A Sense of Doubt blog post #4226 - Mine and My Friend's Growing List of Best Science Fiction Novels

A Sense of Doubt blog post #4226 - Mine and My Friend's Growing List of Best Science Fiction Novels

So, I have been making a list of "best" science fiction books with a friend. More on that farther down.

First, the failure of Open AI.

I gave it six files, images of book covers, and asked it to make a grid. This image below was it's first attempt and the closest to what I wanted.

The problem is that though the bottom three images are the ones I gave it, the top three are not.
For those who don't know it, the bottom right image is the Chinese edition of Three Body Problem.

I asked it repeatedly to use the files I gave it, and it could not manage the task.

It gave me things like this:

How is this a grid of six images?

Or the one above, which included this book that I did not feed it nor have I read:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-Stop_(novel).

And two other books, one that is on the list but not one I shared with it (Asimov) and another that may be put on the list (Zelazny) but has not yet been proposed.

I finally managed to make a grid of all six using the three book row the AI gave me and then clipping the other three book row from the image above. It's not perfectly sized, but I don't really care.

But my issue is that this thing I was asking IS NOT HARD. So why did it repeatedly fail? I don't use AI enough to know or really care, but in light of what I posted yesterday about the risk of super intelligence, it seems to me, that we're a long way from that unless there are other factors at play here (like copyright).

Anyway, here's the list. Just the list for now. In future posts, I will share the proposals arguing for the books and the one that was rejected.

It's a pretty good list, so far, I think.

Deferred means that one of us needs to read the book before accepting or rejecting it.

I am more inclined to accept books I have not read than my friend. For instance, I accepted The Dark Forest (2008) by Liu Cixin without reading it. However, I have decided to read it next, so I could have deferred it. I just figured I would accept it anyway as it is surely worthy to be on the list.

The deferral policy has prompted me to read Quarantine by Greg Egan, which I liked a lot;  The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia (1974) by Ursula K. Le Guin, which I had never read though I had meant to for decades; and Hyperion (1989) by Dan Simmons, which I have also owned for decades and then had to go on and read Fall of Hyperion because Hyperion is a woefully incomplete book. The two books are really one novel.

I have read all the other books on the list, though some I should really re-read. I did re-read The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (1979) - by Douglas Adams because I don't think I have ever read it read (non-audio). I proposed Sirens of Titan (1959) by Kurt Vonnegut right after, which my friend deferred, but has now read and accepted. It's the only book placed on the list in the spot in which it was originally proposed.

But really there's no order to the list.

We do have rules though.

The rules are as follows:

1.  This is for Science Fiction, and not Speculative Fiction.  We may attempt that later, or a different sub-genre, but there are good reasons to focus on Science Fiction as opposed to the more generic Speculative Fiction.  Primarily where does one put Mythology and religious texts?  I think it is wise to avoid those.

2.  We take turns proposing one, and only one, book.  If multiple books from a series are to be added, they are done individually.

3.  The person proposing a book, is essentially voting to put that book on the list.  The other person can either agree, defer, or disagree to the proposed book.  Defer would be where we need to think about it and probably re-read the book in order to either agree or disagree.

4.  Only books which have been proposed and agreed to make it on the list.

5.  There is no limit to the list.  It can continue to grow as time goes on.

6.  There is no order to the list, these books are all worthy of being considered among the best science fiction books of all time.

7.  At this point my assumption is that we would never remove a book from the list, but this could be discussed if there were a good reason.

CRITERIA

“Science Fiction books that have those moments where the author gets the reader to broaden their mind and realize new possibilities” tracks with my own and refines further the criteria of “books SF readers should read” and “best books in the genre.” Our favorites.

If you are reading this blog and read this far and have a book to suggest, please leave a comment.

Thanks for tuning in.

The List

- Frankenstein (1818 / 1831) by Mary Shelley

- Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864) by Jules Verne

- The War of the Worlds (1898) by H. G. Wells

- Dune (1965) by Frank Herbert

- Snow Crash (1992) by Neal Stephenson

- The Demolished Man (1953) Alfred Bester.

- Ender's Game (1985) by Orson Scott Card

- Childhood’s End (1953 / 1990) by Arthur C. Clarke

- Flowers for Algernon (1966) by Daniel Keyes

- Ringworld (1970) - by Larry Niven

- The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (1979) - by Douglas Adams

- Sirens of Titan (1959) by Kurt Vonnegut

- 1984 (1949) by George Orwell

- The Three-Body Problem (2008/2014) by Liu Cixin (translated by Ken Liu)

- Foundation (1951) by Isaac Asimov

- The Left Hand of Darkness (1969) by Ursula K. Le Guin

- Gateway (1977) by Frederik Pohl

- The Moon is a Harsh Mistress (1966) by Robert Heinlein

- Fahrenheit 451 (1953) by Ray Bradbury

- Startide Rising (1983) by David Brin

- The Handmaid's Tale (1985) by Margaret Atwood

- Brave New World (1932) by Aldous Huxley

- A Canticle for Leibowitz (1959) by Walter M. Miller, Jr.

- Doomsday Book (1992) by Connie Willis

- Slan (1940) by A. E. van Vogt

- Binti (2019) by Nnedi Okorafor (Omnibus - including Binti, Binti: Sacred Fire), Binti: Home, Binti: The Night Masquerade)

- A Clockwork Orange (1962) by Anthony Burgess

- A Fire Upon the Deep (1992) by Vernor Vinge

- The Windup Girl (2009) by Paolo Bacigalupi

- Speaker for the Dead (1986) by Orson Scott Card

- Day of the Triffids (1951) by John Wyndham

- Stranger in a Strange Land (1961) by Robert A. Heinlein

- The Caves of Steel (Robot #1) (1954) by Isaac Asimov

- Foundation and Empire (1952) by Isaac Asimov

- The Star My Destination (1956) by Alfred Bester

- Quarantine (1992) by Greg Egan

- The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia (1974) by Ursula K. Le Guin

- Hyperion (1989) by Dan Simmons

- Nova (1968) Samuel Delany

- The Mote in God’s Eye (1974) by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle

- The Martian Chronicles (1950) by Ray Bradbury

- Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea (1869-70) by Jules Verne

- The Lathe of Heaven (1971) by Ursula K. LeGuin

- The Dark Forest (2008) by Liu Cixin

 

Deferred

- Redshirts (2012) by John Scalzi - Proposed by CBT, Deferred by DR

- Wild Seed (1980) by Octavia Butler - Proposed by CBT, Deferred by DR

- Spin (2005) by Robert Charles Wilson - Proposed by CBT, Deferred by DR

- Roadside Picnic (1971) by Arkady Strugatsky, Boris Strugatsky - Proposed by CBT, Deferred by DR

- Titan (1979) by John Varley - Proposed by CBT, Deferred by DR

- Last and First Men (1930) by Olaf Stapledon - Proposed by DR and deferred by CBT

- Planet of the Apes (1963) by Pierre Boulle and Translator - Xan Fielding – Proposed by CBT, Deferred by DR

- The Twentieth Century (1882) (Early Classics Of Science Fiction) by Albert Robida and Philippe Willems - Proposed by DR and deferred by CBT

- The Gods Themselves (1972) by Isaac Asimov – Proposed by CBT, Deferred by DR

 

Rejected

 A Princess of Mars (Barsoom #1) (1912) by Edgar Rice Burroughs - Rejected by DR

 

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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 2609.12 - 10:10

- Days ago: MOM = 4090 days ago & DAD = 744 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I post Hey Mom blog entries on special occasions. I post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day, and now I have a second count for Days since my Dad died on August 28, 2024. I am now in the same time zone as Google! So, when I post at 10:10 a.m. PDT to coincide with the time of Mom's death, I am now actually posting late, so it's really 1:10 p.m. EDT. But I will continue to use the time stamp of 10:10 a.m. to remember the time of her death and sometimes 13:40 EDT for the time of Dad's death. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.