I just reread The Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect (link here) and the amount of details I forgot was astounding. Mostly because it was the parts that neither matter nor that appeal to me -- the number of psychosexual hard-gore pseudo-murders I'm interested in is 0, not the neat half-dozen in it -- but the actual moment of Singularity is still an absolute banger, and despite it having been written in 1994-2002 it feels extremely prescient about GANs and LLMs as well is potentially extremely influential in a wide range of materials (Janet from The Good Place, the VR world in 3 Body Problem, literally OpenAI itself, NVidia's move to run AI on-hardware, etc.)
I don't think I want to recommend it to anyone, per se -- it's politics are not great and its plot is both slight and drags on forever and the aforementioned constant sexualized ultraviolence is very few people's bag -- but there's something so strangely compelling that I do kind of want people to read it too to see what they think? With the caveat that I don't really agree with it very much. I think good works, especially outsider works, can be like that: the kernel of brilliance inside it shines so brightly it's compelling despite its polished turd exterior.
I don't know. Has anyone else read it and have Thoughts?
