How to approach A.I. ethically: Chronicles magazine reminds us of the wisdom of C.S. Lewis and George Orwell

By Michael Grossberg

It’s always encouraging to see a Prometheus-recognized writer remembered in any contemporary article, especially about one of the hottest, most divisive and misunderstood issues of our day.

C.S. Lewis (Creative Commons license)

But it’s wonderful – and rare – to find two such authors remembered in the same article, especially one that quotes them with accuracy and insight.

The enduring wisdom of both C.S. Lewis and George Orwell is at the core of a sensible article about Artificial Intelligence by Benjamin M. Osborne in Chronicles magazine.

Orwell, of course, is a two-time Prometheus Hall of Fame inductee for his novels Nineteen Eighty-Four and Animal Farm. Lewis, meanwhile, is again a Hall of Fame finalist this year for his 1945 science fiction novel That Hideous Strength.

So what ideas and insights by Lewis and Orwell are explored and applied in Osborn’s June 2026 article, “What Would C.S. Lewis Have Thought of AI?

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Artificial intelligence, bioengineering, brain drugs, nanites, espionage, self-determination and mind control: An Appreciation of Ramez Naam’s Nexus, a 2014 Prometheus Award winner for Best Novel

To highlight the Prometheus Awards’ four-decade history and make clear what makes each winner deserve recognition as notable pro-freedom sf/fantasy, the Libertarian Futurist Society is presenting a series of weekly Appreciations of past award-winners.
Here’s the latest Appreciation for Ramez Naam’s Nexus, one of two 2014 Prometheus Award winners for Best Novel:

By Anders Monsen and Michael Grossberg

Nexus offers a gripping exploration of politics, international espionage and new extremes of both freedom and tyranny while imagining how artificial intelligence might pave the way for a post-human future.

Ramen Naam’s ingenious and multi-leveled 2013 novel is set in a plausible near future on and around the Earth where emerging technology opens up unprecedented possibilities for mind control as well as personal liberation and interpersonal connection.

The fast-paced suspense thriller – the first in an exciting and imaginative trilogy that includes the Prometheus-finalist sequels Crux and Apex – centers on a young scientist caught up in danger and ranges from academia to government bureaucracy and from underground San Francisco parties to a secret Shanghai lab.

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Review: Annalee Newitz’s Autonomous explores A.I. rights, intellectual property, debt in social satire

Annalee Newitz (Creative Commons photo)

By William H. Stoddard

Annalee Newitz has had a successful career as a print and online journalist, and has published several books, but until Autonomous, all of these were nonfiction. It was a happy discovery for me that her first venture into fiction showed real mastery of the craft.

I laughed at her epigraph from “The Last Saskatchewan Pirate,” and promptly tracked the song down and bought it; and the opening page of her narrative hooked me and kept me reading. Both her handling of characterization and plot, and the quality of her prose, were the kind of thing I hope for when I glance at a new book and ask if I want to read it.
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