See The Hyperdrive In The Stellar Union.
The drive causes a "...'wake' of gravity fluctuations..." (p. 121) but this is not the same as the hyperspatial wake detectable for up to a light-year that can be modulated to bear messages in the Technic History;
any hyperdrive ship has to be elongated because "...field generators must be mounted fore and aft..." (p. 123) (See one of Bob Shaw's FTL drives in Transports Of Delight);
although the strange ship has this necessary elongation, it is not of human design because its cylinder is beveled into flat planes, its stern bulges and its nose bears a spear-shaped mast;
Trevelyan recognizes it as Tiunran.
Since the otherling ships that disappeared in the Great Cross included Tiunran, we may deduce that X is approaching in a captured ship.
Trevelyan further opines that:
"'...when a technology has advanced to the point of interstellar drive, it doesn't need an empire.'" (p. 124)
I tend to agree but tell that to the Terrans and Merseians in the other history.
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
And I disagree with you. You don't seem willing to accept how COMPETITIVE humans are. And if two or more intelligent races are biochemically similar enough to desire the same kind of planets, then that alone makes competition between them likely. The RESULT will be the rise of different kind of empires.
Ad astra! Sean
Politics is inherent in human nature, and politics is a struggle for power. Power is a positional good. It's necessarily scarce, because if one individual or group has more, then everyone else in the same interaction sphere has less.
And humans desire power -in itself-.
They may use it for this purpose or that, but -in essentio- it is an end, not a means. We evolved this drive because power had positive reproductive consequences for its holders -- witness the fact that 10% of Asia is descended from Temujin (Genghis Khan) and archaeological genetics indicates an almost infinite number of similar genetic bottlenecks.
Such as the Y-chromosome lines characteristic of the Uí Néill (and later O'Neils) in Ireland, for example.
This heritage lives in us all. Short of genetic engineering, we can't get rid of it.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
And I agree with you, about the desire for POWER being inherent in human beings, taking the form of a struggle for its possession. Even tho not everybody wants to be Emperor, King, President, or Prime Minister, etc.
I get impatient, I admit, with those who want to somehow magically and IMPOSSIBLY remove this competitive drive from human beings.
Ad astra! Sean
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