Mirror Worlds: Or the Day Software Puts the Universe in A Shoebox ... How It Will Happen and What It Will Mean

New York & Oxford, England, UK, et al. : Oxford University Press, 1991. Copyright © 1991 by Oxford University Press, Inc. 2nd Printing. Hardcover. Very Good/Very Good. 8vo or 8° (Medium Octavo): between 6" - 9" tall . John Costa (Jacket Design); Nicholas Carriero (Author Photo); 'Medici Princess', 1952 by Joseph Cornell (Jacket Illustration). 237 + pp. A great, almost spotlessly clean copy and dust jacket! Solidly and tightly bound, essentially and nearly flawless copy and dust jacket with minimal internal and external wear and use. Copy with crisp pages, spotlessly clean text, and light shelf wear. Pen note on first free front end page. Smooth covers. Dust jacket shows minimal, minor or light wear around edges. Synopsis: From Library Journal: With evangelical fervor, Gelernter's book-length essay paints a future where software technology, now isolating people, brings them into impersonal proximity through "mirror worlds. " These computer models of reality let users descend to greater depths of detail at will, meet other explorers, and generally get the "big picture" of what's going on. However, Gelernter's own appraisal of the value of computers seems inconsistent and extreme: he claims they are valuable just sitting unused on the coffee table but then insists that the uninitiated will be forced to "sink or swim" (i.e., learn to use computers) in the information sea computers create. His casual style gives the book the feel of a lecture transcript, and his metaphors (e.g., "jettisoned floating landscapes in tuple space") demand considerable hardware and software knowledge to link them with reality. For collections emphasizing computer science. -Doug Kranch, Ambassador Coll. Lib., Big Sandy, Tex. Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Kirkus Reviews Within ten years, Gelernter (Computer Science/Yale) predicts here, scientists will deploy computer systems able to capture extensive data about a particular ``reality'' (hospital, city, etc. ), and to present a constantly updated model on a desktop computer. ``A Mirror World is some huge institution's moving, true-to-life mirror image trapped inside a computer--where you can see and grasp it whole, '' Gelernter writes. Citizens will be able to visit these computer models like public squares, gaining unprecedented access to data on what's going on (and the officials in charge, the author intimates, will presumably welcome a chance to have their performance monitored). Building such mirror worlds will be extraordinarily difficult