Reading long form prose increases your attention span and the shape of your thoughts.

Reading fiction stimulates the imagination, which opens up the space of ideas that the mind can generate.

Fiction is a compressed simulation of life. By reading good fiction one lives more life.

Fiction is a cultural touchstone. New relationships open up when there are shared understandings of stories.

Good, hard science fiction is a record of what some of the most imaginative scientific thinkers (not necessarily scientists) have pondered. Again, mind expanding.

Science fiction stimulates curiosity by asking "what if"?

We all have to engage in lower energy activities and "waste time". Watching documentaries is a "waste of time" for someone not engaged in professional research on the relevant subject. Do you use Reddit? That's a waste of time. Having a science fiction book next to the toilet will leave you feeling more nourished after you've done your business (I look forward to using the bathroom when I know there's a delicious book waiting for me that I only read there).

Dead tree books are better for someone who has a hard time reading. Studies show there's a big difference in retention between words on a screen and words in print. Dead tree books also benefit from being "things" that can be left in the intended reading location, and give a sense of progress and of conquering when completed.

The tactile nature of flipping pages and of breaking in a paperback is lovely. The cover art attracts the eyes to the book.

Reading a book is a different action than looking at your phone or computer, and it has a different set of feelings, emotions, thought patterns. There's the smell of a printed book.

I love Asimov. I, Robot is easy because it's a collection of very short stories, but it risks being seen as shallow. The End of Eternity is considered Asimov's best novel, and it's not too long. I hear good things about The Last Question. Foundation is lovely.

Be right back, going to buy more Asimov.

Haha, funny you mention it, because now that I think about it, it hits that attention-span-needed spot right in-between blog/reddit posts and novels. Which, is a pretty nice and gentle way to ease someone into reading novel-sized material.

It greatly helps that reading Asimov's short stories today still feels very gripping and relevant, probably even moreso than back when it was originally published. Though this is more of a feeling, as I obviously cannot verify how it actually felt to read it back then.

If you're trying to get him to read a classic specifically, maybe it would help to start with some non-fiction pieces. David Foster Wallace has an essay on what makes Dostoevsky great and worth reading [1]. And there are plenty of other essays and books out there on "why read the classics." If you think presenting your case through the lens of scientific rigor would be helpful, there are numerous studies showing that reading fiction increases empathy with others [2] (and if that's not appealing to him, you're probably in for a very long and uphill battle). For a classic recommendation, I think that similar to the article, Crime and Punishment is a good choice. It's pretty approachable language-wise, it's not crazy long, and it hits all those points of universal themes, some humor, and a deep empathy from the author to his main character.

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[0] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/223380.Stories_of_Your_L...

[1] https://www.villagevoice.com/2019/07/04/feodors-guide-joseph...

[2] https://www.discovermagazine.com/mind/how-reading-fiction-in...

That sounded interesting. But it was “worlds”, not “words.”

"The Classics" are at this point literary archeology: they've influenced a lot, but unless you're actually inspired to follow that chain back they're just going to wind up seeming "samey" to things that came after because they were already heavily referenced, extrapolated, deconstructed and their essential ideas endlessly debated.

If so, that makes your job a whole lot harder, but you may be able to challenge that by linking a moving work of fiction with an actual closely held relationship or desire in this person's life. But do not expect to be able to just hand him a book and watch it happen. Speaking from personal experience, I frequently require someone to discuss fiction with before it will "hit home", and I'm not even antagonistic to fiction at all. I'm just bad at it unless I can talk it through with somebody who can be my guide.

Also some people are just missing things neurologically that make certain things compelling for most people. Some people just don't care for music much because it doesn't do much for them and concerts are kind of confusing enjoyment wise. Same with many people in software for watching sports, they're just not that into it.

For others, it moves them greatly. Maybe he doesn't create the internal world required for fiction when he reads fiction.

So either he is on a mission (people who are noticeably good at something tend to be) or they are just missing the thing that would make it enjoyable for them.

PsychoPass, Akira, Cowboy Bebop, Neon Genesis Evangelion, Attack on Titan.

So, movies. I only saw The Shawshank Redemption a few years ago, and it's really really good. Classic. Human. Touching. I'm not even sure how to characterize it except yes, really go see it, it's really at the top of the power distribution of movies.

12 Angry Men. At this point it's the cliché of old but good movies. At this point it's a satire of a socially interesting movie due to its naivete, yet for someone who seems a bit close minded it might be just the right thing. (Or not? :D)

The Pianist. Again, simple. Brutal. Or the recent Joker.

. . .

But really when it comes to AI and fiction.

Blade Runner. If that's not fiction that's worth investing time into, then what is? Even typing this I've got the chills thinking about Roy Batty.

I totally agree with everything on this list, except Akira and NGE. And I am saying that as someone for whom NGE is the all-time personal favorite piece of animated media (and I like Akira a lot too, just not as much).

Akira and NGE are pretty much deconstructions of genres, and are really heavy on at least some basic level of previous exposure and understanding of the context. I am fairly certain that if you make someone without much previous exposure to the context watch Akira, you will get a very resounding "what the fuck did you just make me watch". Watched it in a movie theater myself around 5 years ago, and it was definitely a wild ride. With NGE, I rewatched it many times, partially because I almost always discovered something new on subsequent rewatches.

The rest of the ones you've mentioned are great for easing-in though, and are not shallow even in the slightest. I would also add Ghost in the Shell: Stand-alone Complex series to the list of recommendations.

There were tons of crappy voice overs explaining what was going on. Theological content was removed - the “confession” scene where the robot murdered his creator, the stigmata-style wounds, the dove flying up to heaven. Even the famous “I’ve seen things …” speech was gone.

When home movies became a thing it was re-edited. It became a classic in the “cuts.”

I don’t know if there’s a lesson there. Maybe “don’t worry about re-editing stinkers.”

If the classics feel to archaic or they are too inaccessible, you also might try some contemporary authors. Michael Crichton is very accessible. I think his works can be equally inspiring and creative.

"Artists use lies to tell the truth. Yes, I created a lie. But because you believed it, you found something true about yourself."

- Alan Moore, V for Vendetta

For me, Infinite Jest helped me be more empathetic, which was an area I lacked a lot at the time, to the point that reading it was just clearly useful to me.

But other than that? It's hard to say. I derive a lot of pleasure from fiction, and find the experiences I get from them to be highly meaningful and to sometimes stay with me for years, not unlike memories of times with good friends. Whether or not that's of value to you as an individual just depends on your values.

For me Crime and Punishment was perhaps a bit painful for me as a teenager I remember entering the same state of mind as the main character Raskolnikov from reading it, but it was also a good capstone to connect the feeling from books by Boje, Strindberg and Chekhov.

I don't have an answer for you, but you got me thinking :)

Only recently rediscovered my love for sci-fi after randomly picking up Isaac Asimov's foundation series on a whim while waiting for a flight at a book store.

Not saying it's the best thing ever or necessarily what I'd recommend. But maybe try and think what genere would be interesting to them and then pick one from someone's top x list.

I plan on doing that now using this list https://youtu.be/pP0XnfC1jVM and am very keen to build a bookshelf now haha

What I find special about the TNGS is the Darwin series of automata created at the Neurosciences Institute by Dr. Edelman and his colleagues in the 1990's and 2000's. These machines perform in the real world, not in a restricted simulated world, and display convincing physical behavior indicative of higher psychological functions necessary for consciousness, such as perceptual categorization, memory, and learning. They are based on realistic models of the parts of the biological brain that the theory claims subserve these functions. The extended TNGS allows for the emergence of consciousness based only on further evolutionary development of the brain areas responsible for these functions, in a parsimonious way. No other research I've encountered is anywhere near as convincing.

I post because on almost every video and article about the brain and consciousness that I encounter, the attitude seems to be that we still know next to nothing about how the brain and consciousness work; that there's lots of data but no unifying theory. I believe the extended TNGS is that theory. My motivation is to keep that theory in front of the public. And obviously, I consider it the route to a truly conscious machine, primary and higher-order.

My advice to people who want to create a conscious machine is to seriously ground themselves in the extended TNGS and the Darwin automata first, and proceed from there, by applying to Jeff Krichmar's lab at UC Irvine, possibly. Dr. Edelman's roadmap to a conscious machine is at https://arxiv.org/abs/2105.10461

I'd recommend for example (in no particular order - just some great books imnho):

Earthsea quartet by LeGuin

Dune by Herbert

South of the Border by Murakami

Islands in the Net by Sterling

Foundation trilogy by Asimov

Speed of Dark, by Moon

Accelerando, by Stross

Murderbot diaries, by Wells

A Fire Upon the Deep, by Vinge (and Rainbow's End by same)

2312, by Robinson

And many more, I'm sure :)

What is his current view of the world of humans, etc.

Once you have a grasp of that, there is probably a fiction that can show him how his vision is incomplete.

We are after knowledge and to be useful and interesting the new knowledge need to be just a bit farther than we are at the moment. (zone of proximal development)

Not a book, but for AI I enjoyed watching Joshua Bach interview (consciousness is a simulation)

I agree that most movies are a waste of time at the moment. They mostly repeat the same propaganda.

I feel like I’ve run out of new proximal ideas. I used to devour (not only) science-fiction, but now I find it very hard to find anything whose concepts I’m not already familiar with. Or you have to read through 400 pages to get to just one interesting idea or plot point, and you can’t tell a priori if that will even happen.

It’ hard for me to suggest without any pointer to where you are. Maybe I don’t have anything for you?

What is the last thing you found interesting? How is your life?

Family, friends, career, hobies, plan for the next 6 month?

I agree with him for the most part. However, enjoying something while wasting time is its own reward.

Doesn't literature teach that it's different strokes for different folks? :)

There is no need for anyone to convert others to their hobby of choice - his challenge was a response to you huffing and puffing, not a genuine request.

It's a skill you have to develop, like when you encounter a new musical genre. Lots of people get stuck at the "this sucks and is probably bad and overrated anyway" stage and don't open their minds and challenge themselves to understand why people like it, when encountering literature early on, similar to how many people get stuck in that same place for any musical genres they didn't learn to appreciate by age 25.

At best, they end up reading very light fiction for the rest of their lives—perhaps even YA, which is widely read among adults, in fact. At worst they decide the whole thing's a pretentious sham and they're smarter for not having engaged, which seems to be closer to the case here.

Not sure I'd go with YA if you're trying to convince someone of value in literature beyond entertainment, though. But lighter high-school tier literature, maybe. Salinger (but probably not Catcher in the Rye) or Vonnegut are decent choices, being at about the lightest end that'll still (if the reader's open to it) work those muscles. Gotta start small to develop the skills & taste to appreciate the sublime when it's expressed in written words, and to find meaning, enjoyment, and new mental tools that novice readers largely miss—which is why they often think well-regarded literature is boring and stuffy.

I certainly would, but probably not Harry Potter (personal preference - I think "magic" has been done better, and I think "boarding school" has been done better).

So maybe "Earthsea" by Ursula LeGuin, for example.

People are just suggesting their own favorite books, but nobody started reading fiction with Anna Karenina. But many started with HP and went on to more challenging stuff.

reading HP is fast and loose fun. the characters are okay, the world is okay-ish, the story is the standard good vs evil, there are some interesting dilemmas and the whole setting makes it a lot more palatable than the classic classics :)

(of course there are huuuuuuge plotholes and anyone with a more than two bits of imagination/curiosity starts to pick at the surface of the world it falls apart, like almost anything with magic in it)

But I will concede I've tried other YA series and just couldn't get on with it.

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1695/1695-h/1695-h.htm

Casablanca is also up there.