Seeds Of Knowledge

"...as Trevelyan had wisely foreseen, the self-sufficient, enterprising Nomads bore various seeds of knowledge through the Third Dark Ages. The antecedents of our own civilization were among those who reaped what the Nomads had sown."
-Sandra Miesel, interstitial material IN Anderson, Starship, p. 252.

Does Trevelyan explicitly predict that the Nomads will bear seeds of knowledge through the coming Dark Ages? I will find out by continuing to reread The Peregrine. The following story, "The Chapter Ends," describes a later civilization although it does not indicate any Nomadic influence.

However, the idea that such a group would survive and would preserve something of value is entirely consistent with everything that Poul Anderson wrote, for example in his Technic History. And not just surviving groups - the Bronze Age and the Roman Empire also leave legacies.

"He found the Nomads' closeknit, tradition-laden ways more satisfying than the atomized, cerebral existence considered normal on Earth." (ibid.)

Really? I would be quite happy with an atomized, cerebral existence - but I also recognize the value of traditions. And it makes sense to think of Trevelyan, after a career in Coordination, joining a Nomad ship. According to the Chronology, the Third Dark Ages were then less than a century hence.

An Old Problem

Two Coordinators, Trevelyan and Smokesmith, discuss their suspect, Murdoch:

"'...available data indicate that his companions are quite unintegrate.'
"'...yes, hard cases, none Earth-born, several nonhumans from raptor cultures among them.'"
-Poul Anderson, "The Pirate" IN Anderson, Starship (New York, 1982), pp.211-251 AT p. 220.

Later, when confronting this "unintegrate" crew, Trevelyan:

"...was aware that his own body quivered and went dry in the mouth. A remote part of him decided this was an unintegrate reaction and he needed more training." (p. 249)

These passages shed further light on some earlier posts. I thought that psychological conflicts had destroyed the Solar Union whereas it was cosmic complexity that was to overwhelm and destroy the Stellar Union. This view was correct as far as it went. However, the first problem had not yet been eradicated and indeed it also contributed to the fall of the Stellar Union. People on Earth had attained, or at least had begun to approach, integration of emotion with reason but two other groups had not:

some human beings born off Earth;
nonhumans from raptor cultures.

Thus, Sandra Miesel commented:

"One - even many - foes without could be vanquished; against the enemy within there was no defense. Given the prevailing stage of psychodevelopment, the innate contradictions with individuals and societies could not be resolved. Critical data that needed to be gathered surpassed the capacity of any organization to comprehend, much less coordinate. The Stellar Union flew apart like an overwound spring." (p. 252)

There are two points to note here -

(i) Against the enemy within, there was some defense. Coordinators received integration training. However, many more beings in extrasolar cultures did not.

(ii) Miesel mentions both problems, the stage of psychodevelopment and the inability to comprehend or coordinate critical data, but maybe runs them together, making them sound like a single problem? Of course, they interact. The Coordination Service:

"'...can't coordinate as many planets as are included in our civilization-range today. And that range is still expanding.'"
-Poul Anderson, The Peregrine (New York, 1979), Chapter IV, p. 30.

- and the problem is made even greater because many of those planets are inhabited by unintegrated populations. Noticing that Nomad fliers are armed, Trevelyan thinks:

"Earth thought it had achieved peace...and now this has blossomed again between the stars." (The Peregrine, Chapter VII, p. 51)

Contrasting Aspects Of A Future History Series

Formulaically, so to say, Poul Anderson's The Peregrine is hard sf about the consequences of technological advances in a fictitious future. However, three of its premises -

easy, regular, faster than light interstellar travel;
many habitable, easily colonizeable, Earth-like planets;
an alien race differing from humanity only in greater physical beauty -

- make me think of it more as set in an alternative reality verging on fantasy. Some of Anderson's early pulp stories, like "Witch Of The Demon Seas," present an alternative universe where human and other beings inhabit planets of different stars and there is the possibility of interstellar travel but at the same time magic works. The Peregrine is not in that category but not far from it either.

Any future history series links near future stories to far future stories. Near future stories, like "Marius" and "Un-Man," are much closer to our reality and present problems that we recognize. An Un-Man breaks into the apartment of an Americanist Guardsman, interrogates him, then kills him, making it look like suicide. He justifies this as an act of war and indeed the UN and "the gang" are waging an undeclared covert war. Many people believe that the mere declaration of a war justifies any killing ordered by our government - although, as soon as I write that, moral and even legal considerations intrude. There are such things as war crimes. Personally, I would not trust any existing government to tell me when to kill and would not have joined in the slaughter of 1914-'18 but would have seen the need to oppose Hitler, although not by mass bombing of German cities.

Back to the further future: although a Coordinator cooperating with Nomads thwarts a particular alien plot, the Coordination Service and the Stellar Union are soon to be overwhelmed by the sheer number of external threats:

"'The overworked integrators are years behind in correlating information...A thing can grow to monstrous proportions before they learn of it.'" (The Peregrine, p. 30)

What follows is the Third Dark Ages, similar to the Long Night in the Technic History, although in this series there are no stories set in the period following the breakdown.

Interstellar Fiction

Poul Anderson's The Peregrine, about the interstellar Nomads, was originally called Star Ways. Two of the Nomad spaceships are called Trekker and Voyageur. Anderson wrote this novel decades before the existence of Star Wars, Star Trek or Star Trek: Voyager. However, certain words and terminologies recur in an interstellar sf context.

We recognize the scenario from Star Trek and from other sf works, e.g., by James Blish. A large spaceship with a crew of hundreds or thousands enters a planetary system and goes into orbit around an inhabited or colonized planet. Crew members shuttle to the surface in ship's boats. Star Trek introduced the transporter (teleporter) in order to avoid scenes involving boats. Extrasolar planets are either colonized from Earth or inhabited by surprisingly humanoid natives. One Nomad "marries" (not legally) a very beautiful native woman with white skin and long silver hair.

Thankfully, at least, the Nomad and his new wife are not interfertile - although Star Trek does allow even that in the case of Vulcan. The Vulcans should have been a separated colony, not the result of independent evolution, just as the Time Lords should have been not aliens but future humanity.

Poul Anderson is able to write convincingly and to address significant issues despite such sf cliches, which he later transcended.

An Atomized, Cerebral Existence

In Trevelyan Micah's time, the thirty second century according to the Chronology of the Psychotechnic Series, life on Earth is atomized and cerebral. On an interstellar journey:

"Trevelyan had been meditating upon his philosophy." (Starship, pp. 223-224)

So let's hear some thirty second century philosophy. To paraphrase Braganza Diane (The Peregrine, p. 26):

communication is conveyance of information;
information is a spatio-temporal pattern distinguished by rules of selection, therefore capable of being assigned a meaning;
meaning is the induced state of the percipient;
art is primarily emotional communication.

Comment: I suggest that meaning is not a state internal to individuals but essentially shared and interactive.

Trevelyan (The Peregrine, p. 47):

culture is a process;
civilization is not material technology but a thought-process and an understanding.

Comments:

first proposition OK;
civilization is cities dependent on agricultural technology;
civilized thought and understanding depend on technology.

The Pirate And The Peregrine

"The Pirate" is a prequel to The Peregrine, although the latter was the earliest written installment of the Psychotechnic History and the former was the last. "The Pirate," as a new installment of this future history, has to account for faster than light interstellar flight in terms of "hyperspace" but adds the phrase, "...the tachyon mode...," (Starship, p. 219). This mode gives "...only a weak emission of super-light particles..." (ibid.) but nevertheless enables a Cordy ship to track a suspect.

Poul Anderson wanted to make a point about the importance of valuing the past (see The Pact) and the Coordination Service suited this point so this story got written. It was not intended to add to the History as such.

"The Pirate"/The Peregrine diptych forms the culmination of the Stellar Union period of the Psychotechnic History. This period is characterized by the Coordination Service, which tries to prevent chaos, but also by the Nomads who cause it - or who at least travel and trade freely without any thought of the long term consequences. The novel describes a fruitful collaboration between one Cordy and a Nomad crew who come to realize that they face a common threat to humanity.

We have come a long way from the covert war between the UN and its protean enemy but this is an authentic fictitious history.

Clues

(i) The Nomads have lost ten ships in five years.
(ii) All disappeared in the direction of Sagitarii.
(iii) No mechanical cultures have been found in that region.
(iv) Otherlings have also lost ships in that region.
(v) Coordination Service and Galactic Survey have not.
(vi) There are many apparently uninhabited Earth-like planets.
(vii) Natives on some inhabited E-planets seemed familiar with spaceships -
(viii) - but had never before been visited from the Stellar Union.
(ix) There were surprisingly similar plants on some supposedly uninhabited E-planets.
(x) Galactic Survey had found a dozen identical plants on six uninhabited planets.
(xi) Tiunrans, from an M-planet beyond Vega, passed through that region four centuries previously but had not transplanted plants and had lost four ships.

Nomads and Cordies investigate.

The Ultimate Defeat Of Enemies Both Within And Without?

I wrote here that psychological conflicts destroyed the Solar Union and that cosmic complexity destroyed the Stellar Union. However, Poul Anderson's "The Chapter Ends" describes a later era when both of these problems have been solved.

A man can:

will negative feelings out of his trained nervous system;

mentally control the most basic cosmic forces with only a small expenditure of energy by using an artificially mutated section of his brain.

Thus, he can fly not only through the air (see image) but also through interstellar space at trans-light speeds.

Superheroes are a distinct genre, incorporating elements of fantasy, sf and action-adventure. However, they originated as sf: Superman's powers are extraterrestrial, not magical or supernatural, in origin. Over the decades, his powers went up and down the scale:

able to leap tall buildings at a single bound;
able to fly;
able to survive in vacuum and to fly across interstellar distances in seconds.

Script writers sensibly scaled his powers back down again. Thus, John Byrne's Superman could fly to the Moon and back but was not able to remain conscious indefinitely in vacuum. However, Poul Anderson presents future human beings with the power of interstellar flight.

Although "The Chapter Ends" does not seem to fit with the Psychotechnic History in terms of historical details, it nevertheless presents an interesting scenario where the apparently insuperable problems of this future history have eventually been solved.

A Few Details In "The Pirate"

"Ship Harpsong of Nerthus, out of Highsky for David's Landing, is long overdue..." (Starship, p. 211)

Three words in this passage remind us of no less than four features of the same author's later Technic History:

Highsky Choth on Avalon;

David Falkayn, Founder of Avalon;

Thursday Landing on Diomedes;

Olga's Landing on Imhotep.

A mother trying to protect her child is said to be "...driven by the instinct of Niobe." (p. 238)

A planet with a slain population is described as "'...an archaeological and biological Golconda.'" (p. 243)

Two spaceships are called the Campesino and Genji. (p. 219)

Trevelyan "...had been living for a while at Laugerie Haute..." (p. 212)

On the dead planet, he found an "...ossuary..." (p. 238) - where people, poisoned by radiation, gathered to die.

There are a few unfortunate typos, e.g.:

"...clouds panted briefly to show high towers by a lake..." (p. 232)

The Pact

Poul Anderson's "The Pirate," about Stellar Union Coordination Service field agent, Trevelyan Micah, is narrated a generation later by another Cordy who begins:

"We guard the great Pact: the young generation, the folk of the star frontier, so often do not understand."
-Poul Anderson, Starship (New York, 1982), p. 211.

What "Pact"? The Social Contract? A Constitution? A Pax? A Pax enforced by nuclear or other futuristic weapons? (Remember the Space Patrol in Robert Heinlein's Future History or the Lunar Guard earlier in Anderson's Psychotechnic History.)

In this story, a planetary population has been killed by radiation. The title character aims to get rich quick by selling the idyllic planet with its empty dwellings to would be colonists. The Cordies say no, first, scientists and scholars need as long as it takes to study the dead civilization. The story ends as its narrator explains what he meant by the Pact:

"We guard the great Pact, which is the heart of civilization, of society, and ultimately of life itself: the unspoken Pact between the living, the dead, and the unborn, that to the best of our poor mortal abilities they shall be kept one in the oneness of time. Without it, nothing would have meaning and it may be that nothing would survive. But the young generations so often do not understand." (p. 251)

Anderson had to put the narration into the mouth of another Cordy. The omniscient narrator would not have been able to preach or philosophize like this. Having read to the end, surely we realize that "The Pact" would have been a more appropriate title?