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Fiction

Edited by Ben Pace, Yoav Ravid, Ruby, et al. last updated 8th Nov 2021

Fiction isn't literal truth, but when done well it captures truths and intuitions that are difficult to explain directly. (It’s also damn fun to read.)

“Nonfiction conveys knowledge, fiction conveys experience.” - Eliezer Yudkowsky 

Eliezer Yudkowsky helped kickstart the genre of rationalist fiction, which is about characters who solve the problems in their world by thinking, in a way where the reader could figure it out too. Not where the genius character explains it afterward like Sherlock Holmes or Artemis Fowl, but where the problem is fair and you could’ve figured it out first. Eliezer has written about this in his short online book The Abridged Guide to Intelligent Characters.

Other fiction on the site is in the spirit of hard science fiction, and often involves taking the laws of a universe or the rules of a system to their extreme conclusions, and munchkining your way to become god (or something similar). They also share much of the parts of sci-fi that engage with difficult moral quandaries.

Fiction on this site also tends to have puns. I’m so sorry.

Much more fiction can be found at r/Rational, which is a subreddit devoted to rationalist fiction.

This is a tag for works of fiction, not for analysis or discussion of literature. For that see Fiction (topic).

Fiction Sequences

  • HPMOR
  • Three Worlds Collide
  • The Bayesian Conspiracy
  • Murphy's Quest
  • Luna Lovegood and the Chamber of Secrets
  • Bayeswatch
  • Short stories by lsusr

External links

  • /r/rational/ on Reddit
  • RationalFic on TV Tropes
  • Eliezer Yudkowsky's guide to writing intelligent characters
  • rationalreads.com
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Posts tagged Fiction
268Chapter 1: A Day of Very Low Probability
Eliezer Yudkowsky
11y
19
102Three Worlds Collide (0/8)
Eliezer Yudkowsky
17y
97
261…And I Show You How Deep The Rabbit Hole Goes
Scott Alexander
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15
516The Redaction Machine
Ben
3y
48
382Lies Told To Children
Eliezer Yudkowsky
3y
94
74Answer to Job
Scott Alexander
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7
69Universal Love, Said The Cactus Person
Scott Alexander
10y
3
415That Alien Message
Eliezer Yudkowsky
17y
176
6The Devil You Know
Slimepriestess
5y
1
158The Sword of Good
Eliezer Yudkowsky
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303
139Failed Utopia #4-2
Eliezer Yudkowsky
17y
267
47"Starwink" by Alicorn
Zack_M_Davis
5y
1
117Friendship is Optimal: A My Little Pony fanfic about an optimization process
iceman
13y
152
101The Adventure: a new Utopia story
Stuart_Armstrong
6y
37
66I
PhilGoetz
15y
38
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