The Introduction, called "A Note of Leitmotif," to the first David Falkayn story, called "The Three-Cornered Wheel," at least established that the story was set in a future society with faster than light travel so perhaps it was not as irrelevant as I suggested earlier. But we are trying to track down Noah Arkwright. This Introduction was presented as an excerpt from Commentaries on his Philosophy but otherwise did not mention him.
The Introduction, called "Notes Toward A Definition Of Relatedness," to the second Falkayn story, called "A Sun Invisible," is attributed to Arkwright's own An Introduction to Sophontology and makes interesting points but tells us nothing about its fictitious author.
The interesting points:
most planets are lethal for mankind so are passed by and not much thought about;
of those with free oxygen and liquid water, over half are nevertheless useless or lethal for different reasons;
however, in a large galaxy, random variation and natural selection produce duplications on millions of planets;
humanity has little contact with intelligent species whose psychologies and motivations are radically different;
but, among billions of planets, millions of races are similar enough for both cooperation and conflict;
on the other hand, a nonhuman being can show humanity only those aspects of himself that we can understand so he can seem to be two-dimensional.
Arkwright makes more serious points than the Vance Hall who had earlier commented on his philosophy although he does end with a joke, quoting a human prospector on the planet Quetzalcoal who trusts his nonhuman partner enough to leave him alone with his wife!
I must stop posting for a few hours but next on the agenda are:
(i) an attempt to find out more about Arkwright from the third Introduction in which he is mentioned;
(ii) a reassessment of "Sargasso of Lost Starships."
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