Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Cixin Liu's Postscript for the American Edition for “The Three Body Problem”

reader.epubee.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 110 posts

Re: Cixin Liu's Postscript for the American Edition for “The Three Body Problem”

#51

Post by elihu »

kbenson wrote: post #34
elihu wrote: post #33

This seems like the most controversial bit here: > There’s a strange contradiction revealed by the naïveté and kindness demonstrated by humanity when faced with the universe: On Earth, humankind can step onto another continent, and without a thought, destroy the kindred civilizations found there through warfare and disease. But when they gaze up at the stars, they turn sentimental and believe that if extraterrestrial…

Tit-for-tat assumes a relatively equivalent level of negative outcome for each. There's very little reason to assume an alien civilization would be, and a few reasons to assume they would be quite a bit more advanced and with more resources. Responding in a friendly manner to a direct communication is a good idea. Telling your whole tribe to run to the beach and look at and call to the large wooden boat passing by on…

One can imagine a scenario where the only way our species survives is to detect an alien civilization before they detect us, and to nuke their homeworld preemtively because they would do the same to us. Tit-for-tat doesn't really work when a first-strike can kill everyone. Or to put it another way, tit-for-tat only works in iterated prisoner's dilemma. If an encounter with aliens is more like a single-round prisoner's dilemma, we're in a bit of a bind.

(Even more likely is the scenario where we're so far behind technologically that the best we can do is hope they're friendly; if they aren't, there's nothing much we can do about it.)

However, even if alien races aren't constrained by anything we would recognize as morality, we are (sometimes) constrained by our own morality. I think that's a good thing.

Re: Cixin Liu's Postscript for the American Edition for “The Three Body Problem”

#52

Post by free_rms »

smsm42 wrote: post #38
free_rms wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you name the dates and major events within the Great Leap forward or Cultural Revolution without googling and reading wikipedia? I'm not trying to assert authority here but you could look at the last 500 years, the last 200, 100, years, the last 50 years.. cherrypicking a 25 year period that happened between 70-45 years ago is kinda weird if you're after understanding rather than scoring points.

In the same vein, why should we be obsessing about mere 12 years of German history, and one guy (who isn't even a German but an Austrian!) instead of looking back at hundreds of years of European history and ignoring that unfortunate, but ultimately minor, incident? I mean, if we're about understanding, not scoring points.

Germany's an ally. We don't try to beat them up over hitler, and it wouldn't make sense if we did. For basically the same reasons, so good choice of analogy I guess.

Re: Cixin Liu's Postscript for the American Edition for “The Three Body Problem”

#53

Post by jhanschoo »

logicchains wrote: post #47
Elaine-H wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read the trilogy in Chinese but only the first book in English. The original Dark Forest is perfectly fine. Many people suggested it has the best storytelling among the three. 1. Ken Liu is generally considered (by people who have read the trilogy in both languages) a better translator 2. the Dark Forest's structure does feel a little "literary" to me, which might make you felt "the chapters were strangely broken u…

Shows the western world has really gone to shit when even an author from mainland China finds its thought policing exhausting. Phillip K. Dick would be rolling in his grave.

Keep in mind that what an editor has in mind, you're trying to sell genre fiction that has certain genre expectations, and noticed deviations from the staple that readers notice ought to have meaning to them.

Depending on the fiction the target audience grew up reading they may be sensitive to different tropes. e.g. it might be quite exhausting to read a novel with an overuse of "pure" and "angelic" in a most Anglophone societies where these words aren't that frequently used to describe friends and family.

Re: Cixin Liu's Postscript for the American Edition for “The Three Body Problem”

#54

Post by kbenson »

free_rms wrote: post #50
kbenson wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I didn't get that from it at all. The theme of the last book is a conflict between values and survival. What's the point of survival if you sacrifice all values to do so? That always seemed like a trite argument of those who want to justify their own behavior, and is a cop out in a story. The point of survival is that values change, and can return, but survival is absolute. You fight until there is no other option,…

I don't know if you read the books but there are some pretty severe consequences.

Oh, I've read the first two, I was responding to that statement as it's usually applied in conversation or argument. The discussion and exploration of it is worthwhile. It's common use as a "call to arms" less so.

Re: Cixin Liu's Postscript for the American Edition for “The Three Body Problem”

#55

Post by fspeech »

cromwellian wrote: post #39
woshicoolbe wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a Chinese living in Europe. Almost all the articles in media I read in Western media on China are negative. They only talk about HK, Uyghurs. But China has many exciting things happening and very dynamic. But in another hand, I saw the western media just criticize everything, it's like the whole world only has negative things happening. I personally don't hate the Chinese government. The people's living standard…

The press isn’t just supposed to report government propaganda of how everything is going great because invariable while some people are benefitting, others are suffering. Be it the civilians in Yemen being starved by a Saudi-led American backed proxy war, or the Uyghurs in Xinjiang. Yes, China has raised a huge number of people out of poverty, mostly thanks to Deng inviting in foreign investment, but Xi is turning Ch…

Focusing on the negatives of your own country is fine because the readers have the ability to judge for themselves. Focusing only on the negatives of a foreign country is not unless the goal is to agitate the populace for conflict and war.

Take your imagined trilateral water war as an example, have you looked into how minor the supply is to India? Have you considered the fact that damming for electricity has little effect on total volume of flow? Otoh, when US dammed the Colorado the water was diverted for agriculture and urban consumption. The river basically dried up before reaching Mexico.

Re: Cixin Liu's Postscript for the American Edition for “The Three Body Problem”

#56

Post by bohadi »

actuator wrote: post #23
free_rms wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's happening in India is that farmers were/are going to be screwed, and they're really mad about it. What has happened in China is that a billion farmers are massively, undescribably better off. You literally cannot describe it to the average American, their scale for lifestyle doesn't go that low.

> What has happened in China is that a billion farmers are massively, undescribably better off. After Great Leap forward? Cultural Revolution? What about the farmers of the marginalized communities in Tibet and Xinjiang. I am not saying all that gets printed in Western press is true but it is not all fabricated up as well. There was an actual cost to getting here, which might not have happened in a democratic setup.…

Yes, there is a price and a sacrifice. India is choosing different trade-offs.

Others' progress is our progress too.

Re: Cixin Liu's Postscript for the American Edition for “The Three Body Problem”

#57

Post by boulos »

Elaine-H wrote: post #42
boulos wrote: post #16

If there's anyone out there that has read the trilogy in both the original Mandarin as well as the English translations, I'd love to get their take on the effect of translation. If I remember correctly, I found The Three Body Problem super pleasant to read and engaging. By contrast, I liked the idea of Dark Forest but found it almost painful to read. The chapters were strangely broken up (some extremely long, etc.) a…

I read the trilogy in Chinese but only the first book in English. The original Dark Forest is perfectly fine. Many people suggested it has the best storytelling among the three. 1. Ken Liu is generally considered (by people who have read the trilogy in both languages) a better translator 2. the Dark Forest's structure does feel a little "literary" to me, which might make you felt "the chapters were strangely broken u…

Thanks!

I don't think the political correctness or other changes would have really bothered me, it was much more about structure. IIRC, there were some "chapters" in Dark Forest that were... over an hour?

In Chinese, does the third book also go back to a more ... narrative style? That is, did you consider the first and third books to be "similar in style" but Dark Forest to stand out?

Thanks again!

P.S. I struggled to decide between saying "Chinese" or Mandarin. I had thought there were also "word/regional differences" between Mandarin and Cantonese, not just pronunciation. Good to know that Chinese would have been correct!

Re: Cixin Liu's Postscript for the American Edition for “The Three Body Problem”

#58

Post by pochamago »

slowmovintarget wrote: post #45
quesera wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can think of a few simple (maybe simplistic) reasons for the dichotomy: * We imagine theoretical "people"/beings to be good, but are confronted with the complicated reality of our neighbors. Non-human entities remain strictly theoretical, untainted by the same reality. * We see spacefaring beings as advanced beyond ourselves, and aspirationally believe that goodness accrues with advancement. Or at the very least, t…

Christianity has been fairly responsive to modern reforms. Logic notwithstanding, you sweep a hand and say "God created them too, they are siblings from another star." Granted, that'd be a really hard sell for most mainstream branches of any religion. But, to your point, you said some major religion, and there are already some major religions that declare Christians to be OK to kill.

Definitely going to depend on the religion, and even the sect. Catholicism already has doctrine to deal with it developed back when there were stories about inhuman dog people inhabiting the continent of Africa.

Re: Cixin Liu's Postscript for the American Edition for “The Three Body Problem”

#59

Post by free_rms »

kbenson wrote: post #54
free_rms wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if you read the books but there are some pretty severe consequences.

Oh, I've read the first two, I was responding to that statement as it's usually applied in conversation or argument. The discussion and exploration of it is worthwhile. It's common use as a "call to arms" less so.

The third book is good, almost as good as the second imo. Manages to become completely insane while still feeling believable at each step.

Re: Cixin Liu's Postscript for the American Edition for “The Three Body Problem”

#60

Post by smsm42 »

free_rms wrote: post #52
smsm42 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the same vein, why should we be obsessing about mere 12 years of German history, and one guy (who isn't even a German but an Austrian!) instead of looking back at hundreds of years of European history and ignoring that unfortunate, but ultimately minor, incident? I mean, if we're about understanding, not scoring points.

Germany's an ally. We don't try to beat them up over hitler, and it wouldn't make sense if we did. For basically the same reasons, so good choice of analogy I guess.

Something happened between the time of Hitler and not beating them over it now, that led to Germany becoming an ally. But I guess this is also one of those things we're not supposed to dwell on? It was not an ally and became an ally, just like that. Same with Japan, btw. I guess that would happen magically with China too?
Post reply on HN