Paul M. Cray

@pmc.bsky.social

2456 Followers 6377 Following

"A plain, unvarnished Preston man." Permanent resident alien in Seattle, Wash. Writer and AGI researcher. Interests: books, food, futurology, historiographic metafiction, ideas, sf, technoeconomic paradigm shifts, the Technological Singularity

A photograph of the cover of 'Orbital Studies', No. 0, Ways of Seeing the Living World, showing a wireframe image of something that might be a cell membrane or soap bubble
Overfull bookshelves, Seattle, Washington, 2026 February 14
Bookshelves in my study, West Seattle, Washington, 2025 December 30
Some IKEA Ivar shelving filled with books, West Seattle, Washington, 2025 December 30
A Gray-Nicolls Mystery Ball on a desk in West Seattle, 2025 December 16
Cover of "New Worlds" 183 via https://www.coverbrowser.com/covers/new-worlds/4
The cover of W. Patrick McCray's: "README: A Bookish History of Computing from Electronic Brains to Everything Machines"
An ultraphotorealistic picture of an anthropomorphic ginger cat, dressed in vacc suit battle armour standing on the desolate landscape of a alien moon, a ringed gas giant hanging above him in the sky, holding aloft a plasma rifle in his right paw with the words from "From My Cold, Dead Paw" written across the sky in a sans serif fount
Restored Bevington Road houses, St Anne's College
US hardback edition of Thomas Pynchon's "Shadow Ticket", 2025 October 7
"The Moon and Serpent Bumper Book of Magic" by Alan Moore and Steve Moore, cover design by John Coulthart, seen in the Phenomena section of the Elliott Bay Book Company, Seattle, Washington, 2025 September 22
The cover of the 1973 Picador UK paperback edition of "real time... a catalogue of ideas and information", edited by John Brockman and Ed Rosenfeld
The front cover of my copy of the 1997 paperback edition of "A Book of Two Halves New Football Short Stories" (1996) edited by @nicholasroyle.bsky.social, cover by my old mucker, Chris Moore
Boxes of my books from the UK now in my basement in Seattle, 2025 September 5
Map of the Saint Peter and Saint Paul Archipelago
Video of an anthropomorphic, human-sized fluffy blue Persian cat cooking in a busy restaurant kitchen
A shiny mirror-coated space squirrel in space
A shinny, mirror-coated space squirrel in a Seattle backyard
An anthropomorphic cat in vacc suit battle armour hoists a fusion gun in his right paw and then starts to stride catfully across the hostile alien landscape
The album cover of "The World of Val Doonican"
Commodore PET 2001 computer. On display at the Musée Bolo, EPFL, Lausanne. Photograph by Rama, Wikimedia Commons, Cc-by-sa-2.0-fr, CC BY-SA 2.0 fr, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=17129317
A unboxed Nvidia Jetson Orin Nano DEveloper Kit, Seattle, Washington, 2025 May 1
Comparative Analysis of AI and Drexlerian MNT Development
Table from the August 1995 issue of "Wired" magazine showing the (sadly mostly hilariously wrong) predictions of various nanotechnology experts as to when certain applications of (True Drexlerian) Molecular Nanotechnology might become available
Cover of the 2012 Network DVD release of "The Children of the Stones"
A still from "Stargazy on Zummerdown" showing the Doctor and her companion, a Dr Evelyn Smythe-type character, or, possibly, a Jim Lloyd-type character from "The Archers" checking his order for Borchester Blue with a Helen Archer-type character (it's her birthday tomorrow; all the best people are born on 16 April - yes, she's a fictional member of the Glubb Club!)
1976 Soviet 1:10,000 scale map of Preston showing our house in Cadley, Fulwood
Cover of the second (2000) edition of John von Neumann's "The Computer and the Brain", originally published in 1958
Jesus expels the cryptocoin miners from the Temple
Boxed Kurt Vonnegut GHQ game
Jeff Bezos creating the new James Bond, as though he is Frankenstein. Cartoon by Ellis Rosen “No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to star in a series of increasingly bland spinoffs and TV shows that have significant viewership decline after the first episode.”
Homemade haggis for Burns Night dinner, Seattle, Washington, 2025 January 25
Wolf Moon Engulfs Mars Image Credit & Copyright: Imran Sultan
M83: The Southern Pinwheel Image Credit: CTIO, NOIRLab, DOE, NSF, AURA; Processing: T. A. Rector (U. Alaska Anchorage/NOIRLab), D. de Martin & M. Zamani (NOIRLab)
Beyond Beef mince and vegetable tagine with couscous
Sausage and beans
The old Preston Town Hall, probably ~1910. The town hall burnt down in 1947. Source: https://www.mylancs.uk/2024/02/the-remains-of-prestons-third-town-hall.html
Impossible beef mince, potato and vegetable curry with naan, chili sauce and Red Ember Proxy
William Hartnell in "The Feast of Steven" saying “And incidentally – a happy Christmas, to all of you at home.” Source: https://tragicalhistorytour.com/the-feast-of-steven/
Cover of "New Worlds" 183 via https://www.coverbrowser.com/covers/new-worlds/4
The cover of "New Worlds" 191
The cover of "New Worlds" 153
Cover of Michael Hemmingson's "The Chronotope and Other Speculative Fictions" (Rockville, Maryland: Wildside Press/Borgo Press, 2013) [coll: dos: bound with "Poison from a Dead Sun": pb/] Image courtesy of Wildside Press
Photo of Kindle page of story "Crispr" from "The Big Book of Cyberpunk" with, in a large fount, a quote from Michael Howard (presumably the military historian): "The most dangerous of all moods is that of a great power which sees itself declining to second rank."
Tables that convert to games tables for RPGs