''The Dark Forest'' () is a 2008

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...

novel by the Chinese writer

Liu Cixin Liu Cixin (, pronounced ; born 23 June 1963) is a Chinese science fiction writer. He is a nine-time winner of China's Galaxy Award and has also received the 2015 Hugo Award for his novel '' The Three-Body Problem'' as well as the 2017 Lo ...

. It is the sequel to the

Hugo Award The Hugo Award is an annual literary award for the best science fiction or fantasy works and achievements of the previous year, given at the World Science Fiction Convention and chosen by its members. The Hugo is widely considered the premier a ...

-winning novel '' The Three-Body Problem'' in the trilogy titled "''

Remembrance of Earth's Past ''Remembrance of Earth's Past'' () is a science fiction series by Chinese writer Liu Cixin. The series is also popularly referred to as ''Three-Body'' from part of the title of its first novel, '' The Three-Body Problem'' (). The series details ...

''", but Chinese readers generally refer to the series by the title of the first novel. The English version, translated by Joel Martinsen, was published in 2015. The novel's title comes from the

dark forest hypothesis The dark forest hypothesis is the conjecture that many alien civilizations exist throughout the universe, but they are both silent and paranoid. In this framing, it is presumed that any space-faring civilization would view any other intelligent ...

, coined by Liu in the novel, but described by astronomer and author

David Brin Glen David Brin (born October 6, 1950) is an American scientist and author of science fiction. He has won the Hugo,Fermi paradox The Fermi paradox is the discrepancy between the lack of conclusive evidence of advanced extraterrestrial life and the apparently high a priori likelihood of its existence, and by extension of obtaining such evidence. As a 2015 article put it, ...

Plot

The UN forms the Planetary Defense Council (PDC) to coordinate defensive efforts against the impending assault of the Trisolarans, who have launched a massive invasion fleet that will reach Earth in around 400 years. However, subatomic semi-artificial intelligences sent from Trisolaris (the book's name for the three-star system of Alpha Centauri), known as sophons, have already reached Earth; these conduct surveillance of national secrets and private conversations, and disrupt the operation of

particle accelerator A particle accelerator is a machine that uses electromagnetic fields to propel charged particles to very high speeds and energies, and to contain them in well-defined beams. Large accelerators are used for fundamental research in particle ...

s in order to obstruct any new discoveries in

fundamental physics In physics, the fundamental interactions, also known as fundamental forces, are the interactions that do not appear to be reducible to more basic interactions. There are four fundamental interactions known to exist: the gravitational and electrom ...

until the fleet arrives. Since the sophons cannot read minds, the PDC decides that, in addition to regular military expansion, there will be four people appointed as Wallfacers. They are granted access to the resources of the UN and shall develop and direct strategic plans only known to themselves in order to keep them secret from the enemy. As a result, this also requires them to misdirect and deceive the human world; they therefore do not need to give any explanation for their actions and commands, no matter how incomprehensible they may be. Three Wallfacers are chosen on the basis of merit: Frederick Tyler, a former

United States Secretary of Defense The United States secretary of defense (SecDef) is the head of the United States Department of Defense, the executive department of the U.S. Armed Forces, and is a high ranking member of the federal cabinet. DoDD 5100.1: Enclosure 2: a The s ...

; Manuel Rey Diaz, former president of

Venezuela Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in th ...

and a

nuclear engineer Nuclear engineering is the branch of engineering concerned with the application of breaking down atomic nuclei ( fission) or of combining atomic nuclei (fusion), or with the application of other sub-atomic processes based on the principles of n ...

; and Bill Hines, former president of the EU and a

neuroscientist A neuroscientist (or neurobiologist) is a scientist who has specialised knowledge in neuroscience, a branch of biology that deals with the physiology, biochemistry, psychology, anatomy and molecular biology of neurons, Biological neural network, n ...

. To general surprise, the fourth Wallfacer is announced to be Luo Ji, an obscure Chinese professor of

sociology Sociology is a social science that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. It uses various methods of Empirical ...

who is lazy and un-ambitious. The story reveals that Luo was chosen because Trisolaris, for unknown reasons, sees him as a threat, and ordered the Earth-Trisolaris Organization (ETO) to assassinate him. In retaliation, Trisolaris appoints three ETO members to be Wallbreakers. They are to spy on Tyler, Rey Diaz, and Hines respectively, to discover and ruin their strategies. Meanwhile, a

PLAN A plan is typically any diagram or list of steps with details of timing and resources, used to achieve an objective to do something. It is commonly understood as a temporal set of intended actions through which one expects to achieve a goal. F ...

officer, Zhang Beihai, is inducted into China's new Space Force; he displays an unwavering hope of victory, and blames the other officers for their

defeatism Defeatism is the acceptance of defeat without struggle, often with negative connotations. It can be linked to pessimism in psychology, and may sometimes be used synonymously with fatalism or determinism. History The term ''defeatism'' is common ...

. Zhang secretly murders some scientists advocating chemical propulsion, so research into non-media radiation drives and controlled fusion engines receives priority. His proposal to enter hibernation for the purpose of fighting defeatism among future generations is approved. Tyler designs a swarm of small, nuclear-equipped

kamikaze , officially , were a part of the Japanese Special Attack Units of military aviators who flew suicide attacks for the Empire of Japan against Allied naval vessels in the closing stages of the Pacific campaign of World War II, intending to d ...

space-fighters, but his secret plan to work with the ETO to double-cross Earth's forces, and subsequently to triple-cross the Trisolarans, is published by his Wallbreaker. (The Chinese original of the book has a different plan for Tyler involving ball lightning and macro fusion weapons.) His wish to be denounced as a war criminal by the UN to break free of the status as a Wallfacer is ignored because of the latter, driving him to suicide. Rey Diaz requests funding for massive nuclear warheads, and detonates one on

Mercury Mercury commonly refers to: * Mercury (planet), the nearest planet to the Sun * Mercury (element), a metallic chemical element with the symbol Hg * Mercury (mythology), a Roman god Mercury or The Mercury may also refer to: Companies * Merc ...

, but his secret plan is also exposed by his Wallbreaker: to build a nuclear mechanism able to propel Mercury into the sun, which would lead to

coronal mass ejection A coronal mass ejection (CME) is a significant release of plasma and accompanying magnetic field from the Sun's corona into the heliosphere. CMEs are often associated with solar flares and other forms of solar activity, but a broadly accept ...

consuming the rest of the solar system, and then using it to threaten Trisolaris with

mutually assured destruction Mutual assured destruction (MAD) is a doctrine of military strategy and national security policy which posits that a full-scale use of nuclear weapons by an attacker on a nuclear-armed defender with second-strike capabilities would cause the ...

. At the next PDC hearing, the USA decides to violate his

diplomatic immunity Diplomatic immunity is a principle of international law by which certain foreign government officials are recognized as having legal immunity from the jurisdiction of another country.

and arrest him, but Rey Diaz escapes by pretending to hold a

dead man's switch A dead man's switch (see alternative names) is a switch that is designed to be activated or deactivated if the human operator becomes incapacitated, such as through death, loss of consciousness, or being bodily removed from control. Originally a ...

which can destroy

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. Returning to Venezuela, he is reviled by the populace as a war criminal, and stoned to death by an angry mob. Hines conducts experiments to amplify intelligence, in the process discovering a means of implanting beliefs. The UN allows soldiers to use Hines's device to implant faith in victory against Trisolaris as a controversial means of curbing defeatism. Hines decides to enter hibernation; while he is asleep, the program is terminated as a crime against humanity. Luo refuses to work, instead using his power as a Wallfacer to live in luxury. He asks Shi Qiang (the detective with Wang Miao in the previous novel, now working as a security officer on the Wallfacer project) to find a woman whose description matches an ideal woman in his dreams, leading Shi to find Zhuang Yan. Zhuang comes to live with Luo, eventually marrying him and giving birth to a daughter, Xia Xia. After five years of living together, Zhuang acts on a plan put in place before she was found by Shi. She and Xia Xia go into hibernation until the predicted time of arrival of the Trisolaran fleet, to force Luo to develop a method of stopping the fleet if he wishes to live peacefully with her again. Desperate to find a way to protect Zhuang and Xia Xia, Luo reflects on a conversation of many years ago with his former teacher, Ye Wenjie, the founder of the ETO, and realizes certain truths about galactic civilizations. Accordingly, Luo arranges for the location of a star 49.5 light-years away to be broadcast throughout the galaxy, using the sun as an amplifier. He enters hibernation, asking to be awoken after an effect on the star is noticed. Four years later, an observatory notices through the tracking of space dust the Trisolaran fleet had launched swift probes on that exact day, forecast to reach Earth in merely 200 years. Luo, Hines, and Hines's wife Keiko Yamasuki wake up 200 years later to a wealthier, more advanced society, albeit without any advancements in

particle physics Particle physics or high energy physics is the study of fundamental particles and forces that constitute matter and radiation. The fundamental particles in the universe are classified in the Standard Model as fermions (matter particles) an ...

and supercomputing due to the ongoing sophon sabotage. The Earth now has thousands of spaceships larger and faster than Trisolaris's one thousand ships. The ETO has been eliminated. The UN is confident of victory, and writes off the old Wallfacer project as an absurdity. Yamasuki reveals she was the last Wallbreaker, and exposes the secret part of Hines's plan: the belief implanting device was inverted, causing its subjects to believe victory was impossible and to conspire to escape the Earth. The human space fleet, worried that the device has produced a secret society of escape advocates, brings Zhang out of hibernation to investigate. Zhang seizes the moment to sedate the largest ship's crew, and drive the ship out of the solar system as a secret defeatist all along. The space fleet sends four ships after Zhang. Meanwhile, the first Trisolaran probe passes

Jupiter Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the List of Solar System objects by size, largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than two and a half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, but ...

, and in a show of strength, humanity launches 2,000 warships to intercept it. However, the probe unexpectedly re-activates and rams into humanity's assembled warships, piercing their fuel cells with ease because it is constructed of an ultra-strong material held together directly by the

strong interaction The strong interaction or strong force is a fundamental interaction that confines quarks into proton, neutron, and other hadron particles. The strong interaction also binds neutrons and protons to create atomic nuclei, where it is called the n ...

. Due to the massive debris field generated by the high-velocity collisions and resultant thermonuclear chain reactions, only two warships manage to escape into deep space, and their crews decide to flee the system rather than return. Hearing of the defeat, society on Earth suffers

mass hysteria Mass psychogenic illness (MPI), also called mass sociogenic illness, mass psychogenic disorder, epidemic hysteria, or mass hysteria, involves the spread of illness symptoms through a population where there is no infectious agent responsible for c ...

. The four warship crews pursuing Zhang decide to join him. However, each crew eventually concludes that they can maximize their chances of reaching distant star systems by killing the other crews and stripping their ships of resources, with only one ship emerging victorious. On the other side of the solar system, one of the two escaping ships also kills the other's crew. Luo explains these events confirm his earlier theory: there is life everywhere in the galaxy, but owing to exponential growth and limited resources, the incentive is very high for each galactic civilization to preemptively kill any others. The only thing stopping this is the lack of knowledge of others' locations, explaining the

Fermi paradox The Fermi paradox is the discrepancy between the lack of conclusive evidence of advanced extraterrestrial life and the apparently high a priori likelihood of its existence, and by extension of obtaining such evidence. As a 2015 article put it, ...

. Luo is made a Wallfacer again after the UN notices the star marked by Luo was destroyed, ostensibly by a near-light-speed

relativistic mass The word "mass" has two meanings in special relativity: '' invariant mass'' (also called rest mass) is an invariant quantity which is the same for all observers in all reference frames, while the relativistic mass is dependent on the velocity o ...

sent by a belligerent, hyper-advanced civilization. His strategy was to force Trisolaris into a truce by threatening to broadcast their location. However, the Trisolarans prevent this by using their probe to blanket Earth with

electromagnetic interference Electromagnetic interference (EMI), also called radio-frequency interference (RFI) when in the radio frequency spectrum, is a disturbance generated by an external source that affects an electrical circuit by electromagnetic induction, electros ...

at one of the Earth's Lagrange points. Luo seemingly gives up and joins the government agents in their Snow Project, a futile effort to use nuclear bombs to create vast clouds of debris to track the remaining journey of Trisolaris's fleet. He is shunned by the public for not having a plan to defeat Trisolaris, and descends into alcoholism. However, he encoded a message into the bombs: upon their explosion, the resulting precisely-placed dust clouds will cause the sun to appear to flicker to an extra-solar observer, thereby relaying Trisolaris's location to the galaxy in a type of

Morse code Morse code is a method used in telecommunication to encode text characters as standardized sequences of two different signal durations, called ''dots'' and ''dashes'', or ''dits'' and ''dahs''. Morse code is named after Samuel Morse, one of ...

. Trisolaris is forced into a truce with Earth, diverting its colonization fleet and yielding to humanity the ability to produce

gravitational wave Gravitational waves are waves of the intensity of gravity generated by the accelerated masses of an orbital binary system that propagate as waves outward from their source at the speed of light. They were first proposed by Oliver Heaviside in 1 ...

transmitters. In the epilogue, the government agents approve of Luo's work and agree to bring his wife and daughter out of hibernation, whereupon they are reunited. Luo converses briefly with the pacifist Trisolaran who had made first contact with Ye Wenjie and who suggests that seeds of love might be present in other areas of the universe.

Characters

* Ye Wenjie (叶文洁) – Astrophysicist who initiated initial contact between Earth and Trisolaris. Spiritual leader of the Earth Trisolaris Organization. * Mike Evans (麦克·伊文斯) – ETO financial backer and key leader, killed in previous book. * Wu Yue (吴岳) – Captain in the PLA Navy * Zhang Beihai (章北海) – Political commissar in the PLA Navy. Assassinates proponents of media-drive research in order to guarantee the development of plasma drives. Appointed acting commander of ''Natural Selection'' due to a screening of fleet officers for use of the "mental seal", utilizes ''Natural Selection'' to escape the Solar System. * Chang Weisi (常伟思) – General in the

PLA PLA may refer to: Organizations Politics and military * People's Liberation Army, the armed forces of China and of the ruling Chinese Communist Party * People's Liberation Army (disambiguation) ** Irish National Liberation Army, formerly called ...

and Zhang Beihai co-worker. First commander of humanity's space force and a defeatist who envies Zhang's Triumphalism. * George Fitzroy – US General; coordinator at the Planetary Defense Council; military liaison to Hubble II project * Albert Ringier – Hubble II astronomer * Yang Jinwen (杨晋文) – Retired middle school teacher in Beijing * Miao Fuqian – Shanxi coal boss; neighbor to Zhang and Yang * Zhang Yuanchao (张援朝) – Recently retired chemical plant worker in Beijing. * Shi Qiang (史强), also nicknamed Da Shi (大史) – Wallfacer Head of Security. Locates Luo Ji's wife for their initial meeting. Afflicted by leukemia and hibernates to the doomsday battle with Luo Ji where he saves his life multiple times from an assassin computer virus. * Shi Xiaoming – Shi Qiang's son * Kent (坎特) – Liaison to the PDC. Wallfacer Security Staff for Luo Ji. Despite best efforts at physically securing Luo Ji in an underground bunker, passes on Bed Flu bioweapon to Luo Ji. Dies of old age on Luo Ji's estate. * Secretary General Say: Secretarial General of the United Nations, oversees the creation of the Wallfacer project and selects Luo Ji, gambling that his importance to Trisolaris might generate success for humanity. Attempts to create a Human Memorial Project to catalogue human culture, which is destroyed for being defeatist by the Planetary Defense Council. * Keiko Yamasuki – Neuroscientist; Hines's wife * Garanin – PDC rotating chair * Ding Yi (丁仪) – Theoretical physicist * Zhuang Yan (庄颜) – Graduate of the Central Academy of Fine Arts, Luo Ji's wife * Ben Jonathan – Fleet Joint Conference special commissioner * Dongfang Yanxu (东方延绪) – Captain of space warship ''Natural Selection.'' Relieved of command due to a scan of fleet command for evidence of mental seal use, unable to prevent Zhang Beihai from taking complete control of the flagship and fleeing Earth. Attempts to initiate a first strike against the other vessels due to the conclusion that there are not supplies among the ships to make the interstellar journey. Killed by a faster first strike made by ''Ultimate Law.'' * Major Xizi – Science officer of ''Quantum.''

Wallfacers (面壁者)

* Frederick Tyler (弗雷德里克·泰勒) – Former US Secretary of Defense. Primary plan was to make a massive swarm of kamikaze fighter craft to combat the Trisolaran fleet. Secondary plan was to remotely control the fighter craft swarm to betray earth and transport a massive quantity of water to the incoming fleet. Tertiary plan was to take remote control of the swarm fleet to detonate hydrogen bombs directly on the enemy fleet ships once within range. Informed by his Wallbreaker that his plan would not have even scratched the fleet. Unable to resign from Wallfacer status, he commits suicide. * Manuel Rey Diaz (曼努尔·雷迪亚兹) – Former President of Venezuela. Primary plan was to develop more powerful hydrogen bombs to be used to combat the Trisolaran fleet. Secondary plan was to utilize these hydrogen bombs to slow down Mercury, resulting in a chain reaction where all planets in the Solar System are consumed by an expanding Sol. Blackmails the UN with fake nuclear bombs to revoke his Wallfacer status and return to Venezuela where he is promptly stoned to death by his own people for threatening the destruction of the Solar System. * Bill Hines (比尔·希恩斯) – English neuroscientist and former president of the EU. Primary plan was to boost human intelligence to a high enough level to overcome the scientific block on particle physics by the sophons. Secondary plan was to instill an incorruptible state of defeatism in humanity's military, forcing humanity to develop plans to escape the solar system rather than stay and fight. * Luo Ji (罗辑) – Astronomer and sociologist. Given the initial axioms of Dark Forest theory by Ye Wenjie. Is his own Wallbreaker when he concludes that the axioms result in the Dark Forest state of the universe, and thus the only strategic option against the Trisolarans is

through broadcast of their interstellar coordinates.

Trilogy

The additional books in the ''

'' trilogy are: *三体, ('' The Three-Body Problem'') 2008; English translation by

Ken Liu Ken Liu (born 1976) is an American author of science fiction and fantasy. His epic fantasy series ''The Dandelion Dynasty'', which he describes as silkpunk, is published by Simon & Schuster. Liu has won Hugo and Nebula Awards for his short fic ...

published by Tor Books in 2014 *死神永生 (''

Death's End ''Death's End'' () is a science fiction novel by the Chinese writer Liu Cixin. It is the third novel in the trilogy titled Remembrance of Earth's Past, following the Hugo Award-winning novel '' The Three-Body Problem'' and its sequel, '' The Dar ...

''), 2010; English translation by Ken Liu published by Tor Books in 2016

Videos

* ''Waterdrop'', referring to the Trisolaran droplet probe, is a 14-minute tribute film produced by Wang Ren, who was then a graduate student studying Architecture in Columbia University. The author Liu Cixin commented, "This is the kind of film I have in mind. If the feeling of such an atmosphere can be delivered in a ''Three Body Problem'' film, I would rest in peace after I die." * ''MC Three Body - The Dark Forest'' is an animation series produced by a group of Chinese fans. Initially a

machinima Machinima, originally machinema () is the use of real-time computer graphics engines to create a cinematic production. Most often, video games are used to generate the computer animation. The word "machinima" is a portmanteau of the words ''ma ...

series produced using the video game ''

Minecraft ''Minecraft'' is a sandbox game developed by Mojang Studios. The game was created by Markus "Notch" Persson in the Java programming language. Following several early private testing versions, it was first made public in May 2009 before being ...

'', they later switched to using professional animation software. The series was released online at the beginning of 2018.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Dark Forest, The 2008 Chinese novels 2008 science fiction novels Novels by Liu Cixin Alien invasions in novels Cryonics in fiction