Source
r/threebodyproblem•
Programming_Response

Dark forest questions [Spoilers]

Spoiler

I haven't finished Death's End, so please no spoilers for the third book. Below are spoilers for Dark Forest AND Death's End:

  1. !Why did trisolaris slow down? They sent the droplet that could destroy a whole fleet, but what was the purpose of slowing down? I am at Death's end where they send a second fleet that arrives in 4 years so I don't think they'll explain this!<

  2. !Why didn't trisolaris just kill Luo Ji? Or all of humanity for that matter? In Death's End, they say they'll spare everyone in Australia, but that's after Earth shares its culture and stuff. By the end of Dark Forest, trisolaris doesn't have our culture. (Okay, they could have with sophons and could be lying, but that doesn't seem right to me)!<

Please let me know if I'm just getting ahead of myself, but I feel like there should have been an explanation for these and I might have missed it.

Posted Mar 12, 2022, 3:31 AM UTC

518
pinktie7418•
  1. Explanation for this comes after the fairy tales in Death's End.
  2. Arrogance and carelessness. Trisolarans thought it was enough to stop broadcasting to the Sun, and then they lacked the ability to see through what Luo was really up to during his snow project. Why didn't they kill all of humanity... I don't think that was explicitly explained. I guess it's mostly because they didn't need to at that time...?
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Programming_ResponseOP•

Thank you for the explanation. Makes sense

1
alecesne•

I figure using the droplets to obliterate humanity would make the surface of the planet less useful. If we voluntarily left, they’d have access and use faster perhaps?

You’d think such an advanced society would build orbital habitats rather than move to another gravity well!

1
8Ariadnesthread8•

Why would it make it less useful? Why wouldn't it make it more useful? Wouldn't humans just get in the way of colonization? I've only finished book two but I'm here because I just finished it and I'm so frustrated by it.

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Ultimate_Several20•

Probably because they respected Humanity as a great Civilisation, and they didn't see any way that they(Humanity) could be a threat to them.

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Programming_ResponseOP•

I finished the book but I still don't understand #1.

!Was it just because they needed to not get hit by space dust when accelerating and decelerating?!<

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pinktie7418•

Deceleration from curvature propulsion leaves behind trails observable from far away. Earth and Trisolaris's relative coordinates have already been exposed due to Ye's communications in Book 1. If Trisolaris decelerates too close to the Solar System, the trails from deceleration combined with the communications would make the Solar System look dangerous to an advanced civilisation and trigger their cleansing.

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Programming_ResponseOP•

I'm realizing my question was unclear. I was wondering about the first fleet. When humanity thought they were slowing down as a sign of peace and sending the droplet as a gift.

The second fleet slowed because of curvature propulsion, which makes sense. But the first fleet didn't have that

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8Ariadnesthread8•

Number two doesn't make any sense to me. What was their plan then? Like wasn't the idea that they wanted to live on earth? So did they want to cohabitate? I've only just finished book two but I'm so frustrated by it. I don't understand why they didn't just kill everyone in the first place. Like they had all of this technology, they put all the effort into creating these crazy sofons and then..... They just basically don't use them. Like what's the point in projecting words when you can just kill everybody and take the planet? I really don't understand it.

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pinktie7418•

The sophons themselves do not have the ability to kill, so the only way for Trisolaris to kill everyone on earth without destroying the planet is to hit humans at high speed. The droplet is contained by energy used during propulsion. Not even the droplet can traverse the entire surface of the planet without running out of energy. The whole operation would be too expensive and wasteful and not worth it. I think the book mentioned this at some point but I cannot remember where.

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8Ariadnesthread8•

But why couldn't they just enter somebody's brain and expand a little bit? That would take like what, a millisecond? Way less than that? Couldn't they do that? Like 6 billion times in maybe, I don't know a few weeks?

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pinktie7418•

It's been clearly stated in the beginning of the second book that sophons cannot kill or impact human thought. I think the physicist debunking the various sophon myths is Ding Yo Edit: Ding Yi

2
woofyzhao•
  1. The root problem is the sun not just one man. Also some say that the droplet was indeed going to smash LuoJi (according to the observed path) but at that very moment the destruction of the cursed star was observed by trisolarans so they decided to change route. Sounds more dramatic and fun.
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8Ariadnesthread8•

But they have this sophon technology, why don't they just use it to turn off the signal?

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devilwithabunnytail•

If by slowing down you mean the fleet decelerating, it will be explained.

Not killing Luo Ji - they did want to kill Luo Ji via ETO early on. After Luo Ji worked out his theory of the dark forest? Like Luo himself eventually realized, he is not important. Even if they killed Luo Ji when the droplet came, with the "spell" some smart individuals or research teams will figure out the dark forest sooner or later. What is important to Trisolarans is making sure humanity doesn't have the means to send the coordinates (blocking the sun).

Why not kill the entire humanity? This is actually not an easy task without ruining the future home for Trisolarans themselves. Like trying to kill off all bugs in a city. And what the first droplet can do is limited - it's not like it can send drones and troops into the most remote forests, mountains, and deserts and search for every surviving human. If it had busied itself with that, some humans could have sent out the coordinates using the sun in the process.

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Programming_ResponseOP•

True, he wasn't as important after his spell that's a good point.

I meant after the droplet blocked the sun, but you're right. At that point there was only one droplet so it would have had to stop transmitting to wreak havoc. Thanks

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8Ariadnesthread8•

The droplet is limited, but the sofans are not. They could literally just use a sofan to kill every single human being within. Probably I don't know like a few hours? Like all it would have to do is penetrate a human brain and send an electrical signal or expand. There's only 6 billion of us, they could have it done by the time they arrive. We aren't like bugs. We are not a quickly reproducing species. We reproduce slowly. Even if it took them 10 years to kill everyone of us, they could do it. Bugs reproduce incredibly quickly, they laid tens of thousands of eggs. Humans have one baby at a time, maybe up to two or three if they are lucky or unlucky depending on how you look at it. But it's totally reasonable to kill 6 billion humans. With their technology? This doesn't make sense to me. I don't believe this bug analogy at all. But I'm a scientist who studies bugs, so I'm well aware of how different they are from us. We're not nearly as resilient. That's why we've lived on earth for such a short time compared to bugs. And we've already put ourselves in such danger, we're about to snuff ourselves out in reality outside of the book.

They should have just killed everybody and book 1 and then moved in. Now I've only finished book two, So maybe they answer this question in book 3. But I'm hesitant to read book three because I'm so disappointed by book two.

0
devilwithabunnytail•

This theory was discussed many times here and no, a proton cannot kill you from within no matter how big it tries to expand. Imagine a balloon tries to break a wall by expanding inside a room? A sophon is way weaker than a balloon without even the air inside to help. It creates near zero pressure to any physical objects, including human cells. If a sophon tries to expand where there is not enough space it will simply destroy itself.

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