Substantial Reading

I am continuing to reread Larry Niven's and Jerry Pournelle's The Mote In God's Eye first because it has inspired reflections relevant to the blog and secondly because I have become sufficiently involved with the narrative to want to follow it to its conclusion, then maybe
tackle the sequel.

An sf novel gains substance when it is incorporated into a future history series. Spot the odd man out in this list:

an imminent cosmic collision is detected by the inhabitants of the spindizzy-powered planet, He, as it flies between galaxies;

the Ringworld is explored by a Puppeteer, a kzin, a man and a teela;

the Mote System is explored by the warships MacArthur and Lenin from the Second Empire of Man;

the planets Ythri and Gray/Avalon were discovered during the Grand Survey;

the planet Merseia, shielded from supernova radiation by agents of the Polesotechnic League, later became the principal adversary of the Terran Empire;

the planet Satan is exploited by the Solar Spice & Liquors Company;

the planet Mirkheim is exploited by the Supermetals Company until the Baburites go to war over it;

Avalon, jointly colonized by human beings and Ythrians, is attacked by Terran Imperials, including a Cynthian and a Jerusalem Catholic;

a Wodenite Jerusalem Catholic enters the Patrician System just before Admiral Magnusson, a Merseian sleeper, rebels against the Terran Empire;

the Cloud Universe is explored by a Ranger of the Commonalty;

Orbitsville is colonized by human beings from a future Earth.

Inter-Species Communication II

See Inter-Species Communication.

Poul Anderson
The relevant quotes are:

"The nonhuman remains nonhuman. He can only show us those facets of himself which we can understand. Thus he often seems to be a two-dimensional, even comic personality. But remember, we have the corresponding effect on him."
-Poul Anderson, The Van Rijn Method (New York, 2009), pp. 264-265.

"'[Nonhumans] are too unlike us. You probably know better than I how vastly their psychologies, instincts, drives, capabilities differ from ours, and from each other's...I think we interact with them, and they with us, only on a rather superficial level. Partnership is possible between human and alien, yes. Sometimes even what the human feels as friendship. But how does the alien feel it? That may be ultimately unknowable, on either side.'"
-Poul Anderson, For Love And Glory (New York, 2003), Chapter IX, p. 53.

Bob Shaw
Bob told me that he never had conversations between human beings and aliens but there was some conversation with hyper-dimensional beings in the Orbitsville Trilogy and maybe between souls of different species in the scientifically rationalized hereafter of The Palace Of Eternity? In old age, we try to remember works read literally decades ago.

Carl Sagan
Sagan suggests a means of communication. See here.

Niven and Pournelle
When, in Anderson's A Circus Of Hells, an alien on her own planet shakes her head in disbelief, we ask, "Would she do this?" whereas, when one of Niven's and Pournelle's Moties nods her head, we soon realize that this is because she is trying to converse with human beings and is learning fast.

I am definitely signing off till next month. Excelsior.