Will human civilizations continue to rise and fall in the future as they did in the past?
What will societies based on alien biology and psychology be like?
The Time Patrol Series
How did science and freedom arise?
Will humanity at last transcend its animality?
Can you think of any more important questions than these?
9 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I was too tired last night to answer your questions, but I will do so now!
Based on how actual human being behave, civilizations will continue to rise and fall in the future as they have in the past. But I agree that alien, non human influences may very well affect how such civilizations will evolve and how long they endure.
We already know, from Anderson's Time Patrol stories and non fictional works like IS THERE LIFE ON OTHER WORLDS? how both ordered freedom and a true science arose.
And I am not at all confident that any "transcending" of animality by humans will necessarily be good. Not if any such "transcending" means no longer even being human at all. We do see a few hints in the Time Patrol stories about the Danellians being FRIGHTENING.
I can think of other questions just as important! E.g., does God exist and what doe He wish of mankind and all other intelligent races?
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
With the first four question, I was not seeking answers but highlighting that PA's two main series address these questions.
Paul.
first four questions
Technological change also changes the parameters and limits within which a consistent human nature operates.
Eg., until the Industrial Revolution, most people had to be agricultural laborers; no large society could be otherwise.
This put strong limits on the amount of cultural variation -- for example, one way or another the whole 'superstructure' of civilization had to depend on getting its hands on the surplus production of the agricultural sector.
This could be done in a number of different ways -- feudal aristocracies, bureaucratic empires, etc. -- but it had to be done.
Note that when Poul conceived of the civilization of Ys, he carefully made it a -city- state, without a significant rural hinterland of its own.
This made a society and economy possible that -wouldn't- be possible on a larger scale.
Ys is essentially a "moderate oligarchy" in the sense that a Classical Greek would put it, and basically capitalist, in our terms. The first is probably, and the second almost certainly, impossible in the historical context it inhabits if it weren't limited in geographical terms that way.
And it has to be isolated by supernatural forces to prevent its incorporation in the Roman Empire, an agrarian-based bureaucratic empire dominated by its landowners.
Kaor, Paul and Mr. Stirling!
Paul: Your blog piece focused on asking questions. That led me to thinking how I would answer them. Where possible, questions should get replies.
Mr. Stirling: Fascinating, your comments about THE KING OF YS. Yes, Ys was a small city state without a significant agricultural hinterland. It could only have existed as we see the Andersons describing it because it was small. AND carefully isolated by its gods from the larger world of the Roman Empire.
Ad astra! Sean
Gratillonius was thinking of sending expeditions across the Atlantic to investigate stories of lands there, and possibly to establish settlements.
If the Gods of Ys hadn't gone crazy, they'd have encouraged him to do that -- an entire hemisphere for their worshippers.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I remember that bit from THE KING OF YS. And I wonder why a definitive "discovery" of the Americas, from either Europe or China (see "The Only Game In Town") had to wait so long? I don't think either Roman or Chinese would not have been able to reach the west or east coasts of N. America.
Ad astra! Sean
Keep in mind that the Atlantic is smaller.
The "great circle" patterns of wind and currents in the North and South Atlantic and the corresponding ones in the Pacific were the essential building-blocks whose discovery made worldwide voyaging possible in the age of sail.
But while crossing the Atlantic rapidly became routine, crossing the Pacific remained highly dangerous. The "Manilla Galleons" from Acapulco did it regularly, but their return voyages across the northern Pacific and down the coast of California were gruesomely dangerous and consistently had high casualty rates. This was mainly because they were simply so -long-.
Not until the age of the clippers and then the windjammers did sailing voyages across the Pacific become routine.
Whereas if you know the wind and current patterns you can cross the Atlantic (particularly west to east) in a 2-man open rowboat; it's been done more than once.
And you can do it both ways fairly routinely in sailing ships of as little as 50 tons burden, with a crew of half a dozen.
"Sail south until the butter melts, and turn right; once you're across, sail north until it's chilly, and turn right again," as the old yachtsman's saying goes.
It wasn't the -ships- of the 1500's that were the crucial factor, it was the -knowledge-.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I always read your mini essays with keen interest. Yes, I can see how lack of the knowledge of wind and currents was the chief factor discouraging European mariners from sailing really far west.
The Norse, with their explorations and settlements in Iceland, Greenland, and the abortive colony in North America, might have changed that, if knowledge of their voyages had spread widely. A definitive "discovery" of the Americas by 1100? Maybe!
I have heard of the Manila galleon fleet of Spain. I think Spain occupied held the island of Guam (down till 1898) as a stop over and refitting point for those ships.
Ad astra! Sean
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