Methuselah's Children by Robert Heinlein;
They Shall Have Stars and The Seedling Stars by James Blish;
Orbit Unlimited, The Boat Of A Million Years and Harvest Of Stars by Poul Anderson;
The Stone Dogs by SM Stirling;
Seed Of Light by Edmund Cooper.
These scenarios differ. Misfits feel uncomfortable whereas refugees might flee for their lives. In The Boat Of A Million Years, the handful of mutant immortals, nicknamed "the Survivors," leaves a utopian Earth whereas, in Seed Of Light, a handful of genuine survivors flees from a now uninhabitable Earth.
Resolution of conflicts on Earth and exploration of the universe are two major challenges but it is unlikely that the latter will provide an escape route from the former and, in any case, most people, except in Seed Of Light, would remain to live with or resolve the local problems. Interstellar travel has become a symbol of freedom in American sf but, for most of us, freedom is to be found on Earth.
I discussed Prefaces, Introductions and Forewords in Foreword. Cooper gives us "Proems."
Today, we drive to a Christmas Fair at Leighton Moss. (Scroll down.)
14 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I'm puzzled over why you seem to thin it's unlikely that DISSATISFACTION of one kind or another will motivate some people to leave Earth for other worlds in the future. My view is that I only need to cite a few real world historical examples to make it plausible to think that will happen again in the future. E.g., after King Harald Fairhair completed his unification of Norway around AD 870, many of the Norse chiefs and local kings whom Harald had conquered preferred to leave Norway and settle in Iceland rather than accept his rule. And the European colonies in the Americas were settled by people hungry for conquest or new lands to live on. Some of the English colonies were settled by malcontents at odds with the state established Anglican Church: non-conforming Protestants in Massachusetts and Catholics in Maryland.
So, yes, I do find it very plausible to think political and religious reasons may very well encourage people in the future to leave Earth for other worlds. And that this can happen even if Earth is prosperous and mildly governed.
Sean
Sean,
And I'm puzzled as to why you think I am puzzled about this!
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Because your puzzlement seems at odds with how people have actually BEHAVED, often in ways we disagree with or think was sometimes bad.
Sean
Sean,
But I am not puzzled about it!
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
My puzzlement was due to this sentence of yours: "Resolution of conflicts on Earth and exploration of the universe are two major challenges but it is unlikely that the latter will provide an escape route from the former,..." I actually agree MOST people in such a situation would have little choice except to stay on Earth and either live with or attempt to resolve their disputes and problems. But I think we can both agree it is possible a smaller, esp. DETERMINED group would prefer to leave. Such as the Constitutionalists of Anderson's ORBIT UNLIMITED or the North Americans of Stirling's THE STONE DOGS. And the Draka would make the Constitutinalists swoon with horror and decide that maybe the bumbling World Federation wasn't that bad!
Sean
Sean,
I think that it is unlikely in the real world that anyone will be able to leave the Solar System, reach another system and find there an uninhabited habitable planet to colonize. I do not doubt that some people will be motivated to try to do so.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I mostly agree with you. I would merely add that some planets orbiting other stars might possibly be terraformed, if the would be colonists are willing to live on asteroids or habitats. In fact, some stars might be colonized only that way.
Sean
Kaor, Paul!
I like the idea of using O'Neill style habitats. They could be esp. useful in star systems with no habitable planets but plenty of resources on asteroids. They could be built to hold hundreds of thousands of people in comfort. And so on.
True, they come with drawbacks. One being their vulnerability to attack in times of war (as was mentioned in one of the HARVEST OF STARS books). That too would help shape how star systems settled like that would develop.
Sean
Sean,
Someone crossing an interstellar distance has to take their environment with them so they are not dependent on the unlikelihood of finding an environment waiting for them.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I agree. And I suggested some systems might be colonized by O'Neill style habitats. Either permanently or while a planet was being terraformed.
Sean
Did any non-British Dissidents successfully create a colony for themselves? I know the Huguenots tried and were stamped out by the Spanish. Later in French colonies like New France only 'good Catholics' were allowed to settle. SFAIK the Spanish and Portuguese had similar policies.
Would dissidents be able to settle space without getting killed by the government they were fleeing? I suppose it would require a government in a limited range of oppressiveness, or perhaps a limited range of power.
Any space colonization will initially be in rotating space habitats, or maybe enclosed habitats on planets without a currently breathable atmosphere. Any terraforming will take a *long* time.
One of the more plausible ideas for dissidents fleeing a government they consider tyrannical is, the dissidents building a space habitat & then later moving the habitat if/when tensions increase. If the society of the time has fusion power they could move the habitat from the vicinity of Earth to the outer solar system and maybe later to interstellar space.
For this to be successful the people they are leaving would have to lack either the power or the will to destroy the habitat as it leaves.
The government the dissidents are fleeing would have to be disliked but relatively mild like England of the 17th century.
Kaor, Jim!
The Dutch founded what became the New Amsterdam colony, which was grabbed by the British in the 1660's during one of the Anglo-Dutch wars. And Sweden founded the colony that became
Delaware. Not sure when the English gobbled it up.
And British and Irish Catholics ground under by the anti-Catholic Penal Laws would not think the Britain of the 17th/18th centuries mild!
Another possibility is this: the World Federation of ORBIT UNLIMITED was glad to be rid of the bothersome Constitutionalists and did not mind letting them go to Rustum.
Ad astra! Sean
I don't know if the Dutch or Swedish colonies had any element of "let the dissidents go away" to them.
I do know there was an element of 'give the Catholics a colony like the Puritans do' to the founding of Maryland. So it looks like being Catholic in England was better than being Protestant in France (after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes) or Spain.
Kaor, Jim!
Except it did not last, because the surrounding Protestant colonies hated the Maryland Catholics. The Protestants seized power in Maryland and brought in the Penal Laws.
What a catastrophe Martin Luther was for Christianity!
Ad astra! Sean
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