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December: Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson.
The next poll will pick two books. I'd like to do it that way to keep a strong second place contender from being overlooked, and so I don't have to update the poll so often.
Discuss The Three-Body Problem by Liu Cixin in the comments below.
Snow Crash was written by Neal Stephenson in 1992. The novel features a bit of a Calexit scenario, and is known for popularizing the term "avatar" (paving the way for James Cameron's true magnum opus). These days, Neal moonlights as Magic Leap's "Chief Futurist". Seems appropriate.
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SoylentNews Book Club: Discuss The Three-Body Problem, Start Reading Snow Crash
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The last time I saw him he was walking down Lover's Lane holding his own hand.
-- Fred Allen
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Aurean on Thursday December 06 2018, @02:16PM (5 children)
It was alright; not particularly mind blowing, but not bad, either.
It's the sophons that got me - they violate the laws of thermodynamics, what with not needing energy to move or process information - additionally, they'd have no way of perceiving the world around them, considering that they're a LOT smaller than the wavelength of electromagnetic radiation that's present in any appreciable quantity.
I like the way the world that the book is set in is portrayed (not the world itself, because history)
(Score: 3, Insightful) by SemperOSS on Thursday December 06 2018, @03:19PM
As always, when you read sci-fi, even hardcore sci-fi like this, there are a few assumptions you just have to accept, like the sophons ... Write it up to Arthur C. Clarkeian "magic".
In Clarke's own Rendezvous with Rama the "magic" was the reacitionless drive.
I don't need a signature to draw attention to myself.
Maybe I should add a sarcasm warning now and again?
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday December 06 2018, @04:04PM (1 child)
The sophons weren't restricted to our four dimensional world. We were never given any hint how, or how much, energy might be transferred to/from sophons in the higher dimensions.
The more impossible bit that I kept chuckling over, were the way the aliens would simply dehydrate, when all three suns were scorching the world. Like - their bodies couldn't burn or anything. That, and, when/how did they ever procreate? It seems they rarely got a crop of anything harvested, let alone find time for baking babies. Unless, of course, Mama dehydrated with Baby inside of her, and Baby patiently waited for the next rehydration period.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 06 2018, @06:55PM
I think it's explained, maybe near the end, or the beginning of the second book. The mommy trisolarsn and daddy trisolaran merge together, then split into up to 5 baby trisolarans. The children retain some parental memories, so it's less procreation and more self cloning. Thus, trisolarans have no parents or children.
(Score: 1) by angelosphere on Saturday December 08 2018, @04:19PM (1 child)
they violate the laws of thermodynamics, what with not needing energy to move or process information
Perhaps you should reread the laws of thermodynamics .... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laws_of_thermodynamics [wikipedia.org]
Ooops, it has nothing to do with transfering information ...
(Score: 1) by Aurean on Tuesday December 11 2018, @03:47PM
Specifically the second law: The law of conservation of energy.
"This states that energy can be neither created nor destroyed. However, energy can change forms, and energy can flow from one place to another. A particular consequence of the law of conservation of energy is that the total energy of an isolated system does not change."
There is no source for the energy the sophons express.
Really good science fiction remains in the physically plausible domain. Note that I'm not dissing the books - just that it forces the genre into fantasy territory, rather than remaining pure science fiction.