Thanks, that was a typo. I corrected it to “most of their lunacies”.
No, I didn’t mean human nature, nor just the biosphere. In this case, nature means pretty much the whole Universe except for humans and everything human-made. For example, I’ve read sci-fi stories in which some characters opposed the terraformation of Mars because they saw it as a violation of “nature”, the Venusians in this story would think in a similar way if confronted with the same question.
And yes, the Venusians of the early 22nd century are pretty much enamored with Earth, to the point of almost attempting to recreate it in their floating cities.
One thing I want to make clear in the next few chapters I write is that the Venusians are, in fact, contradictory in their beliefs and attitudes, but that these contradictions they have already exist among present day people, right here on Earth.
No matter how much we, transhumanists and futurists, would like to deny it, nowdays there seems to be an increasing number of people who keep drinking the spoils of modernity while hypocritically idolizing some idealized past, which they see as representing a “simpler” and more “natural” existence. The venusian society in Vena’s Tale is largely designed to criticize this people, who in my opinion represent the greatest threat to transhumanist ambitions.
Thanks. You know, I thought that too. I wasn’t initially aiming for that, but when I started trying to really put myself inside a robot detective’s mind I started recalling those TNG episodes in which data plays Sherlock Holmes in the holodeck. Now screw it, I love data, the character stays this way. However, David does have a particular world view that is very much his own.