Ask HN: Books that altered your view of reality Any recommendations on books that changed how you think about VR/AR/reality? I've been enjoying Ready Player One and Snow Crash lately and am wondering what I should pick up next. Thanks! |
Ask HN: Books that altered your view of reality Any recommendations on books that changed how you think about VR/AR/reality? I've been enjoying Ready Player One and Snow Crash lately and am wondering what I should pick up next. Thanks! |
REAMDE- Neal Stephenson
Pattern Recognition / Zero History / Spook Country - William Gibson
The Peripheral - William Gibson
Not exactly the same thing, but I'll also throw in Glasshouse by Charles Stross. And since we're talking Charles Stross, also add Halting State to the list.
Oh, and VALIS by Philip K. Dick. Definitely worth a read.
Maelcum was pivotal in the entire story and was a cool bad boy type. And you can't forget the whole crew in the "Marcus Garvey" spaceship.
Quality stuff. That right there was enough to make me a lifelong Gibson fan.
Ahh, Case will always be in my heart! :)
I have a big pile of his other works here, waiting to be read, but just haven't gotten to the rest yet. :-(
Rainbows End - Vernor Vinge
Daemon - Daniel Suarez
They are both more AR, which I suspect will be the next step rather than VR, AR novels have if anything proven to me it's more relevant than VR, for now.
Daemon relies a bit more on AI to make the story.
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World - Haruki Murakami. I can't say much about it without ruining it.
A man goes out to buy shoelaces and a cookie during his lunch break, but the story is packed with insane levels of detail about the objects around us and the narrator's imagination about how those details came to be.
One such detail: the way a plastic straw will float in a can of soda until it's horizontal, but sometimes the microscopic burrs in the pull-tab opening will dig into the straw and keep it from doing that.
(Baker is a much more entertaining writer than I am.)
One thing I've noticed (& which I'm sure a lot of people have stated) is that his fictional works are mostly just a platform for him to explore ideas. Whether or not they entertain is a side effect. A few stories on Axiomatic for instance end rather abruptly. It is as if Egan just couldn't be bothered with tying everything in a neat little package once he'd already finished exploring the implications of a particular philosophical idea.
If you just want the physics behind the books, see his website [ http://www.gregegan.net/ORTHOGONAL/ORTHOGONAL.html ]
/r/printsf always has good suggestions
Too short for a TLDR, but it changed the way I look at other people, for the better.
Some might recommend Pynchon as well, personally I'm not convinced but to each his own.
Wholeness and the Implicate Order - David Bohm
Read it around three years ago and I was never the same since. It is non-fiction, and I think VR is only mentioned in passing, but if you see it anywhere, be sure to pick it up. It was a fun and informative read.
After reading this, you will understand (and be able to predict) a lot of patterns of human behavior.
The miracle of mindfulness, No mud/No Lotus, How to Love ...