The ache of losing him hasn't dulled after 11 years. He was gone too soon.
@IRosamelia4 ай бұрын
Call me crazy but for some confusing reason at first I thought you were speaking of Darrell himself and almost fainted, damn pronouns 😅
@travisporco4 ай бұрын
that is so very true
@andreaslermen20084 ай бұрын
I think the biggest plus in the Culture books is, that Banks tried to show it from different perspectives, instead of just telling stories in the same universe. Phlebas gives us an idea, how other species look upon the Culture, Player is from the view of a citizen and Excession is about the Minds. Use of Weapons is one of my favorite SF novels and I read SF books for about 45 years.
@mikemccarthy47654 ай бұрын
the only problem with the Culture books and Banks' work in general is there is no more of it.
@JB525204 ай бұрын
With how AGI is going, he might essentially live again. Banks of interconnected artificial intelligence network modules, or IAIN-M banks, could continue his work.
@joshuawilliams92473 ай бұрын
@@JB52520no.
@justagigilo14 ай бұрын
Should really be a must read for all humans.
@ShiverMeTimbers704 ай бұрын
Probably the best Culture video on YT
@davidunderwood3264 ай бұрын
My favourite author - first came across Excession, found it hard going to grasp some concepts but very rewarding and never looked back, but has stopped me from trying new authors for fear of disappointment! I am just gearing up to do the Dune series again (last read in late 80's) - my memory is the later books weren't so great - we'll see...
@IRosamelia4 ай бұрын
I didn't know how much I needed this! 💝
@libertyauto4 ай бұрын
This was a wonderful essay on the Culture. I will share it with my friends who have still not yet tried the series. In regards to citizens in Culture's post scarcity society: I got the impression that many of the Special Circumstances members are those who are not satisfied with the offered utopia and seek a Special Circumstances position to provide some missing conflict in their lives and possibly see still other societies and options.
@winsomehax4 ай бұрын
Banks' books would make a 10x better series or movie than Roddenberry's view of the future. It's a complete and total mystery why it hasn't been pounced on by TV/movies.
@martinknapp76404 ай бұрын
Isn’t it strange that nobody ever made a movie of the Culture? Though if anyone did, they’d probably make a mess of it
@richardfox48034 ай бұрын
They are too big and detailed for a film and the TV series never made it's way into production.
@ghostdreamer72724 ай бұрын
Amazon was making a show but the Banks estate changed their minds and backed out
@AndyFryDesigner4 ай бұрын
Love and miss Banks he was such a wonderful writer. The culture novels are something I love to come back to and read again. As well as all the great points in this video I also loved the ship names! Ethics Gradient, Attitude Adjuster, Sleeper Service, Frank Exchange Of Views (Psychopath class dROU). So many more 😊
@KarstenLangPedersen4 ай бұрын
I just finished The Player of Games .. again .. it's one of those stories that I return to every few years. Consider Phlebas is "disturbing" at some points, much more so than The Player of Games. Personal choice and freedom is taken to the extreme.
@slaapt3 ай бұрын
I so very much struggled through that book. It spend way to much time on random events in a game we never got any overview of the rules of. I literally could not bring myself to care about it at all. But all the rest was stuck in between of pages of consideration of what was basically random noise.
@stephenwalton85074 ай бұрын
One of my favourite Culture plot devices is "Special Circumstances". The unseen servants of utopia doing the dirty work as the citizenry go about their business oblivious.
@johnberry38244 ай бұрын
NIce insight: the reflections from Ann Leckie's Imperial Radch books.
@shawntipton50784 ай бұрын
Great video and looking forward to finishing the series
@kufujitsu4 ай бұрын
I've read three of Iain's novels : The Wasp Factory, which was a subtle horror story. Walking on Glass, which consisted of three novellas told in non-linear style - one of which is SF, with beings that bare a striking resemblance to Ewoks..... Against a Dark Background, which is a non-Culture SF novel I liked them all - they say that Consisder Phlebas is similar in tone to Against a Dark Background, so that will be where I'll start in my exploration of the Culture.....
@johnberry38244 ай бұрын
What Banks gives us (besides kick-ass stories) is an alternate way of looking at the world, very different from the assumptions we have from the society we live in today. "Thought-provoking" doesn't begin to say it!
@benjaminjeffery68734 ай бұрын
Great videos! Keep the culture content coming. Also, what’s the music you use the background in these vids? it’s very soothing, sci fi style.
@shawntipton50784 ай бұрын
The culture series which I am starting is praised for renewing interest in serious realistic scifi, after star trek + star wars often are accused and derided correctly as dumbing down scifi as a intellectual study and subject in order to appeal to the masses. Hard scifi fans cannot like star trek or doctor who etc
@thumper86844 ай бұрын
Star Trek is proper sci-fi.
@sterlinglewis57004 ай бұрын
Thank you for an excellent overview from a new subscriber. The Culture series had a profound influence on my view of society and the complex issues we face. He helped me in many way to take a 'top down' view, and to keep myself free of the sort of conceptual thinking that blinds one to Reality. I loved his sense of humor, which finds its greatest expression in 'Feersum Endjinn' as about half of it is written in [what I take to be] Scottish dialect - absolutely hysterical, and highly recommended as a by-way springing off from the rest of his works.
@njshore22394 ай бұрын
Thanks - great discussion. My favorite is Excession, some bad-ass AIs struggling with themselves, meaning and us! And a hint that there is something else beyond... Read it three times and will do a fourth in the Spring. I would love for other authors to write epics inside this series, let us know if you know of any. Keep up the good work!
@martindice54244 ай бұрын
All this is true but could create the impression that Banks’ writing is somehow impenetrably cerebral. Let us remember- he could right a cracking good story! Real page turners. Whereas the Expanse series are page turners, they cannot be said to tackle such huge concepts with such quality of writing whilst being thoroughly entertaining. Banks’ sense of humour is perhaps the aspect of his work I miss the most. A wonderful writer and - as far as I can see - a jolly nice chap to boot.
@kaspermcleish525529 күн бұрын
Excellent video - you're really good at this mate.
@corack2524 ай бұрын
That's my lunchtime entertainment sorted 👌
@tsaageotrimm4 ай бұрын
I just can't get enough of the Culture series. I love it. Got the The Culture: Drawings book as a gift 🤩
@Sci-FiOdyssey4 ай бұрын
I got that too 🤩
@IRosamelia4 ай бұрын
@@Sci-FiOdyssey nerd 😘
@Sci-FiOdyssey4 ай бұрын
And proud!
@BlueChrome3 ай бұрын
@@Sci-FiOdyssey> So have you made a review of it yet?, is it worth buying a copy?, it's stupidly expensive where I live so some guidance would be appreciated.
@fuffoonАй бұрын
I found the series very immersing.
@karimc83794 ай бұрын
Ok, you just made me want to read them again (use of weapons is one of my fav)
@Sci-FiOdyssey4 ай бұрын
Mine too. Gets me every time!
@richardfox48034 ай бұрын
Good video. However you missed that even though the books deals with the clash philosophical icebergs, it also deals with issues on a trivial interpersonal level and is shot through with sharp and self deprecative humour. He was gone too soon.
@2Potates3 ай бұрын
When i first heard about this book series i scoffed at it because the person explaining it to me left out the philosophical questions it raises.
@robynmarler19514 ай бұрын
Can anyone help me, I read a sci-fi book about 20 years ago, they were on a massive space ship, like a colony looking for a planet to live on, and it's very factiony, there was a lot of conflict in fact the main character spends time in the brig, and then they get a signal from a planet, go down to look, and find loads of people slaughtered so brutally that they just leg it and get away as fast as possible, but then they figure out that whatever killed the people is following them and catching up, and they end up sacrificing the ship to try to kill the mystery evil beings when they board. Does anyone know this book? It was really scary.
@CMDR_Verm4 ай бұрын
I've found that the only problem with The Culture is it makes other writers seem blinkered. Banks gets under your skin.
@deoradh4 ай бұрын
Great overview, though I don’t think it’s fair to rate the Minds as infallible. They are profound in capability, certainly (I love the one contemplating the scale of its extra-dimensional substrate), but the proof of their existence as independent life lies in their varied, contradictory motivations and their many flaws, not the least of which is the occasional tendency toward ego. That some of them destroy themselves in fits of embarrassment over wrong-doing is a demonstration of this. Were they infallible, that wrongness would not come to pass. Instead, I see them more akin to superior colleagues, with some of them feeling that sense of superiority a bit too much. Somewhat like Greek demigods, perhaps: incredibly powered beings who coexist with humanity but suffering the same flaws, sometimes to much more pronounced impact.
Has everyone forgotten the meaning of the word utopia.
@JB525204 ай бұрын
Some think anarchy would be fine if people have everything they want. It would be worse than if we were all poor. People would have access to larger recreational explosives and more of them. Everyone would race supercars at whatever speed they wanted. They'd all have weaponized subwoofers to smash windows and eardrums, and blinding headlights to permanently damage retinas. No radio or internet would work, because without regulation, people would blast each other off the air for fun. They'd all have the most powerful routers to cut through the noise, but with that much noise there would be no point. People would drive tanks and set off tactical nukes for fun. An infinitely wealthy anarchy would be absolute hell. There's another kind of freedom. One which regulates away the freedoms that people don't want others to have. I don't want people to murder me, so I don't want to have the freedom to do that to others. I don't want to live surrounded by guns, so I don't want the freedom to have a gun. I don't like noise and air pollution, so I don't want the freedom to create them. Every individual's freedom comes at a cost to others. Because of this, any utopia would have to be well regulated, unless it's an anarchist utopia. The people have to agree on which freedoms to sacrifice based on their cultural values. Any culture which believes their values are universal will more often see other cultures violating human (or alien) rights.
@patrickunderwood56624 ай бұрын
Banks IS my favorite science fiction author of all time, but… yes. The Culture requires magic to work. You can’t get there from here. As smart and sophisticated as he was, Banks was a Socialist, convinced that, in a century that had seen Socialists create little other than an ocean of blood, Socialism leads to a just society. He wasn’t alone, of course… Diziet Sma, in The State of the Art, speaking of a possible Special Circumstances intervention on 1970s Earth: “I didn’t want to keep them safe from us and let them devour themselves; I wanted maximum interference; I wanted to hit the place with a program Lev Davidovitch [Trotsky] would have been proud of. I wanted to see the junta generals fill their pants when they realised that the future is - in Earth terms - bright, bright red.”
@Mansplainer2099-jy8ps3 ай бұрын
It sounds like you assume because "anarchy" means there are no rulers (no King, President, Dictator etc.) there would also be no politicians making "laws/rules" and no "law" enforcement of those "laws/rules".
@BlueChrome3 ай бұрын
@@patrickunderwood5662 > Not magic, just a number of AIs with near godlike powers and a generous supply of slap drones, preferably with acerbic wits and extremely perverse senses of humor! 🤪
@or63974 ай бұрын
I have considered picking up the series. Does it address why people are okay with subordinating themselves to AI? To me that’s the main issue I have with premise. Some people do desire to dominate other people and from the premise you list it seems to assume that impulse doesn’t exist?. The idea of benevolent god like AI is a great premise but I’d want the series to directly address that rather just begin this being accepted and moving in to other things. If the answer is the AI aren’t in charge and so they don’t need to address that issue because everyone’s free. I just find that a little far fetched and I would want main premise to be addressed before you start talking about the socialist utopia.
@shawnburnham13 ай бұрын
14:00
@theoldman58964 ай бұрын
There is nothing "utopian" about being an utterly worthless pet to the all-powerful tyrant-AIs "The Minds" and *knowing* it. Such a horrific thing would have to be completely secret from the general population. It's a great *distopian* setting however, and when I read it initially, it felt like really clever satire in that regard. It's kind of like when you hear people from the WEF in Davos talk about the most horrific things that they want to do to humanity, and you might laugh at first thinking it's all clever, sarcastic or satirical humor, only to learn later they were being *dead* serious...
@indigowest689424 күн бұрын
Imagine being so insecure that you'd rather live in an actual dystopia. Go ahead and stay in the capitalist hellscape if it makes you feel strong. I'll gladly be a pet of the Minds if it means I get the freedom to do whatever the hell I want rather than feeding some asshole CEO lol
@General_reader4 ай бұрын
First!
@felill.a.91594 ай бұрын
🤍
@sonofraven764 ай бұрын
He would have winced to hear you mispronounce his adopted middle name 😉
@thumper86844 ай бұрын
The Culture is kind of a critique on colonialism, told by someone who has never faced any personal hardship.
@sergioaccioly52194 ай бұрын
There's a psychological need that the Culture actively works to leave unfulfilled: the need fro a lot of people to dominate/ crap on other people. WHich is why fascism always finds minions willingto do their dirty work. In the back of their heads those minions believe they'll be in charge of the "underclasses". In the meantime, they get to bust heads and feel good about that. Thus far, despite my best efforts, I didn't read Banks. Does he address this question in any book?
@alistairmackintosh94124 ай бұрын
The book "Surface Detail" addresses a situation and ideas in that way.
@sergioaccioly52194 ай бұрын
@@alistairmackintosh9412 thatnk you, I just added it to my reading pile
@FrankinDallas4 ай бұрын
Read the first book. Alien race of dogs? GTGOH.
@commentarytalk14464 ай бұрын
I read one or two of his books in this vein or series and found them to be incredibly poor quality. I cannot get my head around the almost universal praise I hear every time his books are talked about. Fair enough, there's plenty of sci-fi ideas and a sense of adventure and significance eg philosophy in the books I read but they seemed like very shallow treatments at best and very ham-fisted in treatment especially with their influence and effect on the stories in the couple of books I read. I'll pass and move on searching elsewhere for sci-fi stories.
@bigreaderpike2 ай бұрын
Honestly despite all the interesting technology in the culture I could never finish a single book in the series cuz I was just so bored by the story
@motivation_4_succes4 ай бұрын
Hi, your thumbnails need improvement! want to know what improvement.
@user-lq5zv8nn6f4 ай бұрын
Good video. However you missed that even though the books deals with the clash philosophical icebergs, it also deals with issues on a trivial interpersonal level and is shot through with sharp and self deprecative humour. He was gone too soon.