Outside Context Problems: Liberalism and the Other in the Works of Ian M. Banks

Jackson, Patrick Thaddeus, and James Heilman. "Outside Context Problems: Liberalism and the Other in the Works of Ian M. Banks." New Boundaries in Political Science Fiction. Donald M. Hassler and Clyde Wilcox, editors. Columbia, SC: U of South Carolina Press, 2008: [235]-258.[1]

Deals with the liberal values of "Individual Liberty," "Equality," and "Reason." Under Reason:

Perhaps the greatest example of the Culture's commitment to reason is the prominence that it accords to its machines and especially to its Minds [very powerful AI]. Not only are sentient artificial intelligences full citizens of the Culture, but in practice they run both the day-to-day operations of the society and have the lion's share of the responsibility for longer-term planning. [Quotes Consider Phlebas on preference for "the machine rather than the human brain" ....]

In turning virtually everything of consequence over to the Minds, the Culture has in effect allowed itself to be governed by reason more purely than any society dependent on human authorities could possibly be. [...] There is never a question as to whether the Minds in charge of the Culture are acting in accord with reason [...]. The Culture's operating presumption [...] is that if Minds decreee it, then it must be reasonable, and inasmuch as the Culture is a reasonable society, it should listen to its Minds. (Jackson and Heilman p. 245)

The Culture's machine-mediated liberal Reason is not always good for weaker Others who might not want to be assimilated into, or even just dominated by — or merely manipulated by — the Culture (e.g., pp. 249, 251).

RDE, finishing, 27Dec21