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Toast Museum posted:Speaking of Brin, I've heard good things about the Uplift series, but I found the first book really clunky, and the opening chapters of the second book did even less for me. Does the series get a lot better later, or is Brin just not for me? Just read Startide Rising and mourn the fact that you didn't find it at the right age (fourteen).
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Sep 19, 2014 22:40
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Oh god, not MacLeod. I'm not interested in reading about the Culture's heroic worker's soviet.
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Sep 20, 2014 00:12
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Eau de MacGowan posted:Someone else writing the Culture wouldn't work. Ten books is enough, it's not like theres unresolved cliffhangers to be answered.
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Sep 20, 2014 00:16
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Toast Museum posted:Speaking of Brin, I've heard good things about the Uplift series, but I found the first book really clunky, and the opening chapters of the second book did even less for me. Does the series get a lot better later, or is Brin just not for me? Sundiver is incredibly clunky compared to the other books, and the second trilogy feels like a totally different author.
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Sep 20, 2014 00:32
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Fragmented posted:But seriously Banks death was horrible, Just let it go with him. He embraced death in his books, I say just let it end. After a 6 season HBO show of course.
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Sep 20, 2014 02:20
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eriktown posted:Oh god, not MacLeod. I'm not interested in reading about the Culture's heroic worker's soviet. that was MacLeods high point. MacLeod has evolved since then...into something almost as lovely as Charles Stross or Neal Stephenson. keep the culture dead until Banks copyright expires in 100+ years.
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Sep 20, 2014 02:51
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I think there are others who could do interesting things with the Culture universe but nobody else has Banks' voice. That's the whole reason we read him. I reread Surface Detail recently and although it's grim in places and bad stuff happens overall the whole thing is just so much fun. You can tell that he had a great time writing it and even when the themes are dark or unpleasant reading his books is a joy. Except A Song of Stone, I guess everyone has off days.
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Sep 20, 2014 03:08
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How about Terry Pratch- oh. Seriously, though, I wouldn't want a new Culture novel but I could handle a bunch of authors shoet-storying in it together, each with their own take and angle.
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Sep 20, 2014 04:15
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Muurkas posted:How about Gene Wolfe ?
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Sep 20, 2014 14:17
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This is probably old news for everybody but me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ET8IFxPo61w
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Sep 20, 2014 17:16
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Toast Museum posted:Speaking of Brin, I've heard good things about the Uplift series, but I found the first book really clunky, and the opening chapters of the second book did even less for me. Does the series get a lot better later, or is Brin just not for me? Puny humans allied with a couple of loyal uplifted species fighting to survive in an universe that is almost 100% united against them because they threaten the existing social order is a great premise for a space opera but it was poorly executed. They're not bad but they won't rock your world either. Kind of meh, really. Re someone else writing The Culture... Please, don't. I think Banks did a great job exploring the consequences certain future technologies would have for that society, the only thing I can think he didn't fully cover so well were the fatalism\ennui that would accompany something like teleportation\backups and maybe how digitized human hive consciousness that could rival the power of the Minds. There really isn't anything that needs to be explored so it would boil down to fan fiction even if it was good fan fiction. The Culture is my favorite SC series, I'd love if Banks were around to give us 2 or 10 more books but he's gone for the great Simulation in the sky and this is what he left us with. MeLKoR fucked around with this message at 17:51 on Sep 20, 2014 |
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Sep 20, 2014 17:37
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Toast Museum posted:Speaking of Brin, I've heard good things about the Uplift series, but I found the first book really clunky, and the opening chapters of the second book did even less for me. Does the series get a lot better later, or is Brin just not for me? general consensus on the first trilogy tends to be: Startide Rising - great The Uplift War - alright Sundiver - bad I have never finished Sundiver but would agree that Startide Rising is far and away the best of the series.
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Sep 20, 2014 18:35
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Hedrigall posted:I also thought about the anthology idea. In my ideal version they'd all have to be left-wing British SF authors. So Reynolds, Miéville, MacLeod... uh, who else? Charlie Stross is really the best contender here, but I would love to read a Mieville take on the Culture
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Sep 21, 2014 01:03
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God, no, I don't want culture fanfic
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Sep 21, 2014 02:49
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I dunno, I could maybe see enjoying a tribute to Banks and the Culture in a book of short stories by various authors. I don't have any real strong contenders to who I would put in such a thing and overall it might just be better as an unrealized "wouldn't it be cool if..." idea.
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Sep 21, 2014 02:55
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It could work but it would need a strong and ruthless editor.
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Sep 21, 2014 03:05
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a kitten posted:I dunno, I could maybe see enjoying a tribute to Banks and the Culture in a book of short stories by various authors. I don't have any real strong contenders to who I would put in such a thing and overall it might just be better as an unrealized "wouldn't it be cool if..." idea. I vaguely recall they've done anthologies like this for Tolkien and Wells, though I don't know how successful they were. There were also a bunch of Star Wars anthologies--Tales of Special Circumstances Drones would probably fun in the right hands.
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Sep 21, 2014 03:35
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andrew smash posted:It could work but it would need a strong and ruthless editor. You might say it would need an editor with the requisite amount of Gravitas.
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Sep 21, 2014 18:16
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GenVec posted:Look to Windward. Were there any hints that it was actually a rogue group of minds that attempted to sabotage the hub? Who killed the Leviathan on the gas planet, and why? And who did the brutal "culture" assassin really work for? Fragmented posted:Look to Windward was all the Chells I think. There was definitely someone else involved, remember the weird cone things that talked directly mind-to-mind. There's no hint that rogue Culture Minds were involved, but it's plausible. The theory is voiced, but it could just be the Minds being arrogant enough to think that the only thing that could challenge them would be another Mind. The Behemethaur was killed by the Chell or their backers to destroy any evidence of the plot. The nanodust culture assassin almost certainly worked for Special Circumstances, it's pretty much their MO, albeit the extreme end. GenVec posted:Surface Detail: What was the Unfallen Bulbitian hiding? One of my theories is that certain field technologies cut off higher-dimensional access to the 3D universe, which is why the Fallen Bulbitian and other ancient, semi-sublimed entities don't like people using them. They create uncomfortable blind spots. xian posted:You might say it would need an editor with the requisite amount of Gravitas. Gravitas Shortfall fucked around with this message at 09:55 on Sep 22, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 09:52
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The edust assassin was a pretty lame revenge fantasy, to be honest. I was actually surprised to see on checking just now that Look to Windward was published before 9/11, but of course it's not the only case of a bleakly prophetic choice of Banks plot.
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Sep 22, 2014 14:33
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The edust assassin was very Culture in terms of technology, but its overwhelming - and pointless - brutality convinces me that it must have been someone else. There's no point in torturing and killing someone to "send a message" if there's no survivors to tell anyone else what happened. It almost seemed like it was sent to tie up the loose ends of the failed conspiracy by making sure that the Chell conspirators weren't going to blab about who their silent partners are. That would mean either a tech-equiv civilization or an "Intersting Times Gang" who have truly gone off the deep end. Sort of like an extreme version of the Meatfucker. Also, in terms of the Behemethaur, would a creature over a hundred million years old really be vulnerable to a second-rate power like the Chell? These are guys who have survived multiple "galactic cycles" and predate the culture by eons. You'd think anything capable of surviving that long a period would be able to defend itself; over that sort of time frame even peaceful races must occasionally be threatened. GenVec fucked around with this message at 16:30 on Sep 22, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 15:51
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GenVec posted:The edust assassin was very Culture in terms of technology, but its overwhelming - and pointless - brutality convinces me that it must have been someone else. There's no point in torturing and killing someone to "send a message" if there's no survivors to tell anyone else what happened.
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Sep 22, 2014 15:58
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GenVec posted:The edust assassin was very Culture in terms of technology, but its overwhelming - and pointless - brutality convinces me that it must have been someone else. There's no point in torturing and killing someone to "send a message" if there's no survivors to tell anyone else what happened. "I am a Culture terror weapon, she thought; designed to horrify, warn and instruct at the highest level." "She was to leave the complex's security monitoring system uncorrupted, so that what was done was seen to be done, and recorded." "She padded away from the deflated body lying in its bloody pool. The nanomissiles were, she thought, a give-away to the identity of her makers; an integral part of the message she was delivering." MikeJF fucked around with this message at 16:13 on Sep 22, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 16:06
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MikeJF posted:"She was to leave the complex's security monitoring system uncorrupted, so that what was done was seen to be done, and recorded." True, I had forgotten that part. So the Culture basically turns into the Affront when they feel they have enough justification? It's just weird. Billions of their citizens died during the Idiran war, but you didn't see them torturing anyone to death to get their "don't gently caress with the culture" message across in that case - even though they certainly had more cause for it. Edit: And despite all of the weapon's thoughts, I still think it's ambiguous. "Culture Terror Weapon" is probably the greatest clue that something is amiss - the phrase is almost an oxymoron. GenVec fucked around with this message at 16:41 on Sep 22, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 16:11
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Because the Idrians had broken; They understood they'd lost, and why they'd lost. They didn't need any point being made to them. The message is to remind the people behind it (whoever they were) that once roused, the Culture (via Special Circumstances) is quite, quite capable of being exactly as nasty as anyone else, and the fact it chooses not to is purely because of forebearance on their part. Think of the message being "We could root every last one of you out and murder you too, you know. We have decided not to of our own volition, and what you do knowing that is up to you."
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Sep 22, 2014 16:32
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GenVec posted:Also, in terms of the Behemethaur, would a creature over a hundred million years old really be vulnerable to a second-rate power like the Chell? These are guys who have survived multiple "galactic cycles" and predate the culture by eons. You'd think anything capable of surviving over that time frame would be capable of either defending itself or at least sending out a distress call. GenVec posted:So the Culture basically turns into the Affront when they feel they have enough justification? It's just weird. Billions of their citizens died during the Idiran war, but you didn't see them torturing anyone to death to get their "don't gently caress with the culture" message across in that case - even though they certainly had more cause for it. The Irdians were soundly defeated by the Culture, something that surprised the galactic community, since at the time the general consensus was that the Culture were not much more than hedonistic busy-bodies who didn't have the stomach for real war. That's a pretty strong message in and of itself. Special Circumstances really goes in for personal messages. It's not "we will kill your civilisation" - that's too abstract, and too cruel. It's "we know exactly where you live, we know all your secrets, and we will very specifically target you because we know what you have done." I agree though, the e-dust assassin was going perhaps a bit too far, but I suppose there's a reason Culture warship classes are things like Killer, Thug, Abominator, Torturer, Gangster, Psychopath...
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Sep 22, 2014 16:35
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GenVec posted:True, I had forgotten that part. GenVec posted:Edit: And despite all of the weapon's thoughts, I still think it's ambiguous. "Culture Terror Weapon" is probably the greatest clue that something is amiss - the phrase is almost an oxymoron. Gravitas Shortfall posted:hedonistic busy-bodies who didn't have the stomach for real war. Gravitas Shortfall posted:Special Circumstances really goes in for personal messages. It's not "we will kill your civilisation" - that's too abstract, and too cruel. It's "we know exactly where you live, we know all your secrets, and we will very specifically target you because we know what you have done." Nektu fucked around with this message at 17:00 on Sep 22, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 16:49
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I mean one of the main themes of the books is the horrible things that are done to ensure the continued existence of a utopian society.
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Sep 22, 2014 16:56
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Nektu posted:Not really. Isnt that kinda the point of SC? SC members are no longer "normal" Culture citizens and no longer (or at least while they are active) follow the Culture's utopian rules because those rules are not useful to defend against an external threat that simply is not interested in peaceful coexistance. I'd say the video would do more harm to the Culture than blowing up Masaq orbital ever would. There'd be ships and citizens going Ulterior like mad. GenVec fucked around with this message at 17:04 on Sep 22, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 17:00
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GenVec posted:Ok, let's run with that thought. The Chell now have a video of an "obviously" Culture "terror weapon" brutally murdering what appears to be several defenseless Chelgrians, in such a way that the vast majority of Culture citizens would find unacceptable. Is SC hoping that they sit on this video and take it as a private warning, or do they show the rest of the Galaxy (and the Culture itself) how thin the veneer of civilization truly is? It's all the more damning given the abysmal history of covert interventions against the Chell. After all, it's not like the Chelgrians were under some false assumptions over the Culture being "easy pickings pacifists" - they'd just suffered a devastating civil war because of SC. Maybe. But all the data from the Culture side would be released in short order, and while I'm sure there'd be a lot of heated debate, the fact that those specific Chelgrians brainwashed a mentally ill war veteran into becoming a living weapon, attempted the murder of a Culture mind (and the indirect deaths of thousands of citizens), as well as murdering an impossibly ancient, rare being just to cover their tracks might just swing the pendulum back towards "gently caress those guys". EDIT: And the rest of the Galaxy is just going to nod their heads (or sensor pods or social appendages or whatever) and perpetuate the very helpful attitude; Don't gently caress With The Culture. EDIT 2: I'd say the Culture's initial failings with the Chelgrians is FAR more damaging to their rep, both internal and external. They really screwed the pooch big-time, in a way that's both rare and embarassing. Gravitas Shortfall fucked around with this message at 17:14 on Sep 22, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 17:11
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Gravitas Shortfall posted:I mean one of the main themes of the books is the horrible things that are done to ensure the continued existence of a utopian society. I feel like we were reading completely different series.
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Sep 22, 2014 17:15
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GenVec posted:Ok, let's run with that thought. The Chell now have a video of an "obviously" Culture "terror weapon" brutally murdering what appears to be several defenseless Chelgrians, in such a way that the vast majority of Culture citizens would find unacceptable. Is SC hoping that they sit on this video and take it as a private warning, or do they show the rest of the Galaxy (and the Culture itself) how thin the veneer of civilization truly is? It's all the more damning given the abysmal history of covert interventions against the Chell. In one book there was mention of Culture citizens that formed a spliter group that strongly disliked the very idea of using a organization like SC. Of course, this being the Culture, they were fully allowed to express, argue and lobby their point (which obviously did not change anything because the real power lies with the minds, and those fully understand (and implicitly support) SC and what SC is doing). I guess it is a bit like today: most people dont really care and just live their lifes. Those that care enough to think about it either shrug and go "thats life" or start arguing over the internet about how horrible the world is. They only way for minds to turn their back to that would be to go eccentric and leave the culture. I guess however, that it could be that a particular instance of state-terrorism could be perceived as horrible enough to sway public opinion (humans AND minds) against the minds that thought it up. In that case I they would perhaps be subjected to something like the meatfucker was subjected to: social exclusion and maybe loss of their SC status (or maybe not  ).
Nektu fucked around with this message at 17:25 on Sep 22, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 17:15
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GenVec posted:I feel like we were reading completely different series. I read the series the same way Gravitas Shortfall does. A big theme is liberal interventionism, and whether it's ok even if you have near omnipotence.
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Sep 22, 2014 17:21
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Ultimately, the reason that the weapon was used is because a series of Culture Minds ran some incredibly detailed and accurate simulations of a universe in which it was used and a universe in which it wasn't and found the outcomes of the former better to a statistically high enough confidence. The Culture is able to do so to a degree that they can be certain that there are less horrors their way, across all of their interventions, even when you take the rare gently caress-ups like the initial Chelgrian intervention into account. Very rarely, horrible things are done to preserve the utopia - but many, many more horrors never come into existence as a direct result. This is something that they can do that we can't, because they are objective in their analysis, overwhelmingly powerful, and incredibly, incredibly accurate. MikeJF fucked around with this message at 17:28 on Sep 22, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 17:22
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GenVec posted:I feel like we were reading completely different series. There's plenty of other stuff going on, but almost every book involves SC doing something extremely dubious. Several characters have conversations debating the ethics and motives of SC Minds and agents. From an interview with Banks; quote:Despite being a pacifistic utopia that promotes tolerance, the Culture’s ‘Special Circumstances’ division sometimes resorts to shady practices to defend its civilisation’s ‘moral right to exist’. Do you regard any of these practices as ethically problematic, or is any act acceptable when it’s geared towards protecting the ultimate utopia? Basically; Seldom Posts posted:A big theme is liberal interventionism, and whether it's ok even if you have near omnipotence.
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Sep 22, 2014 17:25
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Gravitas Shortfall posted:It was probably their mysterious Culture-equiv-tech allies then. also, the Chelgrians were just a very different kind of problem than the Idirans. The Chelgrians were a mostly blameless people who the Culture had previously wronged, which they felt guilty about. They had a small cabal of leaders who did some bad things. The Idirans were a terrifying and aggressive warrior race, physically and psychologically tougher than any human, who were universally indoctrinated into the same fanatical and aggressive mindset. They were a civilization dedicated to doing bad things. Their leadership wasn't the sole source of their aggression, and, even if their leadership was assassinated spectacularly, they were such hard-asses that it probably would not have gotten them to back down. With the Chelgrians it was an intimately-scaled problem that could have an intimately-scaled solution. With the Idirans it was a civilization-scale conflict that could only be resolved by decisively redirecting the entire course of the rival civilization. It's the difference between World War 2 and a CIA intervention in some banana republic. PupsOfWar fucked around with this message at 17:42 on Sep 22, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 17:37
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Clearly I'm in the minority opinion here, but I wasn't particularly overwhelmed by the impression that SC was doing horrible things to preserve a utopia. Contact (and SC's) interventions seem to stem more from altruistic idealism than from the notion that the Culture is ever truly 'under threat' - given that interventions are almost always carried out against civilizations several rungs below them in the tech ladder and could hardly be considered a real danger anyway. Probably the only time that the Culture was even in real danger (after the Idiran war) was during Excession, and the Minds (bafflingly) used that potentially galaxy-altering event to smack down a minor race of delinquents rather than try to explore a once-in-a-millenia possibility. The discussions on the ethics of SC in the books are interesting solely because they DON'T engage in horrendous acts to keep the Culture supreme - they're genuinely trying to benefit the people they interact with, and are above things like the petty retributive justice shown at the end of Look to Windward. If SC was nothing more than a Space CIA, installing friendly dictatorships and engaging in the occasional massacre of ideological opponents, the moral questions explored in the series would be considerably less compelling. GenVec fucked around with this message at 23:17 on Sep 22, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 17:43
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GenVec posted:Contact (and SC's) interventions seem to stem more from altruistic idealism than from the notion that the Culture is ever truly 'under threat' - given that interventions are almost always carried out against civilizations several rungs below them in the tech ladder and could hardly be considered a real danger anyway. SC seemed always more like the espionage/special ops service that only got involved once real poo poo was happening. GenVec posted:Probably the only time that the Culture was even in real potential danger (after the Idiran war) was during Excession, and the Minds (bafflingly) used that potentially galaxy altering event to smack down a minor race of delinquents rather than try to explore a once-in-a-millenia possibility. GenVec posted:The discussions on the ethics of SC in the books are interesting solely because they DON'T engage in horrendous acts to keep the Culture supreme - they're genuinely trying to benefit the people they interact with, and are above things like the petty retributive justice shown at the end of Look to Windward. If SC was nothing more than a Space CIA, installing friendly dictatorships and engaging in the occasional massacre of ideological opponents, the moral questions explored in the series would be considerably less compelling. (yes, the Nektu fucked around with this message at 18:18 on Sep 22, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 18:01
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Nektu posted:Hmm, I always thought that the interventionalism was contacts metier. Basically contact as something like the diplomatic corps of the Culture. SC isn't really like a different service ('espionage' etc). It has the same broad role as Contact but steps in when things get extremely morally complex and judgements have to be made that ordinary citizens might balk at making or lack the experience or insight to make. That can include interventionalism when the situation is very delicate and the path is unclear. They're more like Contact: Advanced Tier. MikeJF fucked around with this message at 01:04 on Sep 23, 2014 |
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Sep 22, 2014 18:06
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Eh, SC is 'Special Circumstances'. Most of the books happen decades if not centuries apart. Culture space is vast in distance and population and it's interactions with other civilizations are equally broad and complex. That very rarely the Culture would have to step outside the boundaries of what they held to be morally true doesn't mean the morals are wrong. It just means the mechanisms in place to govern those interactions aren't perfect and may need a little manual adjustment from time to time. If they were perfect then there wouldn't be any point to talking about it.
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