"...the philosophical pantheism of Cosmos..." (p. 151)
"...phase velocity..." (p. 150) explains FTL travel as, in James Blish's "Beep"/The Quincunx Of Time, it explains FTL communication.
"...discontinuous psi functions..." (ibid.) are also involved in FTL and we are told elsewhere that "...infinitely discontinuous functions..." (Time Patrol, p. 9) are involved both in instantaneous transportation and in travel to the past.
James Blish and the Time Patrol are frequent sources of comparisons when discussing Poul Anderson's future histories.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
Aha, I erred in my comment to your previous blog piece. VIRGIN PLANET gives us some idea of what "Cosmosism" was. A philosophical pantheism. And I can't believe in pantheism, because I refuse to believe the chair I'm sitting on is a "part" of God, to use a trivial example.
If you were to ask me, I would say I like VIRGIN PLANET best of the Psychotechnic stories. Much more developed and fleshed out than most of the others.
Sean
Post a Comment