Our blog machine is wobbling between fictional timelines with all the finesse of a drunken Time Lord or a demented Neldorian.
In the Old Phoenix multiverse, characters travel between timelines by magic or maybe by entering the Inn from one universe and exiting it to another.
In the Time Patrol universe, characters enter divergent timelines either by altering events or by living through a quantum fluctuation in space-time-energy.
In Poul Anderson's ultimate novel, Genesis, characters can enter virtual realities of alternative timelines and thus could consciously simulate either of the other two scenarios.
Genesis refers to more of the past than we might have thought. Christian and Laurinda enter an "emulated" estate in Surrey in mid-eighteenth century England. This emulated world includes:
underpaid, undernourished, under-respected domestic servants;
American colonists who keep slaves and will rebel;
a French monarchy that will provoke:
"'...a truly terrible revolution, followed by a quarter century of war.'"
When Christian comments:
"'Well, the human condition never did include sanity, did it?'" (ibid.)
- he unknowingly recalls the theme of Anderson's first future history where the Psychotechnic Institute tried to change the human condition. His comment is followed by the observation:
"That was for the machines." (ibid.)
Thus, this single-volume future history replies to that earlier series.
Christian, who has returned to the Solar System, has seen:
suns
worlds
life
nebulae
black holes
galaxies
the space-time structure
- but Laurinda tells him about Jane Austen:
"'An early nineteenth-century writer. She led a quiet life, never went far from home, died young, but she explored people in ways that nobody else ever did.'" (p. 150)
In the borrowed Surrey estate, Laurinda's dinner guests are
James Cook,
Henry Fielding and
Erasmus Darwin. Thus, although
Genesis is a culmination of the traditions of Mary Shelley and HG Wells, it also refers to Jane Austen and Henry Fielding, the latter regarded as a founder of the novel.
28 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
That mention of France reminded me of the problems posed by "the revolution of rising expectations." That is, it was the very eagerness of Louis XVI to govern well and bring in reforms which eventually stirred up hopes and demands for increasingly radical "reforms" that simply could not be met or achieved. So we got the bloody horrors of the monstrous French Revolution and the wars attending it.
Most revolutions are so loathsome and detestable!
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Why could the radical reforms not be met or achieved?
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
It should be obvious: it is not easy to change ancient laws, institutions, reverse long established traditions, or annul long settled precedents. Over generations or centuries vested interests would have grown up around these things, benefiting from them. The people concerned would object to being dispossessed, not always unjustifiably. That was what Louis XVI had to struggle with.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
It is not obvious. Vested interests should be opposed.
"...not always unjustifiably." Sometimes unjustifiably?
A king could have given a lead - but he is one of the vested interests.
Paul.
Actually the domestic servants in an 18th-century English country house weren't undernourished -- they ate far, far better than, say, a farm laborer.
Generally speaking they had meat every day and plenty of the staples, and often ate the surplus portions of their employers' meals.
Contemporary diaries written by literate servants as well as manuals and account-books testify to this.
Kaor, Paul and Mr. Stirling!
Paul: When I think of how hard and long a struggle it was, to use UK examples, to bring about Catholic Emancipation, reform of the House of Commons, abolition of slavery, I cannot be so blase about how easy reforms can be.
I do agree Louis XVI could have been more forceful and decisive. Because he wasn't a genuinely good and kind man came to a tragic end and France suffered a monstrous Revolution.
Mr. Stirling: Dang, then that was a mistake Anderson made, in that depiction of 18th century domestic servants. Ah well, sometimes even a master writer errs.
Ad astra! Sean
Kaor, Paul!
I meant to say Louis XVI "...was a genuinely good and kind man..."
I recommend reading Alexis de Tocqueville's THE OLD REGIME AND THE REVOLUTION for a good study of the pre-1789 French state. Then you would see how hemmed in any king of France would be by custom, precedent, bureaucratic inertia, customary law, etc.
Ad astra! Sean
I am not blase about how easy reforms can be. I just need to look at the world right now.
Kaor, Paul!
I sometimes get the mistaken impression you think all we need for alleged changes for the better requires only a snap of the fingers.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean: there was a reason why domestic servants wanted, and flocked to, positions in the "Downton Abbeys" of the time. Conditions were much better there.
If you were the teenaged maid-of-all-work who was the sole servant in a lower-middle-class home, things would be harder -- but you'd still probably eat better than you had at home.
Sean,
And I experience all the time how much resistance there is to changes for the better.
A reduction in war-mongering and profits for arms companies would hardly be an "alleged" change for the better.
Paul.
Paul: Well, being prepared for war is not "war-mongering". And why would arms companies manufacture arms -- a necessity -- if they didn't make any profits?
I can phrase it differently by saying that it would be better if preparation for war were not necessary - and I know that there are replies to that.
Bottom line: in a profit-based economy, companies have to make profits.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling and Paul!
Mr. Stirling: I agree, I can see how personally working for the boss, before his/her very eyes, can be very useful. Esp. if you've shown yourself to be reliable and loyal.
Paul: I repeat, alleged changes for the better. It is my absolute conviction that many, many of the changes leftists want are futile, counterproductive, disastrous, hopelessly unworkable.
And I agree with Stirling, not you. Merely being prepared for war, in a chaotic and dangerous world, is not "war mongering." The profits arms companies get is what they've earned from filling a need.
And that competitive drive for profits, whether by a baker, car manufacturer, or arms maker is proof that free enterprise economics, based on satisfying the demands of customers, works, while nothing else ever has. So I'll continue to dismiss futile things like socialism.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
It is my absolute conviction that many of the changes leftists want are positive, productive, creative, hopeful and workable.
Of course there is being prepared for war and there is war mongering. Presumably we at least agree that some national political leaders are war mongering. But everyone being prepared for war all the time makes the world chaotic and dangerous. Filling a need? Nuclear weapons? Stealth bombers tested in the Middle East?
I will continue to dismiss destructive capitalism. Competition for profits has developed production and can now be made redundant by the production of plenty for need instead of profit but vested interests cling to economic power.
Is this endless absolutist repetition not pointless?
Paul.
Paul: if you don't make a profit doing X, you make a loss or at best break even.
In that case, someone else has to pay if you want to continue to get X.
This applies regardless of the formal organization of the economy.
Kaor, Paul!
Then we have to disagree, re leftist "ideas."
Of course tyrants like Putin, Xi, or the Muslim fanatics in Iran are war mongers. Because, to them, aggression is perfectly rational if weak willed bunglers like "Josip" tempts them to believe they can get away with it.
Disagree, what you said about "capitalism." Socialism, where ever it has been tried in any places larger than monasteries, has been vastly more destructive.
Ad astra! Sean
Well, not quite. Some of us envisage a future economy based on cooperation for need instead of competition for profit with a level of technology and a kind of social organization that will make this feasible but, meanwhile, I fully agree that, while the present kind of economy exists, any producers that do not make a profit go under and that is one of the factors that determine what is produced and how it is produced etc.
The details of how a cooperative economy will work in practice will have to be learned in practice and cannot be blueprinted in advance but that is true of every large scale activity such as the world as it is now as against the world five hundred years ago.
Sean,
My immediately preceding comment was in reply to SM Stirling.
I wrote "destructive capitalism" simply because I was responding to your dismissive remarks about "socialism," showing that the same kind of language can be used either way.
We have been through this before about what is meant by "socialism" and how often it has been "tried" in the past but you seem not to remember, take into account or respond to what has been said in between but simply to revert to whatever you had said at the very beginning of such an exchange. I really do not want to go through all that again with you telling me what I mean by "socialism." The exchanges are there in the comboxes for anyone who wants to reread them. If they can find them among all the others, of course.
Paul.
Sean,
Of course we have to disagree but surely we are not trying to agree?
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I am aware of the definition of socialism that you favor, but my point has been and is that it has never turned out like that--it became the definition I believe historically accurate.
But I will leave it at that.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
It has never turned out like that because it has almost never been tried. But there is a massive movement of people who are dissatisfied with the way the world is run now. This has to be resolved. We cannot remain indefinitely in this unsustainable state.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
We cannot agree. I don't believe one bit that "massive movement" will amount to anything much.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
We are not trying to agree. Movements amount to a lot. They put political restraints on governments and bring down dictators.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Sometimes, but not always and not even most times. Tyrants tend to be succeeded by more tyrants, sometimes worse than their predecessors.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Yes indeed but we can hope to do more. Inspired leadership by individuals and groups and mass actions by much larger numbers can change things and what else can? We take for granted the gains made by previous generations: electricity, medicine, universal suffrage, democracy, the rule of law, literacy, rights at work, instant communications and always the possibility of going further. Just to leave everything to our present rulers is to go backwards fast.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
And the good things you listed, such as limited gov't (not democracy) came about thru a complex interplay of factors and ideas (such as Christianity and free enterprise economics) unlikely to be always successfully replicated elsewhere. Esp. if such ideas threatens to undermine long established regimes and religions like Islam.
So I remain skeptical!
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Yes, Christianity and free enterprise did some good but I have given reasons why I think that "free enterprise" does not make sense when projected into an indefinite future when the conditions of production and distribution will be completely different.
Paul.
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