The Psychotechnic History: Earlier And Later Periods

"The Green Thumb."

"The systems of similar stars were usually very much alike - especially where it came to the spacing of planets.'" (p. 33)

We now know that this is not the case in our universe.

"Man had found several other species which had developed interstellar travel on their own, and there was no reason to suppose he'd found them all." (ibid.)

A very great deal has happened since the earliest days of interstellar exploration. Meanwhile, the Nomads, founded in "Gypsy," have continued to travel - we will hear more from them later - and they must have adopted the faster means of interstellar travel that has clearly been discovered since the earliest voyages of the Traveler.

If the Psychotechnic History is collected in two omnibus volumes, then "Gypsy" should be the last instalment in Volume I. It is not part of the later period of faster interstellar travel that begins with "Star Ship." The Chronology, if retained, requires major revision.

So Many Worlds

"The Green Thumb."

Joe, the new alien farmhand, who claims to be from the obscure planet Astan IV, asks young Pete questions like how many human beings are there and why do they emigrate? So is Joe a spy? Pete cannot answer the first question because human beings are:

"'...spread over so many worlds.'" (p. 29)

In fact, some settlers come not from Earth but from colonized planets. So this has been going on for a long time. Nerthus is not in the first wave of colonization, less than two centuries after the loss of the Traveler.

Earth is "'...an integrate civilization...'" (ibid.) whereas the colonies are not. Why not? This reminds us of the legacy of the Psychotecnic Institute. In the later story, "The Pirate," a spaceship crew is described as "unintegrate" because its members are:

"'...hard cases, none Earth-born, several nonhumans from raptor cultures among them.'"

-Poul Anderson, "The Pirate" IN Anderson, The Complete Psychotechnic League, Volume 3 (Riverdale, NY, July 2018), pp. 137-165 AT p. 143.

Psychotechnics has done some good but only on one planet.

Early Days

"The Green Thumb."

"'In the early days, men did settle on planets with primitive native races. It only led to conflict...'" (p. 26)

But these are early days, according to the Chronology. We have to imagine a much longer time, many centuries or millennia, between "Gypsy" and the two stories of Nerthusian colonization.

"'I've seen races like his - here and there in the Galaxy - living in so close a symbiosis with nature that they never had to develop any mechanical technology. But they weren't the less intelligent for that.'" (p. 27)

But how did they become intelligent? Human beings developed intelligence by acting on their environment with hands and brains, not by interacting with it symbiotically. 

Uncle Gunnar has seen races throughout the Galaxy. In "Gypsy," it was stated that at that time spaceships were limited to a speed of a few hundred lights but that, if it could be learned what had flung the Traveler so far off course, then the Galaxy would be theirs. It seems that this discovery has been made between stories.

Joe says that he has not been on Earth or "'...on any of the great worlds of the Galaxy..." (p. 28) but instead has:

"'...worked my way along the odd trade-lanes, seeing obscure and backward planets.'" (pp. 28-29)

This is a vast and old interstellar civilization or network of civilizations. We have to think of "Gypsy" as an interlude of early but slow FTL travel between the STL travel of the period that ends with "Brake" and the Galactic travel of the period that begins with "Star Ship." 

A Common Timeline

"The Acolytes" and:

Poul Anderson, "The Green Thumb" IN Anderson, The Complete Psychotechnic League, Volume 3 (Riverdale, NY, July 2018), pp. 21-41.

Characters swearing by Cosmos is one indication that these two Nerthusian stories plus "Gypsy" and "Star Ship" are set in a single fictional timeline. There are also indications that it is the timeline of psychotechnic science:

"Something of [Pete's] training in self-integration came back, psychophysiological habits, a shaking sort of calm." (p. 18)

When Pete feels bad about causing Tobur's death, his uncle and aunt think that they might have to:

"...take him to a psychiatrist in Stellamont." (p. 21)

Not to a doctor but specifically to a psychiatrist.

"The Acolytes" was published in Worlds Beyond in 1951 whereas "The Green Thumb" was published in Science Fiction Quarterly in 1953. Despite this disparity, "The Green Thumb" begins by directly continuing the narrative from the end of "The Acolytes":

"Pete felt so bad about Tobur getting killed on his account..." (ibid.)

We will see Nerthus again but not Pete or his family. 

Sound Effects

"The Acolytes."

Wilson Pete knows the sounds of Terrestrial nights:

buzzing insects;

chirping crickets;

croaking frogs;

blending noises.

Nerthusian night sounds are different and would have to be represented in a film sound track:

thrumming

humming

singing

screaming

pattering

scraping

laughing

hooting

hissing

chuckling

bubbling 

- and the distinctive voice of the small green tinklers, like glass bells that sound like a hypnotic:

"Come out, come out, come out..." (p. 10)

Death trap. The tinkler's siren song is central to the story and would have to be rendered convincingly.

Andersonian extra-solar planets often have equivalents of grass. On Nerthus, there is simply tall grass but it smells different from the Terrestrial variety.

On Nerthus

Poul Anderson, "The Acolytes" IN Anderson, The Complete Psychotechnic League, Volume 3 (Riverdale, NY, July 2018), pp. 3-19.

In Poul Anderson's Technic History, Nat Falkayn grows up on the newly colonized planet, Avalon. In Anderson's Psychotechnic History, ten year old Wilson Pete visits the newly colonized planet, Nerthus. 

Nerthus, relatively close to Earth, is still a frontier planet yet Pete's Uncle Gunnar had:

"...been all over the Galaxy before he settled down on Nerthus." (p. 3)

Maybe Pete exaggerates with that thought, "...all over the Galaxy..."?

Nerthusian "ponies" have six legs and green fur. Pete finds it hard to get used to the "...funny humping motion..." (p. 7) caused by the "...middle pair of legs..." (ibid.) In the Technic History, green stathas have six legs and:

"Six legs gave a lulling rhythm."

-Poul Anderson, The Day Of Their Return IN Anderson, Captain Flandry: Defender Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, February 2010), pp. 1-238 AT 4, p. 102

- to a rider.

Similar details remind us of common authorship. The future histories differ in major respects.

Personal And Planetary Change

"Star Ship."

Histories are about personal and planetary changes. In Poul Anderson's Technic History, Emil Dalmady is a young man when Nicholas van Rijn promotes him and has him trained as an entrepreneur. Dalmady's daughter is an old woman when, on the newly colonized planet of Avalon, she tells the story of a very young man, David Falkayn's grandson. Youth and age continually interact.

In "Star Ship," the human Dougald Anson and the Khazaki Janazik were comrades who adventured across the planet Khazak when Anson was young but, for reasons explained in the story, their comradeship must end when Anson marries Masefield Ellen. And, because of their struggles, old Khazak will have to change when it joins Galactic civilization.

"Star Ship" is a short story with a lot of sword fights - "swords and science" fiction - but is also about life changes and historical changes.

Methuselah And The Boat Of A Million Years

Robert Heinlein's immortal man, Lazarus Long, is in his Future History whereas Poul Anderson's equivalent character, Hanno, is in a separate novel. Both are mutants. Long has lived through the early twentieth century into the Future History whereas Hanno lives through history into the future. Heinlein's title, Methuselah's Children, refers to the Biblical long-lived man whereas Anderson's title, The Boat Of A Million Years, quotes from the Egyptian Book of the Dead.

I identified a "Methuselan Trilogy":

Back To Methuselah George Bernard Shaw

Methuselah's Children by Heinlein

"Requiem for Methuselah," Star Trek episode by Jerome Bixby

- but I have only just discovered that Heinlein quotes from Shaw's preface to Back To Methuselah earlier in his Future History.

Hanno informs or reminds us that:

"'Alexandros destroyed Tyre...'"

-Poul Anderson, The Boat Of A Million Years (London, 1991), I, 1, p. 11.

- whereas Manse Everard of the Time Patrol reflects merely that Tyre "...would die..."

Planet Stories

An sf series featuring interstellar travel is a perfect setting for any number of stories set in diverse planetary systems with no direct connection between them. Thus, in Poul Anderson's Psychotechnic History, "Gypsy" is set on Harbor, "Star Ship" on Khazak and "The Acolytes" on Nerthus, three extra-solar planets. Furthermore, although the colonists on Nerthus retain contact with Earth, those on Harbor and Khazak have lost contact with the rest of the human race and therefore might as well be in separate universes. Such a series becomes broad rather than linear. Imagine stories set on different extra-solar planets in the Star Trek universe but without the Enterprise ever arriving. 

However, even an apparently minor background reference can generate narrative discrepancies, e.g.:

"'Out there is the great civilization of the Galaxy...'"

-Poul Anderson, "Star Ship" IN Anderson, The Complete Psychotechnic League, Volume 2 (Riverdale, NY, February 2018), pp. 273-306 AT p. 291.

Either "Star Ship" is set a very long time later than "Gypsy," which states that interstellar civilization is slowly gestating, or, possibly, the human beings who have been stranded for two generations on Khazak have a very inaccurate understanding of what is beyond their planet.

To Fly Again

In James Blish's Cities In Flight, Volume IV, The Triumph Of Time, the Okie cities no longer fly but Mayor John Amalfi says:

"'This city was meant to fly, and by God it ought to be flying still... Maybe for exploration, maybe for work, the kind of work we used to do.'"

-James Blish, The Triumph Of Time IN Blish, Cities In Flight (London, 1981), pp. 466-596 AT CHAPTER ONE, p. 478.

And he has some support from a younger generation:

"'...if the city's really going up again, Mr. Mayor -'

"'Maybe it is. I don't know yet. What of it?'

"'If it is, we want on,' the boy said in a rush."

-ibid., CHAPTER TWO, p. 492.

Like Poul Anderson's Nomads, the difference being that Amalfi's proposed new voyage is indefinitely postponed by the end of the universe. There will be new universes but they are an untold story.

Kevin, whom I have mentioned in connection with our small sf group, tells me that some musicians do not retire but embark on a never-ending tour. This is the destiny of the Nomads:

"The end came, and we embarked on the long voyage, the voyage that has not ceased yet and, I hope, will never end."

-"Gypsy," p. 270.

We remember Nicholas van Rijn:

"'You take the Long Trail with me!... A universe where all roads lead to roaming. Life never fails us. We fail it, unless we reach out.'"

-Poul Anderson, Mirkheim IN Anderson, Rise Of The Terran Empire (Riverdale, NY, March 2011), pp. 1-291 AT XXI, p. 287.

Amalfi, Thorkild and van Rijn...

The Cross-God

Everyone reading this blog is familiar with the image and symbolism of the cross but there was a time when any symbol was new:

"'...that weird cross-god they have...'"

-Poul Anderson, "Time Patrol" IN Anderson, Time Patrol (Riverdale, NY, December 2010), pp. 1-53 AT 5, p. 33.

Years ago, I read in an sf novel a description of the symbol placed above the grave of an extra-terrestrial. I thought then that, if it had been a man in the grave, then the symbol would have been a cross but, of course, my thought was too culturally specific. 

A schoolboy drew a picture of the Temple in Solomon's time and placed a cross above the door. When I pointed out that the cross should not have been there, I expected him to realize and say, "Of course not!" but instead he looked puzzled and asked, "Why not?" He had not yet got it that the cross was historically specific.

Sometimes people think in concrete symbols rather than in abstract concepts. When I told a Polish man that there is a mosque on our street, he asked not "What do they believe about Christ?" but "Do they have - crucifix?"

I dislike the fact that an instrument of torture and execution has become a religious symbol but it might be given a wider significance. The shorter horizontal line is time extending from past to future through the present whereas the longer vertical line is eternity intersecting the present. This meaning is closer to universal.

In Poul Anderson's "Gypsy," there is no mention of churches or other places of worship on Haven but Thorkild Erling swears by "'...good Cosmos...'" (p. 263) Sandra Miesel's Chronology tells us that the Cosmic Religion begins in 2130 but we are told nothing of its concepts or practices although its name implies universality.

Planets Visited By The Traveler II

There is still more in the following paragraph:

snowfields and sunset on Hralfar;

river in the rainforest covering Atlang;

desert on Thyvari;

New Jupiter.

That is four more planets. Thus, a total of at least fifteen planets in what is described as "...over twenty years..." (p. 265) How much over?

The Travelers themselves have named New Jupiter but, in the other three cases, they have been on a planet long enough to communicate with inhabitants and to learn the local name for the planet. That is a great deal to achieve in less than thirty years. Very little of that time must have been spent between planetary systems although those times also have impressed themselves on the collective consciousness:

"...the cold and vastness and cruelty and emptiness and awe and wonder of open space itself." (p. 267)

"Gypsy."

A lot of experience in what sounds like a very short time.

Planets Visited By The Traveler Before The Settlement On Harbor

"Gypsy."

Flames and naked peaks under a sky-filling sun;

pirates on a red sea attacking an ancient towered fortress;

a tournament on Drangor;

continent-wide steel cities on Alkan;

philosophical cephalopods;

beautiful but lethal natives;

barbaric natives gripped by plague;

ancient laboratories and libraries;

a methane storm;

paradisal beaches;

centauroids attacking their winged enemies' aerial city.

At least eleven planetary systems in a mere twenty years of wandering! At least eight of the eleven inhabited! The fifth planet in the system of Harbor is inhabited and another starfaring race has passed through recently, camping on Harbor. All this means that the galaxy of the Psychotechnic History is extremely crowded. Such galactic population density needs to be reflected in subsequent instalments.

Stars And Galaxy II

 

See Stars And Galaxy.

Could the "Galactic" stories be moved to later in the Chronology? "The Acolytes" and "The Green Thumb" are set during the early days of the colonization of Nerthus. Passages in "Virgin Planet" and The Peregrine are set on Nerthus when it is an established colony. Thus, these stories would also have to be moved until later. Nerthus is also referenced in "The Pirate" and "Symmetry." Maybe the answer is just that there should be a much longer interval between "Gypsy" and "Star Ship"?

There should certainly be an interval of tens of thousands of years before "The Chapter Ends" if it is to be included.

Stars And Galaxy

"Gypsy."

No one in the Traveler understood why an explosion in the engines had thrown them thousands of light-years off course:

"Speculation had involved space warps - whatever that term means, points of infinite discontinuity, undimensional fields, and Cosmos knows what else. Could we find what had happened, and purposefully control the phenomenon which had seized us by some blind accident, the Galaxy would be ours. Meanwhile, we were limited to psuedovelocities of a couple of hundred lights, and interstellar space mocked us with vastness." (p. 261)

"Star travel was still in its infancy when we left Sol." (p. 265)

Yet "Star Ship," set only sixty years later according to Sandra Miesel's Chronology, refers to "Galactic civilization" (p. 284) and "Galactic Coordinators." (p. 286)

In "The Acolytes," set 125 years after "Star Ship," the claim is made that the newly colonized planet, Nerthus is:

"'...going to be one of the great planets of the Galaxy...'"

-Poul Anderson, "The Acolytes" IN Anderson, The Complete Psychotechnic League, Volume 3 (Riverdale, NY, July 2018), pp. 3-19 AT p. 4.

In the sequel to "The Acolytes," it is stated that:

"...there are so many races knocking around the Galaxy these days - with more discovered all the time..." (p. 22)

A newly arrived being claims to be travelling around:

"'...to see what the Galaxy and its civilizations are like...'" (p. 23)

Two different backgrounds conflict.

Home On Harbor

"Gypsy."

Returning to Harbor after a visit to a gas giant:

"...the landscape...lay quietly in the evening, almost empty of man, a green fair breadth of land veined with bright rivers. The westering sun touched each leaf and grass blade with molten gold, an aureate glow which seemed to fill the cool air like a tangible presence, and I could hear the chirp and chatter of the great bird flocks as they settled down in the trees. Yes - it was good to get home." (p. 257)

"It was good to lie in the sun again, with a cool wet wind blowing in from the sea and talking in the trees." (p. 261)

This time the wind "talks." In which other work by Poul Anderson does the wind in the trees sound like speech in a strange language?

There is a case to be made for staying on Harbor and a case to be made for returning to space. Needless to say, some will go and some will stay.

The Traveler had been bound for Alpha Centauri and there would have met the colonists from the Pioneer.

Over The Brow Of The Hill

"Gypsy."

"'...that "something hid behind the ranges" maybe meant more to me than to most others.'" (p. 263)

There is an Irish saying: "Seek the fair land that is over the brow of the hill."

In our meditation group, we recite a text that includes the sentence: "It is futile to travel to other dusty countries, thus forsaking your own seat."

Years ago, on British TV, a guy said that he had gone to Tibet but a monk there told him that the place that he sought was in his own country. The guy returned to England and "realized" that the place that the monk had meant was Glastonbury. Someone said to me, "Isn't it strange that that monk described Glastonbury to him?" - which, of course, he had not. I think the Tibetan monk had meant: "It is futile to travel to other dusty countries..."

The "something hid" and the "fair land" are within us but we can carry them with us to other countries.

Continuing Characters In Three Future History Series

I had expected that, on the current rereading of Poul Anderson's Psychotechnic History, I would skip past "Brake," having, so I thought, analysed this story thoroughly before. However, the story merited further attention. Anderson's texts seem to be inexhaustible.

Of the eleven instalments comprising the first half of the Psychotechnic History, Etienne Fourre appears in the first and second and is referenced as an authoritative historical figure in the eleventh. This is star treatment for a character in the Psychotechnic History and contrasts sharply with the extensive coverage given to Nicholas van Rijn, David Falkayn and Dominic Flandry in the Technic History. "The Acolytes" and "The Green Thumb," about a single colonial family on Nerthus, are almost a continuous narrative. Anderson introduced Trevelyan Micah in The Peregrine (1956), then reused this character, and his companion Braganza Diane, in "The Pirate," (1968), set earlier, simply because the character fitted this new narrative.

By minimizing the role of continuing characters in the Polesotechnic League, Anderson followed his model, Robert Heinlein's Future History. DD Harriman died in "Requiem" (1940), then reappeared as the title character of "The Man Who Sold The Moon" (150), set earlier. Andy Libby appeared in "Misfit" (1939) and Methuselah's Children. (1941) "Universe" (1941) acquired a sequel, "Common Sense," (1941) with the same set of characters. Chairman Dixon chairs a meeting in "Blow-ups Happen" (1940) and again in "The Man Who Sold The Moon." Harriman's associate, Strong, is at both meetings.

Rhysling, Dahlquist and Lazarus Long appear only once. Nehemiah Scudder, despite his importance, remains off-stage.

How To Read "Brake"

"Brake."

The first time I read "Brake," I was conscious only of continuous action with very little explanation. When you reread it, keep track of who the characters are, what their roles are and what happens to them. The Western Reformist hijackers are dispatched quickly and efficiently with the consequence that the violence does not seem quite so interminable. After the last hijacker, their leader Gomez, has been killed, the technical problem of mere survival in a sabotaged spaceship becomes interesting. The story becomes one of human cooperation. The Ganymedeans, in their antiquated ships, attempt rescue and will be able to succeed when the Thunderbolt stops speeding past them and instead floats in the Jovian atmosphere:

"Like an old drop in a densitometer, like a free balloon over eighteenth-century France, like a small defiant bubble in the sky, the Thunderbolt floated." (p. 252)

The French balloon reference reminds that this and other future histories grow out of past history. 

In The Thunderbolt

Poul Anderson. "Brake" IN Anderson, The Complete Psychotechnic League, Volume 2 (Riverdale, NY, February 2018), pp. 217-252.

The Thunderbolt is a spaceship bound from Earth to Ganymede.

Captain 

Peter Banning

First Mate

Tetsuo Tokugawa

Second Mate

Charles Wayne

Stewards

Joppe Tietjens (already dead)

one other

Other Crew

two engineers

two deckhands, including O'Farrell (already dead)

Names of Remaining Crew

Nielson

Bahadur

Castro

Vladimirovitch

Passengers

Cleonie Rogers, tourist

Serge Andreyev, Solar Union Minerals Authority representative, sent to negotiate a trade agreement

Luke Devon, Planetary Engineer, taking terraforming equipment to Europa, also a Rostomily Brother with Tighe System training

Robert Falken, nucleonic technician, offered a job on Callisto

Morgan Gentry, astronaut, hired by the Jovian Republic to pilot inter-satellite shuttles

Gomez, professor of advanced symbolics, going to the new University of X on Ganymede

They are not all they seem.

This culminating story of the first section of Anderson's Psychotechnic History incorporates a lot of historical references to earlier instalments. We have seen the city of X but now it has a University.

The Wind On Harbor

Poul Anderson, "Gypsy" IN Anderson, The Complete Psychotechnic League, Volume 2, pp. 255-270.

Thorkild Erling is happy to return to his home on the planet Harbor and, of course, the wind reflects his feelings. Inside, the hearth-fire leaps while its flames dance and chuckle. Outside, the wind whistles and rattles the door while the sea roars. Whistling, rattling and roaring can be threatening but not here. Instead, they complement the leaping, dancing and chuckling. The Thorkilds:

"...sat in a warm dry house and heard the wind singing outside.

"I was happy..." (p. 258)

The wind, our constant companion in Poul Anderson's works, contributes twice in a single paragraph.

"Here was the peace that heals."

-Poul Anderson, "The Sorrow of Odin the Goth" IN Anderson, Time Patrol (Riverdale, NY, December 2010), pp. 333-465 AT 43, p. 460.

A Release

In Poul Anderson's Psychotechnic History, "Gypsy" comes as a release. Until then, despite a few interesting details about life in the future, the history has been dominated by conflicts between individuals and groups with different visions for the future of mankind:

Fourre versus Reinach in war-torn Europe;

the UN versus nationalists, militarists and Venus separatists;

Humanists versus psychotechnicians;

counterrevolutionaries versus Humanists;

Planetary Engineers versus psychotechnicians;

a Planetary Engineer who is also a Rostomily Brother against Western Reformists -

- culminating in the Second Dark Ages.

Suddenly, instead, we read about human beings on an extra-solar planet which they have reached by hyperdrive and where there are no conflicts. There can be a story without any conflicts. A potential personal conflict is averted as the narrator's wife conceals her feelings about leaving Harbor.

Various Beginnings And Endings

I like the idea that Poul Anderson's "Marius" and "Brake," written within two months of each other, are bookends of the first section of his Psychotechnic History. See "Marius" And "Brake" and "Brake." The second section is bookended by "Gypsy," which introduces the Nomads, and The Peregrine, a novel about the Nomads. Sandra Miesel's Chronology lists three titles after The Peregrine. These works are either a third section or not a section of this future history series, depending on the reader's point of view.

Somewhere back in a combox on this blog, it was suggested that the first two stories in the second section, "Gypsy" and "Star Ship," should change places, the idea being that "Gypsy" refers to faster than light (FTL) space travel whereas "Star Ship" refers to STL and therefore is set earlier.

"Star Ship" is about human beings who have been stranded on an extra-solar planet for two generations. Thus, it was possible that they had travelled there by STL but that FTL had been invented while they were there. However, "Star Ship" does make clear that the vehicle in question was FTL:

"The Star Ship - faster than light... Whoever controlled that ship could get to Galactic stars in a matter of weeks."

-Poul Anderson, "Star Ship" IN Anderson, The Complete Psychotechnic League, Volume 2 (Riverdale, NY, February 2018), pp. 273-306 AT p. 285.

The issue of beginnings and endings is more complicated in the case of Anderson's second future history series, the Technic History. For nine years, this series began with "Wings of Victory" (1972) but then acquired an instalment set earlier, "The Saturn Game" (1981). Thus, The Earth Book of Stormgate begins with "Wings of Victory" whereas The Technic Civilization Saga, Volume I, begins with "The Saturn Game," followed by the Earth Book Introduction, then by "Wings of Victory."

The Polesotechnic League is introduced in the contemporaneous stories, "Margin of Profit" (1956) and "How To Be Ethnic In One Easy Lesson," (1974) and last seen in Mirkheim (1977) but the entire pre-Flandry section of the series, beginning with "The Saturn Game," ends with The People Of The Wind (1973). The Captain Flandry series begins with "Tiger by the Tail" (1951) but the Young Flandry Trilogy, set earlier, begins with Ensign Flandry (1966). The Flandry period ends with The Game of Glory (1985) and the entire Technic History ends with "Starfog." (1967)

In terms of published volumes, the Technic History originally started with the Nicholas van Rijn collection, Trader To The Stars, even though this volume did not include the first van Rijn story, "Margin of Profit." In fact, ten instalments precede the first story in Trader To The Stars, "Hiding Place." (1961)

Action And Barbarism

"The Snows of Ganymede."

The Planetary Engineers fight and escape in a stolen rocket but are pursued, fired at and forced to crash-land after which the survivors have to trek across the frozen surface of Ganymede. Comic strip sf used to consist of similar action although Dan Dare and Captain Condor did not lose so many comrades in combat.

The surviving Engineers encounter "Outlaws" who, despite sounding like Western fiction villains, are space-suited barbarians living inside a mountain behind a cannibalised spaceship airlock. Can barbarism be combined with space tech? Probably not indefinitely. There is a similar setup, but in orbit, in Alfred Bester's The Stars My Destination.

The Engineers have had to break their own rules by intervening in Jovian politics but it turns out that they are supposed to do this discretely when necessary in any case just as the Time Patrol changes history when necessary and also really exists to counter not only time travelling criminals but also temporal chaos. Series state their premises up front, then reveal more later. A good sequel says, "There's a lot that we did not tell you before..."

Life

"The Snows of Ganymede," VI.

A Planetary Engineer explains:

"'Whole bacteria were assembled long ago. It was just a matter of reproducing and accelerating the chain of physicochemical reactions which led to the first life on Earth.'" (p. 182)

Energized complex molecules changed randomly until one became self-replicating. The Engineer adds:

"'Nothing more than microscopic organisms have been made yet, and I see no reason why humans should ever be produced synthetically even if it is possible. Nature has a much more interesting way of achieving that result.'" (ibid.)

Like the Engineer, I have encountered very strong religious opposition to the idea that human beings could ever be produced synthetically. "God wouldn't allow it!" someone shouted. "Can a thing out of a laboratory ever be holy?" someone else asked. "Life comes from life," a Krishna devotee proclaimed. A Muslim exhibition in Lancaster Library spelt out that Allah created Adam without a father or mother and Jesus without a father. Traditions that have stayed with scriptural fundamentalism have not been able to accept the full implications of scientific discoveries.

Ganymede

"Heinlein seems to have a particular fondness for Ganymede: one of the young fellows in Space Cadet was a Ganymedean colonist, the hero of Between Planets was born in a ship that was on its way to Ganymede; Farmer in the Sky is about the settling of Ganymede."

-Alexei Panshin, Heinlein In Dimension (Chicago, 1968), III, 5, p. 58.

(Space Cadet and Farmer in the Sky, but not Between Planets, belong in Heinlein's Juvenile Future History together with Red Planet, The Rolling Stones and Time For The Stars.)

In James Blish's The Seedling Stars, Ganymede is not terraformed but colonized by Adapted Men.

In Poul Anderson's Three Worlds To Conquer, there is a Ganymedean base for communication with Jovians. In Anderson's Flandry series, there is a Ganymedean base for visits to Jupiter. In Anderson's Psychotechnic History, Planetary Engineers survey Ganymede to determine whether it can be terraformed. In Anderson's Twilight World, Epilogue, Ganymede is being terraformed.

Another parallel with Blish is that, in Twilight World, Homo Superior will restore the Terrestrial ecology and, in The Seedling Stars, Adapted Men will recolonize Earth.

A Planetary Engineer says that the Uranian moons are too far away to colonize yet, in Olaf Stapledon's Last And First Men, a later human species colonizes Neptune albeit in a changed Solar System.

See previous blog references to Ganymede. (Scroll down.)

Historical Comparisons

"The Snows of Ganymede," VI.

Not only the omniscient narrator but also the Planetary Engineers compare the Psychotechnic Institute to the Christian Church. The latter began with the ideal of universal brotherhood and wound up burning dissidents. The former tried to remake man scientifically and wound up manipulating populations and falsifying data. 

Heinlein's Future History Chart begins with technical advances but mass psychoses, has the First Human Civilization after the Second American Revolution and ends with the beginning of the first mature culture. Anderson's Psychotechnic History contrasts technological advances with human psychological limitations and describes a long adolescence of Technic civilization.

Two Parallel Future Histories

Psychotechnic History

Recovery from World War III

UN world government

Solar Union, including Humanist Revolt

Second Dark Ages

Stellar Union

Third Dark Ages

interstellar empires

Galactic civilization

Technic History

Recovery from the Chaos

Solar Commonwealth

Time of Troubles

Terran Empire

Long Night

human civilizations in several spiral arms

Parallels

recovery

a Solar political unit

two "Dark Ages"

an imperial period

eventual galactic civilization

Psychotechnic Improvements, Then Decline

"The Snows of Ganymede," V.

When the UN had psychotechnic advisors and administrators:

economic recovery;

world government;

withering nationalism;

education addressing individual and social needs;

population decline;

conservation;

rational (?) economics;

sane penology;

generally available psychiatry;

critical thinking.

Causes of breakdown and Humanist Revolution:

cultural resistance;

psychological resistance;

mass technological unemployment;

superdielectrics shifting military power from government to small groups.

Church, Institute And Patrol

"The Snows of Ganymede," V.

"Somewhat as the medieval Church nurtured Western civilization, the Institute was a kind of placenta for Technic society. In both cases, an outgrown matrix was becoming constrictive and had to be broken, and in both cases the act of breaking threw men back temporarily to disorganization and unreason." (p. 175)

That single passage illuminates the Psychotechnic History. Although the Psychotechnic Institute is outlawed very early in this future history series, governments and other organizations continue to employ psychotechnicians and the science reaches its full fruition and application later. So "The Psychotechnic History," although not "The Psychotechnic League," remains a valid title.

Poul Anderson's Time Patrol series sheds further light on the role of the Church. The idea of a single omnipotent deity decreeing a single set of natural laws encouraged the scientific study of those laws and the medieval church-state conflict prevented either a theocracy or an autocracy, thus allowing the growth of both science and freedom.

Don't just read one series by Poul Anderson.

Two Technic Civilizations

"The Snows of Ganymede," V.

The phrase, "Technic civilization," is used both in the Technic History and in the Psychotechnic History. In the Technic History, the cartelization of the Polesotechnic League is the beginning of the decline of Technic civilization whereas, in the Psychotechnic History, the period following the suppression of the Psychotechnic Institute is described as "...the adolescence of Technic civilization..." (p. 178) The Institute is related to Technic society as the medieval Church was to Western civilization, we are told on p. 175.

I want to pursue this comparison between two Technic civilizations but must prepare to visit the Gregson Institute (scroll down) as described in previous posts. See you-all back here later.

More Effective

"The Snows of Ganymede," IV.

The Planetary Engineers assess Jovian society. One Engineer thinks that, if the subordinate class continues to be treated in the way that it is, then it will either mutiny or degenerate to uselessness. Another suggests that it must have some safety valve or outlet. This turns out to be orgiastic religious services. 

The British Establishment has developed an efficient mechanism for containing discontent. The Conservatives are the natural party of government but occasionally they become so unpopular as to lose a General Election. What happens then? Labour holds the reins of government just long enough to disappoint and disillusion their supporters. Then those supporters stop voting for Labour or for anyone else and the Conservatives are back in for another long period. However, every time there is a General Election, a lot of people think that something important is about to change. Between elections, a lot of people console themselves that the governing party will lose the next election, indeed that opinion polls show that it would lose if there were an election now and that the Prime Minister is guilty of merely holding onto power for the sake of power. I have been hearing this all my life. A party leader who gets past his sell-by date can be put in the House of Lords or on a Board of Directors. He doesn't have to be shot!

This system is more effective than orgies - but the Brits have been practising government for a lot longer than the Jovians.

Little And Big

Poul Anderson published:

21 instalments of his Psychotechnic History in the eight years from 1949 to 1957;

a 22nd instalment eleven years later in 1968;

 

the 43 instalments of his Technic History in the thirty-four years from 1951 and 1985.

Thus, the two series differ both in number of instalments and in length of publication history. We value both a shorter future history series and a longer one. 

Both of these future history series address the Wellsian-Stapledonian theme of human civilization in its cosmic setting. For example, in the Psychotechnic instalment, "The Snows of Ganymede," underground cities have been built on a Jovian moon and there is perennial conflict about the direction that civilization should take.

Civilizations rise and fall in both series but this process is more comprehensively analysed and understood in the Technic History. Whereas Eino Valti founds psychotechnic science, Chunderban Desai explains the decline of Technic civilization.

Terraforming II

"The Snows of Ganymede," IV.

"'...no one would even try to give an atmosphere to Luna or Mercury.'" (p. 161)

There is a Poul Anderson story about a project to terraform the Moon. Anderson covers every option. 

In HG Wells' The First Men In The Moon, the Moon does have an atmosphere that freezes at night. In Robert Heinlein's "The Man Who Sold The Moon," there is speculation that the Moon once had an atmosphere but that Lunar life and atmosphere were destroyed by a nuclear war which explains the craters. In Anderson's Technic History, parts of the Lunar surface are terraformed. See The Lunar Surface In Science Fiction.

In the Psychotechnic History, on Luna and Mercury, the Order of Planetary Engineers concentrates on underground installations with efficient airlocks and stored solar energy. The main point here is that every planet is different and that terraforming may or may not be possible.

Money In The Pioneer

"The Troublemakers."

Within the Pioneer, the various departments pay crew members for their work and some crew members become independent entrepreneurs or traders of various kinds so money circulates although bankers are never mentioned when the various services are listed, e.g.:

"'...the doctors and lawyers and teachers and policemen.'" (p. 112)

But how much money can circulate between a mere seven thousand people, including "'...housewives, children and aged...'" (p. 114)? (Seven thousand is the spaceship's population at the time of this story.)

I have always found financial processes extremely difficult to follow beyond a very basic point:

material production;

barter as the simplest, most primitive, form of exchange;

cash as standardizing exchange and a vast improvement on barter;

banks as places to keep cash in;

banks as institutions that lend money at interest.

Banks make money by lending money that is not theirs and by lending more than is in their possession so that it is impossible for everyone to withdraw their deposits simultaneously. How does this system work? Sometimes it doesn't. How does it work in the Pioneer? Is monetary exchange necessary or helpful in such a small community? I don't know, frankly.

Terraforming

"The Snows of Ganymede," IV.

Terraforming Mars had involved, among many other things, diverting moon-sized meteors of ice from the Saturnian rings to fall onto the planet in just the right places.

This reminds us of Larry Niven's Known Space future history where human beings prefer to colonize the Moon and the Belt rather than Mars. The Martian surface is down at the bottom of a gravity well. However, Jack Brennan, who has become the first protector of the human species, diverts an ice asteroid onto a collision course with Mars. Brennan's purpose is not to begin terraforming but to exterminate the native Martians, here called "martians," because they had killed a handful of human explorers. To a protector, that is a capital offence. Protectors are genetically programmed the way Asimov's robots are positronically programmed. If a protector sees you light a cigarette, he will grab it away from you. If he protects only his own relatives, not the entire species, then he will kill other human beings as casually as he exterminated the martians - who fortunately still survive in the Map of Mars on the Ringworld.

OK. That was a sideways tour into another future history series.

Bade

"The Snows of Ganymede," IV.

"The giant followed wordlessly, and said nothing when the small heap of handbags was pointed out to him - merely picked them up and trudged bade." (p. 156)

Bade?

"The giant followed wordlessly, and said nothing when the small heap of handbags was pointed out to him - merely picked them up and trudged back."

-Poul Anderson, The Snows of Ganymede (New York, 1958), CHAPTER 4, p. 24.

Back! This time, the earlier edition gives us the correct spelling.

That "giant" is:

grey-clad;

hairless;

gigantic;

four-armed;

with an inhumanly vacant face;

introduced as "'Porter...'" (ibid.)

Genetic engineering not enhancing but debasing. We see this also in Anderson's Kith future history.

Allowance And Soul

"The Snows of Ganymede," III.

"'My father was one of the intellectual routineer class which was displaced by the Second Industrial Revolution, though he never joined the Humanists. He didn't like living off citizen's allowance and odd jobs - called it a handout.'" (p. 152)

In good future historical style, we recognize these references and issues from previous instalments even though the series has progressed to new characters in a later period.

Citizen's allowance, which should not be called an "allowance," would not be a handout! It would be a later generation's rightful inheritance from the labour of previous generations. An aristocrat does not regard his inherited income, property or status as a "handout." Technology can level everyone up into the aristocracy - although we will not call it that.

The speaker also reflects that:

"He had crossed millions of kilometers and seen strange landscapes, but had he ever looked into the soul of a man - even his own?" (p. 153)

These are the two complementary themes of Poul Anderson's Psychotechnic History: the external universe and the inner man.

Late Night Link Ups

"The Snows of Ganymede."

A labman asks a Planetary Engineer to bring back some green callistite from the Jovian System. Of course, this reminds us of green Kryptonite.

Fortuitously, this evening I reread the above and also the following:

"We've analysed [some threads] and identified the fabric. It's Crilicon.'

"'Does that come from Krypton?' It was a stupid quip that just slipped out of him.

"Arqua, who obviously didn't read comic strips and didn't know of the existence of Superman, balked."

-Andrea Camilleri, The Paper Moon (London, 2009), 13, p. 184.

I balk at this time of night. I have to stop rereading Poul Anderson because I would want to blog and I don't want to blog. The choice is between Andrea Camilleri and Stieg Larsson, Sicily and Sweden. Tomorrow, back to Anderson and Ganymede.

Another Future Historical Source

"The Snows of Ganymede."

See Future Historical Sources II.

This story discloses one more Psychotechnic History future historical source, namely de la Garde's Short History of Interplanetary Colonization.  De la Garde describes events similar to those in Robert Heinlein's Future History: lunatic years in the late twentieth century with a religious reaction against social troubles and scientific method. There is a Pilgrim exodus to Mars and a White American Church exodus to Ganymede. By 2100 AD, the Ganymedean colony, having lost its financial support on Earth, is completely isolated. 2100 AD is a significant date in Heinlein's History. The colonists, called "Jovians," not "Ganymedeans," have declared independence from the Solar Union.

In 2220, Planetary Engineers, en route to the Jovian System on a survey trip preparatory to the terraforming of Ganymede and Callisto, read de la Garde but realize that by now Ganymedean society will be unlike any of those on the inner planets:

commercial Luna City;

intellectual Mars;

clannish Venus;

Earth now unfamiliar to Engineers.

Space And Nature

"...space was the great Enemy against which all souls aboard, all mankind had to unite..."

-"The Troublemakers," p. 111.

In the following story, a Planetary Engineer thinks of himself as:

"...a soldier in man's finest war, the fight of all men against a blind and indifferent nature which had brought their kind forth without caring."

-Poul Anderson, "The Snows of Ganymede" IN Anderson, The Complete Psychotechnic League (Riverdale, NY, February 2018), pp. 141-214 AT I, p. 142.

We have two enemies. The other is within and is addressed in "Un-Man" and "The Sensitive Man."

A Nazi and a Zionist, stranded on the surface of Ganymede, would have to cooperate to survive. Far enough away, Terrestrial divisions become invisible. The common enemy is space and nature.

The Plan

"The Troublemakers." 

That "plan" must be flexible and adaptable with a lot of safeguards and feedback mechanisms. The psychologists think that Evan Friday has the potential to be a good end-of-voyage Captain so they get him framed and busted down from the officer caste to the labouring class where he might learn some practical politics. If he had not measured up to expectations, then they would have had him exonerated and sinecured but would then have had to find another Captain. Instead, Friday exceeds expectations, organizing the merchant class and leading his "watch" around the outside of the ship to outflank the mutineers - thus saving the ship from an unproductive tyranny and maybe even from extinction? Well, no. The psychologists, having socially engineered the mutiny, must surely have had some other strings to their bow in terms of defeating it? Individuals like Friday can make a very big difference but the plan has to override individualities.

Seldon's Plan is thrown off-course by an unpredictable individual mutant but is flexible enough to get back on course, especially since psychohistorians are still working on it.

Applied Mass Psychology

"'Some men have striven for their own selfish ends, money or power - Wilson was one. We need their type for the plan, we offer it chances to develop - and at the same time, through the ultimate annihilating defeat of such men, we need the type out of our society.'"

-Poul Anderson, "The Troublemakers" IN Anderson, Cold Victory (New York, March 1982), pp. 31-110 AT p. 107.

-Poul Anderson, "The Troublemakers" IN Anderson, The Complete Psychotechnic League, Volume 2 (Riverdale, NY, February 2018), pp. 91-138 AT p. 136.

We think that the second "need" should be "weed."

The characters refer not to "psychotechnics" but only to "psychology." However, they do systematically apply mass psychology within the Pioneer. Does their management of social conflict within the spaceship ensure that the population that arrives at Alpha Centauri will be robust enough to build a colony? Their predictive science of society tells them that it does and will. An even better science of society would be one that everyone consciously participated in but maybe that is asking too much? It does not seem to matter that the Psychotechnic Institute was banned. Psychotechnics has not been.

Discussing this story has given us occasion to discuss history and social dynamics.

People in the Pioneer variously strive for:

selfish ends;

justice for themselves;

justice for their class;

justice for other classes and the ship as a whole.

"'Thus is born the type we ultimately want, the hard-headed fighting visionaries.'" (p. 137)

In the Technic History, Nicholas van Rijn strives for selfish ends but within a framework of justice for all.

In Asimov's Foundation series, Hari Seldon's psychohistory guides the Galaxy through a thousand years between the First and Second Galactic Empires. In "The Troublemakers," psychology guides the Pioneer through one hundred and twenty-three years between Sol and Alpha Centauri.

Great Hollow Night

"The Troublemakers."

"...the great hollow night between Sol and Centauri." (p. 126)

Space used to be thought of as dark although it is full of starlight and, close to a star, there is perpetual day:

"Where day never shuts his eye,

"Up in the broad fields of the sky..."

-see here.

CS Lewis's Elwin Ransom, en route to Mars, realizes that space, or "Heaven," is full of enlivening energy. James Blish's Adolph Haertel, en route to Mars, knows that space is full of lethal radiation. Interstellar space is full of gravitational fields, electromagnetic radiation and virtual particles. Apparently empty space is really full of invisible light.

The Troublemakers: Miscellaneous

"The Troublemakers."

The Pioneer "...is six miles long and two miles in diameter." (p. 125)

Big.

"The whole expedition was a cosmic joke." (p. 118)

Somewhere Dominic Flandry ironically reflects that human life is a comedy created by the gods when they were in a bad mood - or something along those lines. Where?

Friday has been busted from officer to labourer and is now organizing a small shop keepers' self-defence group so he has gained inside knowledge of three social classes. He is being prepared for something by his creator, Poul Anderson, and maybe also by those elusive psychotechnicians that we suspect are lurking somewhere in the Pioneer? What?

Wilson's Brotherhood is mutinying and Friday is poised to take some action but what? I can't remember from previous readings.

Onward and upward.