Diaspora: Amazon.co.uk: Greg Egan: 9780752809250: Books

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Product Description

A dramatic insight into the future of Man in the 30th century and beyond where life is divided into three; fleshers - true homo-sapines; Gleisner robots - human minds within machines; and polises - supercomputers teeming with intellgent software containing copies of human personalities.

About the Author

Greg Egan lives in Perth, Western Australia. He has won the John W. Campbell award for Best Novel and has been short listed for the Hugo three times.

Inside This Book (Learn More)

First Sentence
Yatima surveyed the Doppler-shifted stars around the polis, following the frozen, concentric waves of colour across the sky from expansion to convergence. Read the first page

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Concordance

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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover

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Customer Reviews

16 Reviews

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Average Customer Review

3.9 out of 5 stars (16 customer reviews)

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19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Pure SF for the purists, 16 Jan 2006

By

Rod Williams (London) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Diaspora (Paperback)

This is pure SF at its purest; original, admittedly difficult and challenging, but pushing the boundaries of the genre and rewarding the reader who perseveres.
In the past authors have felt obliged to patronise their readership by providing a certain amount of explanation of the science involved. To be fair to the average readership this is sometimes necessary and indeed Egan provides a glossary at the end of the book which defines some of the terms and concepts explored.
Even so this novel, described by one critic as ‘more science than fiction’, although a brilliant and rewarding piece, is in places very hard work, particularly when Egan goes off into pages of lengthy and eloquent scientific arpeggio.
The basic premise is that toward the end of the 30th century, Humanity has schismed into several forms: the Polises (a polis being a virtual city of digitised human brain structures), Gleisners (similarly digitised humans, but who choose to inhabit physical bodies) and Fleshers (who are physically human but may or may not have genetically engineered their structure). There are also extreme degrees of difference and divergence within these three main groups.
The aftermath of a cosmic disaster forces the polises and the gleisners to send a thousand copies of their populated cities (with copies of the inhabitants) out into the galaxy. There it is discovered – from a vanished Elder Race known as The Transmuters who have left coded messages locked within the structures of neutrons - that a similar collapse is about to occur at the core of the galaxy. One millions of times more powerful than the original disaster; one which will engulf the entire galaxy.
The race is then on to follow in the steps of the Elder Race into another Universe with different physical laws where they will be safe from the aftermath of the core collapse.
The science from here on gets even more complex and is apparently based on the theories and beliefs of contemporary thinking in Physics. Those who know something of Modern Physics and indeed, those who are well acquainted with SF conventions will get far more from this novel than the lay reader.
It has to be said however, that it is to Egan’s credit that he has not been tempted to ‘dumb down’ his writing at all. The breadth of his ideas is breathtaking, beginning with a detailed, very plausible and quite fascinating description of the ‘psychogenesis’ of a digitised personality. Much of the novel is concerned with the subject of individual identity, consciousness and the very nature of ‘self’.
It’s also a novel which poses many questions about our possible future as a designer species, and in so doing, in a kind of Hard SF Dick legacy, questions what it means to be human.

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11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Required reading for science fiction fans, 8 Dec 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Diaspora (Paperback)

No science fiction fan's life is complete until they have read this truly extraordinary novel. 'Diaspora' is a novel that could change the way you think about science fiction.
Post-human civilisation is a land where most science fiction writers fear to tread. Egan, however, charges in like the tourist guide to the end of the universe, training the spotlight of his fearsome narrative skill on all its most interesting and relevant features.
Egan deals with such abstract, difficult concepts that it seems miraculous that he can explain them at all, let alone with such clarity that a lay reader like myself has no trouble following his thread. That he also manages to tell a genuinely emotive story in this strange and alien world is even more surprising. Readers should be advised however that the first quarter of the book is quite hard going - stick with it, you won't be sorry you did. Towards the end the book becomes so intense that you won't be able to put it down, no matter how many multi-dimensional perceptual spaces or quantum-level machinery descriptions Egan can throw in to see if you're still paying attention. Wonder after astrophysical wonder flies from the page, and I guarantee that if you make it past the halfway point, you'll finish it wanting more.

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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Mind-expanding stuff, 14 May 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Diaspora (Paperback)

"Diaspora" is a poetic exploration of the unlimited potential of the human mind. Following on in concept from "Permutation City", Egan explores the nature of consciousness in a future where those who still live in physical bodies - "fleshers" - are conservative anachronisms and where most of the descendants of humanity live as software. Beginning with a beautiful description of the rise into self-awareness of a newly born mind, he considers cloning, travel between stars and dimensions, and the possibilities of complete autonomy afforded by leaving the physical world. "Diaspora" is ideas-driven science fiction at its best.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Accelerating the genre w/ indecipherable hard science
Diaspora reads more like a series of interconnected short stories than a solid novel like Egan's Permutation City or Quarantine. Read more

Published 4 months ago by M-I-K-E 2theD