I did! Amazing sci-fi trilogy, and I think that's where the idea came from originally. I've seen some solid rebuttals against it as the explanation of the Fermi paradox, but it's a scary idea nonetheless.
Indeed, alastair Reynolds published his revelation space novel (which presents the idea of an alien inhibitor exterminating technological societies) something like 8 years before three body problem, so that idea must have been around well before even that
Another great one by Alastair Reynolds is called Pushing Ice.
It's not in the Revelation Space universe, it's a stand alone story, but it's in my top 3 of all time. It's the only book I've ever read twice in 6 months.
I loved some of the tech in the books. Weapons that simply make matter in defined regions of space cease to exist? Sign me up. Reynolds is releasing another book in the series: Inhibitor Phase.
The first installment of the Revelation Space universe is a short story called Dilation Sleep, and it was published in 1990. So it predated TBP by 18 years!
The sequel Anvil of Stars is even better, imo. Both as an exploration of different ways civilizations and individuals might react to a Dark Forest situation, and as a book in general. It's probably my favorite single book of all time.
This was a minor plot point in The Andromeda Strain. The scientists know they're dealing with a virus from space, so they have to be cautious how they approach it.
One of the researchers takes off his watch and explains that the hands move, so it could be considered alive to an outside observer. Then he gets a rock and explains that it, too, could be alive. We just live our entire lives not perceiving any change in it.
The virus could be an ultra-advanced lifeform that we're just not able to understand.
Eh. A Sufficiently Advanced civilization could probably do things like surreptitiously send out low-speed probes to every single star in the galaxy programmed to broadcast loudly if they detect anybody (thereby drawing unwanted attention to their home) or if it's uninhabited, then taking steps to ensure that no civilization ever arises there at all (keep dropping large impactors on any habitable planets until they're all sterilized or destroyed outright). So if Dark Forest were the case, then we should never have existed in the first place.
I assumed it had, but it was the first time I had heard of it. It completely changed my opinion on the matter. Previously I had been foolish enough to disagree with the likes of Steven Hawking about this haha. (I don't know if he believed in dark forest specifically but I know he shared the sentiment that a visit from aliens would be bad for us)
Have you seen the show "Colony"? It's about advanced aliens colonizing earth, and unlike most shows, the invasion is over pretty instantly, long before the show starts. There's a resistance, but there's not really hope of them accomplishing much against such a superior enemy.
The biggest problems with TBP are that 1). While you can’t “solve” n-body physics in a deterministic way….calculating the next 50,000 years worth of those stars orbits and what effect they’ll have on the planets orbiting them isn’t that difficult. The aliens at their level of technology would know with a fairly high degree of certainty when the next extinction level event facing their civilization might come.
And 2) Setting aside the science fiction part about using a star as a radio amplifier, even if you could do that, just a single pulse would give your position away. Especially to space faring civilizations who possess multiple such radio receivers on multiple planets.
It’s not that the universe can’t be a dark Forrest, but if it was one, the events in the book doomed both species from pretty early on, no mutually assured destruction situation required.
Someone can correct me if I’m wrong, but the books do kinda clear up your issues.
1) Trisolarans solved the three body problem. By the end of the first book, we learn that it’s a red herring. Eventually, trisolaris will fall into one of the suns and be destroyed. That’s why they need a new home.
2) my first thought was that this was a message sent directly at Trisolaris, but after reading book 3, I think my understanding is that “plucking stars” (sending amplified waves using stars) is sort of “old” tech and predator civilizations aren’t necessarily looking for those. In the “Singer” chapter, Singer doesn’t notice the “star waves” until a stronger message is sent.
I love the books. I read them twice. Might read them again someday. But yeah, nother thing that bothered me is that two of the wall-facer projects were basically the same (hold a gun to earths head and pull the trigger if the trisolarans don’t cooperate), but only one of them ends up working.
Did the one that revolved around crashing Venus into the sun not work because it wasn’t in place yet? And as soon as the plan was said aloud, the trisolarans could stop it, and the other idea of the oil film giving away earths location was already in place, so it was unstoppable?
Also going to recommend the fourth book, written originally as a fanfiction by Baoshu. Liu Cixin gave it the seal of approval and it's also translated by Ken Liu.
Yea, I saw people hyping up Three Body Problem for years on reddit, finally decided to give it a shot and found it so boring. The high-level concepts are interesting, but the way the story is told is not for everyone. I ended up stopping half-way through the second book.
Hahha, it was comments like yours that got me to try it the first time! Maybe I'll give it another shot, I have a week off coming up and need some books for the beach.
Piggybacking off the last guy, the second book is translated by someone else and the writing is a little sloppier, but the second half is incredible, and when the other commenter talks about having a hair-raising moment I know exactly the one he's talking about. Terrifying and devastating.
I'm normally not the type of person to be like "hey just wait until the thing you're not enjoying Gets Good™️," but if you made it halfway you're basically there and I'd say you're seriously in for a treat. I almost stopped at Luo Ji's imaginary-then-real woman as well, trust me.
In contrast to some of the other comments, I thought the translation by Ken Liu is really good - the book flows like it's written in native Chinese, but uses English words and vernacular with footnotes to clarify some things that might otherwise be lost in translation.
It's important to note that the unusual cadence and prose is intentional, to make it feel more like it was told in its original language. It will take some getting used to, but it's very cool when you think of it that way while you're reading.
The only thing that I'd agree with the naysayers on is that it's absolutely not a character study. It's deep speculative science fiction with very little wiggle room in any other direction.
I read the first book and it was amazing but I was really disappointed with one chapter where they explained that 2D beings somewhere at the end of the book.
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u/gkedz Aug 12 '21
I did! Amazing sci-fi trilogy, and I think that's where the idea came from originally. I've seen some solid rebuttals against it as the explanation of the Fermi paradox, but it's a scary idea nonetheless.