Liu Cixin: The Dark Forest

[bibliogramma]

If anything, Liu Cixin's The Dark Forest (translated by Joel Martinsen) is even more compelling a fiction of ideas than The Three Body Problem was. Where the focus of the first book's philosophical question was the nature of physical reality, in The Dark Forest, Liu explores the question of what his protagonist, Luo Ji, calls "cosmic sociology" - the relations of intelligent species.

These explorations are carried out in the midst of a long lead-up to a crisis - the 400-year voyage of an invading fleet from the scientifically and technologically advanced civilisation called Trisolaris. The Trisolarans, having evolved in the three-sun system of Earth's nearest neighbour Alpha Centauri (a difficult task as was shown in the virtual Three Body Problem game that played a major part in the first novel of the series), want a better piece of real estate, and have made it clear to humans that they are coming to take possession of Earth and its uncomplicated single-sun system.

They have already infiltrated Earth with intelligent multi-dimensional artificial life forms called sophons, which can monitor human actions, alter physical processes, and facilitate instantaneous communication between the Trisolarans and the humans who have formed a kind of religious cult (called the Earth-Trisolaris Organisation, or ETO) centred on them. The presence of the sophons and the actions of the ETO make it virtually impossible to mount any defense plan - as soon as a plan is communicated or stored on any kind of medium, the sophons will learn of it and disrupt it.

Humanity's solution is the Wallfacer Project. Four people are chosen and given carte blanche access to information and resources. Each is to develop a plan for the defense of humanity, but to conceal the nature of that plan from everyone, keeping the details entirely in their heads, using subterfuge as necessary to implement the plan without anyone knowing what it is until the actual conflict is at hand (the fact that these plans will, if successful, unfold over 400 years is made possible by the fortuitous existence of reliable hibernation technology). The ETO counters with the Wallbreakers, selected individuals whose job is to observe the Wallfacers, deduce their plan and make it public, thereby nullifying it.

The novel follows the four Wallfacers, three of whom are notable leaders and scientists, men of dedication and foresight, the sort of people one would expect to be chosen for such a project. Luo Ji, the fourth Wallfacer, is quite a different sort of man. An undistinguished university instructor with no significant achievements to his name, hedonistic and womanising, the only reason for his selection is that the leaders of the Wallfacer project have discovered that for some unknown reason, the ETO consider him a threat to the Trisolarans and have attempted to assassinate him.

One of the great joys of reading this book is watching the slow development of Luo Ji, from a rather unpleasant person with little to recommend him, into a wise and gentle man who truly is humanity's best hope for survival in the crisis.

In 'discovering' the essential tenets of cosmic sociology, Luo Ji's project encapsulates all that is pessimistic in our visions of humanity - a darkness that is echoed in the plans of the other Wallfacers and in the actions of others in the novel who seek their own solutions to the crisis. But in learning, finally, the meaning of love, Luo also shows the way to transcend despair and defeat, the path that leads through and out of the dark forest.

Eagerly awaiting the concluding volume of the series.