Approaches And Issues

Three approaches on this blog:

(i) read or reread Poul Anderson;
(ii) read related authors - we know who they are;
(iii) read non-fiction, finding resonances with Anderson's works.

(iii) can be almost anything on either history or science. Having just read Sapiens: A Brief History of Mankind by Yuval Noah Harari, I am about to embark on Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow, also by Harari. No doubt this second volume addresses issues that sf writers should at least be aware of.

Anderson's sf addresses these futurological issues:

(a) the futures of civilizations;
(b) interplanetary/interstellar exploration/colonization/civilization;
(c) as part of (b), contact with alien intelligences;
(d) AI.

My initial impression is that Harari addresses (a) and (d) and that these issues are currently more urgent than either (b) or (c).