Oh wow! I admit in the first couple paragraphs I was thinking “oh so it’s Greg Egans Quarantine?” and it is a similar idea, but I love the places you went with it. The human-wide dead man’s switch is a haunting idea, and the narrator has this fascinating… loneliness to them. I’m going to replay this one my head for a while.
Maybe there should be a nuclear "Dead Man's Switch" that destroys all of humanity unless we're living in a perfect, blissful utopia with not one person suffering inordinately. Humans off-planet would all have small bombs implanted in their brains that would explode if the Nuclear Dead Man's switch was activated (at least a 99.9999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999% probability in the overwhelming majority of wave function branches).
Of course, we could just have their spacecraft explode. But then again, why the hell would we be launching astronauts into space if we were planning to annihilate the whole species? I have to admit, that would make no sense! 😂
Dark but very interesting. Kind of like someone asked Chuck Palahniuk to write a Sci-Fi riff on The Secret
I hate this, thanks
Oh wow! I admit in the first couple paragraphs I was thinking “oh so it’s Greg Egans Quarantine?” and it is a similar idea, but I love the places you went with it. The human-wide dead man’s switch is a haunting idea, and the narrator has this fascinating… loneliness to them. I’m going to replay this one my head for a while.
Thanks so much! I had not heard of that story, glad to know I'm breaking some new ground
Of your work I've read, this is one of my favorites, if not my overall favorite.
One minor nit: the podcast host switches to news anchor with no explanation
Hmm, how strange friend, you must have dropped in from a parallel universe, I see it says podcast host in both places now (thanks)
Maybe there should be a nuclear "Dead Man's Switch" that destroys all of humanity unless we're living in a perfect, blissful utopia with not one person suffering inordinately. Humans off-planet would all have small bombs implanted in their brains that would explode if the Nuclear Dead Man's switch was activated (at least a 99.9999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999% probability in the overwhelming majority of wave function branches).
Of course, we could just have their spacecraft explode. But then again, why the hell would we be launching astronauts into space if we were planning to annihilate the whole species? I have to admit, that would make no sense! 😂
Ah yes, The Ones Who Destroy Omelas and everyone living in it, rather than walking away