Tuesday, 3 March 2026

Phases (Or Phrases)

In Poul Anderson's Technic History, "hyperspace" is successive quantum jumps. Hyperjumping spaceships become solid to each other if they match the phases (or frequencies) of their jumps.

In Anderson's Psychotechnic History, "hyperspace" is an increase in phase velocity, made possible by the frequency of the engine's oscillators, or is a tachyon mode.

In The Peregrine, part of the Psychotechnic History, when the spaceship is in the fringes of a trepidation vortex:

"'Components of the vibration have the ship's resonance frequencies. They'll shake us apart, atom by atom.'" (CHAPTER XIII, p. 114)

The solution is to:

"'...get the ship as a whole in phase with the major space-pulsations -...'" (pp. 114-115)

- so Coordinator Trevelyan, having glanced at the ship's instruments, then subconsciously computed gravitational and electric potentials, gradients, magnetism, gyration, frequencies and amplitudes, directs the engine room how to:

"'Pulse the hyperdrive, sinusoid - here, I'll give you the figures.'" (p. 115)

It all sounds very similar.

When I worked in a labouring job at the Royal Lancaster Infirmary, (see also Hospital) a member of the domestic staff informed me that a then current building project within the Infirmary was "Phrase One." We wondered how many Phrases there were going to be.

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