Since we hope to build the space for the 10,000 Year Clock underground, for the last 10 years I have been collecting references and images of the great, ambitious and or inspiring underground spaces and stonework of the world (in some cases they are also lessons of what not to do). I thought I would list some of that collection here to share them, as well as ask for any recommendations or references you all might have. (please feel free to make suggestions in the comment section)

• 12th century underground church (France)
• St Patricks well by DaVinci in Orvieto Italy
• The 800 year old salt mines of Poland
• The Stremnaya cliff road in Bolivia China
  
• Anasazi Cliff Dwellings
• Petra
• Japanese Sewer System
• Cappadocia Turkey
• “7 Undergound Wonders of the World”
• The Mormon Geneological Vaults
• Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste Repository
• Nuclear Waste Isolation Pilot Plant
• Cavern in Tennessee (I think)
• Stockholm Subway
• Underground New York
• Mysterious underground spaces blog post
• Large holes in the ground
• The hanging temple in China
• Collection of cave photographs
• Heavenly Stairs
• Great shot of the “Hell Hole” cave
• Underground Moscow
• Niagara Falls aquaducts
• The Stone Work of Machu Picchu
  • And the Inca trail

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I have been noticing a funny phenomenon recently in the work of my favorite science fiction authors. Their futures seem to be shrinking.

I thought it may have just been a coincidence that two of my all time favorites, William Gibson and Neal Stephenson, have both been writing less and less about the far future, and more and more about the near present (or even past in Stephenson’s case). But since meeting Vernor Vinge at one of our lectures, I have been reading his amazing work and noticing the same trend. I started with his most recent book Rainbows End (set in 02025), and recently started reading A Fire Upon the Deep published in 01991, which is set over 50,000 years into the future.

Each of these authors cut their teeth decades ago imagining transcendent future technologies. They invented, or at least popularized concepts of things like cyberspace, the web, virtual reality, and the singularity. It seems that the technological developments of the last 10-20 years have caught up so rapidly that extrapolating on its current possibilities is either more interesting, or simply more imaginable, than postulating on what it might become.

I still love all their work, I just wonder what it is that may be causing the future to shrink?

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