Quote:
Originally Posted by kjk
Wasn't that a plotline in a Heinlein book?
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1. Probably in the sense that Heinlein was a 50s SF writer and played with what-if scenarios, but probably not, because his imagination wasn't creepy enough to have conceived of that idea in that way.
2. In another sense, I wouldn't know because I've only ever made it through one Heinlein book. Writer friends and I used to read parts of Time Enough for Love aloud to each other because we couldn't believe how hilariously bad it was.
3. The idea comes from the most terrifying dream I've ever had, and which I had recurrently when I was a little boy. Nothing gruesome happened in it, unlike my other nightmares, but the sense of being alone with the utterly violent repercussions of unfiltered thought manifesting as action left me so terrified that I couldn't scream as I forced myself awake. All I could do was make a hissing sound.
4. The worst thing you can do to anyone who's creative is compare an idea they share to something that already exists -- especially before they've had the chance to develop it. You have no idea what they'd have done with it on their own, but they now have some horrible precedent to learn to avoid.
As a studio musician, I learned never to do that to other musicians -- especially not while recording an album. If you tell the guitarist who's developing their part as they track it that it sounds exactly like [fill in the song or artist's name], then you've killed their performance. For the next hour, all they're going to do is try desperately to avoid sounding like someone else. Whereas if you say nothing, simply encourage them or ask them to try a suggestion of yours, then they'll do what all studio vets are paid to do, which is be both receptive and original: quick to learn and adapt without losing their own ideas and sound.