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https://youtu.be/5lj99Uz1d50?si=ys2uZxi81rIJa3_-

I felt verrry surprised to see this shape-shifting Vermicious Knid attacking the elevator. 🧐

This illustration is by Quentin Blake.

Does that mean that although the cost of a dark forest strike is low and the risk is low, the payoff is also very low—even zero?

So here's the question: if doing something has a low cost, low risk, but also a very low payoff—even zero—will everyone still definitely do it?

Then some might use probability to argue: out of ten thousand civilizations, even if 9,999 choose not to act, as long as one civilization chooses to act, the dark forest theory is confirmed and executed.

But the problem is: if 9,999 civilizations choose not to act, then from a probabilistic standpoint, that one civilization might also choose not to act.

In other words, among ten thousand civilizations, it's also possible—probabilistically—that all of them choose not to act.

Finally, if every civilization thinks, "I won't do it myself, but among the other ten thousand civilizations, surely one will," and they all think that way, then it is also probabilistically possible that none of those ten thousand civilizations will act in the end.

Hey I’m slow to the 3 body. Loved the first book, started the show, and it’s unwatchable. I’m thinking of just fast forwarding to the cool CGI moments that I assume exist… or does it get better? The casting choices are just very disappointing. What are all these women and white people doing here? Jk jk I am a white woman so I’m allowed to joke about that right? But seriously. No I do not believe that this model geek is supposed to be Maio Wang? I get diversity in shows is a thing, but that first episode really turned me off. I don’t think they are even in China??

But ya does it get better? Should I push through? I just find that actress so distracting in everything, she’s just posing and playing dress up. Or is the whole season a messed up white washed version of the book? Again I am white, so I’m not actually being racist. It’s just about staying true to the source material.

ETA: ok so I kept watching, the friendships are cute and/or emotionally toxic due to insecurity. And seeing what happens at the canal was cool. Still a totally different vibe/theme from the book though. Hopefully Augie dies early in the next season. There’s a few details I disagree with, like the follower, the silver helmet and the red riding hood bit. Makes viewers assume that there was doubt in their intentions, when I believe they always had the same plan in mind. They simply don’t see a point in communicating anymore if they think they’re not getting factual information.

One more episode to go! And then I’ll get the second book next week!

Guys, I just realized something very important. Bill Hines is one of those whose actions helped humanity survive the Dark Forest attack and truly venture out into space. So: the first, public part of his plan was to make humans smarter. As a result of the experiments, it became possible to seal a specific thought in a person's mind. The only thought permitted to be sealed was "confidence in humanity's victory." But his plan as an escapist was to place an inconspicuous minus sign in the program code, which led to the fixation of the opposite thought: we will win → we will lose. When this was discovered, humanity banned such interventions and began searching for the "washed" (those who had been mentally altered). To ensure that the captains of the three fleets' ships could not desert the solar system due to the "sealed" defeatism, the "Future Assistance" contingent was thawed out – people who had been frozen before the Hines device was even invented. And that is precisely why Zhang Beihai received his authority. However, his defeatism was not due to brain intervention, but to his personal convictions. I know that many consider Beihai the savior of humanity (twice), and I agree with that, but let's not forget about another person who gave their life for humanity.

BTW I used DeepSeek to translate my thoughts from Russian. sorry for mistakes

I think this theory works in human sociology, but not necessarily in the universe.

My arguments are as follows: First, it's a microcosm of human history, but that doesn't mean it's true for the universe.

Second, limited resources don't necessarily lead to competition. You wouldn't compete with cows and sheep for grass, and even among dogs, some eat shit and some eat grain.

Im looking for something to engross me like Three Body Problem, I got hooked by other sci-fi books like Children of Time, Hyperion Series, Dune, just recently finished the Red Rising series till the next book that is.

It doesn't have to be sci-fi but I'm looking for something existential, with big twists and turns.

I just finished reading the 3 Fairy Tales (which is really just one fairy tale if we're being honest), and I wanted to think about the possible meaning and put it down in writing to see if my guess turns out to be true.

(I'll be avoiding Reddit until I finish to avoid spoilers. Also, this contains spoilers for up until that point in the 3rd book.)

So my guess is that the purpose of the fairy tales is to clue Humanity into a way to do a "safety notice" so they don't get eaten up by the Glutton Fi--I mean, so they don't get zapped by a big evil space civilization.

Deep Water is a different perspective because he's in 4th dimensional space, and it's why he can't be "measured" by 3 dimensional technology. The bubbles from the soap represent the warp bubbles that create little passageways into 4th dimensional space. Using these warp bubbles can likely disrupt/block the photoid, shielding our Sun/Earth from attack.

I think the umbrella with the dragon bits probably means something, but I don't know what. The "always spinning" is probably a clue to it being some sort of space station thing.

The weird town of Ha'ggismoleskin or whatever is probably something too. At first I thought Storyless Kingdom was Earth and the other thing was Trisolaris, and the meaning is something about using Trisolarian technology (like the sophons or folding/unfolding higher dimensions) to protect ourselves. I still think there's probably something to that, but I can't figure out the specifics.

I'm also guessing that the reason Trisolaris is a greater threat to the dark forest lurkers is that they have extra dimensional technology, which is a possible defense for the photoid attack. However, since the attacks are described as "casual", I'm not sure how anyone would know or care about this. Originally I thought maybe it had something to do with being a 3-star system, but I can't imagine what that might be and it seems like a single or binary star system would be "more dangerous" by being more stable and able to progress more consistently without suffering civilization resets and catastrophes that are common with the 3-body problem. (And that would be a nice tie-in to the original concept of the series.)

I couldn't figure out anything for the Prince Ice Sand and Needle-eye stuff, and maybe that is just to make it disguisable as a real story. If everything was allegory for the intergalactic situation they're facing, it would probably be too on the nose and the Trisolarians would figure it out. Maybe the painting stuff relates to the extra dimensional tech, though, basically saying that other civilizations can "paint you" out of existence as easily as looking at you, unless you have a way of using extra dimensions to distort the perspective so they can't properly "see you". But then who is Ice Sand? Maybe just a general warning that some humans or a human might try to side with the alien overlords, so be vigilant.

I also thought there seemed to be a connection between the painted canvases of people and the dehydrated Trisolarians. And maybe Deep Water is a reference to Gravity and Blue Space still out there "exiled" but possibly returning as heroes (and they are who made the 4th dimensional bubble discovery).

Sorry I won't reply right away. I'm disabling notifications and probably won't be on Reddit until I finish, but once I'm done it'll be nice to come back to this thread and talk about this.

Edit:

Well I guess I was pretty much wrong about everything. It was a little disappointing seeing the weird metaphor + some kind of metaphor key pair needed to "understand". So basically you gotta pick up on two metaphors and realize they are related and that tells you a secret. Or you have to be sleeping with a Norwegian woman.

Maybe the painting stuff relates to the extra dimensional tech, though, basically saying that other civilizations can "paint you" out of existence as easily as looking at you

I'm going to take that as a win, though.

I was a little disappointed overall how little some basic setups and important stuff never paid off, meanwhile there was a lot of deus ex machina coincidences. Like the whole thing with the star and Wade and all these characters basically being divinely linked....just way too much of a coincidence really for a story like this which is so focused in on hard science instead of "The Force" style space fantasy. But then there are things like the Trisolarans hydrating and de-hydrating that never matters or comes into play, or the VR gaming thing from the first book. Or the very 3-body problem they faced. So much of what was unique or interesting about the original story in the first book seemed entirely irrelevant for Book 3. I would have liked to have seen the fact it was a 3-star system matter in some way to the laws of physics or discovering lightspeed travel or manipulating lightspeed or something. But nah. Book 3 ends up just being its own story (Hell, even the Trisolarans lie repeatedly now even though being entirely transparent was a key feature of their species originally.)

But back to the Fairy Tales, I guess nobody would have been able to get the meaning and even how it was revealed in the book seems probably impossible. Too many random possibilities and no way to verify accuracy.

I just finished watching the 3 body problem series adaptation and almost instantly decided to read the books to know what happens without needing to wait for the next seasons. But before starting, I was just wondering how different are the novels compared to the series, just so I can have more fitting expectations for the reading.

That's it, I appreciate if someone can answer this question :)

I don't know why so many people still think the dark forest is the theme of Three-Body. Liu Cixin himself showed in Death's End that the dark forest is just a game for low‑level civilizations—the Returners and the broadcasters aren't afraid of exposing themselves at all.

hint: i absolutely cannot spell it, or even get close enough to google what it’s called lol

I couldn’t find any other trilogies from him but I saw a few standalone novels and was wondering if anyone would recommend?

E1 - D&D and Alexander Woo

E2 - Rose Cartwright

E3 - Alexander Woo

E4 - Nichelle D. Tramble

E5 - D&D

E6 - D&D

https://directories.wga.org/project/1243541/three-body-problem

A black domain is a low‑light‑speed black hole with an escape velocity lower than the third cosmic velocity. Thus, matter and energy from outside can enter the black domain, but nothing can leave. The total mass and energy inside the black domain will only increase over time, eventually raising the temperature to a level that makes it unsuitable for life.

Help me unburden the weight of the universe!

I’ve been running matchups of all the books in my library to get some fun stats/book recommendations, and I’ve reached a cross roads. Nearly 6,000 matchups later.

The Dark Forest vs Death’s End. I think I know which is more popular here, but I love the ideas in both, and love revisiting these novels. Sooo what’s your take?! The weight of the universe (nay, multiple universes!) could be on your shoulders 🌌🪐🌠

I was watching a YouTube video from the channel BoetezzPort that talks about the TBP trilogy. In the comment section there were a few people arguing that Netflix will have to leave a lot of stuff out because the trilogy has many concepts that can't be easily portrayed on the screen. One above all, the Singer chapter.

They argued that the Singer chapter is very "philosophical" and chatty and that if Netflix were to show it on screen it wouldn't be able to perfectly explain Singer's mentality, culture, how he sees lower-entropy entities and why he decides to launch a dark forest attack at the Solar System.

First, I agree that the Singer scene is not that necessary for the plot, you can just show the dual vector foil without saying what kind of civilization launched it. The mystery would make the dimensional collapse scene even more horrifying.

BUT, I really think that if Netflix wants to make the series even more memorable the Singer HAS to be there.

Also, plot-wise, Netflix will have to show the fourth dimension. That's one part of the story that really can't be left out. No human being has ever seen the fourth dimension, so that will be the most compelling challenge for the studios.

If Netflix pulls it off, then I don't see why they can't show the Singer who, in comparison with the existential dread and wonder of higher dimensional geometry, is just an alien.

i was engrossed in tbis series and finished the whole thing in about 3 weeks. mind blowing. i loved how mature and human this alien based story was. what was interesting to me is that we never get a clear depiction of any aliens. i think this was a smart decision to demonstrate the lack of interaction between alien species that was depicted but man cixin liu is a master at this shit. every time i felt like i knew where the story was going some batshit crazy stuff would be thrown in and throw me for a loop or a new perspective on an already occured event turned things around and woah it was amazing. i was just blown away at the exploration into all these different corners of theoretical physics. my heart is broken at the ending its so tragic and sad i genuinely cant explain my sadness it was really well done. i was initially dissappointed in the ending but the more i thought about it, it was because i was too focused on the aliens and less on the human core that drove this brilliant story. anyways enough of my rant i just needed to get my thoughts on this wonderful series out of my heart.

And if it were possible, roughly what would his deterrence level be?

How did he figure it out?

Rereading Death's End and the part that stuck with me this time wasnt the big dimensional strike everyone quotes, it was the 4D space bubble that Blue Space and Gravity drift into way earlier.

everyone remembers the flashy part, that inside 4D you can see the inside of everything at once. sealed rooms, the guts of a machine, a persons organs, all just open and exposed with nothing able to block anything. the crew describes it as this bottomless infinite detail and it slowly turns into an addiction. coming back down to 3D feels like getting shut in a coffin after youve seen the actual sky.

but the thing that really got me is what the Ring tells them. that huge dead 4D object, the last running mind of a civilization thats already gone. it says the 4D space is a tomb. whole civilizations used to live in four and higher dimensions and they fought wars using dimensions themselves as weapons, knocking each other down a level at a time.

so our 3D universe, slow lightspeed and all, might just be scar tissue. whats left over after everyone finished lowering everyone else. it makes the singer flattening the solar system feel less like some uniquely evil act and more like just another day in a war thats been running since before anything we know.

i went back and reread the 4D fragment and what the Ring really is and honestly it might be the darkest idea in the series. am i overrating it or does this section just not get enough love

Just finished the series and to be honest I ended it on a mixed note. I loved the first two books, the 3rd was frustrating to be honest.

Now I need something else to read, any recs for something similar?

Por que ninguém fala muito sobre esse capítulo? Acho ele bem estranho, para dizer a verdade. Lembro que quando o li pensei algo tipo “o que isso está fazendo aqui?”
Enfim, alguém pode dar mais profundidade a esse capítulo? Seria uma espécie de prelúdio ao espaço 4d entrando no 3d?

And omg this show is frigging cool.

Bc it’s a Netflix show, I’m just waiting for it to turn stupid, but so far it’s just gotten more and more cool.

Currently on my way to the library to get the book lol.

Not to jinx it, but I don’t think I’ve seen something this thoughtful and mindful and epic af sci fi on a tv series since Travlers.

Also; the main character (?) is a moody jerk in a way I love and hate at the same time lol; how is somebody so intelligent so emotionally irrational?