All Tomorrows
A Billion Year Chronicle of the Myriad Species and Varying Fortunes of Man
Stats for nerds
5recommend
7mentions
7people
2011–2025years
71% recommend29% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- I agree on circumcision but you made it out that all kinds of mutilation are perfectly acceptable. But that one should definitely be banned, idk why (no -Jewish) Americans are so obsessed with it.
> There are plenty of unknowable things about life.
I agree but I know that I’m going to die someday.
As for where genetic engineering can lead I recommend the book “All Tomorrows”.
In any case i broadly agree with you - however there should still be guardrails and until we can safely and reliably manipulate the genetics of “less complex” animals we shouldn’t experiment with humans.
However you can probably do it if you really want! There are lots of countries that have less guardrails in place - but I would assume you don’t want to take the risk when it’s comes to your own life/offspring or am I wrong?
Take some trajectory-changing bets yourself and then I’ll believe that what you are saying is not just posturing
- Honestly, it reminds me of "All Tomorrows" by C. M. Kosemen.
The "emotions" part is kind of tongue-in-cheek. I think emotional responses are one of the more mechanical parts of a human being.
Ability to demonstrate empathy: that's a good human trick. It can sort of transcend the hard problem of consciousness (what is to be like...) by using all sorts of unorthodox workarounds on our inner workings. It must have been very hard to develop. It doesn't always work, but we'll get there eventually.
edit: fixed book and author name to proper reference
- Dunno about older sci-fi, but I'm reminded of the short(~100 pages) story All Tomorrows by Nemo Ramjet where humanity is genetically transformed by an alien civilisation into various other human-ish species across the galaxy, as slaves in a vast empire. Alt Shift X has a good audio version of it on youtube.
It definitely hits an interesting nexus point between existential sci-fi and Lovecraftian horror, highly recommend it.
- Kosemen's "All Tomorrows" is also a fascinating art book, looking at a possible future of humanity: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Tomorrows
- I got this book a good few years ago. Most of the book is really good and interesting, but overall I'm not sure I liked it, but maybe I missed the point or something. I should reread it sometime and see :)
I did love the setting though - a world where Babbage had completed the analytical engine and computers (mechanical, steam powered ones) were unleashed on the world a hundred years early. Some interesting ideas are explored.
As for other books, I actually enjoyed some of Gibsons newer stuff (The Bridge Trilogy: "Virtual Light", "Idoru" and "All Tomorrows Party"), though I've seen a lot of people say non of his other stuff was as good as Neuromancer.
- Straight from All Tomorrows book.
