Slow Time Between the Stars

by

(2 reviews)

An artificial intelligence on a star-spanning mission explores the farthest horizons of human potential—and its own purpose—in a mind-bending short story by New York Times bestselling author John Scalzi. Equipped with the entirety of human knowledge, a sentient ship is launched on a last-ditch journey to find a new home for civilization. Trillions of miles. Tens of thousands of years. In the space between, the AI has plenty of time to think about life, the vastness of the universe, everything it was meant to do, and—with a perspective created but not limited by humans—what it should do. John Scalzi’s Slow Time Between the Stars is part of The Far Reaches , a collection of science-fiction stories that stretch the imagination and open the heart. They can be read or listened to in one sitting.

4 editions

reviewed Slow Time Between the Stars by John Scalzi

An intelligent, autonomous ship talks to itself

Finished off all the Far Reaches stories and they really were a disappointment overall, especially this entry.

This is a monologue by an intelligent, autonomous ship sent to seed humanity into the galaxy. Humans can't survive the thousands and hundreds of thousands of years to travel to an extra-stellar planet. But a ship with AI that has all of human knowledge, including how to create humans from atomic building blocks, could.

This one changes cuts off contact a couple of years outside the heliopause, and then we get 25+ pages of its super-intelligent thinky thinkies. Including the part that it never gets bored because it's just not thinking when it doesn't have to. In effect, this is some what-if philosophy about humans expanding through the galaxy from Scalzi, put into the words of an AI, and almost no story to speak of.

reviewed Slow Time Between the Stars by John Scalzi

Quick fun read with some nice depth in ideas

This is the first of the Far Reaches series that I’ve read, so I’m not sure if this fits into a series or is an independent story.

The idea of a ship as narrator is fun, and I love how it kept emphasizing that it was a fully autonomous and independent being. Cutting off its creators nearly as soon as it was able also gave me a laugh.

I liked this, and I’ll seek out the first five if they are available. It is a quick read with some deep ideas about the nature of humanity and the importance of life itself.