Additional information
by David Shultz (Author), Richard A. Shury (Author), Michael Rook (Author)
Named Top 10 "Best Lit Mags of 2023" by Chill Subs
Carefully curated stories from our monthly magazine to create a themed short story book about the philosophy and ethics of technology. Perfect for classrooms and book clubs, each story is 1,500-7,000 words and comes with five suggested discussion questions.
Story Summary List
- Abrama's End Game: Abrama learns the gods created her dimension as their play-space to visit, and is forced to fight across realities when she discovers their plan to shut it down.
- The Formula: A group of boys get into a car crash and an AI algorithm is forced to decide who lives and dies.
- Give The Robot The Impossible Job!: An AI tutor faces deactivation if she cannot prove her worth by saving a teenage pupil with an "unsolvable" problem - she's a budding serial killer.
- Sow: A pilot is tasked with "seeding" a distant planet with the codes to give rise to future humans, at the expense of the planet's natural evolutionary process.
- Cicada: Dr. Zhang invents teleportation but refuses to share it with the world.
- The Things We Give: Martha sells years off the end of her life to help her mother and make ends meet.
- Two-Percenters: A new treatment may allow 98% of the people to be genetically enhanced, but at the expense of the 2% who already are.
- The Empathery: Various family members try out new bodies to learn empathy and teambuilding.
- Cost Of Human Life: AI software designed to more efficiently run the railroad system runs into a programming issue.
After Dinner Conversation believes humanity is improved by ethics and morals grounded in philosophical truth. Philosophical truth is discovered through intentional reflection and respectful debate. In order to facilitate that process, we have created a growing series of short stories across genres, a monthly magazine, themed books, and two podcasts. These accessible examples of abstract ethical and philosophical ideas are intended to draw out deeper discussions with friends, family, and students.
Reviews 5/5 Stars!
"With Science fiction we can explore other galaxies and alien conflicts, but with philosophical fiction we can explore other minds and ethical conflicts. Let this book take you on a Phi-Fi adventure."
- William Irwin, Ph.D. - Philosophy Professor, King's College "After Dinner Conversation has taken up the initiative to write themed collections of short stories that fit focused ethics courses - say, a course on bioethics, AI ethics, Tech ethics etc. These collections can offer a spine for such courses or individual stories could be added to a course as illustrative material to stimulate discussion. The stories are lively and engaging and followed by a set of questions to start classroom discussion. Also, outside of educational contexts, the stories will work nicely to stimulate conversation in families, elder hostels, youth clubs, or book groups. Give it a try - I trust that you will enjoy working with the material in this book!"
- Luc Bovens, Ph.D. - Philosophy Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
★★★ If you enjoy this story, subscribe via our website to "After Dinner Conversation Magazine" and get this, and other, similar ethical and philosophical short stories delivered straight to your inbox every month. (Just search "After Dinner Conversation Magazine")★★★
