[Mithfânion]

Have you ever read a book that creates characters that are higher on the evultionary ladder than humans, with advanced intelligence, in a believable way?

I was thinking about how rarely my encounters with such concepts were done in a credible manner. It must be very difficult for an author to imagine such an intelligence and explain about the way it thinks, how and why that advanced intelligence manifests itself, because in the end he's only human himself and there are restrictions to the imagination. I'm sure that a good author could come up with a decent reason for why they're so advanced, but what I'm talking about is showing this intelligence in process.

I'm talking about Fantasy as well as Sci-fi here, though Sci-fi obviously has more potential in this area with regard to posthumanity, nanotech, advanced aliens etc. Of course there are Fantasy creatures with advanced mental abilities as well.

[golinub]

****** Minor Spoilers *******


I can think of a few books with high intelligent characters but they are not the main characters. Most of the time, they are used as external events trigger that the main characters must cope with.

In Arthur C. Clarke's 2001: A Space Odyssey the higher intelligence characters are manifested by the monoliths that have been created to help the emergence of intelligent life.

The Uplift series by David Brin deals with the idea of high intelligence extraterrestrial races fostering lower level races to help them achieve the "uplift" state and be part of the high level intelligent races of the universe.

In the Otherland series by Tad Williams, you have a god like character called The Other that has controls of an immense and very complex virtual universe.

In Isaac Asimov's Robots series, R. Daneel Olivaw is a good example of a human construct that has achieve a higher intelligence level than it's creator.

In the Dune series, Paul and Leto have a distinctive advantage over the other characters with their knowledge of the future given by prescience. Now I'm aware that knowing the future may not be a considered as a sign of high intelligence by some. But knowing how researches of the Cognitive Sciences are still debating about the definition of intelligence (Higher thoughts process reasoning versus higher capacity retention of knowledge) I consider Paul and Leto good examples of very intelligent humans.

[lemming]

Mithfanion, I've noticed the same problem in a lot of books. It's hard to write anything about genius or beyond-human entities in language other than "And then, with a shock of sudden understanding, Jleidsldk saw just how the matter transporter would work. It was so simple!" :)

I think Ted Chiang didn't quite overcome that difficulty in Understand (from his anthology Stories of Your Life and Others), but he sure tried hard.

It's by far the easiest thing (and thus the one I've seen done best) to show slightly enhanced humans. For example, I thought the Sleepless people in Beggars in Spain by Nancy Kress were great. But then they weren't terribly far beyond normal humans.

[Mugwump]

I think Solaris is the most believable advanced intelligence character I've ever encountered in a work of SF.

It's so advanced (or is it?) that it doesn't even behave like a character, which is what you might expect.

[Hobbit]

I think the point's been made above but it's a good one - in SF, although we like the idea of 'higher/more advanced' intelligence, we also usually need in our entertainment something that we can relate to - a human limitation!

Main examples I can think of in addition to those already mentioned:

Mike Moorcock's Dancer's Sequence - Fantasy but their actions are governed by the fact that they are near immortal and can change anything to their will - consequently they are otherworldly;

More Sf based:

Stephen Baxter's work - Xeelee stories/Time: manifold
Asimov's The Gods Themselves - though I remember them as having a lot of human characteristics!
Dan Simmons's Hyperion AI/Machine Culture
Iain McLeod's stories - technology versus human and therefore
possibly Ian M Banks's Culture?

And then there's Harlan Ellison's 'I have no mouth and I must scream' where the computer is clearly of such an intelligence that the reasons for the main character's existance in the story is unknown. Here it is omnipresent, though it's reasons for being are unknown and frankly we as humans are not worth consideriing!

Recently in the August SF Book Club John C Wright's The Golden Age produced some fascinating comments here (http://www.sffworld.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=6106).

Hobbit

[Mithfânion]

Iain McLeod's stories - technology versus human

Hobbit, is this the same guy who's written "The Light Ages" (2003). Are they all short stories or does he have novels that you'd recommend as well?


Lemming, I was going to buy the Stories of your Life by Chiang anyway, but now my interested is piqued even more.

[Hobbit]

Yes, Mith - same person. (Makes me check name spelling!) :) Yes, that should be 'Ian MacLeod' :o

Now, I haven't read Light Ages, though I have been told
a) that it's good; and b) it's different for him. So nif you liked it (and I think you did!) unfortunately I can't tell you whether it's better or worse than that.

His first book was The Cassini Division - start there, I'd suggest, though the one I really thought used this conflict was The Stone Canal (his second).

A word of warning though - I haven't read all his stuff and when his name came up in a debate earlier in the Forum it was clear his work was not for everyone. I'm not totally sure it's for me entirely either, but it did make me think! :)

Hobbit

[Mithfânion]

His first book was The Cassini Division - start there, I'd suggest, though the one I really thought used this conflict was The Stone Canal (his second).

I think you're confused Master Hobbit. :)

Those books are by Scottish author Ken MacLeod, who apart from those books also did the Engines of Light series.

[Hobbit]

Yes, that really has confused things, hasn't it! :confused:

Thank you Mith - obviously I was that worried about the spelling, I didn't check the first name... and I've got to be honest, although I shouldn't, I always think of Iain M Banks and Ken MacLeod in the same sentence, as they are big mates - similar background, politics etc etc.

Apologies for any confusion. *goes off to get sleep*

Hobbit

[Mithfânion]

Yeah, I heard those two often get grouped together. I've read neither of them, but of the two, Banks's books appeal to me the most, I'm a bit put off by the talk of MacLeod's books being so heavy on leftist politics.