison is really a character, and mostly I mean that in the way that people 30 to 40 years ago used the word "character" when they actually meant a much harsher, less polite word. Not that he's a bad guy, just extraordinarily outspoken and a little harsh, sometimes inappropriately so. I don't think I'm an easily intimidated person, but I freeze up a little every time I've been in the same room with him, worried I'm somehow going to set him off.

What do I mean by "outspoken" and "inappropriate"? Well, here are some examples from Saturday night:

Oh, and lots of deserving people won awards. And Rick Rashid, Vice President of Microsoft's research department, gave a keynote speech along with a high-tech multimedia presentation on his laptop that only worked about half the time. The jokes there are just too easy to make, so I won't bother. The stuff that did work was really cool and showed some interesting tech-related developments on the horizon.

Sunday
As a part of the whole Nebulas weekend, we all got a special sneak peek private tour of the new Experience Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame being built in Seattle. This may have been the highlight of the whole week, as it is going to be a really amazing place when it's finished in June.

The whole thing has a lot of money behind it (from Microsoft cofounder Paul Allen) and it's being designed by a team of former Disney park designers. It's going to have some really great high-tech displays, some regular sorts of exhibits relating to SF books, movies, and TV, and some interesting opportunities for research. It's attached to the Experience Music Project, which is a music museum that I've never thought too much of -- lots of wasted space and exhibits that just weren't up my alley . . . which is odd, as I consider myself a big music fan. I wonder if that says more about me or the museum.

In any event, the Experience Science Fiction museum is another reason it's good to live in the Seattle area. Sue and I are going to get charter memberships and support it as much as we can. I expect we'll go there a lot.