"'It's too bad that human exogenesis was developed during the Years of Madness...'" (p. 106)
Another reference to this mysterious period and this time we receive a little more information. The text continues:
"'...when moral scruples went to hell and scientists were as fanatical as everyone else.'" (ibid.)
That has to be an exaggeration. Everyone was fanatical and without scruples? How could society have survived and any kind of sanity been restored?
Sanity has wide bounds but how far can such bounds be stretched? And how could a whole society go beyond anyone's idea of the bounds of sanity? We should also refer to Brian Aldiss' novel, Barefoot In The Head, in which everyone has been affected by hallucinogenic chemical weapons.
I think that we need to be told more about these Years of Madness. They are not even mentioned in the Psychotechnic History Chronology of the Future. But surely they would have been a turning point with people emerging in very different shape into subsequent periods?
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
I think you are right, if the chaos of the Years of Madness had literally been as bad as described, then there would have been massive socio-political collapse. But I can imagine things being very bad, short of that, for years.
Ad astra! Sean
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