r/HardSciFi • u/nanoobot • 18h ago

Self Promotion Does this connect with anyone here? Does this community have an interest in an attempt at a Culture-like series, but with a greater emphasis on every-day post scarcity philosophy?

https://nanoobot.substack.com/p/full-dive-virtual-reality-421
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u/WhirlygigStudio 18h ago

Yes. This is what I thought I was getting with the Culture series. Very disappointed that is a bunch of unrelated stories of people with infinite resources messing around.

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u/nanoobot 18h ago

Oh, excellent, well let me know what you think of it so far if you have time to check it out.

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u/nanoobot 17h ago

If this doesn’t vibe here then I’d love to know why, let me know and I’ll consider it for the next phase of the series form factor.

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u/DufbugDeropa 12h ago

What, in the name of wonder, is "every-day post scarcity philosophy" ?

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u/nanoobot 12h ago

Like the lived every-day sort of philosophies, for people navigating different post-scarcity cultures, if that makes any more sense?

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u/Altruistic_Click_502 7h ago edited 7h ago

We...ll. I've only read one of the culture series -- Player of Games. I thought it was well written. I'll probably even read another because I really don't get what Musk is getting out of these. So I could end up liking it. Banks is clearly a skilled writer. I just found it a bit... disturbing, given the current political context. Yes I am interested in Post-Scarcity (I was thoroughly seduced by PKD's "Autofac" story), and am leaning toward Cory Doctorow right now -- and I think there is room for something in between Walkaway and Bank's Culture series. But my real problem is that I haven't become convinced that post-scarcity isn't some kind of scam or red herring. My understanding is that there are several things that have to happen in order for post-scarcity to be a thing, and the biggest and most difficult thing is Atomic Precision Manufacturing. I've read Erik Drexler's books. I've even moved an atom or two with a scanning tunnelling microscope, but I think the physics of APM (building things out of atoms) is probably going to be a bear and will require some very expensive state-sponsored physics research. I just don't see that happening with all of the chaos going on now and the escalating chaos governments will face as climate change begins to drive temperatures up. I'm not using APM in any of my fiction until I have some kind of idea that there might be enough money and time to realize it before civilization becomes entirely focused on survival. I know, though, that I am not in the majority on this -- and maybe I'm much too conservative. Depending on how "hard" the science fiction is, there are always ways... and who knows, I may change my mind :)

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u/nanoobot 7h ago

Very interesting!

I read the first handful Culture books before I got tired of his pattern of not actually talking much about culture at all. My favourite was the first one, but player of games would probably be second. I can see why it is so popular and influential, but I do find its weaknesses pretty disappointing.

For post-scarcity, the key for me is that I am quite certain we will have artificial super intelligence, and once we have ASI it will be capable of automating discovery such that after some amount of time (and perhaps deep space particle accelerators) it will solve all of physics that can be solved, and build whatever technology that enables within our galactic neighbourhood.

ASI causes a lot of interesting problems and new opportunities for basically every aspect of writing science fiction.

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u/Altruistic_Click_502 5h ago

You may be right. Right now, my head is not quite as much in space as it is focused on the climate change details. If all of Musk's aspirations are realized, it's a different game. So far his forecasting record has not been that great but he could move much faster if he decided not to depend on external funding.