dark forest deterrence
Names: dark forest deterrenceultimate deterrencedeterrencedegree of deterrencedeterrence broadcastdeterrence system
First appears in Book 3: Death's End, chapter 18 (Excerpt from A Past Outside of Time The Ghost of the Wallfacers: The Swordholder)
Appearances
B1
B2
B3
What you know
Book 3: Death's End
- Ch 18Humanity threatens to broadcast Trisolaris's location, destroying both worlds, to force Trisolaris to abandon its invasion plan and share technology.
- Ch 18If humanity as a whole controlled the switch, the degree of deterrence would be near zero, since people would not choose destruction of two worlds.
- Ch 28Dark forest deterrence was terminated when the broadcast system was destroyed and Cheng Xin refused to press the switch.
- Ch 29Deterrence has ended, and the narrator says the world no longer belongs to humans.
- Ch 30The book's author names electing the wrong Swordholder as the most important factor in deterrence failing, with technical design weaknesses also contributing.
- Ch 30Humanity subconsciously feared gravitational wave ships as too powerful, since exiled crews could become like Blue Space and Bronze Age and hold humanity's fate.
- Ch 30Both the deterrer and the deteree share the same terror of deterrence itself.
- Ch 32Had ended thirty-eight days before the fleet's discovery, leaving humanity's future in darkness again.
Connections
- created byLuo Ji
Key moments
- Book 3 · Ch 28Deterrence terminated
The droplets destroy the three gravitational wave transmitters and suppress solar radio amplification, ending dark forest deterrence without attacking the Swordholder.