"...a good many accounts of [Nicholas van Rijn] exist in Library Central..."
-Poul Anderson, INTRODUCTION MARGIN OF PROFIT IN Anderson, The Van Rijn Method (Riverdale, NY, December 2009), pp. 135-136 AT p. 136.
"To screen a glossary of obscure terms, punch Library Central 254-0691."
-Poul Anderson, INTRODUCTION HOW TO BE ETHNIC IN ONE EASY LESSON IN The Van Rijn Method, pp. 175-176 AT p. 176.
"Vaguely remembering that San Francisco had once had special ethnic sections, I did ask Library Central. It screened a fleet of stuff about a district known as Chinatown."
-Poul Anderson, "How To Be Ethnic In One Easy Lesson" IN The Van Rijn Method, pp. 177-197 AT p. 183.
The Library Central in the two INRODUCTIONs is on Avalon whereas the version that is consulted about San Francisco is earlier and on Earth.
In the second quotation above, the fictional editor directly addresses his contemporaries as the narrator of Heinlein's Future History does sometimes.
IIRC, in Larry Niven's Known Space future history, two-hundred-year-old Louis Wu has not learned to read because he is used to receiving audio info from voice-controlled computers. Maybe that doesn't fit because, IIRC, Wu was then on the Ringworld which would have had an unfamiliar script in any case. I have lost touch with Known Space but maybe someone more familiar with that future history would be able to clarify this point and also to comment on how Niven continues the future historical tradition of Heinlein and Anderson?
15 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
And in THE REBEL WORLDS we see Admiral Kheraskov saying he asked "Files" to send him dossiers of Intelligence officers fitting the conditions he required for a special mission.
Ad astra! Sean
Yeah, all information (except deeply secret bits) will be available at all times.
OTOH, that means all -incorrect- information will also be available... and human beings have an inherent tendency to confirmation bias and motivated reasoning. The smarter they are, the better they are at rationalization.
As a thinking person, I started by rationalizing my received beliefs but then I enquired and thought more widely.
Text messaging on phones is keeping literacy essential.
I mostly prefer getting information by reading, since text goes at exactly the speed I am comprehending it. ;)
Now as a proper skeptic I wonder "How do I find the 'Steelman argument' against some position I'm fairly convinced of?"
Yes, the thing about print is that it's not a passive experience -- you control it, and can skip and concentrate or look up some particular passage or information.
With audio, you're much less in control of the experience.
Paul: yes, but then people start rationalizing their -new- beliefs... it's rather like trying to outrun your own sweat.
It can be done, though, but it's not easy. That shows that reason arose for -social- reasons, not to find truth. You can use it that way, but that's an unintended side-effect, I think.
Kaor, Jim and Mr. Stirling!
Jim: I too, for the reasons given by Stirling, prefer reading/print, including hard copy reading.
Mr. Stirling: I agree, no matter how objective we pretend or try to be, all of us are at risk of being affected by confirmation bias, motivated reasoning, wishful thinking, rationalization, etc.
Ad astra! Sean
I agree that everything about us is explicable by natural selection but we can transcend mere survival as an end of action. Opposable thumbs evolved for grasping branches can be used to write poetry and philosophy and play musical instruments.
Pleasure and pain have survival value and both require consciousness so sensitivity developed into sensation.
Reasoning about the environment helps us to manipulate it but we can develop abstract reasoning.
I know a bunch of people who hold the same political beliefs but they divide into two camps.
One camp automatically defends its beliefs at all costs whenever they are challenged. The other camp is more reasoned and considered in its response to disagreement and criticism.
"Theory is grey. Life is green."
Paul: yes, I've seen the same thing. OTOH, in a -fight-, group consensus and absolute certainty generate morale and punching power. Certainty defeats doubt more often than not.
(Though it plays havoc with things like figuring the odds.)
Kaor Mr. Stirling!
Yes, in wars and conflicts contending nations need absolute conviction in the rightness of their causes. I think you meant to say defeat brings about doubt?
Ad astra! Sean
sean: no, the reverse.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I asked because I thought "Certainly defeat doubts more often than not" was unclear.
Ad astra! Sean
sean: my bad. should have read 'certainty defeats doubt'.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
That clarifies what was otherwise a puzzling comment.
Ad astra! Sean
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