31 KiB
[Monthly Book Club] September 2017 Book: Friendship is Optimal: Caelem Est Conterrens & October book suggestion thread
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Author: u/MagicWeasel Cheela Astronaut*
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URL: https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/6y53xc/monthly_book_club_september_2017_book_friendship/
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Score: 32
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Created: 2017-09-05T02:40:27
Post:
(since this is the first thread, please give improvements!)
THIS MONTH:
We're reading Friendship Is Optimal: Caelum Est Conterrens! It's as far as I know the only MLP fanfic that boasts the tagline "As Horrified Eliezer Yudkowsky!".
This is a recursive fanfic that is based on Friendship is Optimal (39k words), but you don't need to read Friendship is Optimal to read Caelem Est Conterrens, and if you only have time to read one, I would say you should read Caelem Est Conterrens. CEC is a wonderful story - a likeable and relatable protagonist who is a regular person. She starts playing the My Little Pony MMORPG and eventually becomes addicted. This story ultimately touches on transhumanism, the AI singularity, and most hauntingly of all the concept of identity. If you have any interest in AI and the Singularity, or in that old "do transporters kill you?" chestnut, and you are scared of reading something with ponies, I implore you: you may find you love this story.
You can find it online for free at fimfiction.net which I find extremely readable on my phone. It's 57k words so should be quite manageable in the next 10 days for most people. If anyone has an epub link or anything feel free to post it in the comments.
NEXT MONTH:
Firstly: I am not sure when the book for the following month should be selected and how that could be handled. It could be part of e.g. a regular weekly thread, or part of the recommendation thread from the 1st of the month. But I suppose we'll see.
The books each month will be chosen by a complicated subjective process entirely at my whim until such time as someone comes up with good selection criteria (in particular I would like variety in setting, theme, published-ness and genre so that way if something is not your cup of tea one month it might be someone else's next month). So, in your October suggestions, try and avoid fanfiction, sci-fi, AI and transhumanism.
Please suggest books here. We are looking at probably something in the 50,000 word - 200,000 word range (feel free to critique this) that is available free online or on Kindle (free or paid).
Suggested suggestion template (feel free to edit/update/add fields):
Title:
Ebook cost:
Word count:
Genre:
Synopsis:
Why /r/rational would like it:
Any content warnings:
Comments:
u/None [+14] (12 hours later)
Title: Cordyceps by Benedict_SC
Ebook cost: free on ao3 (the Download button is at the right side of the page)
Word count: 64k
Genre: Sci-fi, Irrationalfic
Synopsis: An unnamed main character wakes up with amnesia, in a strange hospital they do not recognise. As they attempt to figure out how they got there, the mystery they face soon becomes far stranger than expected.
Why r/rational would like it: On a first glance, it conforms to the rules of rationalfic; characters take their time to figure things out and act according to their motivations to solve a mystery placed in a world with coherent rules. In some ways, it's also a clever whodunnit; an astute reader will figure out what is happening before the characters do.
That is what the work looks like on the surface, but soon enough, it becomes obvious that the work is an irrationalfic, in which rational thought is not the optimal route. I found this to be very interesting and would love to discuss both this work and the genre in general with this sub.
Also, the work is of course well-written.
No content warnings.
u/tonytwostep [+5] (18 hours later)
Your review definitely drew my interest, and it seems like this story would prompt a lot of discussion; however, since this work in particular stands in contrast to normal rationalfics, I think we should establish a "baseline" by examining other works first.
In other words, I definitely want to see this story in the book club, but preferably a few months down the line.
u/None [+4] (19 hours later)
I see your point. However, based on that argument, I don't think the Three-Body Problem is a good choice, either, since that work isn't particularly rational at all, in my opinion.
u/tonytwostep [+1] (19 hours later)
Well, I think Three-Body Problem is "standard" fiction (in that it doesn't attempt to be particularly rational or irrational), which we could then view through the lens of rationality; whereas it sounds like Cordyceps starts as rational, but then specifically tries to subvert rationality as the optimal approach.
But generally I'd agree, that at least the first 2-3 works examined should be clearly rational or rationalist fiction. That gives us our "baseline", so when we start branching out into less rational works, we have a proper lens of rationality to view them through (in what ways is this work rational? in what ways isn't it? what would a more rational character do in this scenario? is the story overall helped or hindered by being less rational? etc). In that way, 3BP probably isn't a great choice for the next story either.
u/Noumero [+3] Self-Appointed Court Statistician (a day later)
at least the first 2-3 works examined should be clearly rational or rationalist fiction
Hm. So you say. Then,
Title: Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality by Eliezer Yudkowsky
Availability: Free
Word count: 662k
Genre: Adventure, Drama, Humor
Synopsis: Harry Potter's aunt married an Oxford professor instead of some schmuck, and Harry was raised in an environment of books, science and rationality, instead of in a cupboard. When the Wizarding World, in a fit of extremely poor decision-making, reveals itself to him, he is gleeful: magic allows him to accelerate his plans for World
DominationOptimization by quite a lot!Why /r/rational would like it: Explicitly written as a rational fanfiction, it checks off all boxes, deconstructing Harry Potter's entire story, upping the intelligence of not only Harry but all characters, weaving an intricate web of plots, and preaching the wisdom of Big Yud (instead of Big Resh's).
Content warnings: discussion of rape and torture, involvement of happiness-sucking literally evil entities, psychological and emotional manipulations, politics, bullying, heartbreaks, The Fourth Wall Will Not Protect You-heartbreaks, character death, dismemberment, mass murder, blasphemy, discussion and explicit depiction of moral and philosophical dilemmas, dreams of necromancy, gross violation of the laws of physics, existential horror, cosmic horror, social horror, pranks, snarks, mindrape, spiders (probably).
(Only mostly joking.)
To be more serious, would any of Wildbow's stories do, then?
u/ketura [+6] Organizer (a day later)
Reading any of wildbow's works in a month only works if you have three weeks off.
u/thechirurgeon [+3] (5 days later)
Read Worm in three weeks. It's like waking from a very long dream and I'm not even sure what I did when I'm not reading.
u/MagicWeasel [+1] Cheela Astronaut (20 hours later)
(For the record I suggested The Three-Body Problem because it was the first thing I could think of that was a little bit different than everything else in the sub, just to have an example so people would know how to fill the form out. I was quite deliberately planning on not picking it)
u/MagicWeasel [+9] Cheela Astronaut (7 minutes later)
(this is purely an example to show you how much detail to give. Unless nobody else has anything to suggest in which case it wins by default?)
(EDIT: Hijacking my own top post to say the below book will not be selected, it was just an example, and that upvotes will only be a minor consideration in the choice of book, which will otherwise be done entirely based on my own personal whim)
Title: The Three Body Problem by Liu Cixin
Ebook cost: $5.33 USD
Word count: 128k
Genre: Sci-fi
Synopsis: 1967: Ye Wenjie witnesses Red Guards beat her father to death during China's Cultural Revolution. This singular event will shape not only the rest of her life but also the future of mankind.
Four decades later, Beijing police ask nanotech engineer Wang Miao to infiltrate a secretive cabal of scientists after a spate of inexplicable suicides. Wang's investigation will lead him to a mysterious online game and immerse him in a virtual world ruled by the intractable and unpredicatable interaction of its three suns.
This is the Three-Body Problem and it is the key to everything: the key to the scientists' deaths, the key to a conspiracy that spans light-years and the key to the extinction-level threat humanity now faces.
Why /r/rational would like it: It's a hugely acclaimed sci-fi novel that is the first of a trilogy. It was originally written in Chinese by a Chinese author and has a lot of content that is related to that, the cultural revolution, etc. The translator's notes in my edition provided a lot of interesting context. Added to that, it's a science fiction story that has a lot of mystery. I wasn't reading it through a rational lens when I read it the first time, but it seemed really well-grounded.
Any content warnings: Some violence in parts, but nothing too graphic
u/AgentME [+1] (2 months later)
I just finished reading this and its two sequels after seeing this post! They were pretty good.
If you liked the content and types of ideas in the sequels, then you might like Manifold: Time and its sequel Manifold: Space. Not perfect books, but they scratch the same itches. (One recommendation though: skip the last one, Manifold: Origin. They're each pretty self-contained so you're not missing much.)
u/MagicWeasel [+1] Cheela Astronaut (2 months later)
Glad you enjoyed it!
Which two sequels? Friendship is Optimal is an entire universe of its own with dozens and dozens of fics of various quality, mostly written by different authors. Caelem Est Conterrens is one such story set in the original FiO universe!
I think I read just about everything FiO I could get my hooves on already, but if there's anything you recommend that I haven't read I'd be very keen to read them!
u/AgentME [+1] (2 months later)
Oh, this was a reply to your older post about The Three-Body Problem! I still plan on reading more sequels to FiO, so thanks too for that recommendation.
u/MagicWeasel [+1] Cheela Astronaut (2 months later)
Thats' what I get for not clicking "show parent"!
I still haven't read the sequels though I got them for my husband for his birthday this year (I am sneaky AF because I knew it would mean I would get to read them). I've been meaning to though!
u/Noumero [+8] Self-Appointed Court Statistician (14 hours later)
Title: Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco
Ebook cost: $9.43 USD
Word count: 215k
Genre: Mystery
Synopsis: A group of vanity publishers, increasingly exasperated by absurd conspiracy theories they're presented with on a daily basis, decide to entertain themselves by inventing a conspiracy theory to end all conspiracy theories. Events go downhill from here.
Why /r/rational would like it: This book could be considered a self-aware commentary on conspiracy theories, and deconstruction of conspiracy fiction. By its very nature, it shows a pretty rational approach to its themes.
One may also find it reminiscent of Unsong (or vice versa): it's full of clever wordplay and references to obscure occult topics, combining that with several surprisingly modern ideas.
No content warnings apply.
u/None [+6] (4 hours later)
Title: The Martian by Andy Weir
Ebook cost: $9.99 USD
Word count: 120k
Genre: Sci-fi
Synopsis: Astronaut Mark Watney gets left behind on Mars because of a freak dust storm, and must use nothing but his wits, knowledge of botany and engineering, and the limited resources he has available to him in order to survive long enough to return home. Features a movie adaptation directed by Ridley Scott and starring Matt Damon.
Why /r/rational would like it: It was originally written as a web serial, and is one of the most grounded and realistic mainstream science-fiction books ever written. My only worry in recommending it here is that most people on this sub will have already read it---it's a perfect fit otherwise. Also, I think following it up with a discussion of the movie would be interesting, as it's one of the few pieces of real rational fiction that has a movie adaptation (only other one I can name now is Arrival).
No content warnings.
u/MagicWeasel [+4] Cheela Astronaut (4 hours later)
Thanks for making a suggestion! It's such a great book! I think I've read it about 3 times. Is number 4 on the horizon? We'll see!
Comparing it with the other suggestion I made (The Three Body Problem) The Martian was a very, very easy read: you can just devour it in a few hours and you wouldn't want to put it down, whereas The Three Body Problem required a lot more attention/careful reading and you were sometimes happy to take a break.
u/None [+2] (4 hours later)
That's a good point; if we're doing just one book per month, it would be better to do something a bit meatier than The Martian. At some point we could do a month where instead of reading one book, we read four---one per week. Or one every two weeks, if not everyone has the time available to read like that.
u/MagicWeasel [+2] Cheela Astronaut (4 hours later)
I think having a variety of "meatiness" from month to month is great, or perhaps putting something like The Martian during December when people are busier (or would it be better to put something meatier during December when people have more free time?).
In any event we'll see how much of a hit these threads are. Ultimately six months from now I'd love to be discovering new novels that I wouldn't have thought to read or have been meaning to read but didn't (e.g. I've been meaning to read A Mote in God's Eye forever), but if people only end up discussing books they'd already read - so months with Ender's Game and The Martian get good play, and The Three Body Problem gets crickets - then that might say we'd be better off doing a weekly "discussion series" where each week we select a new book that is considered "required rationalist reading" that most people "should" already have read. We'd publish the list a month out so people can "catch up" and read what they haven't already read in time for the discussion. So that could work, as an alternative?
u/None [+3] (5 hours later)
Sounds like a great idea to me. I know that I've pretty much run out of things to read, so I'm hoping to use this to get new stuff as well. Although, unlike most people here (I assume), I pretty much don't keep up with anything from this sub but Mother of Learning anymore.
u/None [+7] (6 hours later)
I've pretty much run out of things to read
There should be a bot that responds to that phrase with book recommendations, but there isn't, so let me take its role.
Based on you recommending The Martian, you seem to like hard sci-fi with an emphasis on clearly illustrated thought processes. Off the top of my head, you might like:
Peter Watts - Blindsight. Featuring both some extremely alien aliens and a species of Vampires who are human-like, yet mentally quite different, this book excels as hard, yet colourful sci-fi. In the afterword, the author cites over a hundred papers to substantiate the technologies and alien biologies he speculates about.
Greg Egan - Reasons to be Cheerful. A meditation on what it means to be happy, enabled by some interesting innovations in medical technology.
Vernor Vinge - A Fire Upon the Deep. Less hard scifi, but with some very interesting thought processes, as a race of aliens is introduced whose minds are conglomerates formed by a group of individual bodies. The exact combination of those bodies changes how the individual mind works, which has some interesting effects on individuals.
EDIT: How could I forget Crystal Society? It features an artificial intelligence whose mind is occupied by several different personality threads. They use a betting market to figure out what the body should do.
u/MagicWeasel [+2] Cheela Astronaut (8 hours later)
Those all sound great, particularly Blindsight! Would you be willing to post one of those as a suggestion for October? It looks like Blindsight is available for free on goodreads and a site called "manybooks" which has free ebooks, so it could be a great option.
(then again given this whole book club thing is my supreme domain, I can just say we're watching Blindsight and to hell with anyone else.)
u/None [+3] (9 hours later)
Well, the books are rather good, but I think I should post only one suggestion myself, and I'm still deliberating whether I find something more obscure. Blindsight, Crystal Society and Greg Egan in general were recommended to me by u/Noumero, which is why I thought they were already pretty well-known around here.
I'll think about it for a day or so. If I don't have any great ideas, Blindsight would probably be my recommendation.
EDIT: Also, you said you want to avoid Sci-Fi, AI and Transhumanism, so all of my suggestions here are a no-go. Currently thinking about nominating Cordyceps, despite r/rational being familiar with it.
u/MagicWeasel [+2] Cheela Astronaut (11 hours later)
I've never heard of Cordyceps, for what it's worth!
I'm glad you are planning on suggesting something! I'm a little worried whether I'm going to get many suggestions at all - maybe I made the example form too onerous or something? - but I'm glad you're just thinking about it. Also, I think my time zone is opposite to the English-speaking internet's most populated time zone (despite being the world's most populated time zone), so that no doubt accounts for some.
u/Noumero [+2] Self-Appointed Court Statistician (12 hours later)
Blindsight, Crystal Society and Greg Egan are indeed popular, but I'm not sure that Reasons to be Cheerful in particular is.
Regarding submissions: Foucault's Pendulum? It's not sci-fi, AI, or transhumanism; it's quite self-aware, and has some ideas that might interest this subreddit (Abulafia). It's also pretty Unsong (or vice versa, as it happens).
u/None [+2] (12 hours later)
Let's make a deal: you submit Foucault's Pendulum, while I submit Cordyceps.
u/Noumero [+2] Self-Appointed Court Statistician (13 hours later)
Can I submit multiple entries? I want to submit multiple entries. u/MagicWeasel, can I? They're both neither sci-fi nor fanfiction.
Oh, and u/vi_fi, Foucault's Pendulum is probably fresher in your mind than in mine. Was there anything in this book that would warrant a content warning?
u/None [+3] (14 hours later)
No, I don't think there was anything that would warrant a content warning.
u/Noumero [+2] Self-Appointed Court Statistician (14 hours later)
Posted Foucault's Pendulum.
u/MagicWeasel [+2] Cheela Astronaut (20 hours later)
You can submit as many times as you want. I may be the czar of this thread until such time as someone else wrestles it from my evil grasp, but I'm not THAT sort of czar.
u/callmesalticidae [+3] writes worldbuilding books (a day later)
I was planning on recommending Blindsight the next time I had a keyboard in front of me, so I am 100% in favor of you dictatorially selecting it for a future read.
Let the reign of terror begin!
u/MagicWeasel [+5] Cheela Astronaut (a day later)
Unfortunately since that post, a bunch of people have posted some really good options, so I'm now probably going to choose one of the non-scifi things that are on there.
At the rate I'm going with this, pretty soon my tale will be told in one of those "what is the smallest amount of power you have seen go to someone's head?" AskReddit threads.
u/callmesalticidae [+4] writes worldbuilding books (a day later)
Isn't that the purpose of life, to be the subject of an AskReddit story? >:P
u/ArgentStonecutter [+2] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (9 hours later)
Karl Schroeder: Ventus, Lady of Mazes, Permanence, Lockstep, and the Virga series.
u/None [+2] (12 hours later)
I've actually been putting off the Martian for later, so I will gladly read it!
u/thrawnca [+3] Carbon-based biped (18 hours later)
Are we discussing CeC here, or just making suggestions for next time?
I've read FiO before, and it was nice to follow an immigration journey in more depth. Especially with someone who's really thinking through the process.
The minor rant against God allowing suffering annoyed me, though. Siofra is contemplating whether to die and be reborn in a better world, but apparently forgot or ignored that Christianity promises a very similar idea, albeit with less ponies.
u/MagicWeasel [+4] Cheela Astronaut (20 hours later)
This is an "announcement" thread so people know which book to read now, and a suggestion thread for next time.
I'll put the discussion thread for CeC up around the 14th/15th of the month depending on a complicated venn diagram of my own personal schedule and not stepping on e.g. the worldbuilding wednesday thread.
u/AlcherBlack [+2] (6 days later)
Not sure if it makes sense for it to go into the announcement or the discussion, but just in case: 3 years ago my friend made a short teaser trailer for the fanfic. We both read it at that time and were pretty impressed. I think this may have actually been my entry point to A LOT of rationalist fiction.
u/MagicWeasel [+1] Cheela Astronaut (6 days later)
That's awesome! I will include it in the discussion thread :)
u/youtubot [+1] (6 days later)
Video linked by /u/AlcherBlack:
Title Channel Published Duration Likes Total Views Friendship is Optimal: Caelum Est Conterrens, A Teaser [MLP FIM Fanfic Animation] Hunternif Art 2014-04-22 0:00:52 147+ (94%) 9,785 A tribute/teaser to a thought-provoking sci-fi fanfic...
^Info ^| ^/u/AlcherBlack ^can ^delete ^| ^v2.0.0
u/ElizabethRobinThales [+4] Practically Perfect in Every Way (2 days later)
u/MagicWeasel Next time, the suggestions should have their own thread that's in Contest Mode so everybody sees all the suggestions shuffled randomly, to avoid influencing the vote.
u/MagicWeasel [+1] Cheela Astronaut (2 days later)
That's a great suggestion!
That said, this won't run on upvotes, since I think those would bias in favour of people voting books they've already read. It's purely on my own personal criterea - and I will try not to let upvotes influence the selection (though in practise it isn't possible to remove their influence on my subconscious since I'm sadly not a robot or anything).
So I'm not sure if it's as important?
Also given the volume of suggestions, I think it might be best to only take them every three months or so? (Or just leave the thread open for the six months you can still comment to it, and provide a link in each month's bookclub thread - that's probably the best way)
u/ElizabethRobinThales [+2] Practically Perfect in Every Way (3 days later)
Ah, gotcha. I must've skimmed over the "complicated subjective process" paragraph, but to be fair, I haven't had the ability to access the internet at home for a few weeks (or maybe only like a week, but it feels like a really long time) and I've got other stuff to do while I've got it.
But yeah, Contest Mode is mostly just a deterrent for making sure people who casually look at the first 3 or 5 out of 50 entries don't bias the vote in favor of either newest posts or posts that are already getting upvoted, probably not as important if it's your own personal thing where you're planning on looking at every suggestion.
Also, excellent choice of book for the month. I'm one of the (apparently) minority who kinda prefers the first one, but still a pretty awesome story.
u/MagicWeasel [+1] Cheela Astronaut (3 days later)
Thanks!
I'm not sure if the complicated subjective process will ultimately become a good thing (allows me complete control to ensure we get a variety of genres rather than whatever is popular in general) or a bad thing (my tyranny knows no bounds?). But I figure I'll be sick of curating in six months and someone else can have a go so it'll all shake out in the wash.
u/ThisCatMightCheerYou [+0] (2 days later)
I'm sad
Here's a picture/gif of a cat, hopefully it'll cheer you up :).
I am a bot. use !unsubscribetosadcat for me to ignore you.
u/hankyusa [+3] Sunshine Regiment (6 days later)
I don't think book clubs should cycle through books on a strictly monthly basis. Not all works are the same length. We should agree on a word count per week rate and use that to calculate how many weeks to give to the selected work.
u/MagicWeasel [+3] Cheela Astronaut (6 days later)
That's a good idea, but not all words are created equal. Using two examples that were suggested in this thread, The Martian and Three Body Problem are about equal in word count, but the first time I read The Martian it took me about three days. Three Body Problem took about two or three weeks.
u/hankyusa [+2] Sunshine Regiment (6 days later)
Good point. We can make adjustments for that on a work by work basis.
u/haikubot-1911 [+1] (6 days later)
This point. We can make
Adjustments for that on a
Work by work basis.
^- ^hankyusa
^^I'm ^^a ^^bot ^^made ^^by ^^/u/Eight1911. ^^I ^^detect ^^haiku.
u/MagicWeasel [+1] Cheela Astronaut (6 days later)
I think for now, I'll probably do a 3 or 4 month "pilot" with a new book each month, and then have a meta thread for people to give feedback to work out how to go forward.
I'd like the threads to be well-organised, you know? I've prepared some, for wont of a better word, "discussion points" to put in the FiO:CeC discussion thread that I'll be posting in the next few days, and I am not sure I'd (personally) be willing to do that more often than once a month. (This would be moot if I wasn't the sole czar though.)
u/ColeslawHappiness [+3] (7 days later)
Title: Book of Matthew, King James Version Ebook cost: free Genre: Religious, Fantasy, Historical Second most popular book of the bible, I would like the rational community to begin to look at religious books and their history, monthly, perhaps as an extra side project? There is culture value, and empathy value, and if allows us to discuss in a safe space without too many objections. What I would like is to get peoples opinion of the book without having the book interpreted to them. Maybe a bad idea. I would also be interested in doing this with other religions more notable scriptures.
u/Noumero [+3] Self-Appointed Court Statistician (23 hours later)
Title: The Nightmare People by Lawrence Watt-Evans
Ebook cost: $8.25 USD
Word count: 80k
Genre: Horror
Synopsis: Ed Smith couldn't sleep normally one night, and during what he considered a nightmare saw a monster behind his window. Next morning, he discovered that every single inhabitant of his apartment complex is missing.
Why /r/rational would like it: This book takes Level One Intelligent Genre-Savvy characters, and puts them into a typical horror movie situation. They respond by employing rational thinking and creative problem-solving.
Fair warning, it's far from perfect: slight spoiler
Content warnings: some violence and gore.
u/ColeslawHappiness [+2] (7 days later)
Title: The 48 Laws of Power, audio and print, and ebook Word count: 140k Genre: self-Help, historical, rational guide to irrational scenarios. Synopsis: The 48 Laws of Power Summary. In direct contrast to the compassion-oriented management books that dominate today's business bestseller lists is The 48 Laws of Power, a Machiavellian treatise for the modern age. Cost: 15.00-22.00, also available in audiobook, free on audible trial. This should be a required, listed work of r/rational. I do have one paperback copy to loan by mail, if chosen.