Meanwhile, we cannot really compare Merseians with Martians because there is only one fictional race of Merseians whereas there are no one knows how many fictional races of Martians. Poul Anderson's Merseians, at least those of the Roidhunate, like HG Wells' Martians, want to conquer Earth whereas Ray Bradbury's Martians are almost entirely wiped out by chicken pox brought from Earth - just as Wells' Martian invaders are killed by Terrestrial microbes - while at the same (in a different timeline) CS Lewis' Martians are protected from Terrestrial evil by superior beings in the Solar System. What could be more different? And those are just three of the most prominent examples.
The comparison that I have in mind here is with SM Stirling's Martians. Merseians are multicultural. See information about Cnif hu Vanden here and particularly here. By contrast, Stirling's Martians have been monocultural throughout a very long history and this makes it hard to tell how much of their psychology is genetic as opposed to cultural. Is a monocultural species easier to write about or must the author work harder to keep it consistent? As a mere reader, I can only guess.
Thank you all for so many page views for a day when this is the first post.
9 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
But that monoculturalism of Stirling's was also at least partly because of genetic engineering. Over many thousands of years genetically tweaked themselves to be as we see them in THE COURTS OF THE CRIMSON KINGS.
Ad astra! Sean
Catastrophic epidemics were a feature of the Age of Exploration, as the world disease environment unified. 'twas lucky bacterial theory caught up in the 19th century, or there might have been very bad consequences of fast steamship communication.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
What an appalling notion! Without the work of Jenner and his successors we might have gotten as devastating as the Bubonic Plague of 1346-51 in the 1860's and '70's?
Ad astra! Sean
"very bad consequences of fast steamship communication."
In "Plagues and Peoples" by William H. McNeill c1976, there is a comparison, in Chapter IV, of the spread of Plague due the faster communication of the Mongol Empire in the 1300s and the aborted plague epidemic of the late 19th early 20th centuries and why the latter was abortive.
This includes a hypothesis about where plague originated, that it was introduced to the Mongolian steppe from Yunnan about 1300. Recent research shows that plague was in the Eurasian steppe a few millennia earlier.
This interview
http://pointofinquiry.org/2026/07/sneeze-the-history-and-science-of-the-common-cold-with-immunologist-david-miles/
is about the spread of respiratory infections and what we can do to reduce that problem.
Airports are a major part of the problem.
Kaor, Jim!
That makes sense. But even without the Mongol Empire I think the Black Death would have soon reached the Middle East and Europe roughly around 1346-51.
Stirling's comments brought up grim images of a still primitive Western knowledge of the causes and transmission of disease resulting in a new Black Death devastating Europe and the US in the 1860's, complete with black robed collectors of the death trundling wagons and chanting BRING OUT YOUR DEAD! BRING OUT YOUR DEAD! BRING OUT...!" in the cities.
Such a Plague might even have interrupted the US civil war, devastating the armies of both the Union and the Confederacy.
Ad astra! Sean
Ad astra! Sean
Note, the first major theater of war where battle casualties outnumbered deaths from disease was the Western Front in WW1. (The Eastern Front had enormous losses from disease -- less in the German army than in the others, though.)
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
I remember reading about that, how advancing in medical knowledge made deaths from combat more numerous than deaths from disease for the first time during WW I (aside from the exceptions you noted). I think the Turks were the most incompetent and backward about handling frontline disease.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean: Yes, they suffered more losses from disease than combat -- but they had plenty of combat losses, too.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
Sometimes needlessly so! I recall reading of how the Turks ignored the advice of their Austrian and German allies not to fight too aggressively during the Gallipoli campaign. They didn't and paid dearly in truly appalling casualties, despite the Anglo/French being defeated.
Ad astra! Sean
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