Questions tagged [philip-k-dick]
Philip K Dick was a modern and postmodern dynamo. His visions of the present and future, while bleak and disturbing, often explored the nature of reality. *What is real? What makes us human? Can any real answers be obtained?*
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Was Second Variety brought up in connection with Ellison's suit against Cameron over Terminator?
It seems to me that if anyone had pointed out that some ideas in "Second Variety" were very similar to Terminator's -- in particular, the "infiltrator" of Terminator is completely ...
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Identify a time tunnel story with Old Testament desert shepherds, probably by Philip K. Dick
I had read a story, I believe by Philip K. Dick, but stand to be corrected. It is about this office worker who has some kind of a time tunnel through which he communicates with Old Testament desert ...
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Ubik (spoilers) - what is the point of Pat Conley?
So just read this, and really don't understand the point of the Pat Conley character in Ubik. So Pat was infiltrating Runciter's company... for what purpose exactly? She's literally the most powerful ...
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In Philip K. Dick's "Time out of Joint", which assertions of Mrs McFee's were correct?
Ragle considered that Mrs McFee's assertions were a "garble of suspicions and rumors", but when she mentioned the word "aluminide", and Mr Gumm later reflected on this by saying &...
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Did Philip K. Dick purposefully confuse Mrs. Kesselman with Mrs. Keitelbein in "Time Out Of Joint"?
I am confused about the Kesselman characters (mother and son). When a female voice spoke to Ragle on the phone, reminding him about attending his first civil defence class, she said that Walter could ...
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In Lies Incorporated, what is the significance of beaming a non-lie into Applebaum's head
The book Lies Incorporated features the universe's premier intelligence corporation "Lies Incorporated", a nearly omnipotent corporation, with many strange offshoot functions. One of these ...
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What is Lies Inc.'s Abba?
In Phillip K Dick's book Lies Inc., there exists a figure dubbed 'Abba'. Abba is a persistent source of truth not only for our protagonist, but also those around him. He speaks to the humans in the ...
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What is Artificial Nipple Dilation?
(source: netdna-ssl.com)
In Phillip K. Dick’s Clans of the Alphane Moon, the procedure is named while introducing Mary:
“Let off on the roof field Mary descended by in-ramp to floor ninety, came to ...
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What does the German translate to in Philip K. Dick's "A Scanner Darkly"? [duplicate]
When the main character Bob Arctor starts doubting himself after he writes a bad check to a locksmith. Arctor thought that his roommate wrote the check as a scam, but Arctor realized the handrwriting ...
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American novel or short story, maybe by Philip K Dick about an artist who goes on a quest to paint God's face
I haven't read the story, but I heard about it multiple times from different sources. The only problem is, I forgot the name of the story and the name of the author, but I think it was Philip K Dick.
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Clarification on lies incorporated [closed]
I've seen few references for the book lies incorporated online, and having read through it, I'd like some answers.
In Philip K. Dick's book lies Inc, what is Abba? Does he represent something?
When ...
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Was Philip K. Dick ever involved in design?
Wired.com's 20 Years Ago, Steve Jobs Built the ‘Coolest Computer Ever.’ It Bombed references:
“We have made the coolest computer ever,” he told me. “I guess I’ll just show it to you.”
He yanked off ...
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What's the real reason McClane only returned half of Quail's fee?
In Philip Dick's short story "We Can Remember It For You Wholesale" we find this interesting passage:
"No," McClane said. "And we're going to return half his fee."
"...
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Who portrayed the male newscaster in the movie Imposter?
At the end of Dimension Films' Impostor a newscaster is announcing the climactic event on television. He looks and sounds exactly like Voyager's Harry Kim.
Is this announcer Garrett Wang?
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What did Asimov think of Philip K. Dick?
I'm finishing Asimov's 1981 compilation of essays, in which he offers numerous opinions on many authors, books, and TV shows. But it puzzles me that he makes no mention of Philip K. Dick, who by that ...
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Scene from a PK Dick novel: a subjective world with a huge God-eye in the sky
In the novel, which I thought was Ubik, a party of characters has an accident, and progress through the subjective worlds of each in turn. One of them is a bible-thumping believer, and the staring eye-...
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In which book does a man start whistling a tune, only to discover moments later it is playing on the radio? (passive telepathy is implied)
In which book does a man start whistling a tune, only to discover moments later it is playing on the radio? (and thereby showing passive telepathy)
Clues:
It could be very well be a book by Philip K....
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70s/80s short story (Philip K. Dick?) about a propaganda TV show telling its audience how to think, eventually taken over in a coup
This short story is about a TV show/broadcast used as propaganda. I read it in an anthology in the 70s/80s.
The TV show presenter tells the audience how to think. Everything is black and white, good ...
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Is there a suggested order for the works of Philip K. Dick?
I've been reading some works of Philip K. Dick recently and, as I aim on reading them all, I was wondering if there is some sort of suggested order.
Given the few novels I have read, I expect most of ...
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Story with a fake motorcycle cop [duplicate]
I have a vague memory of a scene of a novel or short story. I am under the impression that it was by Philip K. Dick. A character is going to impersonate a motorbike cop and rehearses in a room (in ...
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Are there other undercover police at New Path and does Bob know about them?
I asked a similar question but thought it best to delete and rewrite from scratch.
There is already a question asking How did “A Scanner Darkly” actually end? but I more curious in how Bob intends to ...
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Will there be more of "The man in the high castle"?
Just finished watching Amazon's version of Philip K Dick's novel The Man in the High Castle.
Do the TV series and the Book currently end in the same way?
Is there more to show in the TV series ...
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Philip K Dick story with subterranean humans and healthier humans above the ground level
I am looking for a Philip K. Dick story about a future in which there are humans living under the ground, who have become very pale-skinned, frail, almost blind, and humans who live above the ground, ...
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How true to the book is the Total Recall remake?
In reading this question I learned that Total Recall was based on a book, and that the original Total Recall was not very much like the book at all.
Is the rebooted Total Recall truer to the book We ...
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" . . .PALMER ELDRITCH" — Why does Leo ask Blau why he's calling him Leo?
At the end of The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, Leo addresses Blau with the following question:
"Leo'? How come you keep calling me 'Leo'?"
What's the significance of Blau calling Leo "Leo"? ...
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Has Ronald Moore ever commented on similarities between BSG and PKD's "Second Variety"?
So I'm reading a collection of Phillip K. Dick short stories, and I got to one called "Second Variety," the plot of which is that autonomous, self-replicating military robots learn to imitate humans ...
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Phillip K. Dick short story about paranoid AI
This is a short story a friend of mine told me about some time ago.
It was written by Philip K. Dick. It was about an AI which controlled US defense system
The AI decided that the main threat for ...
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What is the story or metaphor behind Perky Pat?
I read Perky Pat a few days ago and it doesn't make sense to me.
Summary from Internet (updated):
Then:
3 Questions:
Also, the Simpsons did an episode recently called Brick Like Me where Homer ...
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Is Palmer Eldritch alive or dead?
In Philip K. Dick's 1965 novel The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch the central character Palmer Eldritch is presented in a variety of ways. In some parts of the text he is an ethereal presence that ...
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How did "A Scanner Darkly" actually end?
I just finished reading "A Scanner Darkly" by Philip K. Dick and for some reason I am a little confused to the actual ending. Warning Spoilers Below!
There are two possibilities, as I see it. One is:...
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What book did Philip K. Dick dedicate to Heinlein?
There's a famous quote from Philip K Dick about Heinlein mentioned on the Philip K. Dick Wikipedia page and on this question:
One time when I owed the IRS a lot of money and couldn't raise it,
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Why was Philip K Dick so distressed at Ridley Scott's adaptation of 'Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep'? [duplicate]
I have heard this a couple of times now but I don't know the reasoning behind this. I know that the film adaptation of the novel was released shortly before the authors death.
Also, if this is the ...
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What is the meaning of the Latin inscription on Anarch Peak's tomb?
In Philip K. Dick's novel Counter-Clock World, the following inscription is said to be written on the Anarch's tomb:
Sic igitur magni quoque circum moenia mundi
expugnata dabunt labem putresque ...
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What are the motivations of the Erads?
In Philip K. Dick's novel Counter-Clock World, time on Earth is flowing backwards after an event called the "Hobart Phase", so that dead people come back to life, become younger, and "find a womb" to ...
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Philip K. Dick Essay
Does anyone have any clue where I can find (in any format, although physical would be preferred) an essay written in 1964 (at least according to this site) by Philip K. Dick, that goes by the name of "...
JNat♦
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Why did they name the movie "Blade Runner"?
I just finished reading Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep and I found it interesting that Deckard was always described as a bounty hunter never as a blade runner or anything similar.
What exactly ...
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Difference between science fiction/fantasy and futurism according to Philip K. Dick
In this letter from Philip K. Dick to The Ladd Company, he references a Harrison Ford interview where he says that that Blade Runner is not fantasy nor science fiction, but futurism.
What's did he ...
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In "Time Out Of Joint" what's with objects turning into slips of paper?
At a couple of points in this Philip K. Dick novel the main character experiences physical objects disappearing to be replaced by slips of paper. He maintains a collection of these slips.
I cannot ...
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What's up with Horeselover Fat and Philip K. Dick towards the end of "VALIS"?
I have just finished reading VALIS, and I remain puzzled by something. It seems to be made clear that Horselover Fat is, in essence, an alter ego of Philip K. Dick - a separate personality of someone ...
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Philip K. Dick short story with a man growing a space ship in his back yard?
A discussion I was reading about consensus reality made me think of a story that I probably read in some Philip K. Dick anthology years ago.
The story began from the viewpoint of a man who was ...
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On the personal relation between Phil K. Dick and Robert Heinlein?
It's well known that Dick and Heinlein were friends. On Dick's wikipedia article there is an extract from the introduction to the 1980 short story collection The Golden Man in which Dick praises ...
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Did Philip K. Dick watch "Blade Runner" before his death?
Was Philip K. Dick able to watch a complete version of Blade Runner before his death or just unedited material?
The Blade Runner release date according to Wikipedia and IMDb was 25 June, 1982. Philip ...
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Where can I find a full copy of Philip K Dick's Exegesis?
I've heard recently that a 90% reduced Fat version of the Exegesis was going to come out in print. However, I would really like to get a hold of a full copy. They aren't supposed to exist, however, ...
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What are the different works for Film and Television based on the works of Philip K. Dick?
I recently finished watching the great series "Total Recall 2070" that was based on Philip K. Dick's universe. Philip K. Dick's absurdist blendings of philosophical problems with Sci-Fi has a unique ...
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