Diaspora
A Novel
by Greg Egan · first published 1997
71% recommend28% neutral1% critical
Why HN recommends it
Hard sci-fi about uploaded minds, AI and post-human life, packed with big ideas and detailed science. Suits readers who liked Permutation City or Accelerando and want their thinking stretched.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
From back cover HarperPrism paperback November 1999: It is the thirtieth century. The "world" has evolved into a vast network of probes, satellites, and servers knitting the solar system into one scape from the outer planets to the sun. Humanity, too, has reconfigured itself. Most people have chosen immortality, joining the polises to become conscious software. Others have opted for disposable, renewable robotic bodies that remain in contact with the physical world. A few holdouts stubbornly remain fleshers struggling to shape an antiquated existence in the muck and jungle of Earth.
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There is never a bad time to plug Egan on HN. Diaspora is one of his novels around just this topic. If you decide to read it, strap in, you're going for a mind bending ride. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/156785.Diaspora
on “Exploding stars may have caused mass extinction on Earth: study” ↗…never know anything had occurred.[3] [1] Granted, this is a "if"! [2] The more we know about the universe, the more this seems to be true. [3] This entire point of view is the main theme of the book Diaspora by Greg Egan, which I highly recommend.
on “Why does anything exist?” ↗…I've managed to get paid for it, I'm not convinced that it's essential. If I had taken the academic path, it would have been less relevant. I'm also inspired by post-Singularity fiction, most recently 'Diaspora' by Greg Egan. I don't recall that the concept of "money" occurs in the book.
on “'Rise of the Robots' and 'Shadow Work'” ↗One of the opening scenes from the transhuman adventure novel Diaspora by Greg Egan involves a robot on the moon tending a large laser interferometer which observes two inspiraling neutron stars. Perhaps my favourite book.
on “Second Gravitational Wave Detected at LIGO” ↗Fascinating. It will be wondrous to see if it occurs. It also reminds me of a premise in one of my favorite science fiction novels, Diaspora by Greg Egan. In the story, the characters are monitoring the orbit of a binary star system. The orbit is decaying and a collision is expected at some point. However, soon the characters realize that…
on “Stars may collide in a “red nova” in 2022” ↗Have you read Diaspora by Greg Egan? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diaspora_(novel)
on “Grabby Aliens” ↗…Deepness in the Sky, The Peace War, Marooned in Realtime. All great novels, but start from A Fire Upon the Deep (I read that in 2008) if you haven't read Vinge before, it's the best introduction. Greg Egan, Diaspora, Quarantine, Distress. Egan is the best hardcore SF author out there. _Diaspora_ is a fascinating take on shared simulated reality that's very different from the usual fare. Quarantine will appeal to…
on “Ask HN: Great books you read in 2009?” ↗Diaspora by Greg Egan is one of the most amazing books I've ever read, in terms of the ideas it explores. A serious treatment of the future where humans' minds are scanned into machines: what senses do you have…
on “Foundations by Greg Egan (1998)” ↗I really like Egan's work, particularly earlier books like Diaspora and Permutation City, but find his later works unsatisfying due to poor characterisation and pace. Incandescence is a good example - I plodded through it and finished only by a real effort of will. Does…
on “The Feynman Lectures on Physics are free online” ↗…possibly even stripping part of the atmosphere away, etc. For a great novel based around a strikingly similar premise to what was just observed (and the main reason I even bothered to calculate this), Diaspora by Greg Egan is a fantastic book.
on “Physicists Detect Gravitational Waves, Proving Einstein Right” ↗…brought about by increasing computing power. Somewhat cheeky, a little frenetic. Three Body Problem, by Liu Cixin -- Algorithms and game theory plots regarding solving a civilsation-destroying puzzle. Diaspora, by Greg Egan -- Post-trans-humanist shenanigans. Other things of note: Neal Stephenson writes a lot of cyberpunk computer-adjacent fiction. Snow Crash, Diamond Age, and Cryptonomicon all come to mind.…
Diaspora by Greg Egan will twist the way you think of perception
on “Ask HN: Books that altered your view of reality” ↗Have you read Greg Egan's Diaspora? The "direction" of migration described there is quite interesting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diaspora_%28novel%29
on “Ye cannae change the laws of physics -- or can you?” ↗A GRB plays an important part in the novel Diaspora by Greg Egan. I'd recommend it if you're interested in learning what would actually happen were we to be closer. (Without being a trained astrophysicist, the events in the novel seemed plausible, so…
on “Followup on the star torn apart by a black hole: Hubble picture ” ↗…evidence about the purpose of the universe implies that any specific speculation on the question is almost certainly incorrect. Fun to think about, though. Have you read Greg Egan's Permutation City or Diaspora? http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/PERMUTATION/Permuta... http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/DIASPORA/DIASPORA.h...
on “Who here believes the universe is a computer simulation?” ↗