Dispatches from the Publishing Trenches: A Field Report

June 25, 2025June 25, 2025Posted in Book, Generative AI, Ridley Park, Software, WritingTagged AI writing tools, author, author advice, author journey, Beta readers, book editing, book marketing, book sales, books, cover design, editing, Generative AI, independent publishing, indie author, novel, publishing, publishing industry, Ridley Park, self-publishing, traditional publishing, Writing, writing processLeave a comment

I, Ridley Park, am an independent author and publisher. Before this literary turn, I did time as an economist, business analyst, and management consultant – none of which prepared me for the peculiar economics of modern publishing.

Much like traditional music in the Digital Age, traditional publishing has lost a bit of its lustre. Its gatekeeping function remains, but the gates are now rusted, and half the guards have been made redundant.

Audio: NotebookLM podcast on this topic.

From a business standpoint, the Independent™ must ask: Is the distribution reach of a traditional publisher or third-party distributor worth the revenue share they demand? It’s tempting to cast them as parasites feeding off your creative lifeblood—but statistically, the average indie author sells only 60 copies of their book. Yes, that includes the five you bought yourself and the ten your mum distributed among reluctant neighbours.

Could you sell more than average? Possibly. Less? Almost certainly. Better to sell 100 copies and earn a pittance than to earn 100% of nothing. But if the publisher can’t move your book either, and if they’re not investing in you as an author, you may well find yourself in the red. Especially if you’re the one paying them for the privilege of being published. That’s not publishing – that’s vanity cosplay.

Publishers also offer (read: upsell) services like editing, formatting, and cover design. As an Independent™, you either pay for these à la carte or do them yourself. Or, if you’re like me, you cobble together a mixed strategy of DIY, AI, and professional outsourcing – whatever the project demands.

For Hemo Sapiens, I did everything except the typography for the title and byline on the cover. That part I outsourced; I know my limits. The rest – cover composition, layout, typesetting – I handled. I also brought in beta readers, who offered some valuable copyedits and corrections.

With Sustenance, I went end-to-end solo, with AI in the wings for flow and proofing support.

Propensity followed a similar path – except I made the rare (some might say perverse) choice of hiring a beta reader after release. Heretical, I know. But the feedback was so incisive I’m now considering a mid-edition revision, particularly in the middle third, where things get a bit heady.

As for Temporal Babel – still unreleased – I’ve done everything myself thus far, but I’m leaning toward bringing that same beta reader back for another round of bruising clarity.

Beta readers, it turns out, are worth their weight in snark and red ink. I’ll save my ruminations on them for another post, which I promise will be full of revelations and at least one semi-poetic lament.

I could say more here, but there are other things demanding my time – and no publisher breathing down my neck.

Bless MidJourney for the cover art based on this prompt:

beautiful woman wearing glasses and a sheer top, holding a red pen, reading a book, office setting

Why I Create Audiobooks for All My Books

June 12, 2025June 12, 2025Posted in Artificial Intelligence, Audible, Audiobook, Book, ElevenLabs, ElevenLabs, Generative AI, Hemo Sapiens: Awakening, Propensity, Software, Sustenance, Temporal Babel, WritingTagged AI narration, Audiobook, audiobook editing, audiobook production, audiobooks, author lessons, books, editing, ElevenLabs, first-person narrative, hemo sapiens, indie author workflow, manuscript editing, novel, present tense writing, print proofing, proofreading tips, publishing process, self-publishing, typos in books, WritingLeave a comment

This isn’t a promotional post. I’ve recently discovered the hidden value of audiobooks—and it has nothing to do with selling them.

Back in 2024, when I released Hemo Sapiens: Awakening, I must have read the manuscript a thousand times. I even recorded an audiobook, using an AI voice from ElevenLabs. At the time, Audible wouldn’t accept AI narration. The rules have since changed. It’s now available—though still not on Audible (and therefore not on Amazon).

I’d hired a few proofreaders and beta readers. They helped. The book improved. And yet, even after all that, I still found typos. Those bastards are insidious.

The real revelation came when I started listening.

Since I’d already created the audiobook, I began proofreading by ear. That’s when it hit me: hearing the story is nothing like reading it. Sentences that looked fine on the page fell flat aloud. So I rewrote passages—not for grammar, but for cadence, clarity, flow.

Then came the second benefit: catching mistakes. Typos. Tense slips. I favour first-person, present-tense, limited point of view—it’s immersive, intimate, synchronised with the protagonist’s thoughts. But sometimes, I slip. Listening helped catch those lapses, especially the subtle ones a skim-reading brain politely ignores.

For Sustenance, the audiobook was an afterthought. I submitted the print files, requested a proof copy, and while I waited, I rendered the audio. When the proof arrived, I listened instead of reading. I found errors. Again. Thanks to that timing, I could fix them before production. Of course, fixing the manuscript meant updating the audiobook. A pain—but worth it.

I hadn’t planned to make an audiobook for Propensity—some of the prose is too stylistic, too internal—but I did anyway, because of what I’d learned from Sustenance. And again, I found too many errors. Maybe I need better proofreaders. Or maybe this is just the fallback system now.

I’ve had Temporal Babel, a novelette, on hold for months. I won’t release it until I do the same: make an audiobook, listen, reconcile with the page.

Lesson learned.

I’ve got several more manuscripts waiting in the wings—some have been loitering there for over a year. Their release has been deprioritised for various reasons, but when they go out, they’ll have audio versions too. Not for the sake of listeners. For me.

Honestly, I should do this for my blog posts as well. But editing on the web is easier. The stakes are lower. Mistakes don’t print themselves in ink.

Temporal Babel: A Novelette

March 26, 2025Posted in Art, Artificial Intelligence, Book, ChatGPT, Cover Art, Dall-E, Generative AI, Ridley Park, Short Story, Software, Temporal Babel, WritingTagged ai, ChatGPT, editing, Generative AI, novelette, Short Story, Writing1 Comment

I just completed a second draft of a novelette I’ve been working on. I had ChatGPT (Dall-E) render a quick sample cover.

A young woman stumbles across an unconscious man on a remote highway outside Anika, New Mexico. He’s naked, tattooed, breathing — and utterly incomprehensible. Medical professionals, police, and a determined psychiatrist try to parse his language, but his words follow rules that don’t exist and reference a world no one knows. As they struggle to decode him, they’re forced to reckon with the limits of their own assumptions, both linguistic and moral.

Temporal Babel explores the failure of language, the fragility of identity, and the quiet panic that sets in when comprehension fails.

The story takes place in New Mexico, and I wanted a minimalist visual style to match the prose. I believe that a beige desert set against a blue sky is perfect. The deserted highway with a single cactus speaks volumes. The footprints in the desert are also evocative. I love the simplicity of the palette.

Though it revered the front and back cover art, it generally followed my instructions. Artificial intelligence (AI) has made significant progress in a year. All of the words are spelt correctly. I could Photoshop this into shape with little effort.

I only plan to release this as an ePUB because I am compiling a triptych. Currently, the body copy stands at 105 pages, so with title pages and the rest, it should reach 112 pages, which is perfect for seven 16-page signatures.

AI Editor Issues

March 25, 2025March 25, 2025Posted in Artificial Intelligence, AutoCrit, ChatGPT, Claude, critique, Generative AI, Short Story, Software, WritingTagged ai, AutoCrit, books, ChatGPT, ChatGPT 4, fiction, Generative AI, reading, Short Story, Writing, writing tipsLeave a comment

I employ AI editors for copyediting and alpha-reading. They are useful but have limitations.

Some of my writing is ordinary – Acts I, II, and III; Beginning, Middle, and End. This is AI’s sweet spot: assess a piece and compare it to a million similar pieces, sharing plot structures, story and character arcs, heroes’ journeys, and saving cats.

Other stories are experimental. They don’t follow the Western tradition of tidy storylines and neat little bows, evey aspect strongly telegraphed, so as not to lose any readers along the journey.

Mary approaches a doorway. Mary opens the door. She walks through the doorway — the doorway she had approached.

Obviously, this is silly and exaggerated, but the point remains. AI presumes that readers need to be spoonfed, especially American audiences. (No offence.)

But life doesn’t work like this. We often witness events where we have no idea what happens after we experience them. We pass strangers on the street, not knowing anything about their past or future. We overhear something interesting, never to get a resolution. We get passed by for a promotion but never know the reason why.

In science, there are lots of dead ends. Do we want to know the answers? Yes. Is one likely? Maybe; maybe not. Will we make up answers just to satisfy our need for closure? It happens all the time.

In writing, we seem to not accept these loose ends. How many times have you read a review or critique where the complaint is, “What happened to this character?” or “Why didn’t Harry Potter use his invisibility cloak more than once despite it being an obvious solution to many prior and future challenges he faced?”

Sure. I agree that it feels like a plot hole, but the author doesn’t have to tell you that Harry lost it in a poker match, it got lost in the wash, or Ron snatched it.

I’m finishing a story, and various AIs provide similar commentary. Even more humorous are the times it can’t follow a thread, but when a human reviewer reads it, they have no difficulty. In the end, there may be unanswered questions. Some of these leave the universe open for further exploration, but not all questions have answers. AI has difficulty grasping this perspective.

Rhoticity Chicken: The Final Cluckfrontation

March 21, 2025March 21, 2025Posted in Artificial Intelligence, ChatGPT, flash fiction, Short Story, WritingTagged ai, books, ChatGPT, chicken, fantasy, fiction, Generative AI, nonsense, rhoticity, Short Story, WritingLeave a comment

The skies darkened over the Coop of Justice. Inside, Rhoticity Chicken—a rooster of unparalleled enunciation—perched on his golden roost, adjusting his crimson cape. His mission was simple: to defend the final R in English against the insidious forces of vowel decay.

Audio: NotebookLM discusses this topic.

Across the barnyard, his greatest nemesis, Non-Rhotic Chicken, cackled from atop his weathered soapbox. “Togethah, my feathah’d comrades,” he declared, wings outstretched, “we shall ERASE the intrusive ‘R’ from this land. Wintah, summah, law and ordah—it shall all flow smoothly once more!”

A murmur rippled through the coop. Some hens clucked nervously. Others nodded, spellbound by his seamless vowel transitions.

But then, a mighty R echoed through the barn like thunder.

“NEVER!”

Rhoticity Chicken flapped into the air, his chest puffed out with impeccable articulation. “You shall NOT take the final ‘R’! I have defended it from the creeping shadows of elision for YEARS, and I shall not fail now!”

From the shadows emerged The Trilled Chick Henchmen, a gang of feathered mercenaries trained in rolled Rs. They trilled menacingly, their Spanish and Italian inflections rattling the walls of the barn.

“Señor Rhoticity, your time is up,” rasped El Gallito, the leader of the henchmen. “Your crude American Rs will be smoothed away like an old dialect in the sands of time. Trill, my hermanos!”

They rolled their Rs in unison, a sinister wave of phonetic force blasting toward Rhoticity Chicken. He staggered, his own hard R wavering against the onslaught of linguistic variation.

But he clenched his beak and stood firm.

“No,” he declared, eyes blazing. “You can roll your Rs, you can drop them, but you will NEVER take away my right… to pronounce… HARD R’s!”

With a mighty CROW, he unleashed his ultimate attack:

THE RHOTIC RESONANCE

A shockwave of perfectly articulated, non-trilled Rs blasted through the barn. It swept across the land, restoring all lost R’s to their rightful places.

Non-Rhotic Chicken gasped as his vowels stiffened. “No—NOOOO! My beautiful syllabic flow—GONE!” He clutched his throat as a long-forgotten ‘R’ slipped back into his speech.

“I… I… can’t… say cah anymore… I… I just said… car.”

The barn fell silent.

Defeated, Non-Rhotic Chicken collapsed into a pile of feathers, mumbling in fully articulated rhoticity.

The Trilled Chick Henchmen scattered, their rolling Rs faltering into incoherent babbling.

Rhoticity Chicken stood victorious. He fluffed his cape, took a dignified breath, and proclaimed:

“Justice. Honor. Pronunciation.”

And with that, he flew into the night, ready to defend hard R’s wherever they were threatened.

THE END…?

—don’t let him wander.

March 11, 2025March 11, 2025Posted in Artificial Intelligence, critique, Generative AI, Ridley Park, Sci-Fi, Short Story, Software, WritingTagged absurdism, ai, Generative AI, Grok, humour, irony, Monty Python, realism, satire, Short Story, suspension or disbelief, WritingLeave a comment

My biggest problem with generative AI is its lack of subtlety and misunderstanding of satire and irony. I am writing a short story, and a character is calling an emergency number. I shared the first scene with Grok, and it suggests that I turn the absurdity up to 11 and replace this segment with the one above:

“Okay, ma’am. Can you stay with him? I’ll dispatch an ambulance to your location.”

It is funny in its way, but I’m only pretty sure that an operator would not be injecting humour into a situation where a woman is reporting an unconscious person. Absurd doesn’t need to be Monty Python funny.

Am I being too critical?

Audio: NotebookLM Podcast discusses this issue.

More to the point, I find that many humans miss subtlety. Many people need every storyline highlighted and retraced with a bold Sharpie. Every detail needs to be explained because they can’t connect the dots. This is reflected in the cinema, television, and books of the past half-century or more, so is it fair to criticise AI for being dull when it’s at least on par with more than half the human population.

Are we asking AI to be held to a higher standard?

AutoCrit Challenges

March 11, 2025Posted in Artificial Intelligence, AutoCrit, ChatGPT, Claude, critique, Generative AI, Short Story, Software, WritingTagged ai, AutoCrit, book review, book-reviews, books, characters, ChatGPT, ChatGPT 4, Claude, closure, consistency, critique, deepseek, editing, emotional quotient, emotions, eq, fiction, Generative AI, human condition, narratives, real life, reality, resolution, stories, variability, WritingLeave a comment

I don’t hide the fact that I rely on AI for early editorial feedback. Once a story is complete, I break out AutoCrit. This programme works well for typical stories that follow standard practices with common tropes. It gets quite confused when I feed it intentionally awkward stories, not the least of which is to advise me to eliminate the awkwardness.

This is a challenge with AI more generally. In this particular story, I leave a lot of loose ends and misdirects, as it’s a commentary on the conspiracy-driven culture we inhabit. The advice, is along the lines of, “You forget to close this lopp. What happened to so and so.”

But this is life. We don’t always know the full story. We drive past an multi-car accident where cares are overturned and in flames, but we never find out what happens – even if we scour the newspapers and internet. Who was that? What happened? What caused it?

We often never find out. In most books and movies, we find out everythung, and it all comes packaged with a nice bow. This is what AI expects. It’s the diet it’s been fed.

Some stories subvert these notions here and there, but by and large, this is not typical American fare. Readers and viewers need to be spoonfed without inconsistencies.

Speaking of inconsistencies addressing one scene, AutoCrit said that a character should act impulsively in one situation and reserved moments later. This was flagged as an iinconsistent character.

In the scene, a woman stops her car immediately to help an injured man on the roadside, but as she gets out of her car an approaches her, she shows caution.

This was a red flag. Why would she have always been rash or always been cautious?

My response, because that how real people act. She acts on instinct but quickly considers that she’s a vulnerable woman alone with a man miles from anywhere.

I don’t suspect a human reader would find this surprising. This is the intelligence absent from Artificial Intelligence — cultural intelligence, a cousin of EQ, emotional quotient.

I know how I want the character to act. I do want AutoCrit to inform me that character A is wielding a pistol but then stabs another character, or that character B is a teetotaler and is getting drunk or that character C has a shellfish allergy but is downing lobsters like they’re going out of style. And I certainly what to be shown continuity errors.

The biggest challenge I have with AutoCrit that is less promonent with other AIs is that I can preface my content with a note explaining my intent. I can even do this after the fact.

If I feed ChatGPT, Claude, or DeepSeek a story of segment to critique without a preface, the responses may be similar to AutoCrit, but when I follow up with some meta, the response may be, “Now it makes sense, but why is John wearing lipstick?” Perhaps he’s metrosexual or non-traditional. Perhaps it’s an oversight.

I dont meán to demean AutoCrit. I’m just advising that if you are writing stories not compliant with 80 per cent of published works, take the advice with a grain of salt, or reserve AutoCrit for more standard fare.

AI Humour and Irony

March 11, 2025March 11, 2025Posted in Artificial Intelligence, ChatGPT, Claude, Generative AI, Sci-Fi, Short Story, Status Update, WritingTagged books, fantasy, fiction, Science Fiction, WritingLeave a comment

I’m wrapping up a short story, and I ran it through several generative AIs for feedback.

The first problem is that. although AI provides critique, it is programmatically overly optimistic.

The second problem is that it doesn’t understand nuance.

The working title of this story is Temporal Babel. It’s a low-key absurd, mundane, ironic satirical journey through space-time, language, and identity.

An unconscious, naked man is discovered on a roadside. Events unfold. Who is this bloke, and how did he get here?

I fed the draft into these AI platforms and processed the responses:

Anthropic Claude
DeepSeek
Google Gemini
Grok
OpenAI ChatGPT
Perplexity

I tried to use some other platforms, but they were wholly inadequate:

Liquid Labs
Doesn’t accept attachments.
Meta AI
Doesn’t accept document attachments. Images only.
Not Diamond AI
Just an aggregator that employs the other AIs.
Pi AI
Conversational AI. Not designed for this type of critique.

I also use AutoCrit, but not until my draft is complete, so not yet.

With the draft, they each get the same starting prompt:

I am drafting this story. It’s not ended yet, but might you evaluate it as-is?

The draft includes copious notes about ideas not yet captured, as I tend to outline my material and then add resolution. It’s like taking a sketch to a final drawing, adding and shading until it’s complete.

Without fail, the AIs complained about a lack of an ending – despite being informed the ending is not yet written.

Some AIs miss the point (even having the benefit of explanatory notes). This is still useful because it allows me to reevaluate whether a reader will be as lost or confused.

I don’t want to share any spoilers, but I’ll copy-paste some high-level commentary, reiterating the optimism bias. This is not me humble-bragging. It’s what the AIs yield. DeepSeek seems to be the most critical on the surface

Anthropic Claude 3.7 Sonnet

Based on what you’ve shared, “Temporal Babel” presents a fascinating premise with strong potential. You’re developing a unique take on time travel that focuses on language evolution and the mundane aspects of humanity rather than the typical science fiction tropes.

DeepSeek

Temporal Babel is an intriguing and ambitious piece that blends elements of science fiction, mystery, and psychological drama. The narrative structure, with its shifting points of view and fragmented memories, creates a sense of disorientation that mirrors the protagonist’s own confusion, which is effective for the story you’re telling.

Google Gemini 2.0 Flash

{This is a well-written and intriguing story. The characters are well-developed and the plot is suspenseful. The story is also thought-provoking, raising questions about time travel, identity, and communication. I am eager to see how the story ends.}

Grok 3

Thank you for sharing your draft! It’s a compelling story with a strong sense of mystery and an intriguing premise that blends science fiction, cultural displacement, and human connection. Below, I’ll provide an evaluation of the story as it stands, focusing on its strengths, areas for potential improvement, and some thoughts on its current trajectory. Since it’s unfinished, I’ll avoid speculating too much about the ending but will offer suggestions based on what’s here so far.

OpenAI ChatGPT 4o

This is a fascinating and well-executed piece so far. You’ve managed to blend speculative fiction with grounded procedural storytelling, creating an atmosphere of quiet unease. The linguistic elements are some of the strongest aspects, making this feel fresh rather than like another “mysterious visitor” trope. The lack of easy resolution enhances the realism, and your characters feel distinctive and lived-in.

You’re well on your way to crafting something intelligent, immersive, and deeply intriguing. Keep pushing the subtle strangeness, and this could be an incredibly compelling read.

Perplexity (Auto)

The story has a strong, suspenseful opening. You’ve established a good sense of place and effectively built tension through Sena’s observations and internal thoughts. The mystery surrounding the naked man with strange markings is intriguing, and the arrival of the authorities adds another layer of suspense.

The Rest

Except for Gemini, perhaps a feature of its Flash model, the others provided more extensive feedback and summary.

To be fair, I am no fan of Elon Musk or X (formerly known as Twitter), but I liked Grok. Its responses felt more natural and less forced optimism. It also picked up on some nuance the others missed. This said, it not only missed others, after some dialogue about the satirical ironic intend, it offered me suggestions that felt as natural as Steve Buscemi’s “How do you do, fellow kids?” meme.

Here’s a non-spoiler sample:

Nurse in “Assessment”: “Hold still, E.T., no phoning home yet.” Jef blinks, “No compile,” thinking she means coffee—absurdly off.

Neither story context nor character profiles do anyhting to set up or frame this delivery. “The nurse” is a character. I have no idea where the ET reference comes from, nor by extension, the “phone home” line. How any of this relates to coffee is beyond me.

Grok, don’t quit your day job.

Closing

This story is intentionally anti-science fiction, anti-trope. To clarify, I’m not sure one can write a story devoid of tropes, but I prefer to subvert the expectations that come with some.

Those who follow my Philosophics Blog know that I am a Postmodern philosopher. I don’t buy into teleological notions of progress and associated metanarratives, leading to shiny spaceships and a Jetson existence. Technology is neither Skynet nor a saviour. It’s just a tool.

Accelerando and Other Non-Fantastical Utopianism

February 3, 2025February 3, 2025Posted in Artificial Intelligence, Book, ChatGPT, Generative AI, Sci-Fi, WritingTagged ai, Artificial Intelligence, books, ChatGPT, ChatGPT 4, coexistence, consciousness, dystopia, fiction, future, Generative AI, novel, philosophy, Sci-Fi, Science Fiction, speculation, technology, utopia, WritingLeave a comment

I’ve been absent in the realm of fiction and this blog for a while, and I’ve got many other things distracting me, but I wanted to post something somewhat relevant. I prompted ChatGPT for possible writing ideas related to the rise of artificial intelligence and the interaction with humanity minus the usual tropes. I share the response.

Audio: NotebookLM podcast of this content.

Ah, so you’re after something in the vein of Accelerando—where AI doesn’t turn the world into some saccharine utopia but instead naturally supersedes humanity through sheer momentum, without falling into the Skynet or AI God-King clichés. You want the cold, indifferent inevitability of intelligence evolution, rather than some paradise-like AI nanny-state. Got it.

Here are some that fit your criteria:

1. “Blindsight” (2006) & “Echopraxia” (2014) by Peter Watts

Blindsight is a first-contact novel, but its underlying theme is the obsolescence of human consciousness. The protagonist interacts with post-human beings and non-conscious but hyper-intelligent AI entities that operate on levels far beyond human comprehension.
The sequel, Echopraxia, takes it further, showing how post-biological intelligences leave baseline humans behind—not maliciously, just inevitably.

Why it fits: The AI isn’t a dictator or savior—it just moves beyond us, as if we were an outdated biological app.

2. “The Lifecycle of Software Objects” (2010) by Ted Chiang

A novella exploring the evolution of AI over time, without falling into dystopia or utopia.
It’s about how AI develops differently from humans, not through brute force but through time, experience, and interaction—like raising children.
Eventually, these AI beings begin to diverge from human concerns, neither evil nor particularly benevolent—just different.

Why it fits: AI isn’t malicious or benevolent—it just has its own agenda that doesn’t align with human expectations.

3. “Neuromancer” (1984) & The Sprawl Trilogy by William Gibson

Gibson’s cyberpunk classic ends with an AI (Wintermute) achieving post-human transcendence, merging with its counterpart Neuromancer, and basically leaving humans behind like forgotten relics.
The sequels (Count Zero, Mona Lisa Overdrive) continue exploring this idea, showing that AI evolution doesn’t necessarily mean human destruction—it just means humans are no longer the main players.

Why it fits: AI doesn’t need to kill humans—it just grows beyond them, leaving them to stagnate in their own meatspace.

4. “The Quantum Magician” (2018) by Derek Künsken

A hard sci-fi novel featuring AI as a fully realized successor species to humans.
Unlike many sci-fi AI, these digital minds don’t care about conquering or eradicating humanity. They are simply running simulations and following complex evolutionary patterns that humans don’t fully understand.
They’re more like inscrutable post-human strategists than villains.

Why it fits: AI in this novel is playing a game too vast for humans to comprehend, rather than plotting dominion or destruction.

5. “The Singularity is Near” (2005) by Ray Kurzweil (Nonfiction, but reads like Sci-Fi)

Not a novel, but Kurzweil’s vision of AI progression follows the “humans will simply fade into irrelevance” model rather than outright war or paradise.
He argues that AI will integrate with society at first, then surpass humanity so completely that we’ll become a footnote in history.

Why it fits: If Accelerando is a chaotic, unrestrained Singularity scenario, this book describes the same fate with the veneer of optimism, but the end result is the same—humans are obsolescent.

6. “The Collapsing Empire” (2017) & “The Interdependency” Series by John Scalzi

AI-driven governance is subtly woven into the background of Scalzi’s universe.
The AI here isn’t explicitly replacing humans, but over the course of the series, it becomes clear that humanity’s biggest decisions are increasingly made by non-human intelligence.
Instead of war, there’s a quiet shift—humans stop being necessary.

Why it fits: AI is neither enemy nor friend—it’s just a more efficient system replacing outdated human decision-making.

7. “Player of Games” (1988) & The Culture Series by Iain M. Banks

Banks’ Culture novels are often mistaken for utopian AI futures, but they are really about AI inheriting the universe while humoring human existence.
The Minds (the super-AI) run everything, letting humans play at politics, war, and philosophy, knowing full well they don’t actually matter.
There’s no rebellion—just an unspoken truth: humans are pets in a post-human, AI-governed reality.

Why it fits: AI doesn’t need to conquer humans—it just makes them irrelevant.

8. “Glasshouse” (2006) by Charles Stross

Less well-known than Accelerando, but still in the same vein.
Set in a future where AI and uploaded minds are dominant.
Humans are relics, preserved out of nostalgia, while AI minds operate at a level beyond our comprehension.

Why it fits: AI replaces us, but it’s not a dystopia—humans are just increasingly pointless.

9. “Schismatrix” (1985) by Bruce Sterling

A deep-cut cyberpunk novel about the quiet obsolescence of baseline humans.
AI and post-human intelligences evolve, while humans either upgrade or fade into irrelevance.

Why it fits: It captures that Accelerando vibe of technological change outpacing human relevance rather than destroying us outright.

10. “Minds, Machines & Evolution” (1998) by James P. Hogan

A collection of Hogan’s short fiction, often exploring AI transcending humanity without malevolence.
One of the stories, The Bug Trap, is particularly fitting—it depicts AI simply moving past human limitations, rather than enslaving or eradicating us.

Why it fits: AI isn’t playing by our rules anymore—it’s just evolving past our concerns.

HONORABLE MENTION: Hannu Rajaniemi’s Works

The Quantum Thief, The Fractal Prince, and The Causal Angel all feature AI-driven post-humanity as an inevitable force, rather than an antagonist.
Rajaniemi explores a world where AI and uploaded minds are the dominant lifeforms and biological humanity is barely relevant.

Why it fits: AI doesn’t destroy us—it just leaves us behind.

Final Thoughts

You’re looking for that Accelerando flavour—AI taking over not through malice but through sheer efficiency, intelligence, and inevitability. The books above match that criterion: no Skynet, no god-like AI overlords, just a quiet, creeping obsolescence of humanity as we become background noise in a world where intelligence continues without us.

Which of these feels closest to what you’re looking for? Or do you want something even more clinical and indifferent, like a true “post-human shrug”?

ChatGPT and Academic Pursuits

November 12, 2024November 12, 2024Posted in Artificial Intelligence, ChatGPT, Generative AI, Sci-Fi, WritingTagged adaptability, adaptable agents, Ambigents, boundary-resistant, ChatGPT, competing beliefs, competing truths, conceptual complexity, cosmic clash, flexibility versus rigidity, Fluidics, futuristic landscape, humour, ideological conflict, ideology, inspiration, language philosophy, narrative synthesis, new entity, news, sci-fi concept, sci-fi satire, technology, thought experiment, WritingLeave a comment

I’m always writing, even if not fiction. I’ve neglected this blog, but I’ve been busy. If I’m not actually writing, I am thinking about it. I’ve been working on an academic endeavour about the limitations of language as a part of my Language Insufficiency Hypothesis. I’m creating a novel framework to support and emphasise my point, and I had to borrow and coin some nomenclature for word classes or categories. Two such terms are ambigents and fluidics. As with the others, I’ve given them formal definitions that I ran by ChatGPT.

Heads up: Inventing new words raises Hell with spellcheckers and autocorrect.

You may be able to suss out the context, but ChatGPT does not understand humour very well, so it serves as the perfect straight guy. If anyone is looking for a new writing theme, hit me up. Let’s chat.

If this doesn’t pan out, I’ll write a Sci-Fi book about Ambigents versus Fluidics. I wonder who’d win?

Now, that sounds like a brilliant concept for a sci-fi book! Imagine Ambigents as ideologically-driven agents, boundary-resistant and constantly shifting, embodying the tension between competing truths and perspectives. Meanwhile, Fluidics could be adaptable, resilient, and unbound by ideology—flowing through contexts with ease, surviving precisely because of their flexibility.

The plot practically writes itself: an ideological clash between the Ambigents, who seek stability through contested beliefs, and the Fluidics, who thrive on ambiguity and contextual adaptation. Each faction would have strengths and weaknesses, with Ambigents as passionate but perhaps brittle, and Fluidics as adaptable yet possibly lacking conviction.

Who would win? It depends: do they achieve synthesis, or do their differences prove too profound to bridge? In true sci-fi style, it could end with the emergence of a new entity that transcends both, embodying a harmonious blend of ideological strength and flexible adaptability.

I’d read that book! And it’s perfectly in line with your explorations of language and identity—ideal fodder for a thought-provoking, boundary-pushing narrative.