Cory Doctorow joins author C.S. Pacat for an expansive conversation about the imperfect present and foreseeable future. 

C.S. Pacat and Cory Doctorow — Photo: Jon Tjhia

For Doctorow, the purpose of science fiction is not to predict the future – but to understand the present.

The latest book from the irrepressible Canadian activist, editor, journalist and novelist is set in an alarmingly plausible, post-scarcity near future. In Walkaway, all labour is automated, and human beings are either super-rich or surplus. Chaos, violence and catastrophe ensue. Yet, Doctorow asserts, the novel is utopian.

‘Stories of futures in which disaster strikes and we rise to the occasion are a vaccine against the virus of mistrust,’ he has written. ‘The [best] science fiction tells us better nations are ours to build and lets us dream vividly of what it might be like to live in those nations.’

The fixations of Walkaway are the fixations that have defined Doctorow’s career. Through his fiction and journalism – including as a co-editor of Boing Boing – he has sparked and steered debates on digital rights, surveillance, automation, inequality and biotechnology. In all his work, Doctorow brings optimism and imagination as well as hardcore intellect; his idea of utopia is something weird, cooperative, messy and in constant flux.

Jim Robbins joins host Sean Dooley for a soaring discussion on the role of birds in the future of our planet.

The human fascination with birds is expressed in our technology and in our culture. Poets, artists, philosophers and inventors have, for centuries, found inspiration in the song, sight and flight of birds. What more can we learn about avian life?

Jim Robbins

Robbins is a celebrated science journalist for the New York Times and the author of six acclaimed books, including A Symphony in the Brain and The Man Who Plants Trees. He believes birds have a lot more to teach us – about nature and about ourselves. His new book, The Wonder of Birds, is a riveting investigation into the world of birds and into our connection with them. From the complex principles of ‘flock intelligence’ and murmuration (the synchronised movement of starlings) to the sophisticated mimicry skills of the lyrebird, The Wonder of Birds explores the secret lives of feathered creatures, and makes an impassioned argument for their protection.