3.8 KiB
[D] Mother Horse Eyes invites his readers to play a game
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Author: u/alexshatberg Mouse Army*
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URL: https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/4m45lm/d_mother_horse_eyes_invites_his_readers_to_play_a/
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Score: 14
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Created: 2016-06-01T23:12:36
Post:
For those of you who haven't heard, The Interface Series is a thing that has been happening on Reddit for the past month. In short, it's a highly fragmented fictional narrative that the author's been posting daily to (semi-)random threads.
Earlier today he posted this comment, written in-character, in which seems to invite his readers to come up with a test that determines whether the bulk of his work is prewritten or improvised on the fly.
It's an interesting question: how can we know whether the story is improvised or not? The author does occasionally make direct responses to other Reddit comments and make reference to current events, but as you said this could just be a sort of superficial improvisation, where most of the story is actually fixed, but a few of the details are improvised. The author could also be combing through reddit for the right comment to give the appearance of improvisation. Are we watching real choices in action, or are the events of this universe occurring along some deterministic path? Is there any way to find out? Maybe some sort of test should be devised. But that would require the author to play along.
Which sounds a lot like something the /r/rational readership would enjoy. If we were to construct a test that shows, beyond any reasonable doubt that the narrative is either predetermined or improvised, what would that test look like?
Comments:
u/callmebrotherg [+4] now posting as /u/callmesalticidae (4 hours later)
Holy shit.
It's like I'm reading House of Leaves for the first time again. Holy mother horse eyes.
u/gryfft [+2] (2 days later)
I definitely detect elements of House of Leaves, as well as Cloud Atlas and Videodrome. People have been describing the Interface Series as "Philip K. Dick meets H.P. Lovecraft," and I think there's an element of truth to that, but I think Cronenberg's influence is much more present than Lovecraft's.
The cosmological horror angle also echoes Sam Hughs' latest contributions to the SCP universe.
It is definitely the most compelling work of horror fiction I can recall reading. It fills me with dread, fear, and the desire to know more.
Bravo, /u/_9MOTHER9HORSE9EYES9 .
u/None [+2] (5 hours later)
I don't know, but thank you for linking this. It's every kind of horror I love and hate, viscerally. This is a masterpiece.
u/None [+2] (11 hours later)
This is a pretty good and compelling as a sci-fi/horror story, that fans of SCP Foundation will enjoy.
Don't necessarily expect much rationality-related content though and I think the author was trollish when he suggested trying to come up with tests.
u/Roxolan [+2] Head of antimemetiWalmart senior assistant manager (a day later)
(comment written without knowing much about the series)
Find a current event which significantly contradicts how the story is going so far. Shout-out to the author. See if they reply and are willing to make it fit.
Either way it goes, this is going to be relatively weak evidence though. If the author refuses to play along there's still a chance they could have. Or they could reply but be so skilled at superficial improvisation that the event still doesn't disrupt the story they want to tell. (The genre they chose certainly helps them in that regard.)
We have too little control over /u/_9mother9horse9eyes9 to set up a test they could not evade.