Proof That Science Fiction Is the Literature of the Future, and That I Am the Prognostication MASTER
Posted on March 25, 2015 Posted by John Scalzi 96 Comments
In The Android’s Dream, which I wrote over a decade ago now, I reached into the thinky crevasses of my brain to conceive of a thing that no human had dared to dream of: white chocolate M&M’s. Yes! I was the first! They came from my very thinkmeat! And people said to me then, well, hold up there, Scalzi. Spaceships and aliens are all very well, but white chocolate M&M’s? That’s too radical an idea! And then they laughed, nervously.
WELL WHO IS LAUGHING NOW, PEOPLE:
Yes. Arthur C. Clarke had communication satellites, Robert Heinlein had waterbeds, and now I have white chocolate M&M’s. I predicted this magnificent confection of the future! I did! Me! Alone!
YOUR WORLD IS WHAT I HAVE MADE IT, PUNY HUMANS. PARTAKE OF THE PEARLESCENT PRODUCT OF MY PRODIGIOUSLY UNPARALLELED PROGNOSTICATION.
I’ll take my Grand Master award now, if you please.
Also, in case you’re wondering: They taste okay. A little waxy, but then, these are M&M’s we’re talking about here.
White chocolate is neither white nor chocolate.
Bought some the other day for the office and people and wolfing them down. Didn;t even know they were ScalziFood
John, this is fine and dandy. Now that your super power has been confirmed we’d like to ask you to think long and hard about what you write. If white chocolate M&M’s weren’t bad enough, your last book was about a pandemic.
Nostradamus had nothing on you, sir!
Nice! Now we just need BrainPals and we are all set! On a similar note, I was pretty shocked to see Harry Harrison’s prediction of powdered alcohol (from his 2nd “Stainless Steel Rat novel) become reality! Sadly, the politicians aren’t as excited about the product….
hurr
*checks off another sign of the rapidly approaching End Times*
can you please put nutella m&ms into your next book?
Charles Stross predicted the EU would be in a period of deflation in 2015 Halting State.
I like your prediction better.
I’m with FeetForBrains on this one. I’d not like to see some of those concepts you’ve dreamed up come to fruition, please….
Now think ten years into the future and decide what really, really must manifest, and write it quickly. I’d go with some dark chocolate/caramel/?? that no one but you can conceive. :)
Wow. I completely missed that. And I love me some white chocolate M&Ms, too. Too bad they make me feel sick afterward. No, not from eating too many, even a small number of them will do it. Such is my lot in life. Sigh.
Praise the Prophet Scalzi!
I will henceforth be adopting regular usage of the word “thinkmeat”. Thank you for that. Because mmm… meat…
I’m fine with your Grand Master designation. But *shudder* keep the white chocolate.
Yes, and you got credit cards being used at vending machines too. But not paying with your smartphone/watch. So 2 out of 3?
I hope they’re paying you bank in royalties. Clearly, they are using your idea, and owe you for the IP.
Gotta admit, I laughed out loud, literally, reading this entry! Loved it, and I take my hat off before you, Master. Lol
HG Wells predicted atomic war. He might have been right, but don’t think I mean to thank him.
White chocolate is the spawn of Satan. I hate it with the white-hot heat of 10k suns. In addition to having a vile taste, it is a complete pain to temper.
Not that I have an opinion about this.
And apparently you’re drinking Coke Cherry Zero also. Is that in place of Coke Zero or in addition to Coke Zero? I happen to have an open can of Coke Cherry Zero by my keyboard right now. Cheers!
Isn’t white chocolate where they take all of the good stuff out of chocolate, and try to sell you what’s left?
Eh, it’s not white chocolate Reese so who cares?
White chocolate is an abomination before God.
After being truly shocked at the number of people who chose cheese over beer, I’m pleased to once again feel part of the community. White chocolate is about half a step from carob chips in the “impostor food” Most Wanted List.
Reblogged this on billsh00.
Think what you like about white chocolate (says the guy who ate all the almond bark at Xmas time as a kid)… it’s not _what_ he called, but that he made the call.
All win, Mr. Scalzi!
I still can’t decide if I like your posts or the comments more, but I find both highly amusing most days and you help me while away the monotonous hours of the daily grind. Thank you John and all.
Is the book done yet?
White chocolate is disgusting. Now I know whom to blame.
All hail the Grand Master Procrastinator!!!
White Chocolate is the debil.
Oh, Scalzi. Why couldn’t you use your powers for good, and not evil?
We are not worthy! (genuflexes)
I dislike white chocolate with a passion. Why would anyone take perfectly good chocolate – the food of the gods – and remove the flavor from it? It’s so Wrong.
Why couldn’t you have dreamed up calorie free chocolate instead, Scalzi? That I could get behind.
You did, of course, remember to patent this genius invention, right?
Ugh.
I, for one, despise the current craze of taking a halfway decent established product and making 45 variants of it, most of which generally suck. PB&J Oreos? No thanks.
IS this a sign that The End is Near?
K.W. Ramsey. White Reese’s is a thing too. I’m not sure why, I’m in the contingent that says white chocolate isn’t actually edible. http://www.thehersheycompany.com/brands/reeses-peanut-butter-cups/white.aspx
Or… someone is procrastinating finishing his novel.
Based on the last bit, I would give you a Grand Master of Alliteration award.
@Andrew Lloyd
I watch too much Warehouse 13, for I had a moment of gender confusion when you said “he” in reference to H.G. Wells.
Completely off-topic, but I’m in the mood to share.
Since I already gave my opinion of white chocolate above.
For those of us that can’t eat chocolate (yes, pity me) this is a great gift. Thank you Senor Scalzi.
I object to being classified as puny.
On the other hand I am mortal, so if you write a book about the sudden transformation of humanity into immortal and youthful beings I would be prepared to overlook the puny…
Damn. I never look in the candy aisle–but I’m going to the store right damn now.
Uh, yeah….And remember when Al Gore “invented” the Internet? Now, if you predict that the National Debt will be paid down (and WITHOUT political sleight-of-hand; REALLY paid down), and it is, then I will really be impressed and declare you to be my Lord and Master.
@Frodo:
We are not worthy! (genuflexes)
“Genuflexes” is, strictly speaking, a misspelling, but an AWESOME one! It sounds like the latest craze in Catholic weight training.
Well better than the alien pulling people into it’s body cavity.
Thank goodness it was the candy, and not the condoms you invented. :-)
Huh. I assumed they already existed.
You need – three – verifiable miracles to achieve sainthood; I think we’ll hold off on ‘Grand Master’ for a bit ;-)
Actually, Mars/M&M introduced the white chocolate M&M’s in 2006 as a tie-in product promotion with the second Pirates of the Caribbean film. The Android’s Dream was published in 2006. How do we know that you actually predicted anything and instead may have just gotten wind of M&M’s planned tie-in campaign when you were writing the novel or inserted it in at the last minute? After all, you know a lot of Hollywood people. Can you prove you actually predicted it, rather than that you’re simply a chocolate ad spy?
Today white chocolate M & Ms, tomorrow Electro-Ecstatic condoms. I bow to your prognostic abilities, Grand Master.
Also procrastination master…?
(Unfinished novels and all)
Well, that sorts out our ‘Is SF Predictive?’ panel at Supernova.
I notice there are no brown ones in that bowl. Did you pick them out, or do they come like that? David Lee Roth and Eddie van Halen will want to know.
Scalzi the Master Prognosticationizer, yes. White “chocolate”, no.
Not sayin, jus’ sayin’: Plain white chocolate? Meh.
http://carrotcakemms.com/mms-carrot-cake-9oz.jpg
(available at http://carrotcakemms.com/)
You predicted an abomination, and it has come TRUE!
Stop predicting!
So why don’t you invent something potentially really tasty, like hazelnut M&Ms, or, courtesy of an earlier poster, nutella M&Ms, or M&Ms with a cherry center? (although maybe not any of the seriously weird flavors on carrotcakemms)
As for all the white chocolate haters, I may not eat white chocolate now, but when I was a kid and allergic to chocolate I would absolutely have loved to have had the opportunity to eat white chocolate M&Ms. There were so few “real” candies available for the chocolate allergic that all the white stuff available now is a vast improvement for those who are. Thankfully I have outgrown this defect and now spend my adult life making up for years of chocolate deprivation.
Dang! Nice job, sir. And here I am all chocolate-less for lent. (It’s a good exercise.) I shall have to partake in white chocolate m&ms in the future. Not a future of science fiction. My actual future. Hopefully, I get there without chocolate. (While they contain no cocoa mass, real white choc does contain cocoa butter and I think that would still count as a chocolate product.)
Kat Goodwin:
I wrote the novel in 2003, so I would be THE MASTER PROGNOSTICATOR.
Hey, it is a prognostication that came into being! How cool is that! However, I would be more intrigued if the “Whisper” brand condoms made it into fruition. That would be worth a tweet from the “Lair of Sexiness”.
It’s not bad enough the folks at M&Ms let peanuts take up valuable chocolate space, now they’re letting not-chocolate take up valuable chocolate space. I grudgingly give you credit for thinking of it first, but why did it take them 10 years to make it a reality? What the heck are they reading over there?
John, which novel was that and could you quote the line in the book that applies?
Thanks.
@David Hajicek:
Are you able to see the image at the top of the page? It captures the specific line (highlighted), and the text below the image indicates that it is from The Android’s Dream.
Or, since you haven’t finished your current novel yet, that makes you THE MASTER PROCRASTINATIONATOR.
Funny stuff John but I feel compelled to point out that you subjected the poor guy to bowel loosening pain whenever he bought the stuff, thus reinforcing the truth that no one should EVER buy the stuff.
Bless you! Bless you! Again I say, Bless you!
I need to rush out and get them. Along with Peanut Butter M&M’s. Ambrosia of the Ghods!
Grand Master after more books (hehehe)…
BTW, Brin claims 18 predictions in “Earth” have come true. Just saying….
Will there ever be a sequel to “Android’s Dream?” It is my favorite of all your works.
I also gave up chocolate for Lent (not religious; long story.) I have long maintained that white chocolate is not chocolate at all, so I could have some.
The problem is that I would rather have nothing than white chocolate.
Oh well. *counts days till Easter again*
White chocolate ought to have to have the word “chocolate” forcibly removed and be turned out in shame, like a disgraced military person. It’s a confection, and a flavorless one at that; not worth the fat, sugar, and calories.
Dark chocolate M&Ms, though — those are great. I ate the last bag here in 2 days.
Coming soon: talks with Iran derailed by gassy diplomat’s sudden death. Was his anal implant the work of House Republicans? And what’s with this sheep? News at 11!
White chocolate M&M’s are obviously much more important than communication satellites. I DO like communication satellites but I couldn’t eat a whole one.
JS:
Can you prove that you did so that early? And isn’t that particular year somewhat suspect, given that 2003 was when the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie came out. Perhaps the promotional campaign was planned then but delayed. Are you sure you haven’t been in league with Johnny Depp? Just saying.
White chocolate is actually a form of chocolate made from the cocoa plant. They ferment, dry and then roast the cocoa beans, removing the outer coating, then run the beans through a press which separates out most of the cocoa fat in the center of the bean. The remains are grounded up into cocoa powder. Cocoa fat, milk and sugars can then be added back to the cocoa powder to make the various gradients of chocolate, the ones with the most powder and least fat are the bitter dark chocolates. White chocolate takes the cocoa fat and doesn’t add any or not much cocoa powder to it. But it is chocolate and from that cocoa fat, should actually be an ivory color rather than white.
However, some sweets labelled white chocolate don’t have any or much cocoa butter in them, as using the fat/oil is more expensive than a lot of other vegetable fats and oils, so cheaper labeled white chocolate might be not really white chocolate. I suspect that white chocolate M&M’s probably have very little in the way of actual cocoa butter to them.
Me, I am happy to eat any form of chocolate, except for the really dark chocolates over 75%, which get a little too tree bark like for my tastes. White chocolate I find quite yummy and it really works well when you mix it with milk or dark chocolate, although they kind of melt at different temperatures, having different fat contents. White chocolate doesn’t have the antioxidants trumpeted of dark chocolate, but it also doesn’t have much natural caffeine to it either. Real white chocolate is only a tablespoon or two of cocoa powder away from milk chocolate.
(Mutters darkly at Kat) Dark chocolate rulz, dude, not those, those – insipid, pasty not-chocolate lipid lozenges! Repent thy errant ways.
Hmm, a stop for some Godiva and a good Zinfandel to sooth my hurts seems in order.
So, being in the “avid reader of the blog, but not actually read any of the books yet” category of commenter, I now understand the challenge of writing Lock-In with out semi-colons.
Ehn. What about the condoms?
I guess that’s pretty good, but I invented the joke “did you get a haircut? No, I got them all cut” back in 1973.
Kat Goodwin:
“Are you sure you haven’t been in league with Johnny Depp?”
OH SHIT THEY KNOW
(runs away)
Given the choice between white chocolate and candle wax, I’d take candle wax. OTOH, white chocolate can sometimes be useful in cooking, where its (lack of) taste can be concealed.
Will
Has any one ever seen John Scalzi and Johnny (suspicious coincidence) Depp together?
I am surprised your big demand is grand master award, I would think it would be a check with more zero’s than you have fingers from the Mars family.
So it is YOU who are responsible for this abomination…! ::grabs pitchfork and torch!::
Mind, I like good white chocolate – but the kind of “white chocolate” M&M/Mars, Nestle and Hershey make? Tastes like sweetened paste….
Reblogged this on The Way of the Storyteller: and commented:
Sweet!
Ambivalent:
I eat a small bit of 70% dark chocolate every day cause the doctors say I can and it will be supposedly good for one’s heart, (I suspect that’s a huge bribery situation from the candy companies and Johnny Depp, but I’m not fighting it.)
But that doesn’t mean that I’m going to turn down a good white chocolate truffle. There are some people who don’t like or are allergic to chocolate, which is fine, since we need to have more chocolate for everybody else and there is no sense wasting the rest of the cocoa beans. I would also like my chocolate to not be made by child slaves or slaves at all, and am trying to boycott vote with my dollars there as I can. (Which I’ve been told — many times on this site — means that I am repressing free speech or something something because I’m not allowed to chose what I buy.
Bearpaw: Is there an electric condom — Pirates of the Caribbean 5 promotional tie-in coming up, do you think? Scalzi, have you heard anything from Johnny Depp about that? Scalzi? Did he run away?
Yeah, but you’re also the grand prognosticator who envisioned a future in which space travel, and mind transfers work, but those automatic bathroom faucets DON’T. I’m not ready for such a dystopian vision to become reality.
I will await the peanut version. That is all.
When I read the novel, I thought that white chocolate M&Ms referred to regular milk chocolate M&Ms that had white candy shells, which seems, both more aesthetically pleasing and far more appetizing than those waxy pastel monstrosities pictured above.
I’m gonna go with my interpretation. Just because he wrote the book doesn’t mean that Scalzi can define my vision of what white chocolate M&Ms should be. The freedom of appreciating art is that we get to interpret its meaning for ourselves.
I believe that “white chocolate M&Ms”. Clearly means just regular milk chocolate M&Ms with white candy shells, and NOT the white chocolate abominations in the picture.
Sadly, this means that I can’t accept the premise that Mr. Scalzi’s fictional version of the future is somehow coming true unless and until someone shows me a regular M&M with a white candy shell.
PRODIGIOUSLY UNPARALLELED PROGNOSTICATION is totally the name of my next band. In all caps. I’m thinking psychedelic prog rock…
As a long time fan of the Zero Bar (caramel/almond nougat covered with white chocolate fudge), I approve of these new M&Ms.
It is a proud and lonely thing to be a white chocolate fan.
Aloysius, during Christmas shopping season, one can find white M&Ms of the sort you require, mixed with red and green ones. Or one can buy any color in bulk from the M&M Store.
um?
http://www.candyblog.net/blog/item/mm_pirate_pearls
from may 2006
android’s dream, published oct 2006
without knowing exactly when the respective writing and confectioning started, this all seems kinda ???
Really good, lots of cocoa butter white chocolate: Mmmmmm.
White candy confection that may or may not have been in the same room with some cocoa butter: not so much.
(Predicting white chocolate M&Ms: priceless.)
Thanks to this, I bought the last 2 bags of Dark Mint M&Ms in the store yesterday. I can see that I’m going to need to stock up. The first one out of the bag was about 3X the size of your average M&M and bright green. I think someone made it angry.