(ii) Stellar Union colonists scatter across a planet and dwell far apart but are not isolated because of their telescreens and gravity fliers. This is how Jorun lives on Fulkhis in the Galactic Civilization (see here) except that he no longer needs a device for flying.
(iii) Both the Stellar Union and Galactic Civilization use computers called "integrators."
(iv) The Planetary Engineers had preserved some psychotechnic training, some Stellar Union Coordinators joined the Nomads who transmitted knowledge into the Galactic period and there are psychotechnicians in Galactic Civilization.
4 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
And I still don't believe "The Chapter Ends" is rightly part of the Psychotechnic series, because I simply can't buy humans being able to fly or cross vast interstellar distances FTL by an act of will. I see nothing in the undisputed Psychotechnic stories leading to those implausible abilities.
Sean
Sean,
But enough time had elapsed for those things to happen later.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
If you think in terms of fifty thousand years, maybe. EXCEPT, I simply don't believe it to be possible to somehow genetically manipulate or change human beings to fly FTL and somehow generate a protective "force field" merely by a mental act of will.
After a few experimental, very early stories like "Earthman, Beware!" and "The Chapter Ends," we don't see Poul Anderson using such concepts again. And I think that was because he too found such concepts too implausible for him to suspend his disbelief for the purposes of story writing.
Sean
Sean,
Two issues:
Are the super powers in "The Chapter Ends" plausible? Not very, although you never know.
Can they be fitted into the Psychotechnic History? Maybe, given time. They are are an ultimate culmination of the earlier experiments by the Psychotechnic Institute.
Paul.
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