If anyone is interested, here is the list of joint winners of the Hugo and Nebula awards: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_joint_winners_of_the_Hu... I always find this list tremendously useful when I don't know what to read next.
> I always find this list tremendously useful when I don't know what to read next. Likewise - This is how I recently found 'The Windup Girl' by Paolo Bacigalupi; thoroughly enjoyed this book and would highly recommend it.
The Best Science Fiction Books (According to Reddit)
151–160 of 291 posts
Re: The Best Science Fiction Books (According to Reddit)
#152Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can you offer some examples? I was surprised by this statement.
So I think the fundamentalist christian thing is pretty self explanatory if you've been paying attention. In terms of Jewish culture, it's not really a secret that most of Hollywood, the media, and much of progressivism and culture in general is organized around liberal jewish values. I'm not really an expert on why this is, but from what I can see protestantism sort of hit its high water mark shortly after WWII. Aro…
Re: The Best Science Fiction Books (According to Reddit)
#153The Foundation series was a great read, I read it when I was young and it influenced a lot of how I viewed the world around me. Having just reread it, I must say that it shows that Asimov did not really want to write the last parts of the series (i.e. Prelude to the Foundation and Forward the Foundation). Forward the Foundation especially is just trying to tie everything together by whatever means necessary. That bei…
I think the original three are so good because they are much less tainted by actual technology in the real world it seems, and it's sort of funny how Asimov, in some sense, describes Wikipedia and the utter importance of trade and consumption in ruling those around you, weaving in technology and concepts that even today sound like real science fiction; far fetched but attainable in the future. More importantly, Asimov does a good job in connecting you with the characters.
Re: The Best Science Fiction Books (According to Reddit)
#154Earlier quoted context omitted.
So I think the fundamentalist christian thing is pretty self explanatory if you've been paying attention. In terms of Jewish culture, it's not really a secret that most of Hollywood, the media, and much of progressivism and culture in general is organized around liberal jewish values. I'm not really an expert on why this is, but from what I can see protestantism sort of hit its high water mark shortly after WWII. Aro…
it's not really a secret that most of Hollywood, the media, and much of progressivism and culture in general is organized around liberal jewish values. Cross 'jewish' and that line make sense. There is nothing specifically 'jewish' about those values. If anything, they're Greek. We don't owe a lot to the pre-Socratic societies, apart from them inspiring the Greeks to their greatness. In Western civilization, everythi…
That is, in judaism spiritual development comes from fully engaging with the physical and secular world, and immersing yourself in all of its problems and opportunities. In protestantism, spiritual development comes from contemplative experiences (e.g. thoreau) that are set apart from everyday life, that hopefully allow you to connect more fully with both the secular world and your religious values once you get back to mainstream society. And in fundamentalist christianity, spiritual development comes from the active and purposeful rejection of secular society.
I think the reason we have so many extremists in the GOP right now is as a reaction to the existential arrogance of modern liberalism. E.g. not only do fundamentalists see things like Starbucks and Michael Cera / Seth Rogan movies as endorsing an implicit set of values and model of spiritual development, but they see also them as basically purposely shitting all over their way of life just to rub it in. That's partly why we're increasingly getting politicians like michele bachmann and rick perry.
Re: The Best Science Fiction Books (According to Reddit)
#155Probably the most surprising thing about this list is that whoever made it didn't insert Amazon affiliate links into it. Anyway, these lists always raise the question of what does "good" mean exactly? Inevitably they're dominated by books that were, in their time, incredibly significant. You see the same things in computing books. Someone will always recommend "Design Patterns" but (IMHO) it is the dullest, driest bo…
Re: The Best Science Fiction Books (According to Reddit)
#156If anyone is interested, here is the list of joint winners of the Hugo and Nebula awards: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_joint_winners_of_the_Hu... I always find this list tremendously useful when I don't know what to read next.
Perfect for finding new interesting writers (Bacigalupi was one of the nicest discoveries)
[1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Years_Best_Science_Fiction
Re: The Best Science Fiction Books (According to Reddit)
#157Missing: Eon by Greg Bear http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eon_(novel)
I highly recommend reading Tau Zero by Poul Anderson and Stone by Adam Roberts.
Re: The Best Science Fiction Books (According to Reddit)
#158Obviously with any list there's going to be quite a lot of nits to pick... At any rate, here are mine. Sad to see Stanislaw Lem completely left out in favor of some obviously inferior books (Anathem!?). Also a curious choice for the obligatory Atwood novel. Surprised that Gravity's Rainbow was not on there- I'd put it near the top (maybe it wasn't "Sci-Fi" enough?) Good to see Canticle for Leibowitz as well as a fair…
Re: The Best Science Fiction Books (According to Reddit)
#159Probably the most surprising thing about this list is that whoever made it didn't insert Amazon affiliate links into it. Anyway, these lists always raise the question of what does "good" mean exactly? Inevitably they're dominated by books that were, in their time, incredibly significant. You see the same things in computing books. Someone will always recommend "Design Patterns" but (IMHO) it is the dullest, driest bo…
"Cyberpunk is largely an expression of fears about an Asian (Japanese more often than not) 'takeover' of Western society." I would argue that this has largely already happened. There is sort of a battle between liberal jewish culture and fundamentalist christian culture for being the official US mythology, but on a day to day basis Japanese culture and values are largely what have filled the power void. I would argue…
One of the reasons for the endurance of English-speaking cultures (in particular) is the ability for both the language and the culture (which are distinct yet related) to absorb other languages and cultures.
Take as a counterexample France. There is a Ministry dedicated to keeping the French language "pure". There is plenty of lip service paid to the preservation of French culture. Basically France is acting like its language and culture is under siege... because it is. There are many examples like this.
English as a language seems to have no issue with absorbing the concepts and words of other languages. Once that have been here for centuries have long since been anglicized but more recent adoptees often preserve the original pronunciation.
So what you see as Japanification I see as English-speaking culturue and language simply absorbing another language and culture. This changes the language and culture but both remain firmly "English".
One could even characterize this as "cultural hegemony". It's not really any different to Romanization that took place 1500-2500 years ago.
I would even argue that as much as you might think of this as Japanification that Japan is probably becoming more American/English than we have become Japanese. Japan is still obviously a very different place to the US but many things have changed. There is less of the "job for life" thing that was very popular only decades ago, just as one example.
Re: The Best Science Fiction Books (According to Reddit)
#160Thought I might see 'Flowers for Algernon' on here.
One author that I find sadly missing from the list is John Brunner. Each of "Stand on Zanzibar", "The Sheep Look Up", and "Shockwave Rider" would arguably deserve a place on this list.