From: naddy@mips.inka.de   
      
   On 2025-11-10, Steve Coltrin  wrote:   
      
   >> Greg Egan's short story "The Moat" implies the existence of a cryptic   
   >> population in the near future.  Uninterpretable DNA evidence from   
   >> a crime leads to the realization that somebody, presumably a wealthy   
   >> élite, has made themselves genetically incompatible, maybe by   
   >> switching their DNA to other bases.   
   >   
   > Doesn't he use the same gag in one of his novels, _Distress_ if I recall   
      
   Not that I recall, but _Distress_ had a number of odd sideshows,   
   like the voluntary autists.   
      
   In the settings that are beyond the near future, his protagonists   
   tend to be substantially removed from baseline Homo sapiens.  In   
   _Diaspora_, humanity has split into three groups: The fleshers, who   
   retain a multitude of gene-engineered biological forms; the gleisners,   
   who have transferred their consciousness into robot bodies; and the   
   polis citizens who are disembodied uploaded minds that run on   
   whatever computing substrate is convenient.  His focus and interest   
   are clearly the latter, but I think he was careful not to disparage   
   the others.  Well, the fleshers are barely mentioned, since they   
   are Earth-bound and there is just nothing interesting there.   
      
   --   
   Christian "naddy" Weisgerber                          naddy@mips.inka.de   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)