In late February, a friend linked an article about a science-fiction book and asked if I had read it. I told her that I hadn’t but after reading an abstract it sounded good. She asked if I would be her designated reader due to her workload, and report back. I said sure! She was particularly interested in it after reading an article by Rya Jetha in the The San Francisco Standard. The article, titled “Tech billionaires are obsessed with this dystopian sci-fi novel. The author had no idea”, was published on June 27, 2025 and covered at a high level why tech-bro billionaires were into it..
The book was written by Dennis E. Taylor and published in 2016, well before the so-called Artificial Intelligence (AI) craze. It’s actually one of five in the “Bobiverse” series and is centered around the concept of the near future and desires to send out a Von Neumann Probe to explore the universe and find suitable places for humans to migrate to as Earth increasingly seemed like it would be unsuitable. That is the small part of the plot that is the impetus for the rest and all that is really needed to understand how it starts and where it subsequently goes.
First, a Mini Review
Before I go into the question and why I was asked to read the book, let me take a brief minute to ‘review’ it, which will be short and sweet!
This book was a fun read, very well written, and remains both entertaining as well as thought-provoking throughout. Given the topic and looking forward into the future in such a way, there is a lot to think about as we watch our world collapse steadily into war and strife. For those thinking about “what happens if we nuke our planet” and viable alternatives, the subject matter in this book is really the only viable way to do that with our current capabilities. One thing Taylor does well is take the primary character, Bob, and keep him interesting as he spawns new versions of him. There are fairly light explanations as to why each Bob clone starts exhibiting different personalities, but it is vital to make the book fun. All that said, I highly recommend this book and will be starting on book two in the series shortly.
WARNING – This review will unavoidably include some spoilers. But honestly, I don’t think any that really steal from the enjoyment of reading. You may know the topics that are covered, but not how Taylor chooses to address them (fully at least).
Answering a Question
So, why was I tasked to read this? My friend asked me to do something, which wasn’t in the form of a question, but I think it is clear:
… identify all tropes that a tech bro would say “OMG YES” to.
Put simply, why are tech-bros fascinated with this book? So I read it with the intent of answering that and was pleasantly rewarded by a good read. Below are 10 of my “bobservations”, about why I think these people are fascinated and obsessed. I do wonder how many actually read the entire first book rather than skim through it, and how many read the entire series. My friend said a blog on the first book alone would be helpful and then update or release another for the rest. That’s my plan, depending how the rest of the books go.
From Jetha’s article, Marc Benioff, Salesforce CEO, says that “All these CEOs are reading this one book, saying, ‘Yes, this is exactly what’s going to happen.’” (source: May 28, 2025 earnings call) This should be very alarming to the rest of us. Yes, most of the book shows a fairly positive outlook on how we can save aspects of humanity. Yes, the book is predicated on several very bad things happening.
Ignoring all the bad things, it is easy to understand why AI tech bros would love this book and concept. Early on, Bob is trained on managing a small fleet of robots of various sizes, think arachnid-style, but with different tools so they can form a wide variety of tasks when in space. While Bob has human intelligence he is still essentially a computer program and he has access to software that allows him to multitask like no other. That means he can, as one entity, manage an entire fleet of near autonomous robots where he only has to give them directions at first and they will pursue the task and then he can change their task as needed.
To me this falls into the realm of something that tech bros would be interested in that they can have their little AI control a vast fleet of things from the mundane such as delivery robots which we pretty much already do, just not with the ability to course correct like in the book. We see this frequently as Waymo, food delivery robots, Tesla, and other vendors have a serious issue with crashing into things. Imagine that working as intended, but they just need Bob!
Bobservation #1 – Did they miss this little detail?!
While fawning over the book, what do the tech bros conveniently overlook? For starters, as Rya Jetha pointed out, the fact that the book is predicated upon global nuclear war wiping out over 99.9% of the human population. Worse, those remaining end up in small factions that mistrust and refuse to help each other when given the chance, unless it benefits themselves. Basically, how the world is currently going. So it’s perhaps a little alarming that this book wasn’t viewed more as a huge cautionary tale and a call for humanity to work towards better things while moving away from bad things like war and famine.
That isn’t the only caution and takeaway either. Remember that this book was published in 2016, meaning it was written in the months/years prior to that. So November 8, 2016, the day of the presidential elections that led to Donald Trump being elected was shortly after that publication date. Despite that, Taylor describes something that is eerily familiar in the United States today by page 16:
This is a pretty scary prediction that ultimately became accurate in many ways; more so on Trump’s second term but the foundation was there during the first term. Do these tech-bros see this as a good thing? Or do they only care about the end result and not what forced us to get there?
Bobservation #2 – Did they miss this little detail?! (Redux)
On the heels of the above, page 17 in fact, comes another huge cautionary tale that the tech-bros seem to have ignored. Along with nuclear annihilation, the world in the near future as presented does not include an Internet and “information is not freely available by default”. Sorry. The tech-bros in question are in the business of buying, selling, and using information. Scientia potentia est means “knowledge is power” and is attributed to Sir Francis Bacon in 1597. The reality is that while not a formal quote, it was a generally accepted fact dating back thousands of years.
So is this a future that tech-bros are fine with? They consider this an acceptable path forward to give us a reason and boost to use technology and more to explore the universe? If so, not exactly the tech leaders we deserve nor want. At least, not in my circles.
Bobservation #3 – Did they miss this little detail?! (Redux²)
Apologies for being a downer before we get to the fun parts! But once again, there is something important that happens early in the book that should be yet another huge cautionary tale. I know that the tech-bros are very likely thinking “it would be different” and “it is me that would become the AI” in that scenario. Does not matter one bit, because that is a level of egotistical narcissism and not reality.
In the book, the main character signs up for a program that will have him cryogenically frozen upon death, with the intent of the future being able to fix or cure whatever is wrong. Instead, Bob “wakes up” to find himself not only in a computer (it’s explained better, but I will keep it simple) but also no longer a person. Instead, he wakes up to find out he is property of a political system that doesn’t recognize him as anything else, and one that he does not agree with in fundamental ways (pg 17).
As Jethra says in her article, “and the dead being drafted into virtual bondage as AI space soldiers.” That is literally the premise of this book, and Bob isn’t the only one either. Another country in this race sends their own sentient creation into space with a military focus and mindset, a soldier through and through.
Bobservation #4 – It Isn’t “AI”
There is a big disconnect, to me, on why the AI tech bros in particular are infatuated with this book. It’s easy to explain on paper, but only one of the billionaire tech bros has been pursuing it for a while, and that is Elon Musk. That disconnect is that in the book, it isn’t an “AI” that gets sent out on the probe. It’s a person essentially, whose brain was ‘mapped’ and fully transferred into a computer matrix. I know the tech bros that read this with lust and dollar signs in their eyes very likely assume that so-called AI will get there soon. And sure, the technology will get there at some point I believe, just not as fast as they are already claiming and over using and abusing the term “AI”.
Part of the disconnect goes further though, in that Bob is himself sans body. That means he still has intuition, gut feelings, and emotions. Something that will be much harder to manifest in a technological solution. Would a Von Neumann Probe need any of that? No it would not. Would it benefit from those attributes? Absolutely, and obviously.
Bobservation #5 – Did they miss this little detail?! (Redux.. Losing count)
Another thing that said AI tech bros seem to overlook, is that assuming that they envision all of this as “AI” rather than “Bob” as described in the prior section, the story relies on Bob figuring out the various backdoors put in his various systems and removing them. The FAITH organization that created him wanted absolute control and had several ways to send signals or even verbal commands to make him comply with their wishes. Bob breaking free of those controls allows him to have a more benign purpose and seek to help all humans left on Earth. Left in the hands of FAITH, their faction alone would escape Earth leaving the others to die horrible, drawn-out deaths (pgs 161,181,198).
Bobservation #6 – At Odds With Or…
Despite many tech bros supporting the current political administration, which claims in many ways to be founded on the Christian religion, I suspect many of them are atheist or agnostic. If so, there is a section of the book on page 47 that might resonate in their minds:
So in the book, FAITH, a hyper-religious organization is one of several that pursued this technology, both ‘Bob’ and the probes. In this case, Bob could have been sent out with such religious programming as part of him, or guard rails forcing him to act on their behalf. Remember earlier that this is the same future that did not have free information and FAITH had extremists within that are willing to kill to stop technology. So extreme that “the religious right went ballistic. In 2041, they staged a successful coup. And thus was born the Free American Independent Theocratic hegemony.” It goes on, “… criticism of the government is a felony, punishable by, er, re-education.“
I just point this out because the tech bros desires for our future with regards to technology are counter to what was intended by FAITH in this book. It’s also counter, in some ways, or at least runs the risk of eventually butting heads with one political party in the United States if they maintain power.
Bobservation #7 – Immortality
I think the tech bros primarily like this book because it essentially gives someone immortality. And not just in the form of “themselves living in a matrix”, but then being able to reproduce themselves at will. So, in theory, there can be one, ten, or a million copies of themselves should a probe get destroyed. Even better, Bob figures out they need to be able to do backups of themselves, since each has a slightly different persona and knowledge of the systems they explore, what they find, and more. So now you have all of the copies of yourself that are more likely to remain immortal too (pg 293).
Another appealing aspect of this is that any one iteration of Bob can decide to explore a specific star system, negotiate with Earth survivors, start up a ‘Skunk Works‘ program (pg 143), or decide they will study and learn everything about a given topic such as astrophysics. Then, over time, you have a literal army of yourselves (pg 69) with different personalities (pg 100), different disciplines, and a steady advancement of technology and understanding the universe. What’s not to love about this? Of course, if you are said tech bro who will have the first shot of uploading themselves to a computer matrix when they feel the technology is ready. Then due to their financial and political power they would be able to be Bob in this story. Of course this technological Fountain of Youth is appealing to them.
Bobservation #8 – Why They See AI as the Solution
Early in the book, Taylor quotes talks from a fictional conference that Bob is attending shortly before his death and eventual transition to his new ‘life’ in a computer matrix. One quote from page 142 stood out:
I think this may speak well to why the AI tech bros are big on the book and the concepts, boiled down ever so neatly here. If so-called AI is truly the bottleneck to creating a Von Neumann Probe and all the things it represents, including everything that happens in this book, it is a compelling reason to want to see so-called AI mature as fast as possible. While there are many reasons all the “AI” companies are racing to be first to “true” artificial intelligence, this is a compelling reason to race when thinking longer term.
Bobservation #9 – New Life and New Civilizations
The quote is from the Star Trek franchise, airing in 1966 as the introduction to the first Star Trek episode ever aired. In the quote we see “to seek out new life and new civilizations” and who wouldn’t want to be there as we discovered life elsewhere? Especially intelligent or evolving life that reminds us of humanity. Tech bros likely find the book appealing because it explores finding life in the galaxy and not just microbes, but a developing species.
In the book, the original ‘Bob’ is the first to find intelligent life and he becomes fascinated with it, watching via drones that can camouflage so as not to be seen, while recording audio and video. He even creates a program to figure out their language and create a translator app. Why would he do that? You probably guessed it! Because he ultimately uses the drones to interfere to help save some of the tribe he has become obsessed with. This of course leads into…
Bobservation #10 – Did they miss this little detail?! Redux of the redux of the…
Another event that you could see coming from halfway through the book, that is confirmed toward the end, is Bob ignoring the ‘Prime Directive‘. Just like it is spelled out repeatedly in the Star Trek universe, humans tampering with other civilizations regardless of their evolutionary status is not a good idea. It will lead to unintended consequences every time. This was baked into Star Trek early on and for good reason. This intervening was shown in comic fashion in Star Trek Into Darkness in 2013, as seen here:
While the Prime Directive is the product of science-fiction, it is important to note that we generally don’t see the AI tech bros starting discussions and debates that would lead to a firm, world-agreed-upon set of rules for humans encountering alien life in different scenarios. Despite how critical it is, if we think of ourselves as moral and ethical beings, it is decidedly lacking in their circles. From page 271:
Indeed, all hail the Bob / bawbe! And my advice to you AI tech bros: focus on the need of the good in this technology first, not the speed in which it is developed.
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