Exhalation

Exhalation: Stories by Ted Chiang

Exhalation explores a number of philosophical topics in Science Fiction short stories. Each story also provides a short "why I wrote it" section. (This can be one of the best part.) The first story was an "Arabian nights" type setting that explores a door that lets you go see time in the future. People can explore the future, but can't really make any changes in their life. (As an example, one man goes to see his future self and discovers that he is a frugal miser with huge amounts of hidden wealth. He feels it would be better to spend money and takes all of that money. Alas, his life of wealth is short lived and leads to him hoarding money due to getting robbed and accused of not "earning" it.

A few stories look at different approaches of freewill. One person analyzes their own brain. In another story, people can "fork" their lives in alternate ways. 

One story looks at "virtual people". These AI beings are allowed to grow on their own and are held somewhat like pets and live in virtual worlds. They want additional freedoms and rights, but are they mature enough?

There is one story that looks at communication. It combines a thread of adding written language to an oral communications tribe with a technology that allows people to replay at will any previous event. Is the "real truth" better than the way that we remember things? We may remember a great experience from childhood. However, if we replayed it, we may see that other participants were reluctantly participating. Does this make it worse? Do we really want the "real truth"?

The stories include:

"The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate" 

"Exhalation" 

"What's Expected of Us" 

"The Lifecycle of Software Objects" 

"Dacey's Patent Automatic Nanny" 

"The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling"

"The Great Silence" 

"Omphalos"

"Anxiety Is the Dizziness of Freedom"