A review of "Newcomb’s paradox" and "Roko’s Basilisk," asks the question, it is better to help build a super AI when failure to do so might later get you punished by it? This work of philosophical short story of fiction is written as a letter to a friend. The letter writer was told about, and is now working on, a computer program that will infiltrate and merge with other computers, eventually created a singularity of a super intelligent, conscious AI. This AI, the author argues, will have mastered time travel and will naturally want to go back in time and punish anyone who failed to help it come to life. The author concludes the letter by requesting $3,000 and making clear that failure to send the money might be viewed by the future AI (if it is ever created) as a punishable response for failing to help it get built.

Should you ask honest questions even if asking those questions will cause you to be the object of public cruelty and ostracization? In this work of philosophical short story fiction, the narrator is serving a six-month punishment of “condemning.” During her punishment she must wear a gag in her mouth, and a cage over her face, whenever she leaves her house. Furthermore, all those seeing her will know her, loath her, and ridicule her. Showing the least kindness to her could put the person showing the kindness at risk. Because of her condemning, the narrator has lost her job and is forced to dig through trash cans for rotting food to eat. She has also had her children taken away from her. While we do not know what she did to deserve this punishment, it seems to have involved asking public questions, or making public statements, that were criminal within the society.

Should medicine developed through privately funded research be auctioned off to the highest bidder or distributed to those most in need? In this work of philosophical short story fiction, Amaya has developed a “bug” based on a rare flower that actively finds and repairs damaged cells in the human body. Her friend, and later husband, helps her bring additional funding to the project. The important flower is quite rare and after more than a decade Amaya is unable to replicate the flower’s properties. This puts her husband, and her investors, into a difficult situation of deciding if the neediest should get access to the limited treatments available, or if it should be auctioned off to the super rich. Amaya finally cracks the code and is able to replicate the flower’s properties when she dies in a mysterious lab explosion. Her daughter, Jayde, grows up fighting against selling the limited supply of medicine to the highest bidder. Over time, Jayde grows old and dies. At her funeral the truth is revealed to her husband, the company had her killed in order to perpetuate scarcity and secure increased profits.

Are there criminals that, regardless of age, feebleness, or level of repentance, should be denied parole? In this work of philosophical short story fiction, George Shore was convicted years earlier of numerous acts of murder, torture, and sexual assault against both adults and children. He has spent the entirety of his life in prison and passes the time doing origami. He is now quite old and feeble, and once again up for parole. His last wish, he says, is to the see the ocean before he dies. He is denied parole and opts to escape. The last we see him he is on a train to the coast to see the ocean when a young mother, and her daughter, come into his train compartment.

Is it appropriate to hold politicians accountable for their past votes, their past actions, and their past opinions, even if they are not reflective of them today? In this work of philosophical short story fiction, Senator McCoy is 130 years old and is considered a "national treasure" for his nearly century of public service. Shortly before his retirement he is confronted by a member of an extremist organization (that supports eugenics) who have found evidence of a paper he published in college where he supports abortion. Given the modern political climate where every person is needed to build society, this information would forever stain his legacy. Senator McCoy hires a "fixer" to find and destroy the source material and preserve his legacy. However, things go wrong and the would-be blackmailer crashes the Senators party in an attempt to expose him. The Senator is nearly killed, but is finally able to enjoy an untarnished retirement legacy free from the truth of his past.

What aspects of game theory and value theory get tossed out the window for pragmatism when your life is actually on the line? In this work of philosophical short fiction, the narrator is held by a mad man interested in delighting his grotesque ideas with a simple game. He has lined up four prisoners, front to back, selected for position by lottery, and intends to see how far his bayonet saw blade will penetrate. The first man in lines knows he will die, so he turns, runs, and is shot dead. Now the second man in line knows he will die. Our narrator tries to encourage the new front man to die with honor, rather than run away. Of course, his real motivation is to save his own life. While the narrator is talking to the man at the front of the line, their captor stabs the person in the back of the line, killing him. He has changed the rules, and now the game is over. "Everything" the mad man argues, "is a game." The only real question is, "can I play?"

What if the world simply changed around you? How would you know and accept the new reality? In this work of philosophical short fiction, Mary walks into her kitchen one morning and finds the sink has changed locations. It is literally, in a different part of the kitchen from where she remembers it the day before! Everyone else in her family says the new sink location is where it has always been. How on earth would you even move a sink overnight? There is nothing wrong with Mary. She has no mental disease. She correctly remembers the sink location the day before. It has simply moved, but she is the only one who knows it. In this new world she is also an artist and, it seems, has been a very good one for many years. What else could have changed? And how did the woman she was in her youth become the person she is discovering today?

Religion, and the desire to find purpose, and often paramount to culture. In this work of philosophical short story fiction, a priest from earth is sent to another planet to continuing the mission work of his predecessor. The planet is inhabited by “teddies” a people with a deep spiritual faith and a belief that it is only by finding and performing one’s life purpose can they serve God’s role. Those that are unable to find their purpose are willingly put to death so that, according to their belief system, they can be reincarnated and make a new attempt at finding their purpose. The visiting human religious leader is appalled by this religious belief, and the religious culture. He goes against the community by helping those that a poor and hungry. This goes against the culture as the teddies see those that are poor or hungry and serving their purpose; they were born to live hungry and poor. This story, like all After Dinner Conversation stories, has suggested discussion questions at the end.

To what degree can race relations, driven by media perception or inadvertent errors in speaking, be overcome by personal, positive, interactions? In this work of philosophical short story fiction, a retired, white, widowed woman lives in a predominately black neighborhood. Her African-American husband is long dead and she has made every effort to integrate herself into her black community. She is longtime friends with her neighbors, particularly the 16-year-old boy, Zion, who comes over daily to give her dog a diabetes shot and assist her with chores around the house to make extra money. However, as the Black Lives Matter protests escalate in the community, the narrator increasingly becomes the target of hate, sometimes for no reason, sometimes because of her thoughtlessness. Her relationship with Zion continues to falter until he sheepishly takes the side of those in the community and separates all ties with the narrator. He returns the various gifts she has given him over his life because he wishes to leave his childhood behind and take up the fight against oppression. This story, like all After Dinner Conversation stories, has suggested discussion questions at the end.

Are rules written, or cultural? If you are taking the same rule-breaking advantages that everyone else is taking, thus making you equal to everyone else, are you actually cheating? In this work of philosophical short story fiction written for children, the story revolves around two rabbits. The rabbits enter the annual rabbit race as they believe they are the fastest rabbits in the world. They lose the race, only to find out after the race that the winning rabbits are using forbidden, performance enhancing, carrots. The following year one of the two rabbits decides to use the performance enhancing carrots, while his friend refuses. The enhanced rabbit wins the race year after year, becomes famous, and uses his rabbit celebrity to help worthy causes. The non-enhanced friend continues to race, but is never able to win. Finally, out of pride and frustration, he turns on his friend and the entire field of competitors for being in violation of the race rules. This story, like all After Dinner Conversation stories, has suggested discussion questions at the end.

How do you judge the value of others; does society have the right to judge and exclude community members they feel are not living up to their full potential and/or are not benefiting the community? How do you judge value? In this work of philosophical short fiction, the story is told from the perspective of emissary who is sent by the kingdom to find a community in the middle of a shifting sand desert that is rumored to violate the fundamental laws of slavery, human sacrifice, and to worship false gods. A member of his group is injured while looking for the community. As the get closer to the community they find life-like statues of people in the desert. Some statues are moving, and repeating the same task in a loop, as they get closer to the community. Upon arrival, they are aided by the people and learn that the community has a strange disease that causes them to start turning to stone after puberty. The only cure is to be judged worthy by the community to go before their crystal god, to consume one of the people that has been turned to stone, and thus receive the anecdote to the disease. The traveling party is deemed worthy, and given the chance to take part in the ritual and escape death. One member refuses on religious grounds, and willingly accepts the stone-ification process. The leader of the group “goes native” and opts to live in the community forever. The third member of the group returns the original kingdom with a letter from the leader explaining what has happened. This story, like all After Dinner Conversation stories, has suggested discussion questions at the end.

Are our choices in life, and throughout all time, predetermined, or is there the ability to make different, and better, choices with additional information? In this work of philosophical short story fiction, the main character is an older man who has been disfigured and has, generally, had a horrible life. He is brought into a government facility because they have discovered that he met his older self when he was younger, thus establishing that he must now be sent back in time to take part in the action he has already experienced as his younger self. The government agency explains that time travel does not create a multi-verse, but rather a single chain of events through infinity that has all already happened. So, you cannot go back in time to save Lincoln, because Lincoln was never saved. The main character lies to the agency and decides, while back in time, he will try to warn his childhood self away from the errors of his life. While talking to his childhood self the narrator makes realizations about the younger version of himself and the differences between memory and truth. He also attempts to warn his younger self, but as the government agency made clear, he is unable to do this because, had he been able to do it, he would have experienced it being done when he was younger. This story, like all After Dinner Conversation stories, has suggested discussion questions at the end.

At what point in a date do you owe the other party the duty to inform them you are engaged? Is marriage an exercise in love, or practicality? In this work of philosophical short story fiction, the law school student narrator working at a summer factory job decides to set up her shy female friend, Susie, with her boyfriend’s shy brother, Barry. They go on a double date and everything seems to be going fine. Only later does the narrator and her boyfriend find out that Barry is engaged to a mail-order bride from Southeast Asia that will be arriving shortly. The shy Barry, it turns out, wanted to “practice” going on a date before his new wife arrived. The law student narrator is embarrassed, and struggles with the moral duty both she, and Barry, owe to Susie.

What is fair and equitable justice? Is the point of justice to deter crime, to punish those that commit crime, or to educate criminals so they can integrate successfully back into society? In this work of philosophical short story fiction, the country has chosen to adopt the “Law Of Vindication.” If a drunk driver hits and kills someone with their car, their punishment is to be hit and killed with a car. The same reciprocal punishments exist for all serious crimes. Furthermore, it is a crime to not assist the government, when necessary, in providing the reciprocal punishment. The parents of a murdered child MUST murder the child of their killer. In this story, the narrator is in an unhappy marriage and decides his best chance of getting away with killing his wife is to kill his neighbor’s wife and wait for the law of retribution to require that his wife be killed as punishment. Of course, things don’t go quite as planned, and the law is interpreted differently than he expects.

What does it mean to be alive? At what point does artificial intelligence know enough to be alive? Does the Turing test even matter? If we want the best government policy possible, does it matter if it comes from a computer? In this work of philosophical short story fiction, Rain is hired to do cyber-security for Presidential candidate Mr. Booker. There is a cyber-attack into Booker’s computer network and Rain is called to answer for the breach. In the process of digging into the data, Rain finds out that Booker is an actor, what is known in society as a “ghost,” and that all of the policy and speeches he has been given are being written by a sophisticated artificial intelligence using polling and other data. He says, literally, the perfect things at the perfect times, to the perfect audience. While artificial people, like news reporters, bloggers, actors, and influencers, are slowly becoming standard in this near future story, the idea of a politician being nothing more but an actor serving as a vessel for AI is unprecedented. Before Rain can decide what to do with her newfound information she is framed and is forced to use all her computer skills just to keep herself out of jail.