14 science fiction stories in under 6 minutes

I can't make science fiction any more. So, to get the ideas I have out of my head, I went to a Standard BBC Quarry, and put all of them one video. Pull down the description for a list of the books that inspired these!

FICTION RECOMMENDATIONS, all FREELY AVAILABLE ONLINE:

Arguably the peak of late-noughties singularity fiction, a fad for the "rapture of the nerds" that's mostly passed now. It's still worth a read, even if its early sections are already feeling a little dated:

A book from the peak era of Adbusters, talking about corporate-sponsored mind-uploading, the author tried to invoice a load of brands for the entirely-uninvited "product placement".

REFERENCED IN THE VIDEO BUT I HAVEN'T READ YET:

(you can find contact details and social links there too)

[davidwolfberg]

"we regret that your afterlife will not continue" is such a fantastic and ominous line

[Tjalve]

"This is a story from a future.
Not THE future. Just A future."

That's how the best Tom Scott videos start.

[ClonedGamer]

"I would be filming in the quarry but they're quarrying"

I don't know why that sentence made me laugh as much as it did.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

I kinda missed your "this is not the future, just a future" type videos. A little quick speculative fiction for the near future. They are always fun to watch to see what you got right and what you got wrong after we've move closer to it being less speculative and instead just fiction.

[AabhasLall]

"It seems like a bad idea to potentially induce that much existential angst", says Tom Scott, after casually inducing too much existential angst.

[AmunRa]

Tom: "I'm not great at writing fiction."
Meanwhile, at Disney: "Somehow, Palpatine has returned."

[sjorswijnhoven]

I really like the 'afterlife server' ending thingy. Obviously the servers would be held up by alive people, so it creates an ethical dilemma about what being alive means and if you can just decide to stop 'dead' people from existing. I hope that sentence made any sense😅

[ConnorEllisMusic]

The ending was even more creepy for me, walking home at night. The video ended and there was no more sound. Just eerie quiet.

I thought the simulation WAS ending.

[jvdb]

Another idea: Thoughts can be copyrighted. If someone thinks of a science fiction story, they now have the rights to it and will chase after any initiative to create it. The creative industry grinds to a halt as only the most ridiculous plots and ideas are able to pass legal scrutiny.

[TotoDG]

“I’m not great at writing fiction.”

Trust me, Tom, a lot of successful authors and scriptwriters aren’t good at writing fiction.

[Nahnono]

I know how embarrassing it can feel to put stuff like this out there so good on you Tom, respect.

[Raykkie]

4:07 Already the case with high-tech implants. There's (real) horror stories of people just unsure when their eyes will just shutdown due to a lack of update and/or repair. And just plain unable to have a surgery to remove them. It's horrible.

[HelloFutureMe]

If anyone wants to read more about brain uploads and digital consciousness, and the very weird things it can do to what a 'person' is, then Greg Egan's Diaspora and Permutation City are fantastic!

[Cerise]

Tom: "I'm not very good at writing fiction."
See, that's already a fictional statement. Ought to go in the count, that.

[comradegarrett]

Imagine how personality development would go in the "influencer"/streamer situation. I can imagine people who just binge their favorite streamers all the time throughout their childhood and adolescents and their own psychological makeup starts to develop in tandem to the streamer - but only in the ways the streamer feels and behaves on screen. Taking parasocial to a whole new level. Knowing someone's stans would be almost like knowing a warped version of the person themself.

[username]

Love that you mentioned Greg Egan. My favorite book of his 'Permutation city' goes deeper than any other sci-fi I've read into what it means to be an uploaded consciousness.

[themandownstairs]

I can imagine for the "influencer but literally" storyline some streamer having to desperately avoid having intrusive thoughts to keep their audience safe. these stories definitely have some potential!

[adamdapatsfan]

Imagine learning that your entire existence was a theoretical focus group that will end in a minute or so and feeling anything other than immense relief that this isn't what _actual_ existence is like.

[yeoldpepsi]

Tom Scott has finally lied to us

"I'm not good at writing fiction"

Haha no I'd read a book series from you

[cSkylaneRG]

To be perfectly honest, I've thought quite highly of your sci-fi stories in the past, right after I stop being mortally terrified by the thought of how close they are to reality and just how easy it would be for most of them to actually happen.