The Culture novels as a dystopia
A couple of people have mentioned to me: “we need more fiction examples of positive AI superintelligence – utopias like the Culture novels”. And they’re right, AI can be tremendously positive, and some beacons lit into the future could help make that come around. But one of my hobbies is “oppositional reading” – deliberately interpreting novels counter to the obvious / intended reading. And it’s not so clear to me that the Culture is all it is cracked up to be. Most of the novels take the pers