Morality Machines in the Distant Future Universe

Far Futures is a collection of stories put together by Gregory Benford, with contributiosn from Greg Bear, Poul Anderson, Haldeman, Kingsbury, and Sheffield.


Not going to happen. But great story. If you don't like it, then re-write it with a Maxwell's demon catching particles as the universe continues to accelerate outward, trying to predict which ones it should grab based on current projected but not-quite-there solutions. Now would that really make the story better?
They're all excellent as you might expect from a Benford-edited collection, but the one story in particular that stood out to me was Bear's Judgement Engine. The story is a collision of thermodynamics, morality, and metaphysics. At the Big Crunch there remains a single library where the far future's remaining minds remain, crunching through possible solutions to suffering and the nature of existence.

Essentially, consciousness requires life, which requires energy, which requires things to prey on other things, and in all the aeons of existence, no one has found a way around this brute fact of reality. There is either non-existence, or there is suffering - which includes things making each other suffer. As the edge of the universe and the end of all things draws quickly and inexorably closer, this Problem is the last unsolved conjecture at the end of time. Why do they care? Because (in an homage to Buddhist ideas about death and reincarnation) their thoughts at the moment of the Big Crunch will determine the nature of the entire universe that will appear at the next Big Bang. A story like this can only end in tragedy.

Metal Philosophical Cosmology

The universe is not beautiful or sensible or meaningful (of course it's not) and it's totally justified being annoyed at the idiots who gasp with horror when someone dares express this, and - seemingly worse - isn't particularly bothered by it. What arrogance and ignorance would make us think it should be in the first place? Outside of the slice where our oversensitive distorted provincial little brains evolved and are able to knit into a sensible story, it's a mess, exactly as philosopher Jim Holt states here:

...the universe is more ugly than it is beautiful...the form we can expect reality to take at its most general level is that of an infinite, incomplete mediocre mess. The laws of physics are not particularly elegant. The ingredients of the universe show no aesthetic parsimony. There are 60 odd elementary particles. That's way more than is necessary. If the universe is created by a God it's a God with no sense of economy or elegance. There's way too much suffering in the universe. Childhood cancer shouldn't be a part of any decent universe. And even though it's infinitely removed from nothingness the universe also falls infinitely short of containing all imaginable realities.

And where's the character-building in a nice universe anyway? If it's all made for us like some kind of eternal terrarium, or even happens to be a nice place to live, you can be a wimp and still survive there. We live in an indifferent mess whether or not we like it anyway. And we can say that without trying to be depressed or shocking about it; it's just a fact. To insist otherwise about the universe is not only deluded, it's clinging to illusion out of weakness. Because most of us are happy we're here, and we survive and prosper in it.

As if that's not metal enough, there are occasional other metal things like dark lightning. Gamma ray bursts on Earth! That's metal as hell dude.

Neil Degrasse Tyson is a Superhero

This went around a little bit ago but I mean come on. As if badass astrophysicist and wrestler wasn't enough, finally we know his alter ego: fighting crime as Late 80s Funk-Metal Man. Between him and Hawking's crime-fighting exoskeleton, the bad guys don't have a chance.