If you could live in any fictional world, what world would you live in and why?

Sat, 27 Mar 2010 17:08:48 GMT

If you could live in any fictional world, what world would you live in and why?

First, a clarification.

I interpreted the question as what society you want to live in, which seemed the right way to rule out stories where the main characters have an awesome time because they're special (eg. where it's good to live as a noble, but not as a commoner) or because they narrowly achieve a great victory (but it would be much more likely to be overrun by the dark lord's forced).

But that allows you to choose one society out of a world that may have multiple, eg. if there's a book about planet X, you can choose to live on planet X, even if there's a whole galaxy of other planets the books don't say anything about.

Of course, how good the society is is almost independent of how good the book is. The book naturally focuses on the conflicts to be as interesting as possible, and the society is mostly the background to that.

So what would I look for:

* A society with good technological or magical health care. Unpleasant diseases are relegated to the history books. Eg. Discworld doesn't mention this, but given that medicine is practically non-existent, and magic is rarely used to cure diseases, people must die at medieval rates. Whereas in Harry Potter, it seems most things can be cured overnight.

* Preferably good options on immortality, so long as I'm choosing

* An emphasis on progress, on society progressing and discovering new, exciting things, and opportunities to achieve something rather than just sitting around eating lotuses. Maybe even kicking ass.

That said, it sounds like one of the technological utopias, such as Iain Banks' Culture or maybe Startrek, would fit best.

I'm also intrigued by the suggestions of Gallifry. We know almost nothing about it, but it's presumably very advanced, you get 13 lifetimes, and you may (not sure) get to play in time.

Or also Narnia, which involves taking a lot on faith, but is presented as very very magical, in the "wonderful to experience" sense.

ETA: You may also want to read a discussion on "is Brave New World a good/bad place to live" at the original post: http://theferrett.livejournal.com/1418312.html?thread=70522184#t70522184

comments

Cycling in the RHL: Follow-up

Tue, 21 Jul 2009 11:57:45 GMT

The last post asked if it was reasonable to cycle in a particular right-turn lane (where there would be room for two cars and a cycle abreast in the road, but definitely not a car and a cycle abreast in the right lane).

I think the problem was I'd not yet decided whether delaying N other people's jounrey by 30s was worth delaying mine by 2min. If it wasn't, I wouldn't do it, and if it was, I would. If the only option were to walk or cycle dangerously I would walk. If the only option is to cycle in the lane I would cycle in the middle of it.

However, because I'd not decided, I made the bad compromise of cycling in the middle of the lane but feeling guilty about it. So I really should decide one way or the other.

I'd decided cycling was a good transport choice for myself. And that it would be more convenient in Cambridge if more people cycled rather than drove, because congestion is less. However, right or not, I feel bad imposing that opinion on other people.

I may think it's more convenient for them overall in terms of less waiting at lights and looking for parking if I cycle. However, they may disagree, and if I force someone to wait behind me I feel like I'm saying "my life is more important than yours" to their face, and I hate saying that. (I also hate people saying that to me.) Obviously, in a car, they'd equally well have to wait, but because I've obviously no choice they can pretend to themselves I had a good reason for being there, but if I choose to cycle, I always could get off or pull over to let them pass.

In summary, it looks like I should either stop cycling altogether, or admit that I have a right to cycle in that lane, and if so, I should choose the latter and not apologise for it.

comments

jack

If you could live in any fictional world, what world would you live in and why?

Cycling in the RHL: Follow-up