While my favorite is probably Story of Your Life, Understand is damn near my second favorite, or rather probably was before I got to Exhalation and realized just what he had done there. (To pull at the thin threads of what constitutes consciousness so deftly...)
But there are so many great examples of building these compelling, rich tapestries, with enough world building and exploration to draw you all the way in. Tower of Babylon, Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate... just phenomenal pieces that stick with you long after you've read them, and are something to savor.
Separately, I was so pleased with how Denis Villeneuve (and specifically, Eric Heisserer) adapted the screenplay for Story of Your Life, to create such a phenomenal transition to film in Arrival... it seemed such a complex concept that could easily collapse for want of oversimplification or trying too hard, and instead it was such a faithful reproduction... ended up being one of my favorite science fiction films of all time.
Damn, I love Ted Chiang.
This one was great, because it's not clear until the very end whether the character is going through increasing levels of paranoia, or dealing with an adversary. The way the dénouement is stitched together (literally) was such a shock. I love it.
It's called "Stories of your life". Highly recommend both the book that includes it ("Stories of your life and others") as well as Exhalation. Ted Chiang is superb.
> it's not clear until the very end whether the character is going through increasing levels of paranoia, or dealing with an adversary
Er, which one do you think it resolved as? Your phrasing suggests you went from doubt to believing the narrator is reliable and sane. I was and am convinced in his reliability; yet, he fell for a painfully obvious ploy by the adversary, which is not terribly consistent with superintelligence. Nevertheless I understand the story to be, in-universe, reliable, but from outside, intentionally following narrative tropes consistent with mental illness. Other tropes include "there's something in the jab", "CIA is after me", "I have become the renfield of a hidden adversary".
So there's a lot of evidence for the opposite interpretation, that the protagonist is simply ill the whole time. This interpretation has the distinct advantage that falling for the attack was truly a flaw on the part of the protagonist (qua confabulator, I suppose) rather than the narrative or the author. In fact I can't really say why I don't adopt this as my preferred interpretation; perhaps a bias for my original interpretation, or skill on Chiang's part in convincing the reader of the less plausible explanation through, what, sheer sympathy?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stories_of_Your_Life_and_Other...
I can recall reading this for the first time two years ago. I opened the book and started reading at 11:00p as I was winding down for the evening, thinking that I'd spend 30 minutes reading before I got too tired to keep my eyes open and turn in for the night.
I very quickly got sucked in and found myself LEANING into the story. Within 45 minutes I was energized and sitting upright in my bed. I was fully alert and HAD to keep going. It was invigorating. After I completed the story I stayed awake for another 2 hours. Coasting on the inertia of this story. I was wired and inspired.
Who needs drugs when you've got masterful storytelling like this?
Regarding this story itself. I have a guilty love of stories about genius. Can anyone recommend similar stories/books/movies?
Why? It really paints a visceral picture of how learning happens and how superhuman intelligence is achieved through both neuron and physhiological transformations.
It's valid at some technical level but I dislike it so much. There are so many things. If I had to pick only a few, it's that it encourages to see LLMs as a worse and static rendering of an 'ideal' piece of data that we already have. This is not how the LLMs are useful. An LLM can be at its best when it's explaining or imagining for example something like 'how could x be combined with y in the context of z.' The LLM uses its imagination to answer it. Some would say 'hallucination' which isn't so good description. But in the metaphor of 'blurry jpeg' its answer could only be described as a 'jpeg artifact'. Which is bad. The most useful help that an LLM provides is analogous to the worst aspect of a blurry jpeg. Ughhh I hate it so much.
I don't want to be only negative so I'll put an example of an LLM take that I think is good, it's the simulators essay https://generative.ink/posts/simulators/
Also I can easily believe that Ted Chiang is an excellent science fiction story author I have read almost none of his stories but I heard they are great and I want to read them soon.
The Children novels are from another tradition - space opera. They focus on big canvases, rather than big ideas. That's not to imply the big ideas aren't there, but they're not the focal point in the same way. They're comparable to Alastair Reynolds or Iain Banks, not Ted Chiang.
First part is true and it brings up the question why Professor Xavier did not controlled his body with his telepathic powers?
The second part is not true. If one can coordinate to fire more muscle fibers at once, one can exert more power.
I also do not like that two superintelligent beings are fighting. It is such a bad trope. From what I know, these of intelligence quotient above 160 usually are interested in their work and life and rarely exhibit any, let me say, non-normal behavior.
Even academic mathematics has its share of Dramas. Engaging in conflict is a core evolutionary neccessity, being very smart does not remove you from that.
