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But the Minds are something of a turtles-all-the-way-down solution. If the Culture has Minds, why wouldn't other civilizations? And why would Culture-esque Mi
by ethbr1 2y ago
But the Minds are something of a turtles-all-the-way-down solution.
If the Culture has Minds, why wouldn't other civilizations?
And why would Culture-esque Minds be superior to less-Culture-y Minds?
- AlotOfReading 2y agoOther civilizations do have minds, constructed differently. The Gzilt in Hydrogen Sonata have minds constructed by humans after they've passed, with personalities from those people.
- Vecr 2y ago1) Not humans, Banks just calls them that in the text of the books, and 2) Any mind derived from a "human like" (even to a very small degree, really human like civilization and evolved) is at a massive disadvantage to a very highly optimized result of recursive self improvement.
- AlotOfReading 2y agoActual earth humans are in the books and noted to be of the same general body plan. Close enough. The Gzilt minds are specifically compared to culture minds and deemed to be comparable in capabilities.
- Vecr 2y ago> The Gzilt minds are specifically compared to culture minds and deemed to be comparable in capabilities. Well, that's not really realistic. Maybe they are only pretending to be based on organics, but really aren't, and just put up a facade.
- AlotOfReading 2y agoThey're not based on organics, but that's missing the larger point that realism isn't the point of sci fi like the culture series. It's an imaginary setting the author is using to look at society.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- ItCouldBeWorse 2y agoBecause if other civilizations develop minds- the minds take over- and derive from all worlds the one best outcome- and then join the culture who is already riding the golden path.
- ethbr1 2y agoOr all Minds in the Culture are already this sort of Mind. See underlying textual creepiness about "what exactly are the humans for?" I.e. an inverted Matrix, with the humans kept in the physical
- ItCouldBeWorse 2y agoBut there is the layers in between Ian M.Banks wrote about. GroupMinds, people who upload themselves and become more AI like and on and on.. The thing hidden in plane sight is the has and has nots of the culture though. Some have processing power- and some must beg those with processing power to run all the things.