Is there a name for the cognitive bias or even a trope where you feel like human infrastructure—buildings, books, roads, microchips, plastics—are a sort of homogenous naturally-occurring goo that replenishes itself rather than being the product of human labor? A lot of urban fantasy & horror SF draws on this: libraries that go on forever, “the backrooms”, impractically vast digital networks in cyberpunk, epiphenomenal mystical roads in Kentucky Route Zero…
@glyph a whole lot of these concepts overlap on the point of treating the world as not entirely real and persistent, but as a projection of our subconscious and thus an extension of us. A belief that or daydreams and nightmares can manifest in front of us.
I wonder... if these depictions of homogeonous, nefarious, infrastructure is less something of note in and of itself, rather, if it is a reflection of this innate feeling that... we all have bullshit jobs live bullshit lives and are ultimately, living in a paradigm devoid of meaning?
@glyph I bet you've seen it but my favorite recent example of this is that infinite alternate-dimension IKEA story. Can't remember if literal SCP entry or just something that could easily have been one…
@bitprophet There's a SCP like that, but also an actual novella that posits IKEA-likes are dimensional wormhole sources and also predatory exodimensional hive predators.
@bitprophet@glyph leaving aside the trope -- which is fascinating and completely recognizable! -- yes, you really need to play Control. It's REALLY good.
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