The Sword and Laser discussion

Science Fiction has long used the future to explore ideas and trends that reflect on our world today. Certainly not all SF is that way – I can still love my space opera and science fantasy for its escapism – but I would argue that some of the best or at least most interesting SF is that way. Which would be an argument for why a book such as Machinehood should be a great read. Except it wasn’t.

Machinehood pushes all the buttons for a near-future dystopian mirror that reflects back on today. The world the author envisions extends from current realities – the wealth gap, the rise of the gig economy, economic upset driven by WAI, and so on. If you've read recent non-fiction on AI and machine intelligence (e.g., “Life 3.0” by Max Tegmark) these are the kinds of issues futurists are thinking about today.

In spite of all this, Machinehood falls into a category of novels that I think relies too heavily on science and doesn’t do that great of a job with the fiction. Other darlings of that category include Greg Bear (string theory and wormholes, oh my!) and Gregory Benford (that massive black hole at the center of our galaxy and machine life, look out!) Plots that are plodding, meandering or generally unbelievable. Protagonists and antagonists who make decisions that have you scratching your head. Prose that doesn’t flow and spends a lot of time trying to set up, explain or justify what is happening. Ideas that are grand, execution that fails. In some ways, I think being too well-researched creates some of these problems. As one counter-example, I read William Gibson in an interview saying he really had minimal understanding of computers and the internet when he wrote Neuromancer (on a typewriter.) But wow.

I can't say as this novel garners very many stars for me. Not because the world-building is bad, but because the characters didn’t grab me and I really didn’t buy into the plot arc. Which is a shame. It had potential. Am I the only one who feels this way?

Oaken wrote: "Science Fiction has long used the future to explore ideas and trends that reflect on our world today. Certainly not all SF is that way – I can still love my space opera and science fantasy for its ..."

While it sounds like I enjoyed the book more than you (I thought the action pieces were well done), I do agree that the characters and plot don't live up to the meticulous setting the author built.

I thought the pills were an incredibly cool invention and I wouldn't mind having a personal WAI assistant. :)

Oaken wrote: "Science Fiction has long used the future to explore ideas and trends that reflect on our world today. Certainly not all SF is that way – I can still love my space opera and science fantasy for its ..."

Yes, what they said. The tech was great. I loved the information interchange possibilities & people working from wherever they were. Also (view spoiler)[the integration of Welga & her personal assistant & the entire Internet was great. (hide spoiler)]

However I agree with Oaken: the characters didn’t grab me and I really didn’t buy into the plot arc.

And did anyone else find it preachy? I got tired of being lectured at while the action stalled.

I think it would have been way cooler if (view spoiler)[ the mind behind the Machinehood had turned out to be an evolved super AI, not some fanatic with the same old revolutionary rhetoric (hide spoiler)].

I am enjoying the book so far. I think the narration is very well done. I like that we have two female main characters--soldier and scientist--that have families/obligations outside of their jobs/gigs.

I like the parts that have action in them and some of the interactions. The problems I have is where there is a lot of explanation and that the characters themselves let the tech babble get in the way of the natural flow of language.

Compared to say The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, the moon people call themselves "Loonies" and use a lot of made up language to talk to each other about complex topics they don't really understand. It made the communication personal and specific to the situation. In this book, everyone uses the complicated science language and don't really personalize the language. Characters talk in DNA and AI technobabble with the most personalized language being calling WAIs "whys" and SAIs "sighs". I think this, in turn, makes it hard to connect with the characters. I use techno talk regularly in my job, but not with my wife or kids. If we do, I try to make it understandable.

It's not just the technical talk. The journal threw me off completely as it did not feel how a person would write. It seemed be a way to create a history, but done so briefly, I had a hard time believing a person wrote it. I was glad when that section completed.

I don’t know about good science - these magical pills that make you feel instantly great seem more based in fantasy than some potential future fact - if only life were that easy! And then there was mention of some make up you just sprayed onto your face and AI magic made it change colour to match how it thought you wanted to look???? Did I read that right? I think it was in chapter 1 and I started late, so was remembering the title of this thread with utter confusion!

I’m enjoying the story so far as a fun romp with good characters - it’s like I’m not reading the same book! Haha!

Ruth (tilltab) Ashworth wrote: "I don’t know about good science - these magical pills that make you feel instantly great seem more based in fantasy than some potential future fact - if only life were that easy! And then there was..."

Miracle Max goes corporate selling his life giving “pills” that ignore the 2nd law of thermodynamics which is about right from a computer scientist. If you took these you would need to eat so much food… c.f. Olympic athletes training regimes.

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Ruth (tilltab) Ashworth wrote: "I don’t know about good science - these magical pills that make you feel instantly great seem more based in fantasy than some potential future fact - if only life were that easy! "

In my lifetime, we have seen a large number of mental illnesses move from debilitating to manageable based on pharmacology. The number of people that had to be institutionalized has dropped to the point where we closed many institutions and completely re-evaluated how these institutions operate.

My personal struggles with ADD, while not eliminated, are vastly improved by a pill I take every morning. I'm vastly happier than I was 5 years ago.

I optimistic that a "soma" for minor depression will be found, perhaps in my lifetime.

I still expect many people to say "you just need to plow through it, avoid the soma" when it arrives though :-)

I'm not saying drugs can't do amazing things - I'd be dead several times over if not for modern medicine - but they will NEVER work instantly and perfectly as they are represented early on in this book, much as I would wish otherwise.

It's like a particular bugbear of mine you see all the time in films and TV, where someone having an asthma attack takes one puff on an inhailer (doesn't even hold their breath or anything) and are instantly breathing normally by the next breath - as someone who has had severe asthma, I wish! Alas, the body just doesn't work like that!

I think the author was careful to mention these were not simply drugs. I thought of them more as nanites - swarms of nano technologies that helped repair tissue or prompted the body to release the needed hormones and metabolic substances to work faster/harder. There is already experimentation underway on nanotechnology and concepts like tissue engineering to create artificial scaffolding that mimics the natural cellular structures your body already creates when healing damage. What will that look like in 75 years?

You mentioned makeup earlier. We have black & white e-paper today and experimental full color e-paper created using nanotechnology. Imagine being able to spray a microscopic film of that on your face and programming the makeup or tattoos you want.

Its a stretch from where we are today - and they won't be instant - but I wouldn't put them down as completely impossible or the uses of them as unrealistic. I like the example somebody used of describing today's technology to a person from the distant past:

"I have a device in my pocket containing the sum of all human knowledge…" conveying the wonders of modern technology. Followed by, "I use it to view pictures of cats," conveying the mundane way we humans leverage said wonders.

Quote is not mine, I don't recall where I first saw it. :-)

Sorry, but the idea of having something programmed by a machine and then sprayed evenly over a sweaty and uneven surface and the result somehow being perfect make up does not sound like believable sci-fi.

It’s okay - I don’t need my sci-fi to be super believable - bring your ridiculous idea and hand-wavey explanation and throw them at me, and I’ll come along for the ride! I was just surprised to hear this book described a having ‘good’ science when the early chapters in particular were pretty crazy.

But clearly, you see possibility where I see magic. It’s cool. Happily, I will most likely be dead long before I have to worry about who is right. lol

I was referring to the fact that all of these pills would require a lot of energy to heal the body and allow it to move quickly enough to compete with robotics.

The zip pills seemed like magic as they ignore 2nd law of thermodynamics. The ability to move that quickly would require re-engineering of the bones and muscles. In some ways the cyborgs are more realistic as they require tech and internal energy sources to gain the higher performance.

The pills to aid concentration and focus are an extension of already existing drugs and require no boosting of metabolism and hence no additional energy.

Iain wrote: "I was referring to the fact that all of these pills would require a lot of energy to heal the body and allow it to move quickly enough to compete with robotics.

The zip pills seemed like magic as..."

Yep, I'm less good at explaining the why, but they sure sound more like magic than science to me!

Oaken wrote: "Science Fiction has long used the future to explore ideas and trends that reflect on our world today. Certainly not all SF is that way – I can still love my space opera and science fantasy for its ..."

you were not, I felt the same way, I found the worldbuilding much more interesting than the plot and the characters