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Accelerando by Charles Stross, The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson, Diaspora by Greg Egan, Distraction by Bruce Sterling
by fouc 5y ago
Accelerando by Charles Stross, The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson, Diaspora by Greg Egan, Distraction by Bruce Sterling
- elygre 5y agoI just read Diaspora, and find it far from hard sci-fi. The Wikipedia page says “Egan invents several new theories of physics”, and that to me is not hard sci-fi.
- fouc 5y agoI think the best hard sci-fi can include cutting edge theories or even ideas that the author themselves are proposing, based on a reasonable understanding of the existing science. At the time many of Greg Egan's early books from the 90s/00s were written, there were a lot more competing ideas or theories in quantum mechanics compared to now. In his books he basically explores some of those ideas, and pushes the boundaries. The best sci-fi to me inspire future scientists or engineers to explore novel approaches.
- PicassoCTs 5y agoSorry, but Accelerando is horrible. I recommend Singularity Sky, the weird one, not watered down for the mainstream. The characters are flat, but the weirdness on route, is captured much better.
- fouc 5y agoI have a soft spot for Accelerando because it was my first encounter with the exo-cortex (or perhaps more accurately called cybernetics) concept, aka computers as an external brain. Also it was my first encounter with the concept of smart contracts, laws & corporations run purely as code.