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Permutation City (1994)

gregegan.net

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Re: Permutation City (1994)

#101

Post by maxglute »

Doches wrote: post #29

Fun to see this on HN today; I just finished it last night, on a recommendation from a friend. It was great, and left me full of unfinished thoughts -- just what you want from a good SF yarn. For folks who enjoyed the ideas in it I can heartily recommend qntm's short story Lena ( https://qntm.org/lena ), which explores some of the same ideas but with a hefty dollop of (implied, but all the more intense for it) psycho…

Good read, feels like it should be structured as an academic paper with made up bibliographies.

Re: Permutation City (1994)

#102

Post by nyssos »

G3rn0ti wrote: post #13
k__ wrote: post #2

Pretty awesome book. Would be cool if someone could recommend sci-fi that equally good.

> Would be cool if someone could recommend sci-fi that equally good. You could consider „Diaspora“ by the same author a good sequel a couple of thousands of years into the future where humanity is but a faint memory called „dream apes“ as living fossils in this story.

> where humanity is but a faint memory called „dream apes“ as living fossils in this story.

Dream apes are the descendants of an extreme primitivist subculture, the "statics" the protagonists visit at the beginning are baseline humans.

Re: Permutation City (1994)

#105

Post by vagab0nd »

rollulus wrote: post #8

I loved this book. It’s the sort of book that made me occasionally pause and think about the ideas presented in it. Boltzmann brains still fascinate me. The spot market for CPU power was visionary. When reading it again when I was older I only found the characters a bit weak.

> The spot market for CPU power was visionary.

Absolutely. Not to mention the use of proof of work, just 2 years after the idea was actually proposed. Very ahead of its time.

Re: Permutation City (1994)

#106

Post by gilbetron »

dandare wrote: post #103

Just came here to say that Diaspora by Gregg Egan is my #1 book ever :)

I literally was telling a friend about how the one group needed to warn the group on earth about the danger (keeping things vague deliberately!) and how they had to quickly "evolve" different entities to be able to communicate with the earth beings.

Also the different time scale awareness concept.

Such great ideas!

Re: Permutation City (1994)

#107

Post by ArekDymalski »

k__ wrote: post #2

Pretty awesome book. Would be cool if someone could recommend sci-fi that equally good.

Let me share several books that brought me a similar level of awe, due to the scope and creativity of the world-building:

1. Accelerando by Charles Stross - for THE Scope.

2. Quantum Thief by Hanny Rajaniemi - for the similarly high entry threshold and rewarding experience when you cross it.

3. Revelation Space by Alastair Reynolds - for a fascinating vision of future human societies.

I'd be happy to find more books like these.

Re: Permutation City (1994)

#108

Post by alexpotato »

cstross wrote: post #81
alexpotato wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read Accelerando recently and it's great. Hard to believe that it was written in 2005 given the one scene where the main character is walking around generating multiple interlocking crypto contracts to store money for his daughter.

It was published in 2005 -- actually I wrote the 9 novelettes that went into it from 1998-2003 (they were originally published in Asimov's SF magazine from 2002-2004 before I assembled and rewrote them to make the book).

Not going to lie, getting a comment from THE AUTHOR of a book I greatly enjoyed is now one of the highlights of my 10+ years of being on HN!

I should add: every time I hear the phrase "state vector" I think of Accelerando.

Re: Permutation City (1994)

#109

Post by yboris »

edanm wrote: post #95
mindcrime wrote: post #84

I thought Permutation City was great. One of my favorite sci-fi reads from the last couple of decades. It's probably about time to read it again, as most of the details escape me now. Anyway, I was going to say... I've always thought that folks who enjoyed Permutation City might also enjoy Glasshouse [1] by Charles Stross[2]. The two novels aren't necessarily overtly similar, but I feel like there's a sort of abstrac…

I've long wanted to read Charles Stross and somehow haven't. (Well, I read a few chapters of Accelerando years ago and never finished it, despiting liking it quite a bit.) Do you think Glasshouse is a good place to start with his writing and is representative of his style? I loved Permutation City, one of my favorite books. (I would've asked cstross himself but that would seem too awkward!)

I once commented on HN how much I loved Accelerando and Charles Stross responded suggesting I read his The Rapture of the Nerds. I read it soon after and loved it. I very much enjoy the genre of people living inside computers; I welcome recommendations.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rapture_of_the_Nerds

Re: Permutation City (1994)

#110

Post by yboris »

cstross wrote: post #81
alexpotato wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read Accelerando recently and it's great. Hard to believe that it was written in 2005 given the one scene where the main character is walking around generating multiple interlocking crypto contracts to store money for his daughter.

It was published in 2005 -- actually I wrote the 9 novelettes that went into it from 1998-2003 (they were originally published in Asimov's SF magazine from 2002-2004 before I assembled and rewrote them to make the book).

Thank you for your work! Last time I praised Accelerando on HN you commented that I should read The Rapture of the Nerds. I read it shortly after and loved it!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rapture_of_the_Nerds

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