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Comment by unicornporn | Hacker News Reader

While not nearly as dramatic, this story reminds me a serious accident I had in my early childhood. For a long time I thought that perhaps I did die and that I had continued life in a near identical parallel dimension while leaving friends and relatives mourning in the one I had been born in.

I wonder if this thought ever occurred to the pilot.

A fantastic read.

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I guess we're wandering a bit from the topic, but I used to feel the same way about, of all things, that childhood pastime of spinning around with your arms out. I spent more time than I'm comfortable specifying believing that every revolution put me in a slightly different universe, and that in order to get back, I'd have to perform exactly as many counter-revolutions in the opposite direction.

While this may sound insanely OCD, I remember thinking that I didn't have to get the number of counter-revolutions exactly right -- within a half-dozen or so should be "good enough".

I guess I was an imaginative child.

Haha, wonderful. It's a an appealing thought I must say. What if the the "right" maneuvers in space actually open inter-dimensional portals. Sounds like we could've made good friends.

This is known as "quantum immortality" [0]

[0] https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_immortality

Thank you!

Anathem by Neal Stephenson explores this idea towards the very end. Doesn't give it much time but obviously it's hard to interpret from our end.

Thank you. I was kind of hoping someone would have suggestions for further reading. :)

Alastair Reynolds wrote a short story with this as an element. I think it's in Zima Blue.

Greg Egan goes into such things at length in Permutation City.

Thanks, I'm looking forward to some inter-dimensional reading!

Anathem is a great book that explores lots of interesting, fairly unique ideas, and does some moderately original world building. But I always tell people Stephenson (the author, personal favorite) isn't for everyone, and Anathem isn't even for all Stephenson fans, it can be a hard read for many.

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