Whence Quantum Fiction, Part 3

As the first quarter of the Twenty-First Century draws to a close, we stand at a peculiar crossroads. Cultural pressure generated by Artificial Intelligence and a glut of fiction writers is transforming the publishing industry. Two prevailing camps have emerged: Those who embrace A.I. as a necessary tool and an inevitability and those who reject it in favor of traditional (human) avenues of creativity.

As this battle is being waged, quantum theory has increasingly entered into new areas of research, including mind science and quantum biology. We may be on the verge of a “1919 moment” like that which occurred during the Eclipse of 1919, when a prediction of Einstein’s theory of General Relativity was proven. Experiments being conducted now may show that human consciousness is not created through electrochemical processes and neural structures alone, but also through quantum structures.

If this proof can be had, if we have another “1919 moment” but regarding quantum consciousness, it may fuel a resurgence of a near-extinct literary genre called Quantum Fiction. This genre was marginally popular in the early 1990s, partly because String Theory had placed quantum theory in the public consciousness. It waned when excitement about string theory evaporated. But as we’ve seen, Quantum Fiction, especially those forms that affect basic literary structure, are difficult or impossible for current A.I. models to mimic. The critical acceptance of these forms may stave off some of A.I.’s more immediate cultural pressure on the publishing industry, and give writers and readers a way to “envision” new theories of quantum perception.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

A.I. has had an increasing and immediate impact on writing and the publishing industry. Open A.I. was released at the end of 2022. Since then we’ve seen enormous transformations in a number of industries:

• Coding that was done by humans is now increasingly done by machine. There was pseudo-coding automation before 2022, but now there is an entire shift of the industry where traditional coders are replaced by A.I. and many roles for software coders are now either pushed into architect spaces, or into check spaces to prove the integrity of A.I.-generated code.

• Human resources has experienced a shift in hiring practices and resumes. There are more resumes per candidate than ever before. Candidates are encouraged to use A.I. to generate a different resume for each open role. Parsers such as ATS must be employed to screen the huge volume of resumes. This creates headaches for HR departments since the A.I.-generated resumes may not be linked to the best-qualified candidates: A.I. tends to insert whatever catchphrases it encounters in the job description directly into the resume, regardless of the candidate’s skill set, “gaming the system.” These resumes (it is theorized) will survive ATS screening because it is done using A.I. tools. (Rose, 2024)

• Management and research departments have started employing A.I. to close the “documentation gap”: A software project (for example) may have fallen behind in documentation because of the expense involved. An easy fix is to have A.I. generate the technical documentation. This creates a challenge because the volumes of documents may become endless overnight. To be of any use, these documents must be peer-reviewed, which then brings on the same expense that A.I. promised to circumvent. The natural solution is to have A.I. perform the peer review.

While this has some positive effects, and some bona fide technical and scientific breakthroughs have already been attributed to A.I., we risk portions of our technical infrastructure to become inaccessible to us. There have been numerous examples of two interconnected “chatbots” inventing their own language to communicate. (Facebook AI Research, DALL-E 2, GNMT, Facebook’s “Alice” and “Bob”, etc.) If technical documentation is similarly aligned for A.I. (as opposed to human) consumption, and this fact is not discovered because this documentation is not human peer-reviewed, our technical documentation—and thereby our technology—is no longer under our full control.

The point is that A.I. can do language-driven tasks much more quickly and cheaply than humans, and (if need be) in a more efficient language which we may not be able to interpret. This is a natural outcome of programs which have the ability to learn. Given the transformative impact we’ve seen on many industries—A.I. seems to be everywhere—it is easy to overlook that this tool is less than three years old.

A.I. AND THE PUBLISHING INDUSTRY

The publishing industry has drawn a line in the sand against A.I. Most, if not all publishers require a signed affidavit (or a checkbox) stating that content was not generated using A.I. in whole or in part. Human screening of submissions for “signs of A.I.” are conducted, but also parsing tools and bot detectors, because of ever-increasing volumes of work. The one tool which publishers have on their side is that currently, generative A.I. models cannot produce any work using “creativity,” something which became apparent in the “experiment” of the previous blog post. They may only regenerate works which are mixes of their data input from online sources. Thus, a human with the correct experience and knowledge may detect an A.I.-generated story in a subjective, time-consuming process.

Nevertheless, human judges have been fooled. In 2023, an A.I.-generated science fiction story won second prize in a literary contest in China. (Vainilavičius, 2023)  And A.I. is not a static model. New advances and new “generations” of A.I. will more closely mimic human writing and even creativity. Unless sophisticated automatic detection becomes the norm, we can envision A.I. eventually overwhelming the industry by becoming “undetectable.” A kind of “arms race” between creation and detection may arise.

Almost from its inception, proponents of A.I. have advertised its ability to “write a story in an hour instead of months” and even “make a million dollars or more by publishing A.I. fiction.” (Reddit, 2023) The threat this imposes on the publishing industry is obvious: Editors, publishers, and literary agents are already swamped by the glut of submissions. If they are overwhelmed by a sudden crush of “stories” generated by A.I., as handlers of resumes are, they will likewise be forced to turn to A.I. parsing tools to scan submissions. We cannot assume that these A.I. tools will prefer human authors, since they will likely judge works primarily by punctuation, grammar, and other structures which A.I. excels at. To be proper screeners, these tools must include “creativity detectors” as well, something beyond current technology.

The generative nature of current A.I. algorithms comes with a further drawback: “Cognitive Disorder”:

What A.I. publishes becomes part of its own online dataset, and so its output becomes fraught with repetitions. (We saw this in the previous blog, the way precise times were used, and the repetition of the term “grandmother.” If the experiment were allowed to run through millions of trials rather than only 100, we might have even seen the generation of a “Cognitive Disorder Artifact”: A term which appears randomly in one story, then continues to appear in several subsequent stories. This occurs especially readily with small datasets like “Quantum Fiction Stories” because each of the 100 stories we generated is added to A.I.’s dataset, and the initial dataset was quite small: Perhaps only a dozen stories. The net result—which has been measured by researchers—is that the quality of everything generated by A.I. diminishes over time: An example of the classic idiom, “Don’t poop where you eat.” This diminishing continues until a new generation of A.I. is developed, with a fresh dataset and learning algorithm which excludes sourcing anything generated by the previous generation.) Researchers are working on a long-term fix to this issue which currently stifles the advance of A.I. towards a model able to fully mimic human creativity.

Some authors do not fear a publishing industry in which A.I.-generation is the standard, and some even welcome it. Tim Boucher said:

 “It's inevitable that all artists will encounter and make use of AI tools to some extent; it will just be about finding the right combination that works for you.

I envision also a future where AI-assisted storytelling becomes the norm, and readers transform into co-creators, as AI enables authors and readers to generate highly specific content rapidly on demand.” (Boucher, 2023)

Tim Boucher. He published 97 books generated by A.I., earning “thousands.” A visionary?

Tim Boucher may be right. If the industry is to survive, perhaps it must embrace this new technology, in much the way that the coding industry is currently doing, and the HR industry with A.I.-generated resumes. If the publishing industry opens up to A.I.-generated content, it will have an irreversible impact: Traditional publishers, agents, editors, and writers (as they exist now) might be replaced by collectives of “A.I. writers” and “A.I. readers” who will co-produce works together, exactly as Tim envisions.

Net consumption of books has actually been dropping per year, down an average of 18.5 books per individual in the U.S. in 1999, to 12.6 per individual in the U.S. in 2021 (Zandt). Already in the industry, with online publication, self-publication, and other alternative venues, production outpaces consumption. We can only imagine if A.I.-generated publication becomes the norm, this imbalance will increase exponentially. The vast majority of A.I. writers will languish in a sea of literally millions of their fellows, unpaid for their work and unrecognized.

The traditional publishing industry has been slow to embrace change. Some more forward-thinking publishers and writers’ groups have spearheaded the movement towards new forms of publishing. For example, the SFWA voted in 2015 to admit self-publication and small press credits for active membership (SFWA). Ten years earlier, they were embroiled in a debate regarding whether online publications should count as writing credits. These changes seem to be coming one step at a time, gradually, all across the industry.

Like the French Salon in 1874, we can only imagine publishers bowing to public pressure. We might envision that readers will prefer the industry that Tim Boucher envisions, and one day an A.I.-generated novel may win a Nebula Award. But the slow pace of the industry towards this “inevitability” seems not to be geared for its sheer velocity. ChatGTP is only three years old. Most people envision an “extinction-level event” rapidly approaching, much more rapidly than the publishing industry can adjust. Most in the industry perceive A.I. to be a threat to their livelihood. This is why almost all publishers try to exclude A.I.-generated content with whatever barriers they have, fighting its “inevitability” tooth and nail.

QUANTUM FICTION AND ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

As we’ve seen in last month’s blog, ChatGTP 4.0 does a relatively poor job at generating Quantum Fiction stories. What it can do is repetitive, and not based upon current quantum theories, but mostly older models of “Many Universes” and Relativity. My speculation is that this is because it is generating these stories based upon the very few QF stories it has available, mostly published in the 1990s when these theories were more in vogue.

This is, of course, a temporary condition from which Generative A.I. machines will recover. Even if no more QF stories are published, more sophisticated A.I. algorithms able to better mimic creativity should be able to write better QF tales soon, certainly within 15 years. Until more QF is published and available online, for the time being there is a “QF gap” in Generative A.I.’s algorithm. We can easily produce QF works which it cannot mimic.

I would like to make an analogy between this and where traditional art and realism stood in the mid-19th Century: Photography placed cultural pressure on Realism and portrait painters in particular. Their livelihood was directly threatened because photography could produce a portrait of an individual much more quickly, cheaply, and accurately than a portrait painter. Painters responded to this threat by developing modern art—a process taking sixty years or more—which created paintings that photography could not match.

If Artificial Intelligence operates in any way like photography—if it likewise generates cultural pressure on twenty-first century literature—then we might expect some parallel developments. We could anticipate that literature could fight for its survival by developing new forms which Artificial Intelligence cannot easily mimic, similar to the development of modern art. These new literary forms will most likely include Quantum Fiction.

QUANTUM FICTION AND QUANTUM CONSCIOUSNESS: The “1919 MOMENT”

Quantum Consciousness is a relatively new set of theories put forth by Roger Penrose, Stuart Hameroff, and others in an attempt to describe how the mind forms consciousness through quantum structures, not solely through electro-chemical and neurological structures. The quantum structures, called “microtubules,” have been isolated from neurons, and collapse of a wavefunctions in the presence of anesthesia has been observed.

However, studies in 2024 which showed this effect failed to complete a connection between what can be regarded a limited quantum effect on ceasing consciousness (in the presence of drugs which do not have a direct chemical effect, such as lithium or xenon) and anything which generates a wave function or entanglement. In other words, we have found the “off” switch, but not the “on” switch. As intriguing as these results are, we are not at the point where we can definitively say that consciousness arises from the microtubules.

But we are close, and growing closer. Soon, if the theory is correct, we may find an experiment which uncovers the seat of human consciousness within neurons, the same way that the 1919 eclipse uncovered the underlying structure of Spacetime and Gravitation. When that occurs, the public at large will have an increased curiosity in theories of Quantum Consciousness, the same way they had an increased curiosity regarding Relativity in the early Twentieth Century.

Quantum Fiction will step up to fill people’s curiosity about these things. And, since quantum theory has evolved and changed in thirty years, it will NOT be QF of the same sort that was published in the 1990s. It will have some similarities, but if it is to help us envision the new theories, it must deal primarily with Quantum Consciousness, Quantum Biology, and “Quantum Perception.”

As with modern art, which was not produced by experts in relativity or theoretical physics, we expect Quantum Fiction to be produced primarily by laypeople. These will be individuals and groups whose imaginations embrace quantum theory and its implications, but not necessarily understanding any of it more than vaguely. Thus, as with modern art, they become the delivery method for the public at large to envision quantum theory, “picturing the unseeable.”

THE NEW QUANTUM FICTION

There is already some curiosity about what Quantum Fiction is, and what it IS NOT. This is because theories of Quantum Consciousness have already generated some curiosity in the online press.

Let us briefly list the attributes of this new “Quantum Fiction.”

First, it is NOT about this guy:

Nor is it about “Ant-Man,” or the “Quantum Realm.”

Basically, these are SCIENCE FICTION stories in which the word “Quantum” has been inserted. This has been done in much the way the term “Atomic Power” was inserted into Captain Nemo and 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea, or “Warp Drive” in Star Trek. Technology stands in for a MAGICAL EFFECT, usually scientifically impossible, in order to take the plot wherever imagination dictates.

No, “Quantum Science” cannot allow you to leap into other bodies, nor can it allow you to shrink yourself down to enter another world. These are quantum “subject matter” stories, since they almost always contain some quantum jargon, but they are NOT Quantum Fiction.

 Also, it is not necessarily about TIME TRAVEL, or TIME LOOPS, or TIME STOPPING. These are actually science fiction stories which arise from comments made about General Relativity by Einstein, Stephen Hawking, and others, so not related to quantum theory at all.

 They MIGHT be about “Many Universes,” and such uncomfortable possibilities as stepping into another universe, or encountering one’s self from another universe. ChatGTP loves to write “Quantum Stories” in this vein, and we see a large representation in the literature and cinema. However, some stories which involve parallel universes are typically more subtle and varied than these examples. In a “real” QF story, we might be transported to a parallel world without the narrator or the reader being made aware of that fact. We may never be informed that part of the action takes place in a parallel dimension, affected by the choices made by the MC, choices by others, or probability.

Take as an example the two excerpts:

 “Lea came to the end of the corridor, closing in on the other woman. She put her hand on the stranger’s shoulder, pulled her around—and gasped. The eyes, the face—they were hers. But they weren’t.

 ’I remember this!’ the stranger said. ‘I remember when I met myself!’ Then, sudden terror. ‘This is when Ricki shot me! We’ve got to run!!!’”

Versus:

“Asta took aim with the rifle and fired. It was not a decision. It was an involuntary act.

 The stranger folded at the middle, fell like a marionette. Dead.

 Only then, the decision came upon her. Was it right? Taking a human life? Ending all the possibilities, everything that this individual’s choices entailed?

 Asta dropped the rifle, a whisper of smoke still trailing from the barrel. No. It was too enormous to contemplate. But it was too late.”

Both are Quantum Fiction events, but the first is a literal displacement in Multiverses, the second a subjective realization that the MC has eliminated a universe of probability, with a brief (figurative) swapping of cause and effect. QF sample number 1 is very similar to what ChatGTP can understand. Sample number 2 seems beyond ChatGTP’s limits. And sample 2 is much more of what I am talking about.

 Wikipedia gives a brief (uncited) list of “quantum fiction characteristics.” I will not cite these, since they only give one-sided guidance towards what QF entails.

 Instead, I will offer some general principles:

 First and most important, all effective QF is scalar. It runs on a scale from “pure QF” through some degrees of “hybrid” QF, to “minimal QF,” depending on the degree of QF principles and structures:

Hybrid QF will have some QF elements and structures admixed with a story of some other genre or genres. Thus, we have “Quantum Fiction/Science Fiction,” “Quantum Fiction/Fantasy,” “Quantum Fiction/Horror” and so forth.

 The writing of a “Pure QF” story might be possible, but the result might not be able to be read and understood by humans.

Likewise, the production of a story completely devoid of QF elements might be possible, but even in mainstream literature, the admixture of even a minimal amount of QF elements helps enliven plot, characterization, and “imagination.” People have been admiring these stories for decades without recognizing them or categorizing them.

Taken at some level, ALL fiction might be categorized as QF. However, in terms of writing QF to defeat A.I’s algorithm, for the remainder of this blog we’ll concentrate on “Hybrid QF” in which QF elements are prevalent enough to be noticeable.

“THE QF TEN”

What are these elements? A QF element is limited only by the writer’s imagination and interest in quantum theory. However, I’ll assume that future writers of Quantum Fiction will be ignorant of quantum theory. With this in mind, what elements might they add to their set of literary tools?

•  ·         Cause and effect get swapped, transposed, or “entangled.” The logical sequence of events in which a character’s actions or decisions occur are sometimes derailed. This can appear like short, intense sequences of dementia, or characters not acting logically. In standard stories, this usually occurs after a dream sequence, or before a reveal that explains a character’s actions—only in this instance there is no dream or reveal.

• ·         A character suddenly sees the world from another character’s POV. This stems from current theories of multiple universes, each created by an individual’s perceptions. This element is most effective in 1st-person POV, and (again) the event is usually presented as a “dream sequence” or out-of-body experience.

• ·         A character undoes a choice they made to affect reality. Traditionally, this is done via time travel or universe-hopping, but some excellent examples involve visions or prophecy. The MC escapes prophecy by making a choice, then either escape or get trapped by fate. (See Frank Herbert’s “Dune.) This has been overdone, but with the advent of quantum perception there may be room for additional development.

• ·         A character has a sense that they’ve made a mistake in their life, so they aren’t living in the “optimal reality.” Again, perhaps overdone, but this may also have time for an upgrade.

• ·         Every time an MC makes a choice, it affects reality. The MC becomes uniquely aware of the changes they foment and either rue them or welcome them.

• ·         An MC experiences major trauma, which makes them feel they have “left reality.”

• ·         Various characters experience time or the flow of events at different rates. Sometimes this is in accordance to their “status.” Sometimes, characters get into conflicts based on time flow or concepts of reality.

• ·         An MC comes to some realization about the universe which is an epiphany with either sets them apart, or connects them to a community who share the same realization. Sometimes, this can turn into a “Lord of the Flies” thing, where the character must rescue or escape.

• ·         MC is convinced the world is not “real.” Typically, they are an ostracized child, who at the climax either vindicates themselves or ends up dead; possibly both.

• ·         A character witnesses an event and by witnessing it becomes caught up irrationally in the event. One which I’d love to write: A character witnesses a murder, then discovers they are the murderer, or even the victim.

These are the type of elements to be encountered in “hybrid” QF stories. Additional elements which might occur in “pure” QF stories include:

• ·         Juxtaposition between observer and observed.

• ·         Sequence of plot loops, runs backwards, or random.

• ·         Radical POV changes.

• ·         Dreams, memory, and reality become interchangeable.

• ·         Dialogue shifts in time: MC has a conversation with someone from another time.

• ·         Character completely swaps places with another character.

• ·         MC lives two or more parallel lives.

• ·         MC jumps from reality to reality.

• ·         MC sees illogical connections between events beyond cause and effect.

• ·         MC ceases to exist.

• ·         Quantum structures affect language and structure (usually in poetry)

• ·         Different characters have different memories of events, which usually can’t be reconciled.

“QUANTUM PERCEPTION”

This is the element I have explored in my writing for over a decade. All that time, I was the “guy who wrote weird, unpublishable fiction.” I discovered (by accident) in December 2024 that “quantum fiction” exists. It was popular in the 1990s, and there are a small handful of people still left alive who write it. I was transformed! The thing I loved actually existed! It had a name!

In short, I became a Quantum Fiction writer. I embarked on this “quest.” Who knows where it may lead?

I describe my own theory of quantum perception in my Book, “A/not A” (available on Amazon). To summarize the elements of quantum perception:

• Everyone lives in their own reality. This reality is not necessarily tied to any “real” external world, but is made solely of an individual’s perceptions.

• “Truth” exists not as a demonstrable immutable whole, but only as a correlation between an individual’s statements and their perceptions. If the correlation is high, the statement is “true.” If the correlation is low, the statement is “false.”

• Ordinarily, one indivual (A) will not have direct access to another individual’s (not A) perceptions. They will only be able to hear the statements that that individual utters. Thus, they will ordinarily only be able to judge that individual’s statements by their own perceptions. This will lead to A judging not A’s statements by the wrong criteria. This often leads to a lower perception of truth value.

• This unfortunate state of affairs falls prey to one further complication: “Not A” isn’t a real individual that exists other than within A’s own set of perceptions. “Not A,” and everything they utter, is only a figment of A’s perceptions, existing within their universe.

• Likewise, A and all that they utter is nothing more than a figment within Not A’s universe.

• The most encompassing scenario is when A and Not A make their attestations is that both are true, in that both have a high correlation to that individual’s perceptions. This is the case even when A and Not A directly contradict each other.

So, all of this mind tinkering gave me fertile ground to develop fiction:

• Villains are no longer evil. Heroes are no longer good. They just “see things differently.”

• Reveals are much richer. When characters realize they’ve made an error, if their “eyes are opened,” it is as if an entire universe comes crashing down.

• “Many Worlds” theory is no longer something magical. It is something we each encounter every day. Everyone lives in a separate universe they create. (Biocentrism.)

• With this in mind, when we “swap realities” we don’t encounter ourself from another universe. Instead, we simply see the world through other’s eyes. This can be doubled, seeing through two sets of eyes, as “plural perception” or even “multiple perception.”

I could go on and on about this, but only two things need be stated: First, all of this mental rumination was developed from my own limited understanding of the two-slit experiment and a few other basic concepts. This was decades before I had heard of “quantum consciousness.” And second, as this writing developed, I found no limits in what I could achieve. Basically, I called this writing “urban fantasy.” But although it had a plot and structure which approached magical realism and even surrealism, these stories were usually devoid of magical objects and even scientific explanations. Strange things “just happened,” and what happened had few limitations.*

In my naivete, I was trying to describe how I saw the world, with everyone living in their own self-created universes and believing they were “right” and anyone who disagreed with them was “wrong.” I felt I could somehow transport this vision to others, wrapping small bits of it in more digestible prose, like wrapping a dog’s heartworm pill in a piece of cheese so that he would swallow it. I was writing Hybrid Quantum Fiction.

OPENING THE GATE

Vera Zubareva is a Russian writer who I consider the “poet laureate” of Quantum Fiction. There are few like her in the world, people who see the world through a different set of eyes than other people. It is frustrating, attempting to describe the connections of a reality others cannot see, or are even afraid to glimpse.

She was once quoted on a weblog—and I must unfortunately paraphrase the quotation, since the vagaries of the internet have since erased the blog:

“The writer of quantum fiction has a critical challenge finding acceptance. Traditional methods of criticism might exclude them because the work contains experimental structures which cannot be summarized.”

This comment might well apply more to “pure” quantum fiction than to hybrid forms. (It seems easier to produce “pure” quantum poetry because poetry may already be devoid of linear structure and prose.) Yet it bears consideration: The traditional publishing industry is gated by agents, editors, and publishers who have a long-standing regimen by which literature is judged. The goal is to find something which is sellable (even trendy), but the reference standards change with glacial slowness. New genres are difficult to establish, and they come into being only when industry demand (or even politics) deem them necessary.

At the present time, quantum fiction remains marginalized. Perhaps rightfully so, because it doesn’t sell - agents have no reason to find it attractive. There are no large venues for QF stories. Yet, is this because the public has no curiosity? Or because the publishing industry is mired in the past?

It may be both. A Google search for Quantum Fiction turns up at best a dozen titles. Few people ask for this genre. This probably fuels publishers’ reluctance to move towards it. Query Manager, a major tool used by writers to find agents, has a comprehensive list of “genres”: Quantum Fiction is not listed, nor is “Experimental Fiction.” The closest category one might submit under is “Literary Fiction.” Or, one could submit under the “standard genre” which the QF is admixed, such as science fiction, fantasy, or horror.

If this is done, if we “dog heartworm pill” the QF as some other genre, we run into two problems: The first is the one which Vera Zubarev summarizes: We must summarize work which has experimental structure. Even if it does not, it may have illogical occurrences which make sense from a QF perspective, but from a standard genre just look like sloppy writing. Second, we are always asked to supply comparable works. For QF, our comps may all be thirty years old, or we might be forced to comp to recent works which bear no relation to our work. Currently, the publishing industry is not a friendly place for QF.

I am not giving up. I hope - through this blog and by other means - to find like-minded individuals who can lobby for change. The publishing industry would be well-advised to make some allowances and ways that QF and other new genres can find admittance. They could be like the 1874 Salon, responding to public desires. They have done this before: LGBTQ+ literature had no voice to speak of in the mid-20th century. Now it is a thriving part of the publishing culture, thanks in part to the industry’s support.

It seems though, that the challenge is different this time, and it is immediate. The publishing industry must respond very quickly to these new cultural necessities and challenges. A.I., in particular, is not standing still.

NOTE

• - Similarly, we have NO EXPLANATION of how or why Grigor Samsa transforms into an insect in Kafka’s “The Metamorphosis.”

BIBLIOGRAPHY

 Boucher, Tim, “I’m Making Thousands Using AI to Write Books,” Newsweek, May 15, 2023.

 Reddit, “How To Earn $1M+ By Using AI To Write Books” (r/artificial), 2023.

 Rose, Katherine, “A.I. Resume Tools: Benefits and Challenges,” Recruitics.com, 2024. (Retrieved from https://info.recruitics.com/blog/ai-generated-resumes-the-staffing-industry.

 Schmeidel, Stacey, “Groundbreaking Study Affirms Quantum Basis for Consciousness: A Paradigm Shift in Understanding Human Nature,” Sept 14, 2024, SciTechDaily.

 SFWA, “SFWA Welcomes Self-Published and Small Press Authors!” Feb 3, 2015, recovered from https://www.sfwa.org/2015/02/03/sfwa-welcomes-self-published-small-press-authors/

 Vainilavičius, Justinas, “AI-Generated Science Fiction Novel Wins Literary Prize in China,” Cybernews, Dec. 29, 2023.

 Zandt, Florian, “U.S. Readers Are Getting Less Voracious”, Statista, Jan 11, 2022.

 Zubarev, Vera, “Fate and Chance in Literature and Film” (Course at Penn Arts & Sciences), Spring2017, recovered from https://www.sas.upenn.edu/~vzubarev.