"Now the Empire has fallen, the Long Night descended upon the tiny fraction of the galaxy which man once explored and colonized. Like Romano-Britons after the last legion had withdrawn, people out in the former marches of civilization do not even know what is happening at its former heart. They have the physical capability of going there and finding out, but are too busy surviving. They are also, all unawares, generating whole new societies of their own."
-Poul Anderson, INTRODUCTION IN Anderson, Flandry's Legacy (Riverdale, NY, June 2012), pp. 543-544 AT p. 544.
This Introduction is to The Night Face. Two instalments later, in "Starfog," we glimpse some of those whole new societies that have spread through several spiral arms of the galaxy in a period when Anglic has become an ancient, and long dead, language. We watch history unfold right to the end of Poul Anderson's Technic History series.
13 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
The Technic stories are far more satisfactory, solid feeling, than Asimov's Foundation stories. The latter has a curiously flat, static, implausibly unchanging socio/political/economic background.
Ad astra! Sean
Asimov was writing for a different audience, generationally, with different tastes, and is as different from Anderson as Asimov is from EE Smith, and as Smith is from Stapledon.
Yet space opera remains space opera, and all can be enjoyed; just don't mistake it for HSF. ;)
Kaor, Dave!
Yes, I can see that. Yes, and as a boy I loved the original FOUNDATION books. But, by 1975 I became dissatisfied with Asimov's longer stories/novels. There was too much talk in them and not enough action and description. Also, I came to find Asimov's writing too plain, colorless, monochromatic. Hardly any of the characters he created were memorable/interesting. I could go on, but this is enough.
What does "HSF" mean?
Ad astra! Sean
Really 'hard' SF has never been all that popular.
Using a definition which rules out SF which contradicts current scientific consensus from being called "hard".
Authors who stick to that have always reminded me of the old joke about why strict Scottish Presbyterians objected to sexual intercourse while standing up:
It might lead to sinful -dancing-.
Pickle-up-the-arse types, in other words.
Also, 'scientific consensus' is a moving target.
Cosmological theories long current have been taking an awful beating as we observe more with things like the Hubble and Webb space telescopes, just to name one.
Ancient DNA research has upended archaeology in a way traumatic to many archaeologists (and amusing to me, btw.).
I could go on. And then there's the "replicability crisis" in a lot of scientific fields, particularly social-science ones.
Add in that "hard" SF is usually (tho' not always) near-future, and near-future SF gets dated very, very, very fast.
Because predicting the future is impossible, and most detailed predictions are embarrassingly bad.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I agree, but I still appreciate well done hard SF of the kind written by Hal Clement, Poul Anderson, Pournelle/Niven, and you. And more recently the works of Andy Weir.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean:
The hard SF of those authors mostly (or all) assume something that is not part of the science of the day. Eg: even Hal Clement has humans at other stars by some sort of FTL transport. They usually stick to "one big lie" and keep everything else based on science as then understood.
Andy Weir's "Project Hail Mary" is an interesting case. The astrophage has a bunch of properties that are new to science & all derive from one basic 'newness'. I like the way the characters talk about each new weirdness & how the weirdnesses link together. Then there is one result of the properties of astrophage that massively violates a very fundamental law in currently understood science that the characters *do not* mention.
For the moment I will leave it as an exercise for the reader to identify that.
If you want I will explain it in a later comment.
Kaor, Jim!
Of course, I agree! Hard SF writers worth their salt make one or two assumptions going beyond the known science of their time.
I've read Weir's THE MARTIAN and ARTEMIS, but not PROJECT HAIL MARY. Don't tell me about that massive of that very fundamental scientific law till I read the third book! (Smiles)
Ad astra! Sean
I think one needs a pretty good physical sciences education to catch that violation. It was only when I was a most of the way through the book that I thought 'doesn't this property plus that property *combined* violate...?'.
It might be like the dust storm in "The Martian". Weir knew that was wrong but needed something to get the plot going.
Kaor, Jim!
Let me read PROJECT HAIL MARY first! (Smiles)
Another thing to keep in mind. After all Mars does have sand or dust storms.
We should learn a lot more about Mars if/when Elon Musk sends the first manned expedition to "Barsoom"!
Ad astra! Sean
If.
Kaor, Paul!
I did say "if" as well, with that "if/when."
I sometimes go to the SpaceX website, to get an idea of the latest work being done for getting mankind off this rock! I would not be surprised if Musk was inspired by Heinlein's D.D. Harriman or Anderson's Nicholas van Rijn and Anson Guthrie.
Ad astra! Sean
Mars does have dust storms, but the thinness of the atmosphere means that even the fastest winds only lifts very fine dust and are not enough to damage equipment. Martian dust storms cover solar panels with dust and obscure vision but are not otherwise dangerous.
The solar panel issue is a good reason to use nuclear power sources for exploration on the Martian surface. Radioisotope Thermal Generators or a nuclear reactor like the Kilopower.
Kaor, Jim!
It would still make sense to clean that dust off those solar panels!
I agree, use both nuclear power and solar panels ob Mars. Both have their places.
Ad astra! Sean
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