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Marshall Brain has died

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Re: Marshall Brain has died

#11

Post by Mistletoe »

bckr wrote: post #7

Oh, this is very sad. I was really inspired by his essays and stories when I was 17. I wonder what was happening with him.

> Marshall Brain died inside his office Wednesday on N.C. State’s centennial campus.

>While the university would not confirm any details related to his death, sources close to Brain said he died by suicide.

:(

Marshall was a frequent poster in subreddits such as /r/collapse.

https://www.reddit.com/user/MarshallBrain/

I don’t think it’s hard to see what things concerned him. I think it’s important for all of us to realize that no matter how we think the world is going there is still brightness in the world and Marshall contributed to that brightness through his contributions to society.

Re: Marshall Brain has died

#12

Post by simpaticoder »

monocasa wrote: post #6

I'm going to use this time to drop the Marshall Brain work that had the biggest impact on me, and is some of the most prescient speculative fiction I've read. Manna: Two Views of Humanity’s Future He contracts two societies. One is a dystopia where AI very, very similar to today's ML models is integrated into society as a replacement for the middle class, removing social mobility as well as acting as a panopticon low…

Very cool story, quite impactful on my thinking, although I will caution that the dystopia is better conceived than the utopia, mainly because the later requires inventing fantasy technology while the former does not. Indeed it's not clear at all what forces might destabalize the dystopia, since the power structures are immortal and self-replicating, and physics and biology (at least) prevents the utopia from existing. Maybe an asteroid or a caldera explosion? In fact I would love to read a sequel where the dystopia wins and AI-empowered oligarchs and human wage slaves create generation ships to nearby stars and eventually setup fast food restaurants in every corner of the galaxy.

Re: Marshall Brain has died

#14

Post by schiffern »

BadHumans wrote: post #9

Given the amount of dystopian content he was posting on his website and subreddit lately, he seemed to be despairing quite a bit regarding the direction of society.

I noticed that. He made several subreddits, here's a (likely incomplete) list. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42224139

His commentary near the end of this interview is also telling. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BA5v2cfJp1o

An optimist in (increasingly) a cynic's world. Be at peace, Marshall Brain.

Re: Marshall Brain has died

#15

Post by gothink »

Wow, this is very tragic. I was actually just reflecting on the influence Howstuffworks.com had on my life and interests. Quick story:

My first introduction to programming was building a Geocities website in HTML (using notepad, of course) at a science camp in 1999. They also showed us the "How HTML Works" web page as a resource, which became my first technical resource. I remembering struggling with something on my website and eventually emailing my question to Howstuffworks, not expecting much back. Not only did a very patient and informative woman respond to me, she continued to answer my questions and offer helpful guidance to this very eager kid for the rest of the summer. Without that positive experience, who knows if I would have stuck with it. It's been on mind a lot since I just realized that was 25 years ago.

I hope Marshall knew how much people valued the things he created and the impact they had.

Re: Marshall Brain has died

#16

Post by yarg »

As someone who has pulled himself back from suicidality, I absolutely abhor the expression "died by suicide".

If I had gone through with it, I would have killed myself - and any euphemisms being thrown around would serve no-one at all (especially not those still living in that hole).

I would much rather have it framed as me having done something unforgivably stupid and completely preventable - but as a society we'd much rather reject that reality and instead refuse to acknowledge that more often than not the signs were all there; that not only was the death an irreversible act of idiocy, but it was also something that we could've and should've stopped yet did nothing to prevent.

Re: Marshall Brain has died

#17

Post by schiffern »

gothink wrote: post #15

Wow, this is very tragic. I was actually just reflecting on the influence Howstuffworks.com had on my life and interests. Quick story: My first introduction to programming was building a Geocities website in HTML (using notepad, of course) at a science camp in 1999. They also showed us the "How HTML Works" web page as a resource, which became my first technical resource. I remembering struggling with something on my…

Marshall Brain also wrote many programming books in the 90s era.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_Brain#Publications

Re: Marshall Brain has died

#18

Post by bckr »

Mistletoe wrote: post #11
bckr wrote: post #7

Oh, this is very sad. I was really inspired by his essays and stories when I was 17. I wonder what was happening with him.

> Marshall Brain died inside his office Wednesday on N.C. State’s centennial campus. >While the university would not confirm any details related to his death, sources close to Brain said he died by suicide. :( Marshall was a frequent poster in subreddits such as /r/collapse. https://www.reddit.com/user/MarshallBrain/ I don’t think it’s hard to see what things concerned him. I think it’s important for all of us to rea…

I wondered. How dark.

Re: Marshall Brain has died

#19

Post by yrral »

Wow, when I was a kid back in the early 2000s, howstuffworks was my favorite website. I bet I read every article on how various things work (there were many hundreds).

I found that the knowledge from that website helped me understand how everything in the world worked and satisfied my curious mind. I attribute my knack for understanding new things and fixing things to this website.

Back then, the site was clean and had very good clean and expertly written explanations of how various mechanical, everyday and scientific equipment worked. Nowadays that website is not the same, seems riddled with SEO spam and fluff articles like a content mill.

Rest in Peace Marshall Brain, thank you for all your contributions to my (and likely others) life

Re: Marshall Brain has died

#20

Post by arresin »

gothink wrote: post #15

Wow, this is very tragic. I was actually just reflecting on the influence Howstuffworks.com had on my life and interests. Quick story: My first introduction to programming was building a Geocities website in HTML (using notepad, of course) at a science camp in 1999. They also showed us the "How HTML Works" web page as a resource, which became my first technical resource. I remembering struggling with something on my…

This makes me nostalgic for the small internet.
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