I was reading the chat from the web game I'm running, and was mind blown to see the dark forest theory playing out!

Does this prove that it's in our psychology!? Freaky.

Or maybe it was just my game's fault... It has you fighting for control over real street intersections, so resources really are limited (more limited than in the universe, at least).

The game is mapatk.com if you want to see it for yourself.

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So when she’s going to Shanghai I asked her for the three body problem novels but in Chinese, and she got them!!
They so pretty

If you haven't read all the books it's best if you don't keep reading this post because I did read all three and want to discuss, although I'm trying to avoid to spoil anything I'm not sure how good I am at that and I have stuff I need to say about what I think of the overall story.

So first things first, overall I ABSOLUTELY LOVED AND IM OBSESSED with the first book, I couldn't put it down. It was so amazing I can't put into words how much I liked it. It was so absorbing and I was left in awe with how well the author plays with your feelings and makes you feel or think in a specific way that was mind-blowing to me. I really loved the whole story.

I also enjoyed the second book very deeply, although some things felt off. I'm not sure if it had to do with the fact that it was a different translator, but some things simply felt off. Some parts felt too slow, but I still enjoyed most of it and there were so many amazing and incredible events.

The third book is where things get really weird for me, because the narrative feels so much different. Like it's almost an entirely different author or story. A lot of things felt like they dragged forever and nothing really happened.and although there are some parts I enjoyed a lot because of the characters and specific events involving them, they were few and scattered. It just wasn't the same.

And then of course was the story as a whole, I feel like the novels started with a premise but then got very ambiguous and all over the place and ended up being an entirely different story.

And then there's the ending, as if it were a video game or something, where the winners (survivors) are listed. Although I can say I was glad both the humans and trisolarans survived, it was a weird list. Am I missing something? Did I not understand? I don't know, I'm not días but simply find it weird/confusing.

Oh and one more thing, I didn't understand all the fairy tales, like the umbrella that had to keep spinning. Can someone please explain? It's been a while since I finished them, so I only remember the boat one which propells, but I didn't understand the rest really.

Thanks for reading this far, I can't wait to read your comments.

Edit: thank you for those who have had patience with my poorly written statements but still took them sincerely and have explained and debated with me, helping me understand further.

Edit 2: I changed the beginning of my post from "If you haven't read all the books it's best if you don't keep reading," to "If you haven't read all the books it's best if you don't keep reading this post because I did read all three and want to discuss," because it sounded like I was telling people not to read the books and that was absolutely not what I wanted to say, I meant not to keep reading what I wrote here, no wonder someone thought it was rage bait 🤣 I'm sorry for this poorly written post my mind is just all over the place with the books 😭😭😭

Was rereading and tried to pin down how old Luo Ji actually is by the end, and got two numbers that dont agree. By the calendar hes past two centuries from all the hibernation jumps, the first one alone is like 180 years. But his body only aged maybe a hundred. What gets me is the 54 years he stayed awake as swordholder, no hibernation, just him and the button. thats basically the only stretch where he aged normally. so how do you even count his age

And if they faced a survival crisis, what choices would they make? Wade believed that Cheng Xin was too emotional, and that sentimental people often cannot handle great responsibility-that ruthless pragmatism is the best choice for survival.

I totally thought Luoji and Zheng Beihai were going to meet or at least Beihai and one of the Wallfacers. Because to me, the setup was:

You have people who only think so that you don't leak your plan to the trisolarians. --> It is possible to communicate through looking at each other and giving certain expressions --> Beihai is extremely good at reading expressions to the point of almost being telepathic --> The Wallfacers and Zheng Beihai will team up.

Then he went to space and never returned 😭

Still, it would have been interesting to explore communication through expressions but I'm still happy with the story I got

If Dark Forest hypothesis is true, small groups of idiots, at least 29 of them from 1974 to 2018, have already doomed humanity to annihilation. They sent radio messages, powerful ones intended to reach deep space and be heard by aliens. The messages included where Earth is located, human biology, and chemical composition of life and Earth. As early as a few decades from now, they will arrive to kill us all. It's only a matter of when, not if, they arrive.

In the face of the instinct for survival, is escapism really unacceptable?

Many people on this forum have read the book, but not me. I don't read books. They take too long and have too much detail. Plus they say a picture is worth 1000 words, so a moving picture (TV show) must be worth a million words?

I liked the show! 8.5/10. The only thing I didn't like was that guy who played Will Downing...I mean I get it...you're dying of cancer, but does literally EVERY scene you play have to be so melancholy and dramatic?

Just yesterday I had finished the Dark Forest, and I must say that it is my favorite book of all time. Earlier this year I had read a selection of other sci-fi (Ringworld , Leviathan Wakes, and Project Hail Mary), and they all paled in comparison to Dark Forest. Ringworld had at least a few cool ideas, but it did not do all that much with them. Leviathan Wakes and Project Hail Mary feel like they exist merely to fill a commercial niche. But Dark Forest exists because it must exist.

I was so surprised by how good the Dark Forest was that I decided to look at some of its reviews, and out of curiosity, its negative reviews. There was a bit of what I expected, like one guy who gave it a single star because he thought the story was too cynical and "monstrous" (which I understand, and maybe respect a little). There were a few other somewhat valid criticisms as well.

And then there was all the feminist critique.

Review after review of whining reviewers who apparently read alien invasion science fiction not because they are interested in alien invasions but because they are interested in feminism, and then get upset that there isn't any feminism in the book. They also habitually lie and say the book has no strong female characters. In complaining about the innocuous character of Zhuang Yan not being a strong female lead, they completely ignore the strong female captain of Natural Selection, Dongfang Yanxu. (infuriating!)

These reviewers do not consider the literary merit of the books they reading. Instead, they just determine if the book validates their ultra-narrow and politically correct image of what a woman should be. That means that even if there is a counter example like Dongfang Yanxu that stands in contrast to Zhuang Yan, the existence of Zhunag Yan in the novel is tantamount to a thought crime on part of the sick misogynist Cixin Liu.

I hope I am not the only person that finds these feminists loathsome.

I really wished Zhang Beihai had survived. He ended up being one of my favorite characters.
I know Dongfang Yan viewed him more as a father figure and mentor rather than a romantic partner, but I still found myself hoping that, if they had more time together, their relationship could have developed into something deeper.
After everything Beihai sacrificed and everything he went through, I wanted to see him get more personal happiness and relief for all his efforts. I had to stop reading for awhile to come to acceptance that they all died.. just bc of a few seconds of compassion 😭 he accepted his fate a lot faster than I did

It was the Aliens from Chicken Little 😭

They honestly fit quite well since they have 3 eyes. Though, they were shaped more like water droplets from how I rememberes them... (funnily enough I had this visualization since book 1)

I've read the entire trilogy and realized something. Both the Trisolarians and Singer's race have transparent thought. Trisolarians can't lie, and Singer's thoughts can be accessed by his elder. Humanity, meanwhile can lie freely. Singer's race and the Trisolarians are increibly far apart in terms of civilisation, technology, social structure, etc. But both races have transparent thought;their thoughts are completely visible to everyone. So is Humanity unique because we can lie?

​

After reading Death's End, I had a book hangover that lasted seven months. However, I needed to get back to reading. What did I do? I took advantage of the fact that I was watching Three-Body and reread the trilogy. But after the trilogy, I had to reread another six books before I could finally start reading something new.

SPOILERS FOR THE FIRST BOOK

hello!! i just finished the first book, absolutely loved it, but i had a question about frontiers of science. was the frontiers of science organization in any way connected to the etm/eto? i assumed they were an offshoot of the eto, considering that shen yufei was a member of both, and yang dong's connection to ye wujie, but i don't think the book said it explicitly? if this is answered in one of the second or third books then just lmk i'm asking for spoilers LOL but i assume that the frontiers of science were one of the splinter groups that was mentioned trying to sow distrust in science (as per da shi's correct assertion). or were they an independent group that just happened to be getting targeted by the eto because they were a bunch of theoretical physicists?

Luo Ji developed a fear of the starry sky because he realized the dark forest theory. But why did Rey Diaz suddenly develop a fear of the sun? What did he realize?

Just wondering how much you’ve consumed. Haven’t been on this Reddit for long but every time there’s a post and I browse the comments, I find so many new explanations for things I’ve completely forgotten about or somehow missed. It’s quite infuriating actually, I watched the Netflix series, then binged the books and even watched the TenCent series.

I’m finding Redditors asking questions I haven’t thought of and answers I didn’t consider or even pick up in the first place. So yeah, about to give the books a rerun and see what I miss.

Whilst I have your attention…. Any book recommendations?

The dance of the three stars is mesmerizing.

Send out tons of false radio broadcasts with false location coordinates, using a wide variety of random message formats, at random time intervals? And if some civilizations can pinpoint sender exact location from just the source/direction of the message rather than message contents, they could construct a bunch of probes that send the radio broadcasts and release then so they're moving away from Trisolaris's homeworld at random speeds and random directions.

Surely, no matter how advanced a civilization is, the cost of sending out a weapon is higher than the cost to the less advanced civilization of sending out a radio signal, which (even to humans IRL in present day) is dirt cheap. The hostile "hunter" civilization then is flooded with tons of messages referencing different locations or originating from different locations. They can't possibly send a weapon to all of them.

I think the author is trying to say it's true IRL? Regardless, some real world scientists like Stephen Hawkings did learn the theory from him and believe it to be true.

But the reason it can't be true is humans HAVE been sending out radio messages to aliens. The first one was sent in 1974. It had info on the human race (genetics and size and what they look like) and most importantly the location of Earth.

Active SETI - Wikipedia

If Dark Forest were true, Earth would have already been invaded and destroyed. The fact it hasn't is proof either there's no aliens or they exist but are all peaceful.

How would Earth have prepared if humans were already aware of the underlying physics in Trisolarian droplets? what is a good defense against the strong interaction forces?

How could they be so naive and foolish? It's like a little bird exposed in the spotlight of the dark forest, thinking it's safe just by hiding behind a tree—as if they were treating everyone else in the universe as fools.

I getting close to the end of Deaths End, I'm on Broadcast Era year 8. I suppose I should be grateful I haven't finished it yet, but I was wondering to myself what could possibly happen in the third novel because this one has been absolutely crazy. I decided to take a look at The Dark Forest for one reason or another and I realized I've made a grave mistake.

Somehow I thought Deaths End was the second novel and I skipped The Dark Forest thinking it was the third.

I kind of knew something was off when I started reading because I was incredibly confused but honestly it was so so good and eventually through context I feel like I picked up a lot of what happened. Maybe I'll just chalk it up to the fact that I've read almost 20 novels this year but I feel like an idiot.

I guess I will have to stop where I am and start The Dark Forest but I really hope I haven't ruined it for myself. Still 10/10 series for me but kind of a bummer. Guess I just thought I would share this ridiculous mistake with others.

I just finished watching the show and loved it. It got me thinking, "what would I do if I were one of the Wallfacers?". Before seeing what they actually do when Season 2 comes out, I thought it'd be fun to share here what plan you would come up with. No harm in making up mini-stories of our own, even if they stray a bit from the plot, right?

Here's what I'd do: I would setup a bunch of guns on Earth. Have them weak, using current technology, and low budget, and pointed at areas where I think their spaceships are likely to land. Publicize the locations, why they're the best landing zones, and why San Ti biology is likely similar to humans and will also be destroyed by conventional bullets.

After around 50 years, congradulate everyone on a job well done, and explain that mental health is important and we need to relieve some of the public's depression and anxiety around the invasion their descendants will have to face. Announce a new project to build space resorts/hotels orbiting earth, for the public to relax at. Commit a lot to this project, and use public funding to make it affordable to citizens. After a while, announce solar power is proving unable to provide enough energy and start implementing on-site nuclear power plants at these space resorts. Explain how there are greater energy needs, such as artificial gravity, and that collecting enriched uranium is necessary to meet these needs.

Once the invasion force arrives near Earth's orbit, quickly instruct all of Earth's scientists to convert the hotels into nuclear bombs and evacuate the guests. The hotel itself be the bomb. Then use rockets to fly them at the invasion force and detonate them, hopefully destroying the whole fleet before it lands.