Daemon (2006)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daemon_(novel)

by solomonb • 5 months ago

53 13 5 months ago

en.wikipedia.org

solomonb3• 5 months ago

I keep coming back to Daniel Suarez' breakout novel. It feels so topical with the rise of agentic AI and I often wonder if when and when something like it could arise.

_stillmind• 5 months ago

Daemon is one of my favorite books. Michael Crichton's Prey with robot swarms is cool too.

solomonb3• 5 months ago

Does it change your perspective on agentic systems like Openclaw?

jaynate• 5 months ago

I think about this book often since Nov 2022. It’s a fantastic read.

ai_critic• 5 months ago

If you haven't read this--and also Manna (https://marshallbrain.com/manna1)--you probably should.

wild_egg• 5 months ago

Scenes from this book have been regularly coming to mind for almost 20 years now. No idea how it holds up for new readers today but it left quite an impact way back then.

surprisetalk• 5 months ago

This book is soooo good!

Cyphase• 5 months ago

There was a small thread about Daemon a few weeks ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46996474

Someone there mentioned never having heard of the sequel, so.. FYI, there's a sequel! It's called Freedom™[0]. It's very much one story split into two volumes, not "our heroes go on a new adventure".

And as I said in that thread, for another great fictional portrayal of AI, see Person of Interest[1]; it starts as a crime procedural with an AI-flavored twist, and ended up being considered by many critics the best sci-fi show on broadcast TV.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom%E2%84%A2

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Person_of_Interest_(TV_series)

solomonb3• 5 months ago

Yes Person of Interest is great! It starts kinda slow as a fairly generic police procedural but gets really epic by the end.

busterarm• 5 months ago

Good books.

His recent work is great too. Also I've met Dan a few times at Defcon and he's a really great and interesting guy.

tuzemec• 5 months ago

I can recommend 'Delta-V' by the same author too.

navark• 5 months ago

Delta-V was great, but I was disappointed by the bland characters and storytelling of it's sequel Critical Mass. It's easily Daniel Suarez's weakest novel.

The first of his books I read is "Kill Decision" which has more than held up in it's predictions of drone warfare and AI advancements. Based on the accuracy of his predictions from this book, and Daemon too, I'm bullish on space mining!

adynaton• 5 months ago

Such a great book. There should be a screen adaptation, keeping the story at the same time and technology level, I think it would be a hit.

Daemon (2006)

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