(i) physical and psychological instruction;
(ii) secrecy conditioning;
(iii) a new 20th century public persona;
(iv) the Temporal language;
(v) fifty thousand years of combat from Bronze Age rapiers to cyclic blasts;
(vi) "There was the study of history, science, arts and philosophies, fine details of dialect and mannerism. These last were only for the 1850-2000 period; if he had occasion to go elsewhere he would pick up special instruction from a hypnotic conditioner."
-Poul Anderson, "Time Patrol," section 2, IN Time Patrol (New York, 2006), p. 13.
(vi) implies that at least some Attached agents do move around at least within their own milieu. So someone based in 1850 could visit 2000 or vice versa? But that would be to visit a completely different era, same milieu or no same milieu. Mainwethering, working in the London office, 1890-1910, says that he was shocked to visit the 21st century. That is only the following milieu but it probably differs as much again. We are in 2015. How much has already changed since 2000?
10 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I'll cite a trivial example. My current automobile was purchased by me in 2000. From time to time I take it for servicing at the dealership where I got it--and while there I sometimes look over the new cars offered for sale. And I can tell recent models are quite different from mine, which is ancient in automotive terms!
But I still hanker after air cars! (Smiles)
Sean
Sean and Paul:
Terry Pratchett once commented that we in the late 20th were LIVING in science fiction without realizing it -- he specified a situation when, while visiting an Australian store, he called his wife in England on his cell phone to make sure of her dress size. No emergency, but pull out the cell and call the other side of the planet and, oh, "would you prefer it in blue or green," dear? Just a year or four later, his phone likely would've been able to send her a picture of the style, too.
Spider Robinson's short story "The Time Traveler" in *Callahan's Crosstime Saloon* is about a man who travels from the early 1960s to the early 70s by the unpleasant means of being in a banana republic prison cell, completely incommunicado. The culture shock he experienced after just ten years drove him to despair -- and stunned the regulars at Callahan's, when they stopped to think about how much world change they'd taken for granted.
Hi, David!
Oh, I agree! We ARE living in what has to be considered a science fictional world in many ways. And I would not have thought of cell phones, because that is already "old" technology (I first saw a real cell phone about twenty years ago). The example I thought of was how, not long ago, I read of researchers who managed to clone cells from a human organ. A first step to making cloning practical for human beings. I first came across the concept of cloning (altho not the word) in ENSIGN FLANDRY over forty years ago.
I only wish we were living in an even more science fictional world! By now we should have had O'Neill colonies, bases and colonies on the Moon, and expeditions sent to Mars, terraforming Venus, etc.. And perhaps even thinking of sending ships to the nearest stars!
And I have read some of Spider Robinson's "Callahan Crosstime Saloon" books.
Sean
Even Arthur C Clarke could get it hopelessly wrong. Take The Fountains Of Paradise (1979). Dr Morgan is staying in a hotel in the mid 22nd century and his room doesn't have a computer terminal so he has to use one in the lobby to access a mainframe. Yet 35 years after the book, a guest would be using a laptop/tablet and the hotel's WiFi link. Even a space elevator looks less far fetched than it did then.
Hi, John!
Ha! That reminds me of how some readers tend to treat SF writers like prophets, as men having a hot line to the future. Of course I know that is not true. But, I do admit to sometimes being tempted to treat Poul Anderson like a prophet! (Smiles)
Sean
I can't resist bringing up my favorite example of SF writer as prophet, with the subversion that in this case, no one at the time seems to have noticed the prophecy:
John W. Campbell, Jr., later famous as editor of *Astounding Science Fiction* magazine, wrote a short story, "Frictional Losses," in 1936. It mentioned briefly how the Japanese countered an invasion by supercharging airplane engines, packing the planes full of explosives, and crashing them into the enemy ships. In Campbell's story, this made them heroes to all the world, because the invaders were from outer space.
Come World War II and, according to a quote from Admiral Nimitz, everyone in the U.S. Navy was totally shocked by the *kamikaze*, because no one had imagined that the Japanese would use a tactic like that. It might've crossed their minds if they'd been readers of Campbell....
I discovered this some years ago. Curiously, I've never seen it cited by anyone but myself. I personally verified that it WASN'T a case of someone after WWII editing the tactic into Campbell's story.
(Incidentally, the space aliens responded to *kamikaze* tactics by atom-bombing Japan so hard that more-or-less the whole archipelago "slid off its foundations" into the deep ocean.)
Hi, David!
Now that was interesting, that John Campbell was familiar enough with Japanese history and culture that he was able to use "Kamikaze" tactics in one of his stories. And I fear any Navy officers who might have read "Frictional Losses" were too far down the chain of command to be taken seriously if they suggested precautions be taken against Kamikaze pilots.
And I wonder if Campbell ever got questioned by FBI agents about how he knew of atom bombing? After all, Robert Heinlein, I think, was questioned about how much he knew of atomics just as the Manhattan Project was beginning.
Sean
Sean:
Well, the TERM "atomic bomb" was used by H.G. Wells in a 1914 story, so just that phrase doesn't indicate any more knowledge than it takes to write a story speaking of "hyperspace." But writer Cleve Cartmill was interrogated by the FBI in 1944 because his story "Deadline" seemed so very on-target about how to build a nuke ... and "Deadline was published in Campbell's magazine -- in fact, Wikipedia says Campbell gave Cartmill most of his technical information.
As far as his knowledge of Japan is concerned, the odd thing is that I've found no evidence of him specializing in that culture. Somehow, though, he'd picked up on the aspect of Japanese thought that made the *kamikaze* a possibility.
Any **U.S.** Navy officers who read it were far down the chain of command -- but I've sometimes wondered if Campbell accidentally gave someone in Japan's navy ideas....
Hi, David!
Granted, some kind of vague knowledge of "atomic" technology was becoming widespread from at least the time H.G. Wells used "atomic bomb" in 1914.
As omnivorous a reader as John Campbell was, I can easily see him finding out about kamikazes simply from reading any reasonably decent book about Japan.
A rather alarming thought, that a Japanese Navy officer who was also an SF fan might have read Campbell's story featuring kamikazes. And gotten ideas--which his superiors had no trouble understanding and using, because it was already part of the Japanese mindset and culture.
Sean
John: "Even Arthur C Clarke could get it hopelessly wrong."
Some time ago I read a reprint of Clarke's 1945 paper on using geosynchronous satellites as communication relays.
So much right, but two amusingly wrong details.
1) he assumed the satellites would be manned because someone would have to be there to replace burned out vacuum tubes.
2) he assumed curved mirrors concentrating sunlight to run heat engines to power the satellites, since he didn't anticipate photovoltaics.
Interesting about Campbell anticipating kamikaze tactics. That was new to me.
I have long known about Cleve Cartmill story.
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