Science fiction discussion

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Dreamland said:
The protagonist (Manuel) strikes a woman (Davis) at some point when she demands that Adam Selene be dismantled because he's an insane computer (and Manny's best friend), he's shocked by his outburst and remembers that if it happened in public there would be lots of (thirsty) men nearby ready to throw him out of the airlock for harming a woman. It is also suggested that a woman can put aside a husband (polyandria) when she's tired of him.

The start of the revolution happens to be when a UN peace officer murders a woman.
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You're reading way too into it. That "sacred woman" thing has to do with the fact men outnumber women three to one in that society so hurting or killing one is a major taboo. It's got everything to do with weird frontier society norms and nothing to do with YASS QUEEN.

The book is a libertarian treatise written fifty years before the current zeitgeist. It's about cultural liberation and disdain towards authoritarian laws. Don't compare it to modern third wave feminism because you're seeing SJWs under your bed.
 
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Replicant Sasquatch said:
Don't compare it to modern third wave feminism because you're seeing SJWs under your bed.
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I never said i did, the actual warriors would call the author a Nazi because he wrote Starship Troopers. And i have to admit, i like Heinlein's tendency to play with radical political ideas though, especially in an era where a lot of tension existed between them (he fought in the korean war, perhaps what caused this?).
 
Dreamland said:
I never said i did, the actual warriors would call the author a Nazi because he wrote Starship Troopers. And i have to admit, i like Heinlein's tendency to play with radical political ideas though, especially in an era where a lot of tension existed between them (he fought in the korean war, perhaps what caused this?).
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You pretty much did by calling it a "feminist anti-fa revolt" which is a pretty fucking loaded description. Shame on you.

As for Heinlein playing with a bunch of different themes, I think he was just a crazy guy with a lot of balls. Moon is probably the closest you'll get to his actual politics.
 
I recently read Stephen Baxter's Raft. Never read any Baxter up until now, but Raft has made me very excited to read into the rest of his work (the Xeelee series is apparently very similar to Raft).

Raft is a good hard sci-fi standalone about the descendents of a group of humans trapped in a universe where gravity is several billion times stronger than it is in our universe. Hence the universe consists of millions of small nebula that have a lifespan of a few thousand years. In the nebula, stars live for only a few minutes before burning out their hydrogen, gravity's dense enough for breathable oxygen to be spread throughout the nebula without life support systems, and there are very interesting animals adapted for this unique ecosystem. Despite not being exposition-heavy, the book does a great job of giving the reader a tour of the world and one can imagine Baxter has a compendium of notes detailing stuff like chemical concentrations, orbital mechanics, and biological possibility in this world.

The nebula the humans are in is running out of hydrogen and oxygen, and is thus dying. The protagonist is at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder and travels to try to discover the nature of the problem, and undergoes the standard heroes journey. He eventually has to try to stop the destruction of human society by an anarchic revolution and try to find a way to make it outlive the death of the nebula.

I give it a 4/5. The downsides to Raft are that there are a couple of obnoxious characters (the two main females in the book are both obnoxious to varying degrees - the second one introduced is downright insufferable), and the final fifth of the book does feel rushed and a bit inconsistent in tone. Also, there's a cliched monologue just at the end which feels out of place for the character giving it.
 
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Oh boy, a sci-fi thread. Allow me to shill my man : Greg Egan

If you are just slightly interested in math and/or physics, you will adore his books. Greg Egan takes a mathematical supposition, and then builds a story over it.
For example, take the book that has my name on it : Dichronauts. It is about a 2 spacial dimension and 2 time dimension universe. The laws of physics drastically change because of this, obviously.
more info : http://www.gregegan.net/DICHRONAUTS/DICHRONAUTS.html
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I initially bought Dichronaut just because I wanted to learn more about space-time in a fun way. But what I ended up loving the most in this book was the story, I wasn't expecting to be so engaged and in love with the characters.

Right now I'm reading another book of his. But enough with the shilling, go check it out if your interested, Greg is underated.
 
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Your Weird Fetish said:
So no one has mentioned Blindsight by Peter Watts? It's even fucking free on the author's website because he fucking hated his publisher. If you like weird ass aliens it's definitely the scifi for you.
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That's been brought up before in other threads. It is really good.

What's funny is Watts absolutely is a lolcow but he's objectively more intelligent than just about anyone on this site so trying to make a thread on him would be a fool's errand.
 
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Replicant Sasquatch said:
That's been brought up before in other threads. It is really good.

What's funny is Watts absolutely is a lolcow but he's objectively more intelligent than just about anyone on this site so trying to make a thread on him would be a fool's errand.
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Smart people can be obscenely stupid, as proven by that border patrol incident.
 
Your Weird Fetish said:
Smart people can be obscenely stupid, as proven by that border patrol incident.
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I dunno, I feel like Watts's assholery is less stupidity and more the fact he's just ballsy enough to actually do what he wants. I think that stunt was asinine but I give the guy credit for putting his money where his mouth is. Most of the people we cover would have just sheepishly let the BP guys search their car then bitch about it on Twitter.
 
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So I've had an idea for a dinosaur hunting game where you go back to specific times like in Hunter Call of the Wild. How would that work without massive wormholes?
 
Let's necro this!

It's #VintageSciFiMonth and today we're talking about a golden age classic: A.E. Van Vogt's Slan!

 
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Necro.
Fenoxo's very NSFW Flash Game Trials in Tainted Space is neat (if you are into the tf kinks/furry/xeno kinks.)
Warning: it takes months for your player character to level up to 10/11. and hours out of your fucking life.
Even the first demo build, you can only cap at level 10.
 
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Two chapters away from finishing Stanislaw Lem's Solaris.
Fantastic read! I'm still intrigued though as to who's responsible for the butt ass naked sheboon in a grass skirt. She's extensively described as a steatopgic Amazon (how have IdPol jackasses not cancelled this guy yet?) but after she's mentioned only in passing a couple times. But I've been dying to know who's responsible--Snow? Gibarian? Sartorious?

My absolute favorite aspect of Lem's prose is his worldbuilding and rich descriptions via texbooks, expedition accounts, and historical texts. If you've watched 2002 Solaris with George Clooney, I think they NAILED the actual phenomena of the mimoids, arcing, plasma effects, and waves/colors of the ocean. His descriptions are haunting, hypnotic, colorful, and imaginative. I also enjoy the questions he raises about sentience, sapience, and omnipotence of the ocean as well as the "ethics" of Kelvin's decisions and Snow's take on Kelvin's thoughts and actions.

This has quickly become a book I will definitely read again and again. My next read is George R.R. Martin's Nightflyers. I purchased both books at a place in my city called Half-Price Books. Great store. Lots of book treasures there.
 
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So I was thinking of the Culture series by Iain Banks.

It seems to me to be the ideal utopia of Liberalism, or of current Western society. At least in some respects.

So in my autism, I tried to imagine living in in the Culture.

My result? I would legitimately have trouble getting up in the morning, I’m not social enough for all the parties, concerts and other social events. And playing in some virtual video game world would be great and all-I’m sure there would be amazing graphics but what’s the point?

(I’d also probably not be good enough to join Contact or Special Circumstances).

Like just from a pure material perspective-I can think of no better life. But what makes life genuinely worth living? Even if every form of pleasure, entertainment, diversion and game is at your finger tips.

(Also being a pet/child under the care of a bunch of god like AIs is frightening in more ways than one-not least because you could never be “right” in opposition to them, they would actually know what was best for you, and only let you choose your own way out of principle, not because you have any actual power in the relationship).

That isn’t to say I dismiss the books, it does raise the question of what can a truly abundant society offer? It just seems like it’s too superficial at least to me.

I’d probably be a weird loner who doesn’t change his sex every year or insert drug glands to feel euphoric every weekend.

But I’m sure someone will disagree.
 
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I
Shamash said:
So I was thinking of the Culture series by Iain Banks.

It seems to me to be the ideal utopia of Liberalism, or of current Western society. At least in some respects.

So in my autism, I tried to imagine living in in the Culture.

My result? I would legitimately have trouble getting up in the morning, I’m not social enough for all the parties, concerts and other social events. And playing in some virtual video game world would be great and all-I’m sure there would be amazing graphics but what’s the point?

(I’d also probably not be good enough to join Contact or Special Circumstances).

Like just from a pure material perspective-I can think of no better life. But what makes life genuinely worth living? Even if every form of pleasure, entertainment, diversion and game is at your finger tips.

(Also being a pet/child under the care of a bunch of god like AIs is frightening in more ways than one-not least because you could never be “right” in opposition to them, they would actually know what was best for you, and only let you choose your own way out of principle, not because you have any actual power in the relationship).

That isn’t to say I dismiss the books, it does raise the question of what can a truly abundant society offer? It just seems like it’s too superficial at least to me.

I’d probably be a weird loner who doesn’t change his sex every year or insert drug glands to feel euphoric every weekend.

But I’m sure someone will disagree.
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I felt the same way but I figured The Culture would simply let you opt-out if you asked. You don't have to be part of society and can simply go live the life the want inside or out of Culture borders. The Minds would let you live the life you wanted, even if it was difficult for you. I'm thinking of that island with the cannibal cult leader in Consider Phlebus. They're on an island on a ring world, have been there for years living this utterly depraved, harmful lifestyle, but because everyone there is choosing to be there, the Mind on charge just ignores them. Even when the world is set to be destroyed, a small shuttle is sent to collect them and it just sits on the beach waiting for them. Doesn't force them to do anything.

So what you do in The Culture is really up to you. You have to make your own challenges in life. It's like Minecraft. There really isn't much of a stated goal, you just have to find your own entertainment and purpose. Hedonism, art, exploration... In terms of science fiction universes I'd like to live in, it's probably the top, even if I don't have what it takes to be part of Contact or Special Circumstances. Just give me a ship and a drone and I'll make my own fun.
 
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Constellationzero said:
Two chapters away from finishing Stanislaw Lem's Solaris.
Fantastic read! I'm still intrigued though as to who's responsible for the butt ass naked sheboon in a grass skirt. She's extensively described as a steatopgic Amazon (how have IdPol jackasses not cancelled this guy yet?) but after she's mentioned only in passing a couple times. But I've been dying to know who's responsible--Snow? Gibarian? Sartorious?

My absolute favorite aspect of Lem's prose is his worldbuilding and rich descriptions via texbooks, expedition accounts, and historical texts. If you've watched 2002 Solaris with George Clooney, I think they NAILED the actual phenomena of the mimoids, arcing, plasma effects, and waves/colors of the ocean. His descriptions are haunting, hypnotic, colorful, and imaginative. I also enjoy the questions he raises about sentience, sapience, and omnipotence of the ocean as well as the "ethics" of Kelvin's decisions and Snow's take on Kelvin's thoughts and actions.

This has quickly become a book I will definitely read again and again. My next read is George R.R. Martin's Nightflyers. I purchased both books at a place in my city called Half-Price Books. Great store. Lots of book treasures there.
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I've really grown to appreciate His Master's voice because of this. Lem's prose is engaging and uniquely interesting, without falling into shock value or plot baiting. The freaking book is nothing but a scientist's soliloquy on whether the interpretations of the larger science community of a purportedly alien information dump are to be benign to the human race or just more fuel for the MIC. It's as valid today as it was during the 60s.
 
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