Philip Dick, Ubik - Death, Cold-Pac, and Half-Life - Sadler's Lectures

29/05/2025 20 min
Philip Dick, Ubik - Death, Cold-Pac, and Half-Life - Sadler's Lectures

Listen "Philip Dick, Ubik - Death, Cold-Pac, and Half-Life - Sadler's Lectures"

Episode Synopsis

This lecture discusses key ideas from the 20th Century American science-fiction short story writer and novelist, Philip K. Dick's novel Ubik

It focuses specifically on one of the key features of the narrative world Dick develops in the story, namely the technology of Cold-Pac, which allows people who have experienced bodily death to be kept at cold temperatures and have their brains and thereby consciousnesses maintained, extending them for a while into "half-life". They do eventually run down and die after their energies are exhausted, and perhaps are reincarnated or have their consciousness simply drift off into space. Within half-life, there are some predatorial people who consume the lives of other people in order to extend their own half-lives.

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