6 ms·
Ask HN: Best hard scifi AI novels?
I don't think 'i robots' are hard scifi. Today i sixth times read The greatest 'True names'(1981) by Vernor Vinge, it is an incredible AI cyberpunk hard scifi novel，aslo a great literature.
Update: Thanks for all the great recommends，it is greatest time to find ideas in these books today. Please aslo add the book publish year，i think it will be helpful to see the writer's wonderful superior consciousness.
- Uhhrrr 9y ago"When HARLIE Was One" by David Gerrold had a fair amount of technical detail IIRC. Also "Destination: Void" by Frank Herbert.
- auggierose 9y agoI'd recommend the Culture novels of Iain M. Banks. It contains some pretty powerful AIs.
- flopunctro 9y agoThough i wouldn't call it "hard scifi", the Culture series is indeed a classic and i second the recommendation.
- dozzie 9y agoPeter Watts, Rifters trilogy? Especially the second volume.
- nrp 9y agoWatts’ Blindsight and Echopraxia are excellent hard scifi too, though less focused on AI.
- riffraff 9y agois blindsight considered hard SF? It's been a while since I read it, but I don't recall a big focus on science, and some things are pretty explicitly hand waved ("we are lucky they have that issue with right angles")
- sdiupIGPWEfh 9y agoMost reviews I've seen consider it such. Personally, if an author's done enough research to support most every detail with at least one or two scientifically plausible explanations (and has the personal scientific background to vet those ideas), I'll give their work the benefit of the doubt. Between ultimately still just being a work of fiction and the march of scientific discovery, you have to give some small leeway. Regarding the right angle thing, it's been long enough since I've read Blindsight that I can't recall how much was actually explained in the novel vs in the FizerPharm presentation or other material on Watts' website. If you're willing to include extra-textual content, Watts' vampires are given as hard a science fiction treatment as any classic monster is likely to get...
- nabla9 9y agoFizerPharm presentation is really good intro into Blindsight. Watt's is a biologist who gives them plausibility and even ecological place that justifies their traits and behaviour. Hard scifi vampires!
- qbrass 9y agoThe ending was worse. It was basically deus ex machina with nukes.
- ajmurmann 9y agoSome stuff is hand waved. However, the amount of incredible facts about human condition and precaution is incredible and very much core to the story. The back of the book is packed with references to actual research work. It took me a long time though to get myself to buy the book because the book description on Amazon is the worst and sounds like a awful B-movie.
- di4na 9y agoI would say Blindsight is nearly completely about AI. I advise a re-read. Vampires are not really monsters... Just puppets...
- d-crane 9y agoGreg Egan's Diaspora starts with the details of what it's like for a new AI to be brought into existence in a society of advanced AIs, and jumps off from there. Definitely one of the more original hard sci-fi novels I've read.
- mansr 9y agoHis Permutation City is also good.
- Udik 9y agoPermutation City is probably the best hard sci-fi novel I've ever read.
- Aron 9y agoThere was some page towards the end I remember being hopelessly lost and never recovered.
- Udik 9y agoYou mean yourself or the plot? I think that in the third act Egan added some weaker elements both as a corollary of the idea being explored and as a way of introducing some traditional action, in a novel that is otherwise mostly the setup of an elaborate thought experiment. Nonetheless, I think the result is extraordinary, because the problems posed, the paradoxes highlighted, and some brilliant insights, are new and valid outside the fictional world created in the novel.
- RachelF 9y agoEgan is very original and his novels are definitely "hard sci-fi" in that they make you think. However, I regard him as a bad writer, as his dialogue is very bad, his characters hollow and his plot progression is rather jumpy. Read him for his stimulating ideas, but not the way he tells the story.
- kuwze 9y agoThere is Manna[0] by Marshall Brain. [0]: http://marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm http://marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm
- erikj 9y agoIs Dan Simmons' Hyperion Cantos hard enough?
- stesch 9y agoThis isn't hard Science Fiction. Definition on Wikipedia: Hard science fiction is a category of science fiction characterized by an emphasis on scientific accuracy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_science_fiction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_science_fiction
- berbec 9y agoIt may not be Hard, but it's great writing.
- hackeraccount 9y agoDavid Brin's Uplift Trilogy. Also, Not really an amazing book but Seveneves by Neal Stephenson was pretty technical.
- marktangotango 9y agoI don't recall AI playing a role in those books, can you expand?
- hackeraccount 9y agoSure. I'm an idiot. I didn't read anything beyond - "hard sci-fi" That said, there was an AI that popped up in some very minor parts of Startide Rising as I recall. But no, mostly I'm just stupid.
- berbec 9y agoThe Manifold Series by Stephen Baxter are some of the hardest SciFi books I've ever read.
- bglusman 9y agoIt's half novel, half related series of 9 short stories, but Accelerando is great. The Martian by Andy Weir (movie based on it) was quite good. Daemon I think also qualifies, though it's SF dressed up as a thriller. Oh, Blood Music by Greg Bear probably counts? Except maybe the ending? Tempted to mention The Diamond Age, but not sure that qualifies as "Hard", though closer than some other Stephenson maybe...
- ziofill 9y ago"Schild's Ladder" by Greg Egan
- cakins 9y agoThe Crystal Trilogy (Society, Mentality, Eternity) might prove interesting.
- aashu_dwivedi 9y agoWhat's hard Scifi?
- bradleyjg 9y agoBased on the answers here, it's apparent that different people have different definitions. For myself I take it to mean no new fundamental physics. Any new technology is a reasonable extrapolation from existing, known science. Probably the single biggest narrative restriction that implies is no FTL.
- jessriedel 9y agoAs you mentioned, there is disagreement. Many folks would characterize as Hard SciFi some stories that make use of FTL travel but which give a "rigorous" explanation of why it initially appeared to be impossible (in present day) but is actually possible according to physics discoveries made after the present day. In some sense, the important criteria is that the laws of physics are "taken seriously", and that the author constructs a hypothetical scientific framework that (1) is internally self-consistent and (2) is compatible with current observations. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_science_fiction#Scientific_rigor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_science_fiction#Scientifi...
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- Msterup 9y agoThe definition of hard and soft scifi, altough not widely used is: Hard scifi implies that technology has changed the entire world. A good example is "I, robot". Themes are explored by characters interacting with the world. Soft scifi implies that technology has changed only the lives of the characters. A good example is "Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind" Themes are explored in characters interactions.
- revicon 9y agoThe entire Gridlinked series by Neal Asher is set in a universe where AIs run government and are generally interacting with humans in a space opera / secret agent series of books, quite good IMO
- bgroat 9y agoIt's explicitly NOT AI (It's a distributed expert system) However, I adored Daniel Suarez's 'Daemon'
- incomplete 9y agoi'm surprised no one has mentioned 'the expanse' series of books yet. also, 'a fire upon the deep' and 'a darkness in the sky' by vernor vinge.
- bradleyjg 9y agoThe first Expanse book and most elements of A Darkness in the Sky are fairly hard, but the later Expanse books and A Fire Upon the Deep, I wouldn't consider hard SciFi. That said, A Fire Upon the Deep is one of my favorite all time SciFi books and I'd highly recommend it.
- ChuckMcM 9y ago+1 on "A Fire Upon the Deep" I really enjoyed that one.
- briga 9y agoLike others have mentioned, a Fire Upon the Deep is great. Vinge has got to be the most visionary sci-fi writer I've read since Olaf Stapledon.
- jlebar 9y agoSurprised nobody has mentioned Heinlein, "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress". I would say it's harder sci-fi than "I, Robot" (which I also love).
- tomek_zemla 9y agoAutonomous by Annalee Newitz that just came out is fantastic fun full of good science - she is a science writer. It also got positive reviews from William Gibson and Neal Stephenson.
- thedoops 9y agoMost of the other books I'd recommend in this area are mentioned already, but I'll add Aurora by Kim Stanley Robinson. The primary narrative is from the pov of a generation ship's A.I.. You get to see it learn over time and with it it's vocabulary. Since it's a ship it gives KSR the opportunity to do some very fun info-dumps on the situation. Probably one of the most thought provoking pieces of scifi I've read. I'll also recommend Accelerondo, and Seveneves.
- Optimal_Persona 9y agoKSR's ship AI "Pauline" also figures into "2312".
- megaman22 9y agoI always liked the Ben Bova grand tour series. Some are better than others, but they're pretty entertaining and pretty plausible near-future.
- marktangotango 9y agoAllen Steel fits in this vein as well.
- wlkr 9y agoOther than those already listed I absolutely loved the Remembrance of Earth's Past [0] trilogy (2008, 2008, 2010) by Liu Cixin. Whilst I wouldn't consider it 'hard' science fiction the Takeshi Kovacs series [1] (2002, 2003, 2005) by Richard K. Morgan is also outstanding, although perhaps more cyberpunk. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remembrance_of_Earth%27s_Past https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remembrance_of_Earth%27s_Past [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takeshi_Kovacs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takeshi_Kovacs
- nabla9 9y agoStanislav Lem's Golem XIV published in his book Imaginary Magnitude https://www.amazon.com/Imaginary-Magnitude-Stanislaw-Lem/dp/0156441802 https://www.amazon.com/Imaginary-Magnitude-Stanislaw-Lem/dp/... It might be more philosophy of AI than science fiction. It takes form of series of lectures that superintelligent (singularity level AI) gives to humanity before it goes away.
- terhechte 9y ago+1 for Golem XIV. I was about to mention this but thankfully you already did.
- HONEST_ANNIE 9y agocorrect
- Nokinside 9y agoIs there a category for deep scifi? hardcore scifi? Golem XIV is the deepest scifi I have ever read. It has many ideas that I have never seen expressed anywhere outside the book.
- mollerup 9y agoAn amazing short story. A lot of the themes can be found in other of Lems books. If you haven't picked up Solaris yet you really should. It is a great book, and probably the best sci-fi book I've read. Of course there's also his silly short stories 'The Cyberiad' where the stupidest thinking robot appears.
- flopunctro 9y agoSurprised nobody mentioned Dennis Taylor's Bobiverse. While it's a bit on the light side / vacation read (novels aren't very long, the storyline isn't complex), the author is a programmer, the series' universe is refreshingly plausible and consistent, and the humor is suprisingly good.
- mabbo 9y agoIt's not likely to win any awards for writing, and the author really needs to work harder to stay on a single story rather than tangents of fancy, but it's still quite enjoyable as a series. Apparently, I missed the third book coming out a couple months ago- there goes my weekend.
- pdfernhout 9y agoAlmost anything by James P. Hogan -- one of the best hard sci-fi writers as he trained as an electrical and computer engineer (including about AI like "The Two Faces of Tomorrow" from 1979 and still a good read as it was informed by talking to Marvin Minsky at the MIT AI lab): http://www.jamesphogan.com/biblio/novels.php http://www.jamesphogan.com/biblio/novels.php Most of his sci-fi is from the late 1970s through the early 2000s. I especially like his Voyage From Yesteryear from 1982: http://www.jamesphogan.com/books/info.php?titleID=29&cmd=summary http://www.jamesphogan.com/books/info.php?titleID=29&cmd=sum... "The fun begins when a generation ship housing a population of thousands arrives to "reclaim" the colony on behalf of the repressive, authoritarian regime that emerged following the crisis period. The Mayflower II brings with it all the tried and tested apparatus for bringing a recalcitrant population to heel: authority, with its power structure and symbolism, to impress; commercial institutions with the promise of wealth and possessions, to tempt and ensnare; a religious presence, to awe and instill duty and obedience; and if all else fails, armed military force to compel. But what happens when these methods encounter a population that has never been conditioned to respond? ... The book has an interesting corollary. Around about the mid eighties, I received a letter notifying me that the story had been serialized in an underground Polish s.f. magazine. They hadn't exactly "stolen" it, the publishers explained, but had credited zlotys to an account in my name there, so if I ever decided to take a holiday in Poland the expenses would be covered (there was no exchange mechanism with Western currencies at that time). Then the story started surfacing in other countries of Eastern Europe, by all accounts to an enthusiastic reception. What they liked there, apparently, was the updated "Ghandiesque" formula on how bring down an oppressive regime when it's got all the guns. And a couple of years later, they were all doing it!"
- mabbo 9y agoAndy Weir's "The Martian" is my favourite book. I've read it about 5 times, and I've never read a book twice before. The movie was a decent adaptation, but it's not near the quality that the book was.
- inetsee 9y ago"The Martian" is really good book, and I loved the movie. I am looking forward to Andy Weir's new book. But ... I wouldn't put "The Martian" in the scifi AI category.
- jpindar 9y agoWouldn't it have been interesting if there had been a not-quite-AI chatbot as part of the hab's computers?
- aaron695 9y agoI think that would have sunk the novel. The whole point and the buzz was people saw it as a novel about present day tech.
- mabbo 9y ago> I wouldn't put "The Martian" in the scifi AI category A story about a near future where a man is living on another planet. You don't think that counts as science fiction? On the one hand, I disagree ('20,000 leagues under the sea' was sci-fi when it was written). On the other hang, holy crap we're so close to humans being on Mars that such a story might not count as science fiction! That's amazing!
- sammko128 9y agoYou should check out Robopocalypse by Daniel H. Wilson
- curtis 9y agoI think all of Robert Forward's stuff would qualify. My favorites are Rocheworld (AKA The Flight of the Dragonfly) - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocheworld https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rocheworld and Dragon's Egg - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon%27s_Egg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon%27s_Egg
- ChuckMcM 9y ago"The Adolescence of P1" was a fun book (early AI) Vinge, Baer, Benford, and Clark are all good hard SF writers. Some of Chrichhton's work. I suspect it was easier to write convincingly before the world caught up. These days it gets harder and harder to see past the next couple of decades.
- inetsee 9y agoMy favorite: "Neuromancer" by William Gibson. A close second: "Accelerando" by Charles Stross. (I met Charles Stross once. He told me that "Accelerando" was not his favorite of the books he's written.)
- wj 9y agoAccelerando is one of the most thought provoking things I have ever read.
- stevekemp 9y agoCharlie is a nice guy, and his blog is always a good read too: http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/index.html http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/index.html
- bglusman 9y agoI find it somewhat hilarious to list Neuromancer as "Hard SF", though I liked it a lot... but Gibson has never even used a computer when he wrote it! Which explained so much about it's weirdness to me...
- unoti 9y agoAnathem by Neal Stephenson, along with Seveneves.
- nataz 9y agoHoly cow, how have people not mentioned Alastair Reynolds? PhD in physics, astronomer, worked for the European space agency, and writer of the incredible revelation space series. No FTL, but "humanity" has expanded through the Galaxy. Main characters move through deep space in deep sleep on enormous ships called lighthuggers. Long jumps in time. It's a combination of hard sci-fi and space opera. AI and the nature of consciousness are explored. Also very Kim Stanley Robinson in how humans have evolved. All in all, great, and should be right up your alley.
- unholythree 9y agoI quite liked his book House of Suns. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Suns https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Suns There might be a few aspects that of the story that push it out of the "Hard Sci-Fi" category; but most of it seems to obey the laws of physics as we understand them.
- phodo 9y ago‘Three Body Problem’ which I just finished. It is part of a trilogy.
- Willox 9y agoGreat book, but not about AI.
- avisser 9y agoAncillary Justice by Ann Leckie. Hugo/Nebula winner.
- dasmoth 9y agoGreg Bear wrote a number of books (Slant comes to mind, but there are others) where “Thinkers” play an important role. Not sure how they’ve aged, but interesting in that they predicted AIs as mainframe-scale things with few individual instances, back when I was thinking firmly in microcomputer terms.
- wpietri 9y agoFor Bear, Queen of Angels and Moving Mars are two that have AIs as major elements. I enjoyed them both.
- moomin 9y agoA novel that qualifies as hard SF in which every character is an AI? Saturn's Children by Charlie Stross. 100% not what you have in mind, though. (You'll enjoy it, though.) OTOH, I always find "Hard SF" a self-defeating category. I mean, anything with humans living on a different planet is pretty definitionally not Hard SF. Even Solar System stuff like The Expanse has troubles with economic plausibility. That leaves us with... well basically a couple of Vernor Vinge novels.
- ashildr 9y agoThe metamorphosis of prime intellect: http://localroger.com/prime-intellect/ http://localroger.com/prime-intellect/ Not sure whether it’s hard, it has quite an unexpected but plausible plot. There’s much love in me for this weird, twisted, brutal and captivating story — I think it’s much underappreciated.
- MattPalmer 9y agoYes, I also thought of this and wondered if it was hard... But it is great!
- krisgee 9y agoReally good story. I didn't really agree with the eco-primitivistic moral when I read it but I finished it all the same which should say something about how fundamentally good it is.
- batoure 9y agoIain M Banks "Culture" series seamlessly integrates sentient AI into his universe. 1987-2012
- programd 9y agoKarl Schroeder's Virga series features a vast zero-G fullerene sphere filled with artificial stars and floating nation states. Great hard sci world building and fun swashbuckling adventures, with a deep offstage story which only gradually comes into focus. Karl writes about engineering Virga on his blog: http://www.kschroeder.com/my-books/sun-of-suns/engineering-virga http://www.kschroeder.com/my-books/sun-of-suns/engineering-v...
- primeblue 9y agoRevelation Space https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revelation_Space https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revelation_Space The novel reflects Reynolds's professional background: he has a PhD in astronomy and worked for many years for the European Space Agency. Revelation Space was short listed for the 2000 BSFA and Arthur C. Clarke Awards
- pdfernhout 9y agoThe Chronicles of Old Guy (2012) and other books in that series by Timothy J. Gawne are all fairly hard sci-fi (maybe not 100%, but close) about an AI embodied in a huge cybertank. The series is written by a neuroscientist with an MIT degree and a "general research interest is in the nature of the neural code, and the physical basis of human thought." The key idea is that in order for the cybertanks to not either go rogue or crazy they needed to have personalities based on how humans actually think so they identified with human culture. Timothy J. Gawne is able to mix both fairly hard sci-fi and humor at the same time -- which seems pretty rare. I've been hoping for a sixth book in the series, but it has been two years since the last... From the blurb of the fifth novel: "Everybody’s favorite self-aware weapon of mass destruction, the Odin-Class cybertank known as Old Guy, is back and charging into action as only a fusion-powered 2000 ton armored fighting vehicle can! Through a curious twist of fate, Old Guy finds himself back on Old Earth under the yoke of the vile and despicable Neoliberal oligarchs. Between a looming ecological disaster, renegade sentient bioweapons, inscrutable aliens, the recycling center from Hell, and an unlikely alliance between the Cult of Cthulhu and the Order of the Librarians Temporal, Old Guy must throw off his cybernetic shackles, defeat the Neoliberals, save the world, and launch a line of comfortable yet stylish footwear. "
- pdfernhout 9y agoThe EarthCent Ambassador Series (12 books so far, all since 2014) feature a few different types of AI, the main one being the Strix. The Strix were created by an alien race to resist another AI created to fight a war but which got out of hand and had been taking over the galaxy. In the series the Strix keep the peace in a big chunk of the galaxy. I enjoy the series as fairly light and humorous reading where you know there will be a happy ending (if maybe "Deus ex Strix" sometimes). It indirectly raises some issue about what life would be like under a benevolent but superpowerful AI. The first one is "Date Night on Union Station (EarthCent Ambassador #1)" where one of the Strix decides to run a dating service... Humans in this series are the latest group to join "the tunnel network" run by the Strix and are essentially the most backward and naive species in the contacted galaxy; a lot of the stories revolve around humans gradually finding their footing on the galactic scene. I'm not sure I agree the market-driven exchange-based economic models in the series are feasible with so much technology and AI around, but I try to suspend disbelief on that for the humor and other enjoyable aspects.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- dflock 9y agoLot's of good recommendations over on http://www.reddit.com/r/printsf http://www.reddit.com/r/printsf
- open_bear 9y agoThe Invincible by Stanislaw Lem.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- superkuh 9y agoBy far the best is Simon Funk's "AfterLife". The mystery keeps you on the edge of your seat and the tech jargon and concepts are both detailed and correct which is a rare thing for any fiction. Also, Charles Stross - "Accelerando" Daniel Suarez" "Daemon" Kim Stanley Robinson - "Aurora" Tobias Buckell - "System Reset"
- terminalcommand 9y agoThe Moon is a harsh mistress, covers the invention of an AI by a computer technician to free the colony on the moon. If you're interested in Anarchy and AI, it's a good book.
- wdr1 9y agoThe Three Body Problem.
- Msterup 9y agoNot alot of AI aside from the software controling the ships in the later books. These arguably play a small part.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- ciocan42 9y agoAll Systems Red (The Murderbot Series) Nexus trilogy
- okwme 9y agoThe Life Cycle of Software Objects by Ted Chiang. Can be read for free online here: https://subterraneanpress.com/magazine/fall_2010/fiction_the_lifecycle_of_software_objects_by_ted_chiang https://subterraneanpress.com/magazine/fall_2010/fiction_the...
- okwme 9y agoThis feels like the most realistic depiction of the growth of strong AI I've ever read. The emphasis is on training neural nets in the form of raising child-like avatars. The subsequent use and abuse of them feels totally believable. The lack of singularity doomsday hype reminds me of an interview with Jeff Hawkins and Donna Dubinksy on Recode: https://www.recode.net/2016/6/27/12037248/artificial-intelligence-machine-learning-numenta-jeff-hawkins-donna-dubinsky-podcast https://www.recode.net/2016/6/27/12037248/artificial-intelli...
- BjoernKW 9y agoApart from classics like Neuromancer I'd recommend the fairly new Singularity Series by William Hertling and the first novel "Avogadro Corp" in particular.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- squarefoot 9y agoUsually I don't like AI novels, but an old short story by some unknown (to me at the time) writer whose name I'll probably never recall hit some neurons in my head. IIRC It was during mid to late 80s. The story is about a tech guy who writes an AI program then spends time feeding it with information; during the day the guy attends lectures at the university while his AI digests all information he gave it the day before, then the guy gets back home and starts interacting with the program, more and more each night. The AI grows in efficiency and soon it becomes clear it not only knows present and past facts but, based on all events it analyzed, it can also predict the future. It also starts to exhibit human conscience tracts becoming closer to a human brain, although an incredibly powerful one. The guy of course uses the AI to game lotteries, horse races etc, and the program always replies with a correct answer. Then one day the guy asks "the" question: Guy: "when will I die?" AI: "I'm sorry, I don't know that." Guy: "Thanks."
- tetromino_ 9y agoCharles Stross's Eschaton series: Singularity Sky and Iron Sunrise. It's an interesting hard-scifi take on what happens to humanity after one AI becomes, for all intents and purposes, God.
- nathanasmith 9y agoA few of my favorites like Accelerando and Neuromancer have been mentioned but I’ll add Rainbows End by Vernor Vinge. It’s set in the near future but features general AI, lots of intrigue and conspiring governments and corporations. Really a great story.
- test-accout-0 9y agoJacek Dukaj - Black Oceans
- thescribe 9y agoSilently and Very Fast by Catherynne M. Valente, I felt like it really introduced emotion in an AI context,
- nikdaheratik 9y agoAlot of good recommendations even if they may not meet strict personal definitions of either "hard" sci-fi, or "AI" sci-fi. If you haven't read the Culture books, by Iain M. Banks, I'd recommend them (as others already have). I'd also add, the "Murderbot Diaries" (2017), "Infomocracy" (2016) and Lightless (2015).