

Profile of Ted Chiang: The Perfectionist - sohkamyung
https://stories.californiasunday.com/2015-01-04/ted-chiang-scifi-perfectionist/

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chevreuil
In the 2010 Boréal conference Ted Chiang had an interesting take on the
singularity and the computable brain. There is a transcript (in french) here :
[http://www.actusf.com/spip/article-9802.html](http://www.actusf.com/spip/article-9802.html).

To sum it up that is what he says : "There is this thing called ethnobiology,
a sub-dicscipline of anthropology, that studies the way civilizations
understand and represent the living things. Ethnobiology reveals a constant in
History : we tend to compare our brain to the most complex technology we know.
At the Renaissance, philosopher assimilated the brain to a very complex and
subtle clockwork, Freud compared it to a steam engine, which pressure should
be evacuated to avoid explosion. In the 40's, schoolboy and schoolgirls were
told that brain was like a telephone exchange. Today, computers are the most
advanced technology we know, so we tend to compare our brain to it. But like
our predecessors, it's very likely that we are wrong. Let just think forward,
and admit that we are totally biased by the fact that computer are now
inherent part of our life. Let's admit that there is a chance that our brain
may never be modeled by a computer."

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alex-g
This reminded me of Chiang's 2008 story "Exhalation"
([http://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/exhalation/](http://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/exhalation/)),
which explores cognition and entropy through the idea of minds which are built
as pneumatic engines.

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mrmondo
Stories of your life and others is a must read - truly beautiful, deep and
thought provoking writing that I can highly recommend.
[https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/223380](https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/223380)

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smcgivern
As can I, Story of Your Life is one of the best pieces of fiction I've read.
He's always good at communicating interesting (and often provocative) ideas,
but that story also blends it with a wonderful portrayal of grief. On top of
that, the structure of the story itself is a reflection of the ideas discussed
in the story.

As I said when I reviewed that book on Goodreads, if I'd spent the £11.40 for
the book and only received that story, it would have been more than worth it.

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cousin_it
My favorite story by Chiang, "Liking What You see", is available online:
[http://www.ibooksonline.com/88/Text/liking.html](http://www.ibooksonline.com/88/Text/liking.html)

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smcgivern
As is The Lifecycle of Software Objects:
[http://subterraneanpress.com/magazine/fall_2010/fiction_the_...](http://subterraneanpress.com/magazine/fall_2010/fiction_the_lifecycle_of_software_objects_by_ted_chiang)

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pierrec
Interesting, so he's still a (part-time) technical writer for Microsoft? Does
he write MSDN articles? I might have read more of his works than I thought...

The news about the planned hollywood adaptation is both exciting and
frightening. These are really not cinematic stories as far as I can tell,
unless you're ready to transform a story that happens inside someone's mind,
like "Understand", into a graphical adventure like "Lucy". But after all, why
not. I'm not one to say that a bad movie adaptation can really hurt a book -
the book doesn't care.

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Osmium
> The news about the planned hollywood adaptation is both exciting and
> frightening. These are really not cinematic stories as far as I can tell

I don't know, I think some of them could be adapted to screen really quite
well ("Tower of Babylon" and "Seventy-two Letters" spring to mind). But
regardless, honestly I'm just grateful Hollywood is tackling more challenging
material more than anything.

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mwfogleman
I was thrilled to find out Denis Villeneuve is doing the adaptation. He's a
fantastic director, with complex, morally challenging films.

~~~
pierrec
I'm not so sure that Villeneuve is such a great fit. I find the dominant
feeling in his films is always one of dread or disgust, or both. In a way, I'd
rather have a more "neutral" director tackle this. Take Carl Sagan's _Contact_
for example. I know it's not exactly like _Story of Your Life_ , but it's
something of a reference in the way it was adapted to cinema. One of the
things that give the movie its power and beauty is the director's humility: he
doesn't try to make a cinematic experiment out of it. Granted, the fact that
Sagan was involved in the production and originally intended the story to be
adapted to cinema is also an important factor.

In fact, the best thing would probably be Ted Chiang getting similarly
involved in the production!

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diziet
I stumbled upon Ted Chiang's stories completely randomly about 10 years ago --
perhaps it was a periodical like Asimov's or perhaps someone linked a story to
me online in an IRC chat. I read 'Understand' and instantly fell in love. Ted
Chiang is nowhere as prolific as other writers, but he writes really excellent
short stories. It's exciting how 'Story of Your Life' is being made into a
film!

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Osmium
One of my favourite writers, even though I've only read a few of his short
stories. He's a very striking writer who manages to combine very big ideas
with really fluid prose, which is something that seems quite rare.

I understand he's written several short stories available only online (freely
available) rather than in print. If anyone knows of a Kindle version that
collects his online stories I'd be very grateful!

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supreethks
Had recently got introduced to Ted's work through a recommendation made no the
"Rationally Speaking" podcast.[1] Can't wait to read his work.

[1] [http://rationallyspeaking.blogspot.in/2012/10/rationally-
spe...](http://rationallyspeaking.blogspot.in/2012/10/rationally-speaking-
podcast-on-science.html)

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jedanbik
Obligatory Metafilter post with collection of links to original material:
[http://www.metafilter.com/98974/This-isnt-your-
grandfathers-...](http://www.metafilter.com/98974/This-isnt-your-grandfathers-
science-fiction)

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ryanmk
I'd like to see what his take would be on a Groundhog's Day scenario.

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jamhan
Why does the author of that article use such stupid punctuation in the byline?
"Ted Chiang’s science fiction wins piles of awards. When he publishes, which
is hardly ever."

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drzaiusapelord
Am I the only one sick of singularity writers? Its been explored since at
least the 1990s and its just... boring. No wonder weirdo dystopian sci-
fi/fantasy and "sci-lit" is so popular now. This ground has been retread so
many times, I'm not sure where it can go or who is truly enjoying it. Heck,
Accelerando is practically a parody of singularity writing fads and its ten
years old!

I think this is how people felt in the 50s and 60s when "monster/alien of the
week" type potboilers ruled sci-fi until a new generation of writers like
Bester, Dick, Lem, Roddenberry, and others started to break away from selling
trends that had a roadmap to nowhere and started taking chances with original
concepts, engaging stories and characters, character development, moral
ambiguity, relationship stories, etc.

Maybe its just me, but my god, is "hard" or "not soft/fantasy" sci-fi hard to
read nowadays. There's very little soul or characterization or creative
breakthroughs. Its like we all decided a near futurish
singularity/robots/space-ships scenario is all we can handle. That said, I
really did enjoy Stephenson's Anathem. I think we're going to look back at
this period and wonder why we didn't demand more from sci-fi. Somewhat
ironically, the best sci-fi writing I've been seeing in the last decade is in
video games and not in novels, film, or short-stories. I guess that industry,
at least in parts, still has an appetite for chance-taking and a young-ish
fanbase that appreciates such things. I'd rather, say, play Mass Effect or
Bioshock Infinite than read what's popular today or play Alien: Isolation than
watch Prometheus.

Perhaps I'm too critical, but when I ask for recommendations I get the same 20
or so novels, all of which way beyond their fresh date. /r/printsf just seems
like a bunch of old guys recommending Dune over and over, or the same six or
seven old Stross, Watts, or Banks novels.

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roywiggins
Wait, I'm confused, are you calling Ted Chiang a singularity writer? I can't
think of many of his stories that comfortably sit in that category.

