16 ms·

There Is No Antimemetics Division (2018)

• swayvil 2y ago
  This is trippy and disturbing. Which is exactly what I look for in my scifi.
  • sdwr 2y ago
    If you liked that, you'd really like the book fragnemt, by a guy who writes disturbing sci-fi snippets on twitter https://www.amazon.com/Fragnemt-ctrlcreep/dp/1795354437 https://www.amazon.com/Fragnemt-ctrlcreep/dp/1795354437
    • deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
  • sumtechguy 2y ago
    The entirety of SCP is basically that. A huge time sink of several thousand weird tiny stories wrapped in a strangely compelling procedural bureaucratic language.
  • hughesjj 2y ago
    You should check out the rest of qntms work, its pretty legit imo. I got into fine structure back in college and ended up binging all their content, no regrets https://qntm.org/fiction https://qntm.org/fiction
• BiteCode_dev 2y ago
  A very underrated piece. Take the best of SCP lore, keep you guessing, make you root for the most deeply lost cause that can possibly be and still see hope because the characters and settings are awesome. However, what do I know? This is my first day on HN.
  • Cthulhu_ 2y ago
    What's a HN?
    • streamfan 2y ago
      Hacker News
    • YeGoblynQueenne 2y ago
      It's what people say while sitting on the toilet. Like "GNH", "MHN" and "RHN".
  • the_af 2y ago
    Hell of a first day! You seem on edge.
    • BiteCode_dev 2y ago
      Are you this web site director?
• karaterobot 2y ago
  Usually if I recommend a book, it's a guarantee nobody will be interested in checking it out. No so with this one. Just by mentioning the premise, I know at least four people who straight up bought it on Amazon immediately. I guess that's what you get with a high concept. Or, maybe there's something more sinister going on. Maybe the book is spreading itself virally.
  • killerstorm 2y ago
    Can you give an example of books you recommend?
  • sph 2y ago
    I read it years ago, forgot all about it (heh), and I just got a new Kindle in the mail. Good timing to reread it again and support the author.
• throw310822 2y ago
  The first chapter is especially fun: https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/we-need-to-talk-about-fifty-five https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/we-need-to-talk-about-fifty-fiv... > An antimeme is an idea with self-censoring properties; an idea which, by its intrinsic nature, discourages or prevents people from spreading it. Also, I have to say I love the idea of antimemes. You don't want some ideas to spread? Make it shameful to even admit you have them. It works.
  • ceejayoz 2y ago
    There's a short film of that first scene (and several others in a series) I found delightful. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-IiVeGAydE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-IiVeGAydE
    • XorNot 2y ago
      It's a great hook too because it's an inversion of something which is so common and normal: I forgot to do something.
    • the_af 2y ago
      Thanks for sharing! I really liked this. I appreciate indie shorts/movies that are carried mostly by the acting and judicious use of limited resources.
      • ceejayoz 2y ago
        One of my favorites of this nature: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dxSsZ_Perw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dxSsZ_Perw
        • the_af 2y ago
          Wow! I love this kind of short clips (unsurprisingly, short stories are my favorite kind of literature). Thanks again for sharing.
  • devvvvvvv 2y ago
• timvdalen 2y ago
  Read this a couple years back. I hadn't read any SCP things at that point, but it's a really cool read (and self-contained enough that while I did look up some things on the wiki, I didn't really need to)!
• cwmma 2y ago
  Fine Structure by QNTM is also fantastic FYI https://www.amazon.com/Fine-Structure-Sam-Hughes-ebook/dp/B07DW2PMS6/ https://www.amazon.com/Fine-Structure-Sam-Hughes-ebook/dp/B0...
  • calmbonsai 2y ago
    The whole "practical super-hero" stuff was great as well as the Eka Script concepts.
• csours 2y ago
  When I finished this, I felt like I should have been taking notes as I read it. But then, how could I be sure that the notes were trustworthy?
• galdosdi 2y ago
  This book got me through some tough times. It's one of my favorite pieces of literature. It deserves to be a classic 100 years from now. Part of why it works is by the nature of its subject, the book and its various plot points and devices serve essentially as metaphors for almost anything-- anything related to how humans communicate and remember. It's not just superficially a fun sci-fi romp, it's also a story about the stories we tell ourselves and each other, about how we assign meaning to events, among other things. It reminds me just a very little of Godel Escher Bach, but I like this one better. I am also reminded of Lewis Carroll, and the cryptic quote that "through the looking glass is the best book on mathematics for the layman, since it is the best book on any subject for the layman" It is poetry. It is a Rorschach blot about Rorschach blots. I can't recommend it enough.
  • jeroenvlek 2y ago
    Bought it due to your recommendation. Will start after I finished The Will to Battle by Ada Palmer
    • RangerScience 2y ago
      Is it just me or are these books just astonishingly good? Like… sometimes k come across media at juuust the right time and (emotional) place and they’re amazing but on review merely good. I’m immediately re-reading them and they’re just as good - if not better - the second time. Quickly became my favorite books of all time, which you’ll have to trust me is saying something.
      • dudinax 2y ago
        Which books do you mean?
        • RangerScience 2y ago
          Ada Palmer's Terra Ignota; Will to Battle is book 3 (of four, all released)
      • 2y ago
• rawling 2y ago
  May as well ask here: anyone know what this recent post is about? https://qntm.org/back https://qntm.org/back
  • quuxplusone 2y ago
    Seems like a straightforward rephrasing of the classic tweet: "Kind of a bummer to have been born at the very end of the Fuck Around century just to live the rest of my life in the Find Out century." I don't think it needs to relate to any _specific_ development of the recent past, which I assume is what you're asking.
    • deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    • OgsyedIE 2y ago
      Within the 48 hours before it was posted there were only two world events of note so unless qntm saw some general article about overshoot or global crises within the few days before then it was either a statement about general vibes or in reference to one of the two events with the implication that they were indicative of broader trends. FWIW, the two notable world events were the deployment of French troops to the French Caledonian riots and the first successful Ukrainian attack on a Russian oil export facility. Were either of them indicative of a broader destabilization? Only time will tell.
      • reducesuffering 2y ago
        QNTM is very attune to the dystopian possibilities of future tech, obviously. Rollercoaster is a clear give away they're talking about future acceleration. I'd bet it's an ode to the possible dystopia coming with technological acceleration a la AGI. "someone at the front of the train begins to scream" X-Risk / "doomers"? They're screaming first, but the rest will soon too.
      • ryankrage77 2y ago
        It was tweeted months before it became a post on the site, so I don't think it's referencing anything very recent.
• herculity275 2y ago
  The author has also written a short horror story about simulated intelligence which I highly recommend: https://qntm.org/mmacevedo https://qntm.org/mmacevedo
  • crummy 2y ago
    If you enjoyed this story, I cannot recommend enough the video game SOMA, which explores the concept very effectively from a first person perspective (which makes it all the more impactful).
  • vessenes 2y ago
    Yess, that's a good one. It made me rethink my "sure I'd get scanned" plans, and put me in the "never allow my children to do that" camp. Extremely creepy.
    • LeifCarrotson 2y ago
      I'm sure you realize it is fiction - one possible dystopian future among an infinite ocean of other futures. You can just as easily write a sci-fi where the protagonist upload is the Siri/Alexa/Google equivalent personal assistant to most of humanity: More than just telling the smartphone to set a reminder for a wedding reception, it could literally share in their joy, experiencing the whole event distributed among every device in the audience, or more than just a voice trigger from some astronaut to take a picture, it could gaze in awe at the view, selectively melding back their experiences to the rest of the collective so there's no loss when an instance becomes damaged. The protagonist in such a story could have the richest, most complex life imaginable. It is impactful, for sure, and worthy of consideration, but I don't think you should make decisions based on one scary story.
      • teyrana 2y ago
        Sounds like you should write that story! I'd love to read that :D
      • jerf 2y ago
        It is fiction. But it is also absolutely the case that uploading yourself is flinging yourself irrevocably into a box which you do not and can not control, but other people can. (Or, given the time frame we are talking about, entities in general, about which you may not even want to assume basic humanity.) I used to think that maybe it was something only the rich could do, but then I realized that even the rich, even if they funded the program from sand and coal to the final product, could never even begin to guarantee that the simulator really was what it said on the tin. Indeed, the motivation is all the greater for any number of criminals, intelligence agencies, compromised individuals, and even just several people involved in the process that aren't as pure as the driven snow in the face of the realization that if they just put a little bit of code here and there they'll be able to get the simulated rich guy to sign off on anything they like, to compromise the machine. From inside the box, what incentives are you going to offer the external world to not screw with your simulation state? And the reality is, there's no answer to that, because whatever you say, they can get whatever your offer is by screwing with you anyhow. I'm not sure how to resolve this problem. The incentives are fundamentally in favor of the guy in the box getting screwed with. Your best hope is that you still experience subjective continuity with your past self and that the entity screwing with you at least makes you happy about the new state they've crafted for you, whatever it may be.
• Something1234 2y ago
  I really like his book Ra. It's a great example of secret societies and layers within layers. Although to me it honestly sounds impossible.
  • bazzargh 2y ago
    I really enjoyed it too, though the first half of the book is better than the second. I'd bought it while stuck in an airport trudging through Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy (which I hated), saw a book by qntm in my recommended list and bought it instantly, having read their online stuff. Unlike the KSR, it was great fun and I blazed through it.
    • BLKNSLVR 2y ago
      I've read, and mostly enjoyed the experience, KSRs Mars Trilogy. The all-encompassing scope definitely gets tiring, but I found most of it interesting enough that I'd look forward to the evenings going to bed and reading to find out the next stage of the evolution of the society or terraforming progress or political (in)stability. I'm glad I've read it, but I doubt I'll return to it. I'll definitely be looking for this as a book gift to myself.
    • jacobedawson 2y ago
      The Mars Trilogy is a slog imo because of the way it's written (e.g. insufferable dialogue), whereas the concepts and scope were just enough to keep me going. I felt the same way about his Ministry For The Future - he has great ideas written with pulp fiction skills. I wonder if having books like this rewritten by an llm in a different style could reinvigorate poorly written / high concept stories.
• ZitchDog 2y ago
  I am halfway through this book and wanting to read it slower because it's that good. I think we could make a pretty cool AI powered ARG based on the lore.
• jes5199 2y ago
  this book could have been a short story
  • ceejayoz 2y ago
    That's how it started.
    • k__ 2y ago
      I had the impression, it started as a bunch of loosely connected pages on the SCP wiki.
  • NKosmatos 2y ago
    This book will be a good sci-fi film ;-)
    • TeMPOraL 2y ago
      It was a great movie, though it flew over the heads of most viewers and got ~4/10 on Filmweb. You really don't remember it being in theatres a few years ago?
      • NKosmatos 2y ago
        I should have searched first…my mistake :-( There was a mini series released this year (March 2024): https://www.imdb.com/title/tt32017112/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt32017112/ and also a short film: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt32269914/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt32269914/
        • jerf 2y ago
          On the one hand, the miniseries on YouTube failed the test I tend to apply to these sorts of adaptations, which is, can you understand it without having read the source material? It's hard to pretend I haven't read the original 3 or 4 times, but I don't think the answer is yes here. Maybe after 3 or 4 viewings, but the cold drop into the universe without the ability to do a lot more exposition is pretty rough. On the other hand, I have no idea how a miniseries or even a movie could reasonably adapt this for even a general sci-fi audience. As viscerally stimulating as film can be, there are some high-concept stories that just need text. I will compliment the miniseries for how it selected the subset of stories to adapt. There is a nice natural ending there. A downer, perhaps, but, welcome to the SCP-iverse. "I forgot what universe this was. For a while there, I thought, maybe… this was the universe where we win sometimes." - https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/your-last-first-day https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/your-last-first-day (not used in the miniseries)
• mopierotti 2y ago
  I sent out about 8 copies of this book to friends/relatives for christmas a couple years ago, and it was very well received. It's not without flaws, but it's absolutely packed with novel concepts, relatively short, and provides a unique experience for unsuspecting readers. The physical book cover is quite good looking as well in my opinion. I also loved Ra by the same author, but it felt a little messier plot-wise, so I hesitate to recommend it to an audience who isn't already accustomed to reading "out-there" online/sci-fi/rationalist fiction.
  • KboPAacDA3 2y ago
    The cover reminds me of John Harris's _A Dream of Starlight_. https://www.alisoneldred.com/john-harris/fine-art-prints-1/science-fiction-4/2504-a-dream-of-starlight/ https://www.alisoneldred.com/john-harris/fine-art-prints-1/s...
  • michaelbuckbee 2y ago
    I also came here to try and convince folks to read "Ra" which I thought was fantastic. Though that being said, I feel like we're flipped on which is more "out there" as Ra feels much less slippery of an idea.
    • LoganDark 2y ago
      Fine Structure too!
      • robbiep 2y ago
        Fine structure is great!
  • LoganDark 2y ago
    I love Ra. (also Fine Structure.) I don't think the plot is necessarily that much messier as much as it is more complex. As in, this is super mega nerd shit. Unless you can relate things you're reading to things you've read before, it won't make too much sense to you. But if you're constructing a theory of the book's universe and story as you read, it's downright addictive. I don't know where to find more books like those but I really, really want to.
• volkk 2y ago
  this book messed me up in the midst of reading it (i guess in a good way?). I've never had anything resembling a panic attack and i had to put it down and get up from the cafe that I was in and go for a walk. It really "incepted" me and made me question reality and memories. I eventually came back and finished it, (thought the first half was stronger than the second) and I was fine. I have alzheimers running in my family so I think I was a bit more predisposed to existential fear around memory
  • galdosdi 2y ago
    This is one of the many things I had in mind when I mentioned in another comment that this book is a metaphor for anything and everything. I knew someone who saw it as a metaphor for dealing with their past trauma and their need to "fight a war for survival you cannot be allowed to remember you are fighting" I've thought about it a lot as I've seen mental decline in my family too. The long goodbye. Marion Wheeler's relationship. Beautiful.
    • LoganDark 2y ago
      > "fight a war for survival you cannot be allowed to remember you are fighting" This is such a colossal mood. I have DID and it's incredibly common for me to not remember trauma, but still somehow have to navigate life affected by it. It's really weird how I can know exactly what not to do without even knowing that I'm avoiding something, or what it is I'm avoiding.
• agubelu 2y ago
  The concept of an antimeme has been living rent free in my head (which is quite ironic) ever since I first read this piece back then. Easily my favorite tale from the SCP universe.
  • BiteCode_dev 2y ago
    I know right? Then you start wondering if you, or anybody, have forgotten anything so important that it would shatter your world. And would you ever know? Is there any way to ever know? What if the past changes as much as the future? What if that's the Mandela effect?
    • passion__desire 2y ago
      Have you seen the documentary "7 second memory man" on BBC. It is about an intelligent person who is confined to live with only 7 second memory. He keeps a diary recording his entries. As he reads past entries, he realises the predicament he is in and considers that his case would be interesting to doctors. Then forgets all about that. Rediscovering the whole thing again in the next 7 seconds for himself anew. 44:20 @ https://youtu.be/k_P7Y0-wgos https://youtu.be/k_P7Y0-wgos
      • BiteCode_dev 2y ago
        7 seconds is a nightmare, barely just enough time to suffer in a loop.
    • lazyasciiart 2y ago
      There are people who have discovered that their parents lied about their baby stories and instead they were part of mass kidnappings/government schemes, like Liebensborn and the disappeared children in Argentina and Spain. Or more individual stories, like "My mom is actually my grandma". These days the professional advice is not to keep that secret from your adopted children precisely because the revelation itself can be much more damaging than the knowledge. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_children_of_Francoism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_children_of_Francoism
• debo_ 2y ago
  Somehow, I just managed to learn what SCP [0] is a couple of days ago. I've already started ~~stealing~~ working some of the ideas into a D&D campaign I'm running (on an improv basis.) It's neat to see that SCP also resulted in some... reasonably novel thinking? Thanks for sharing, I'm going to pick this up. [0] https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/ https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/
  • 0x3444ac53 2y ago
    It's crazy how that works right? SCPs are an old internet thing and show up all over the place. Most people pay it no mind, but once you learn about it you realize how crazy wide spread it is.
    • debo_ 2y ago
      Yeah. I found it through playing a game called Anno Mutationem, and all the discussions about it kept referencing this SCP thing. I figured there was no way they were talking about secure copy, but the fact that no one ever stopped to unpack the acronym indicated to me that I'd missed Something Big On The Internet.
    • Ancapistani 2y ago
      I was pleasantly surprised a couple of years ago, when both my daughters were suddenly obsessed with SCPs. They were about 9 and 14 at the time, and I didn’t introduce them to the concept - they discovered it on their own. What followed was a few weeks of me re-reading them, discovering several new offshoots of the SCP genre, and getting to discover those works for the first time with my kids. It was an awesome experience, and something I honestly never expected to come out of a random “old Internet” meme like that. :)
      • gknoy 2y ago
        This is only tangentially related, but have you played the video game "Control"? That and Alan Wake (both from Remedy) seem to relate very well with the SCP genre.
• motohagiography 2y ago
  where is the community of people who read books like this other than HN? I was reading this a few months ago but put it down because the language and characters clunky but I will definitely revisit it after this thread as the ideas are apparently worth it.
  • azemetre 2y ago
    Mostly reddit, twitter, discord, mastodon. There are plenty of bookclubs that read similar books too. Just pick a platform and search.
  • archermarks 2y ago
    reddit's printsf subreddit is the best place to discuss sci fi and fantasy imho. Low spam rate, good, in-depth discussion, and obscure recommendations from people who genuinely love the genre and aren't judgy about it.
  • hughesjj 2y ago
    Qntm themself used to post a bunch on everything2 https://everything2.com/ https://everything2.com/ Also stuff like star destroyer https://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewforum.php?f=54 https://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewforum.php?f=54 Or the sietch https://www.the-sietch.com/index.php?forums/creative-writing.9/ https://www.the-sietch.com/index.php?forums/creative-writing... Or many reddit communities like https://old.reddit.com/r/HFY/ https://old.reddit.com/r/HFY/
  • shnock 2y ago
    r/rational
  • zeekaran 2y ago
    Best I know of is /r/rational which focuses on rationalist writing, like Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, Worm, Ra (also by qntm), and a million other things. As for meatspace, if you have a local LessWrong / rationalist adjacent meetup, those are usually full of people who read stuff like this.
  • Scene_Cast2 2y ago
• 1-more 2y ago
  Qntm is also the author of - Hatetris: Tetris where the computer gives you the worst possible next piece https://qntm.org/files/hatetris/hatetris.html https://qntm.org/files/hatetris/hatetris.html - Absurdle: Wordle where the computer narrows down (as little as possible) to a solution word as you guess https://qntm.org/files/absurdle/absurdle.html https://qntm.org/files/absurdle/absurdle.html - "All I want for Christmas is a negative leap second" https://qntm.org/leap https://qntm.org/leap - "It's probably time to stop recommending Clean Code" https://qntm.org/clean https://qntm.org/clean Interesting cat!
  • moritzwarhier 2y ago
    I want to add the story "Lena", which has been posted here a couple of times as well. It's fantastic. https://qntm.org/mmacevedo https://qntm.org/mmacevedo A later blog post about the story: https://qntm.org/uploading https://qntm.org/uploading
    • fishtoaster 2y ago
      There's also a sequel to Lena, though not for free online. https://twitter.com/qntm/status/1732377446576435337 https://twitter.com/qntm/status/1732377446576435337
      • edanm 2y ago
        Thank you! I had no idea and really love Lena (and much of qntm's other writing).
  • TremendousJudge 2y ago
    > So... imagine that someone enters a kitchen, because they want to show you how to make a cup of coffee. As you watch carefully, they flick a switch on the wall. The switch looks like a light switch, but none of the lights in the kitchen turn on or off. Next, they open a cabinet and take down a mug, set it on the worktop, and then tap it twice with a teaspoon. They wait for thirty seconds, and finally they reach behind the refrigerator, where you can't see, and pull out a different mug, this one full of fresh coffee. > ...What just happened? What was flicking the switch for? Was tapping the empty mug part of the procedure? Where did the coffee come from? > That's what this code is like. I hope to never write code that warrants a description half as scathing as this one
• teaearlgraycold 2y ago
  I haven't read the book, just the web-page. But the concept of an anti-meme reminded me of something. The magicians Penn & Teller use this concept to keep their magic tricks safe. They've publicly said that most of their tricks look really impressive, but once you find out how the work you'll be disappointed. What people want to discover is that the magic trick is really an elaborate puzzle where the viewer has just short of enough information to figure it out. The desired explanation for a trick is a hair trigger piece of information that suddenly has it all make sense. Instead the explanations are really just a long sequence of boring facts. What you see is a facade with a bunch of mundane machinery hidden away. If anyone does explain the trick then by the time they're half way through all of the steps you've lost interest.
  • lupire 2y ago
    Most tricks have a very short explanation. Something is just a fake prop. A hidden breathing tube in the water. The camera is upside down. The nails are popped up from the table, not shot from the gun. The selected card is forced by sleight of hand. Like a video game or a movie, there's a fake trigger and a fake effect and then there's a mockup of the appearance of the connection between. Making it look good requires a lot of detailed work, like painting a miniature city for a movie, which bores most people, but the trick is explained very simply.
• selimthegrim 2y ago
  I read “We need to talk about Fifty-five” quite a bit ago and loved it but it now occurs to me wouldn’t “anamnestic” be a better word than “mnestic”? I guess only medical students know “anamnesis” these days?
  • jerf 2y ago
    It is a play on the standard SCP term "amnestic" for a drug that erases memory. Which only pushes your question back one level. I've thought the derivation of "amnestic" is somewhat questionable before too. But it established itself very early. There's some other parts of very, very early SCP lore that are pretty questionable; flinging arbitrary numbers of the so-called "D-Class" death row inmates into the waiting maw of a cosmic horror has become fairly disfavored for a variety of reasons over time too, for instance. But it's part of the groundwork now.
    • selimthegrim 2y ago
      I looked it up and I guess it has an immunology specific meaning which I guess I knew about in the back of my head (no pun intended).
• failrate 2y ago
  I once tried to show a friend of mine this book on Google Read on my phone, but since it was Google Read, it did not actually display all of the titles in my library. So, the book "disappeared". Actual moment of panic.
• sneak 2y ago
  I have the printed version of this, a paperback. It has cool cover art.
• _dain_ 2y ago
  I don't understand. It's just a link to a blank page?
• calmbonsai 2y ago
  Shout-out for "Ra" by the same author. https://a.co/d/2Q85QGD https://a.co/d/2Q85QGD The best novel I've read in the past decade.
  • dvirsky 2y ago
    I actually think the ending of it really prevented it from being that (at least for me). It started good, then the second act was like "Whoah, this is the most amazing sci-fi I've ever read", then the third act was just all over the place and completely lost me. And that's the revised ending, I didn't read the original one.
    • brookst 2y ago
      Same experience. So much promise that the way it collapses is disappointing, almost angry-making. I even gave it a second try thinking that maybe I'd just missed something. Nope. Antimemetics remains a top 10 all-time though.
      • dvirsky 2y ago
        > Antimemetics remains a top 10 all-time though. It's good, but didn't leave that big of an impression on me, maybe because I didn't know all the SCP stuff beforehand, I just liked qntm's other works so I read it.
    • zeekaran 2y ago
      I prefer the original ending, but I don't think it'll change your feelings.
• deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
• radicaldreamer 2y ago
  A lot more people will be exposed to qntm’s work now that a major Sci-Fi publisher has picked up rights to his work: https://www.thebookseller.com/rights/del-rey-snaps-up-high-concept-sci-fi-cosmic-horror-from-sam-hughes https://www.thebookseller.com/rights/del-rey-snaps-up-high-c...
• simon_void 2y ago
  Silence will fall when the question is asked
• slaymaker1907 2y ago
  Besides passwords, I know EMDR is basically an attempt at an antimemetic for PTSD. However, one thing I’ve wondered about that therapy is how effective it is at also reducing the behaviors of PTSD. I had almost total disassociative amnesia after sexual abuse by an older friend in elementary school, possibly Jr High. While I remembered the friend, I still don’t really remember the abuse and know about it until my parents warned me about this person moving back while I was in high school. However, I was still very sensitive regarding any nudity (even with sexual partners) and personal space until I spent some time with a therapist. I think the memories of the abuse were truly gone and not repressed, recovery of repressed memories seems to be pseudoscience. However, it doesn’t seem implausible to lose only the episodic memory of the trauma.
• Centigonal 2y ago
  Good Book. Fine Structure by the same author is also very good.
• tnolet 2y ago
  Love this book. It’s also one of the most genuinely scary books I’ve read. There are some scenes in this book that really are frightening. Maybe House of Leaves is up there too.
  • lowbloodsugar 2y ago
    As someone whose way of making money and surving is to deeply understand things, this book is terrifying. It is one of my top 2 books of all time. I can't decide if my favorite is this, or Gideon the Ninth (a very different vibe).
• dj_mc_merlin 2y ago
  https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-3125 https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-3125 contains a fun keypad to reverse engineer. I thought I could simply extract the password from the text but the author lightly obfuscated it (which makes more sense knowing that he has a programming background). I wonder what's the intended way of finding the code -- perhaps it's in one of the later stories. edit: Oh, I saw it right after posting the comment. It's quite literally in front of your nose. Such a fun series.
• dysfunction 2y ago
  This one feels especially relevant with the recent development about ChatGPT unintentionally cloning its user's voice: https://qntm.org/perso https://qntm.org/perso
• Nition 2y ago
  Spoilers, but I'll try to phrase this vaguely: --- Near the end, I noticed one or two hints that SCP-4987 was still around. I thought that was going to be the key to the solution at the end, but the story went for the more generic option. I found a comment by QNTM that the former was actually his original plan[0]. Personally I actually would have preferred that ending but maybe that's just because I thought I'd guessed the twist ahead of time. The whole book is really really good. If anyone comes into this not having heard of the "SCP Foundation" before, imagine something a bit like the secret government organisation from Men In Black but instead of aliens it's the paranormal. [0] Major spoilers here if you haven't read the story already: https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/forum/t-13410227/tombstone#post-4689287 https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/forum/t-13410227/tombstone#post...
  • BeefySwain 2y ago
    For those confused about SCP-4987, it refers to https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/where-have-you-been-all-my-life#:~:text=the%20man%20says.%20%22-,SCP%2D4987,-.%20You%20drip%2Dfeed https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/where-have-you-been-all-my-life... and not https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-4987 https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-4987 Not sure if there was (is?) ever a true SCP article for it.
    • Nition 2y ago
      Yeah, when the story was written that SCP number didn't exist yet, so it was a safe unused number. Unfortunately not anymore. SCP-4987 is also explained in the first chapter, for a slightly less spoilery link. https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/we-need-to-talk-about-fifty-five https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/we-need-to-talk-about-fifty-fiv...
      • BeefySwain 2y ago
        We never do learn what "Clay" actually was do we?
        • Nition 2y ago
• morgango 2y ago
  I really enjoyed this one. Fascinating, thought provoking work.
• patch_cable 2y ago
  I'll throw in that the hardcover book is absolutely gorgeous and a pleasure to hold and read from.
  • prepend 2y ago
    Qntm’a hardcover books are really well designed. And cheap. I think I paid $12 or something. It really makes me annoyed to see crappy hardcovers for $20-30, knowing that what looks like self-publishing can do such a good job.
• ThouYS 2y ago
  one of the many books with a great premise, but ultimately no actual story
• schlauerfox 2y ago
  Like Marvel's X-Men character Forget-me-not
• epiccoleman 2y ago
  If you like this kind of thing, the rest of qntm's work is definitely worth checking out - as evidenced already in several comments. Another good pointer to follow is to Unsong and Scott Alexander's other fiction (all shorts, spread through his old blog Slate Star Codex and new blog Astral Codex Ten). Both of those were already mentioned, so let me drop a recommendation for something new - Worm, the first (and absolutely massive) book in Wildbow's Parahumans series. Iirc it's longer than all 5 published ASOIAF novels combined, so it's a big commitment, but that length moves through a ton of different arcs. It's centered around a "superheroes" kind of scenario with a level of analysis and thought that'll tickle the fancy of certain kinds of nerds. The main character's power is to control bugs - and it's a lot of fun to see the author make that seemingly lame power into something incredibly useful and lethal. It's just a fun read overall, lots of room to nerd out about it. I haven't read the sequel yet, but I've read good things. Also, though they're more mainstream, Greg Egan and Ted Chiang are some of the best spec-fic / sci-fi authors I know of, and do a similarly great job of breaking down interesting concepts into compelling stories.
  • kurisufag 2y ago
    Permutation City is my favorite from Greg Egan. Worm gives off the sort of interesting-resourceful vibe mostly for the first half, until the large time skip, at which point it stops being street-level and starts getting very comic book grandiose-silly.
  • RangerScience 2y ago
    Seconding all of the recommendations. Wildbow (author or Worm) has a number of other works (Twig got rave reviews; I’m uncommon in liking Pact) And, if you like those… I’ll also recommend Practical Guide to Evil (and that author’s next and in-progress work, Pale Lights)
    • shnock 2y ago
      Extremely strong recommend of Pale Lights, Unsong Strong recommend to all of QNTM's, especially their SCP work (linked), Ra, Fine Structure. Also to PGTE, Worth the Candle Recommend to Worm. Check out r/rational!
• markcipolla 2y ago
  Curiously, I've just finished this book a few days ago, and hands down, one of the best pieces of writing I've enjoyed.
• odo1242 2y ago
  This has been said before, but it’s my favorite sci-fi story lol
• js8 2y ago
  "Or any piece of information which would be difficult to share even if you tried: complex equations, very boring passages of text, large blocks of random numbers" So.. antimemes have high Kolmogorov complexity?
  • lupire 2y ago
    No, the reverse.
• welcome_dragon 2y ago
  From the title I assumed this had something to do with The Foundation
• fitsumbelay 2y ago
  That was an awesome read, thanks Good thread of recommendations too
• MR4D 2y ago
  I love it if there were a sequel. I think it could be called “The Antimemetics Division Division”. (Yes, I typed that correctly). Would make for a very interesting read.
  • BiteCode_dev 2y ago
    I don't understand. It is a sequel. You don't remember the first book?
    • dleink 2y ago
      When there are three books it's called a "trilogy".
• DiscourseFan 2y ago
  I feel like I must've read this before...
• panenw 2y ago
  one big problem i have with this story is that they have magic anti antimeme drugs and they somehow still don't know what scp-055 is
  • lxgr 2y ago
    They do, but you, the reader, don't :)
• ndsipa_pomu 2y ago
  For fans of the SCP universe, I'd like to recommend "The Lost Room" TV series. It's not related to SCP, but has a very similar feel with the reality distorting room and objects. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lost_Room https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lost_Room
• eleveriven 2y ago
  I've never come across this book by chance. I need to read it
• radu_floricica 2y ago
  Found this thread yesterday. Finished the book yesterday as well. It was well worth it.
• bribri 2y ago
  I got into SCP from playing Remedy’s Control game which is based on the lore. Highly recommend the game since the vibe is perfect and visuals are beautiful.
• The-Ludwig 2y ago
  This is the first fiction book I read in more than a decade. I never understood the appeal of reading although I gave it a shot again at least once a year. I finished this book in 3 days since it trended here, and I can not overstate how much of a compliment that is. Something in the last days made me fall in love with books again, although I can’t remember exactly what. Also, the title of this post is confusing - what is an antimeme?