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There Will Come Soft Rains (1950) [pdf]

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Re: There Will Come Soft Rains (1950) [pdf]

#311

Post by GlickWick »

worksonmine wrote: post #133
nahuel0x wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as we know life is only present on Earth, we presuppose that in the vastness of Cosmos there are other instances of it or that it can re-emerge from almost zero, but the reality is that we simply don't know. So maybe there is a possibility that wiping out all the life on Earth also wipes it from the entire Cosmos, forever.

"Humanity" is far from "all the life on Earth". Nature will be better off once it happens.

I see this a lot, and I think it's sort of naive. Nature itself is doomed due to the way the universe works. It's also far more brutal and arbitrary than we could imagine being. The only way to even have a chance at avoiding the doom that "nature" is facing is for something to evolve that can manipulate and forestall this inevitability.

I don't know if humanity is what can do that, and likely nobody knows. But nature is not going to survive either once you broaden the time horizon a bit.

Re: There Will Come Soft Rains (1950) [pdf]

#312

Post by sorokod »

openasocket wrote: post #295
apelapan wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nuclear annihilation on any sort of global scale is further off than ever in the past 60-70 years or so. The doomsday clock is mostly worrying about climate change, conventional war and Facebook boomers spreading and believing fake news. I don't mean that things are fine, just that Nuclear annihilation is less of a concern than some make it out to be.

With the expiration of New Start earlier this year, there are no nuclear arms control agreements in effect between the US and Russia, which hasn’t been the case since the 1960s. Russia, China, and the US are all actively modernizing and developing new nuclear capabilities. China has been greatly expanding their nuclear arsenal, building hundreds of new silos. North Korea has an expansive set of tactical and strategic…

In addition, usage of tactical nuclear weapons comes up again and again from Russian sources, driven by the situation in the Ukraine war.

Re: There Will Come Soft Rains (1950) [pdf]

#313

Post by kebman »

I imagined one of those automatic lawn mowers on a very sunny day, going about its own business cutting the grass. Until it arrived on the non-shielded side, and it kinda sags a bit and keels over into the black-charred ground on that side. A clean shadow between the un-touched grass, and the ground in directly in the path of the blast. Or maybe the charred ground is for later. We need to see the nice, automated kitchen first. And only then the rest of the world. Would be a very interesting short film, I think.

Re: There Will Come Soft Rains (1950) [pdf]

#314

Post by the_af »

state_less wrote: post #301
the_af wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is really an anti-war poem rather than anti-humanity or about nature in general. Sara Teasdale was forced to write her sentiments obliquely. From Wikipedia: > "The Sedition Act of 1918 enacted two months before the original publication of "There Will Come Soft Rains" made it a criminal offense to "willfully utter, print, write, or publish any disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language about the form of the…

If you read the Influences section just under section you quoted from Wikipedia, it seems she was under the influence of the idea of an 'uncaring universe' from reading Darwin. And yet there are humans that treat animals well (e.g. dogs, cats, crows and so on... ) These animals would feel the loss if humans disappeared. So i don't think it's right to say that nature (animals) wouldn't care and that the sentiment is a…

Thanks for the reply. I agree with you that humans are animals and also part of nature. I don't think there's an implied put down of animals or nature in the poem. I think the author was talking about how meaningless and tragic human endeavors are, such as war, when framed against the rest of nature. While (some) animals would briefly miss us -- and yes, some would struggle to live without mankind, having become dependent on us -- this would be brief, and nature would continue without us.

Re: There Will Come Soft Rains (1950) [pdf]

#315

Post by arch_deluxe »

lantastic wrote: post #288
paulorlando wrote: post #201

It seems quaint now, but it’s astonishing how much the fear of war (especially nuclear annihilation) affected mid-century fiction. In addition to "There Will Come Soft Rains" we have short stories like Stephen Vincent Benét’s "By the Waters of Babylon." In that story, society has been bombed back to the stone age. Even religion is a stone age recreation. Something like hot and cold running water seems like it must co…

On topic of fear of nuclear war: After reading Daniel Ellsberg's The Doomsday Machine, I'm surprised we as a species are still around.

A book I highly recommend, but personally found distressing to read, especially the chapter on the strategy of targeting civilian populations, which continues to haunt me.

Re: There Will Come Soft Rains (1950) [pdf]

#316

Post by 1234letshaveatw »

mrloopex wrote: post #110

Born in 1968 I missed “duck and cover” but rode the wave of Reagan brinkmanship with my skater friends until 1990, watching all the broadcast TV PSAs and songs and art about nuclear war. It was real. It pervaded daily life: the notion that two old white men were having a pissing contest with every human as disposable bargaining chips. And as always, 25% of the US population cheered for purification of the planet beca…

Still happening https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/sd.71358

Re: There Will Come Soft Rains (1950) [pdf]

#317

Post by NoImmatureAdHom »

adamc wrote: post #281
apelapan wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nuclear annihilation on any sort of global scale is further off than ever in the past 60-70 years or so. The doomsday clock is mostly worrying about climate change, conventional war and Facebook boomers spreading and believing fake news. I don't mean that things are fine, just that Nuclear annihilation is less of a concern than some make it out to be.

No. The past year has substantially nudged things in the other direction.

I'd say it's tough to say.

On the one hand, one of the major nuclear powers is embroiled in a war in Europe. Which is extremely bad news and clearly makes the probability of nuclear war increase.

On the other hand, we're getting better and better at targeting, which means much smaller warheads can get the job done. We have little use for 50MT behemoths any more (excepting doomsday weapons).

Re: There Will Come Soft Rains (1950) [pdf]

#318

Post by WillAdams »

rob74 wrote: post #252
armagon wrote: post #177

The most striking incongruity with our modern era to me is that the family was all outside when the blast occurred. With pervasive screens, we just don't get outside like we used to. And why on earth was that dad mowing when the house was able to take care of it?

That's one of the usual failures of science fiction: most authors imagine technological progress, but don't also predict what societal changes it might bring. So this family had a quaint picture-book suburban 1950s life, just with robots. Same as Asimov's Detective Baley smoked a pipe and had a traditional 1950s marriage with a stay-at-home wife - just with robots...

The usual response here is, any author can predict the horseless carriage, only a true visionary will predict the traffic jam and road rage.

Re: There Will Come Soft Rains (1950) [pdf]

#319

Post by purpleflame1257 »

frmersdog wrote: post #123
briansm wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminds me of when November 2019 came and went (the date that Blade Runner is set in)

Off the top of my head, events in popular science fiction that have "already occurred": First Laughing Man Incident - Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex (2024) Third Impact - Neon Genesis Evangelion (2015) Fourth Corporate War - Cyberpunk (2022) Geisel Library Walk - Rainbows End (2025) 2020 Tokyo Olympics - Akira (2020)

The Olympics were canceled(postponed) due to a plague, so that tracks

Re: There Will Come Soft Rains (1950) [pdf]

#320

Post by ElevenLathe »

jdsnape wrote: post #279
billiam wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quaint? We are the closest we've ever been to nuclear annihilation, according to the experts: https://thebulletin.org/doomsday-clock/timeline/

For sure, but it doesn’t pervade public consciousness in the same way. Not sure why, perhaps because the memory of mass-scale war has faded with the previous generations.

Fear of nuclear war was useful for midcentury US elites because it could be transmuted into fear of Communism. Since 1991 it just isn't as useful for that purpose, so the culture industry doesn't push it anymore. Their use against Japan in WW2 has also (just about) fallen out of living memory.
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