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The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman

3 pointsby samuelzxuabout 2 years ago

1 comment

samuelzxuabout 2 years ago
Curious to know whether anyone else here have read this, and their thoughts on it. I&#x27;ve just finished my first reading and found it entirely impossible to stop until I had read the whole thing. I&#x27;ve left a comment to kick off a discussion:<p>- There&#x27;s an obvious symmetry with our own times, where stories and facts are smeared together. It&#x27;s touching how clear it rings of &quot;we see what we want to see&quot; in the modern world of an infinitude of hot takes and narratives. Of course, even more recently, generative AI puts an even more literal spin in this direction.<p>- Desire and Will. In this book these two are differentiated in that desire cannot be changed, whereas you can will a desire into existence. I&#x27;m not sure about the philosophical basis of this - I&#x27;ve not read The World As Will and Representation - but I have a feeling it might strike some similar notes.<p>- In the interest of not spoiling the book, I&#x27;ll say the carnal stuff is very in-your-face and deliberately so. The author was definitely shocking when she tried to be.