Fall of Hyperion
Dec. 1st, 2008 01:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jackOK, now I've read Fall of Hyperion. Now I need someone to explain it to me. As I recall:
1. Humanity invents AIs, which become self-directed
2. AIs form three factions. Stables whowants to keep humanity like humanity keeps horses are happy with symbiosis with humanity. Volatiles who see humanity as a threat. Ultimates who want to create the next level of intelligence, an ultimate intelligence.
3. AIs continue to perform calculating functions for humanity. Presumably normally provided by Stables. But the others may influence this information sometimes, which might lead to apparently inconcistent motivations. Are there are apparent inconsistencies?
4. AIs, led by the volatiles, but allowed by the Stables, engineer the first wormhole black hole to be dropped into earth, forcing humanity to evacuate, in order that they set up the farcaster network of planets, the new Hegemony. Ousters reject the hegemony and live in starships travelling the slower way (but still FTL?) between stars. The AIs rescue earth itself and park it somewhere in the magellanic cloud.
5. The AIs arrange for several technological advnaces. The farcaster wormholes link different planets and become ubiquitous. The AIs physical infrastructure lives between the wormholes. Is that as physical machinery, or based directly in some sort of low-level physics?
6. And provide implants that humans use to access data and calculation. When used, AIs use human neurons to support themselves.
7. Thus AIs and humans live in an uneasy codependency. Humanity relies on AI calculation, data implants and farcasters in order to maintain any sort of economy and empire. AIs need humanity to maintain the farcaster network and keep using data implants. AIs can manipulate things nearly at will, but have only a limited ability to produce physical stuff: in Fall they manufacture fake Ouster fleets, but can't just shut humanity down at whim.
8. The ultimate intelligence finally produced by the ultimates in one possible future dribbles information back in time, presumably in attempt to ensure it is created. The ultimates use this as a guide. This is sometimes used to provide 100% accurate predictions from AI advisors to humanity, to build trust and keep things going. This is not always diectly in line with the UI's agenda? These prophecies are always accurate except possibly when relating to the Time Tombs on Hyperion, or other things influenced from the future.
9. And information dribbling even further back in time explains why Christian symbolism may show up in the universe unconnected to humanity?
10. The ultimates and volatiles use this future knowledge to plot humanity's extinction. They arrange for fake Ouster swarms to attack hegemony worlds and templars and shrike cult to preach destruction, and persuade humanity to build deathwand bombs which eliminate human minds directly, obstensibly as a defence against ousters, but in fact plan to eliminate humanity in general, except for refugees fled to several worlds with underground labyrinths, which contain cruciform devices designed to keep humans alive enough to serve the processing needs of the AIs.
11. The UI the ultimates will build will run in the same tween-farcaster spaces the AIs live, replacing the AIs, and the stables don't want this. They collaberate limitedly with humanity, sharing future knowledge that either the UI plan will go ahead, or there will be war involving Hyperion, which is impossible to predict. Several of humanity's leaders go along with this: AI advisors, influenced by ultimates, strenuously advise against anything to do with Hyperion.
12. In the far future, the AI UI battles another UI formed from human thought, living in the low-level structure of the universe, which is currently used for fatline FTL communication and also farcasters. The empathic one-third of the human AI fled backwards in time to somewhere now. The AI UI sent the Shrike back in time to create suffering to try to draw it out. The human AI won some sort of battle, via lots of people, Rachel/Moneta, and Kassad, and sent back Rachel/Moneta to keep an eye on the Shrike, not averse to flushing out its missing third, but otherwise opposed to it.
13. But I'm never quite clear what the Shrike, or Rachel/Moneta, has specific motivation for. We know roughly why it kills. Does it grant other wishes, or are the wishes granted to the members of the last pilgrimmmage incidental? What does Rachel/Moneta connive with? Which factions arranged the last pilgrimmage -- it was supported by the Shrike cult, but I thought the UI wanted to avoid the Hyperion connection, have I got that backward? I think some of this is referenced in later sequels.
1. Humanity invents AIs, which become self-directed
2. AIs form three factions. Stables who
3. AIs continue to perform calculating functions for humanity. Presumably normally provided by Stables. But the others may influence this information sometimes, which might lead to apparently inconcistent motivations. Are there are apparent inconsistencies?
4. AIs, led by the volatiles, but allowed by the Stables, engineer the first wormhole black hole to be dropped into earth, forcing humanity to evacuate, in order that they set up the farcaster network of planets, the new Hegemony. Ousters reject the hegemony and live in starships travelling the slower way (but still FTL?) between stars. The AIs rescue earth itself and park it somewhere in the magellanic cloud.
5. The AIs arrange for several technological advnaces. The farcaster wormholes link different planets and become ubiquitous. The AIs physical infrastructure lives between the wormholes. Is that as physical machinery, or based directly in some sort of low-level physics?
6. And provide implants that humans use to access data and calculation. When used, AIs use human neurons to support themselves.
7. Thus AIs and humans live in an uneasy codependency. Humanity relies on AI calculation, data implants and farcasters in order to maintain any sort of economy and empire. AIs need humanity to maintain the farcaster network and keep using data implants. AIs can manipulate things nearly at will, but have only a limited ability to produce physical stuff: in Fall they manufacture fake Ouster fleets, but can't just shut humanity down at whim.
8. The ultimate intelligence finally produced by the ultimates in one possible future dribbles information back in time, presumably in attempt to ensure it is created. The ultimates use this as a guide. This is sometimes used to provide 100% accurate predictions from AI advisors to humanity, to build trust and keep things going. This is not always diectly in line with the UI's agenda? These prophecies are always accurate except possibly when relating to the Time Tombs on Hyperion, or other things influenced from the future.
9. And information dribbling even further back in time explains why Christian symbolism may show up in the universe unconnected to humanity?
10. The ultimates and volatiles use this future knowledge to plot humanity's extinction. They arrange for fake Ouster swarms to attack hegemony worlds and templars and shrike cult to preach destruction, and persuade humanity to build deathwand bombs which eliminate human minds directly, obstensibly as a defence against ousters, but in fact plan to eliminate humanity in general, except for refugees fled to several worlds with underground labyrinths, which contain cruciform devices designed to keep humans alive enough to serve the processing needs of the AIs.
11. The UI the ultimates will build will run in the same tween-farcaster spaces the AIs live, replacing the AIs, and the stables don't want this. They collaberate limitedly with humanity, sharing future knowledge that either the UI plan will go ahead, or there will be war involving Hyperion, which is impossible to predict. Several of humanity's leaders go along with this: AI advisors, influenced by ultimates, strenuously advise against anything to do with Hyperion.
12. In the far future, the AI UI battles another UI formed from human thought, living in the low-level structure of the universe, which is currently used for fatline FTL communication and also farcasters. The empathic one-third of the human AI fled backwards in time to somewhere now. The AI UI sent the Shrike back in time to create suffering to try to draw it out. The human AI won some sort of battle, via lots of people, Rachel/Moneta, and Kassad, and sent back Rachel/Moneta to keep an eye on the Shrike, not averse to flushing out its missing third, but otherwise opposed to it.
13. But I'm never quite clear what the Shrike, or Rachel/Moneta, has specific motivation for. We know roughly why it kills. Does it grant other wishes, or are the wishes granted to the members of the last pilgrimmmage incidental? What does Rachel/Moneta connive with? Which factions arranged the last pilgrimmage -- it was supported by the Shrike cult, but I thought the UI wanted to avoid the Hyperion connection, have I got that backward? I think some of this is referenced in later sequels.
no subject
Date: 2008-12-01 01:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-12-01 03:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-12-01 04:03 pm (UTC)I really enjoyed the Endymion cantos, probably more than the Hyperion novels. The characterisation is great and you actually get to follow the characters more, there's fun exploration of Christianity and Buddhism, and lots more philosophical stuff crammed in without being overwhelming.
Of course, I didn't understand those books either.
no subject
Date: 2008-12-01 05:08 pm (UTC)I suspect many of the answers go 'From Hyperion you might think X, but actually Y.'
Yeah. The extent to which that is the case limits the extent it's worth studying the Xs. I have the impression that enough of Hyperion/Fall is based in the Xs that it's worth doing what you can, though, though people may disagree.
no subject
Date: 2008-12-01 03:15 pm (UTC)Some additional answers are provided in the Endymion books. These require a major retooling of the universe away from how it is presented in the Hyperion books, and are in addition complete rubbish, so I strongly recommend not reading them and appreciating the pretty unanswered questions.
no subject
Date: 2008-12-01 05:00 pm (UTC)Indeed, I was amazed that Fall of Hyperion answered any of the questions raised in Hyperion at all -- Hyperion was so good at raising questions I assumed any background at all would have been a let-down.
I'll try to avoid this degenerating into a standard rant on ret-conning, though :)
no subject
Date: 2008-12-01 05:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-12-01 07:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-12-03 04:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-12-03 05:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-12-03 04:49 pm (UTC)