Meetings

Some of us attend large meetings in real life and some of us read Poul Anderson's accounts of the Dennitzan Parliament in A Knight Of Ghosts And Shadows and of the Dalesmen's Council in Vault Of The Ages. I belong to both groups: both to the large-meetings-attenders group and to the Poul Anderson readers group. Anderson gets the feel and tone of such meetings right. There is tumult, uncertainty and a collective appraisal of vast but immediate issues:

"A few men, as usual, had to make speeches proposing this or that, or simply for or against Ralph's suggestion..."

-Vault Of The Ages, Chapter 14, p. 141.

Anderson imagines an entire species, the Ythrians, who are better equipped than human beings, at least as we know them, to make collective decisions quickly. Ythrians do not restate the obvious, repeat themselves or duplicate what previous speakers have said. With advanced communications technology, a planetary population is able to vote to continue to wage war in a few hours. Human members of Ythrian choths participate in the global Khruath and learn from the Ythrians who are their fellow Avalonians. I think that Anderson has sketched a future for mankind - and one that should make war unnecessary.