Alexei Panshin distinguishes:
"...between extrapolation and speculation." (VII., p. 160)
- by which he means:
Extrapolation
"...the closely reasoned inferential process." (ibid.)
"...an account of the operation of known processes." (ibid.)
e.g., Hal Clement's Mission of Gravity.
Speculation
"...the less confined concern with how and of what the world is made." (ibid.)
"...an account of the essential nature of things." (ibid.)
e.g., James Blish's The Triumph of Time.
I would have said that we extrapolate from the known and speculate about the unknown. Thus, a mission to Mars is extrapolation whereas the arrival of an extrasolar spaceship is speculation.
Panshin adds that extrapolation and speculation overlap and also that a deeper sort of speculation is:
"the author's attitude toward life, or his conception of the world." (ibid.)
Is that a sort of speculation? Many attitudes and world-views are dogmatic and not what we would usually call speculative. Speculation requires some imagination.
The opening story of Poul Anderson's Technic History, "The Saturn Game," is extrapolative. Which stories are speculative? Can anyone divide up Anderson's works on this basis?
Panshin arrives at unconscious meanings and attitudes by examining an author's recurrent:
"...symbols, themes, and ideas..." (p. 161)
He identifies liberty and unreality as Heinleinian themes whereas I have identified freedom and diversity as Andersonian themes.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
I would have added that realism was also one of Anderson's themes, esp. realism about what human beings are like and what socio-political forms are likely to work. By and large Anderson's views were that human beings are not perfect, that all their societies/states are always going to have flaws. Therefore the most lasting societies/states makes allowances for our flaws, vices, imperfections. All of which are things orthodox Catholics agrees with.
Merry Christmas! Sean
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