The sci fi short story is my jam. It’s what I fall back on time and time again when I’m looking for a book to scratch that itch—the one to rekindle my love of reading.
I adored this collection of short stories, with my favorites being the first, the titular story, and the one about the life cycle of digients.
As in his previous short story collection, Ted Chiang offers us a series of essays presenting thought experiments, camouflaged perfectly as well written fiction, in his own calm, measured, well polished style.
This collection seems to be concerned a lot with parenting, free will and AIs. I think especially on AI, it makes very interesting observations, which everyone should read. It offers an alternative vision for producing AIs that has a chance to avoid the pitfalls that creating them based on principles put forth in code has (at least in my mind).
All in all, it would even be worth it just for the story in question, so the fact that most of the stories are great means everyone interested in thought experiments about science should read it.
This collection is a tour of fascinating ideas. The philosophical/moral implications of technology pop up a lot. Some of my favorites:
The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate: hear LeVar Burton read it here
Exhalation: A character's intense self-examination
The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling: A pair of related stories discussing technology's impact on us.
Anxiety is the Dizziness of Freedom: Branching timelines, possibilities, and their implications for the meaning of personal choice.
While I enjoyed all of the central ideas, some of the individual stories lost me. For example, I found the premise of "The Lifecycle of Software Objects" more interesting than the actual story. Ditto for "Omphalos".
