Yes, I agree. However, as I mentioned in my OP, I think that the prominence of Hell in stories like Unsong and Project Lawful is partly due to them functioning as plot devices to make taking over the world not just ethical but in fact morally obligatory.
Analogously, if a bunch of 19th-century Marxist fiction featured working conditions far harsher than any that existed in the real world, which compelled the heroes to launch a proletarian revolution, you wouldn’t just think “this makes total sense given the fictional premise”, you’d also think “the fictional premise was chosen to help the authors make the thing they already supported (and wanted to write about) seem morally good”.
And “take over the world for good reasons” was IIRC MIRI’s actual plan (hidden under the terminology “decisive strategic advantage” or “pivotal act” or similar).
Ok, but factory farms really do exist? And I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to call them hellish, or hells-on-earth.
And most of the beings that live in our civilization, depending on how you count, live and die in those factory farms.
So it seems that our world is not very different from that of Unsong or Project Lawful, in this respect? Even if the authors chose that setting for literary convenience, and it is only accidentally reflective of reality.
Yes, I agree. However, as I mentioned in my OP, I think that the prominence of Hell in stories like Unsong and Project Lawful is partly due to them functioning as plot devices to make taking over the world not just ethical but in fact morally obligatory.
Analogously, if a bunch of 19th-century Marxist fiction featured working conditions far harsher than any that existed in the real world, which compelled the heroes to launch a proletarian revolution, you wouldn’t just think “this makes total sense given the fictional premise”, you’d also think “the fictional premise was chosen to help the authors make the thing they already supported (and wanted to write about) seem morally good”.
And “take over the world for good reasons” was IIRC MIRI’s actual plan (hidden under the terminology “decisive strategic advantage” or “pivotal act” or similar).
Ok, but factory farms really do exist? And I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to call them hellish, or hells-on-earth.
And most of the beings that live in our civilization, depending on how you count, live and die in those factory farms.
So it seems that our world is not very different from that of Unsong or Project Lawful, in this respect? Even if the authors chose that setting for literary convenience, and it is only accidentally reflective of reality.
Makes sense yeah.
Still though, I agree with Raemon’s characterization of the Planecrash story.