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Jonathan Crocker
08-29-2016
17:40 UT
|
Ah, thanks - obviously time to read Little Fuzzy again!
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David "PiperFan" Johnson  08-29-2016
04:41 UT
|
Jackson" Grimmoer" Russell wrote:
> The faux Martian cave drawings were mentioned
> along with Piltdown Man in Little Fuzzy.
"That fellow who carved a Late Upland Martian inscription in that cave in Kenya, for instance."
That's
Leonard Kellogg, speaking to Ernst Mallin, before they traveled to
Holloway's camp, citing examples from history after suggesting that
Holloway is perpetrating a hoax in claiming that the Fuzzies are
sapient.
What it suggests is that at about the same time he gave
up on the idea of a Martian origin for Paratime humans Beam was also
making it clear that Terro-humans did not believe that any ancient
Martians had ever been to Terra.
Yeek!
David
--
"Considering
the one author about whom I am uniquely qualified to speak, I question
if any reader of H. Beam Piper will long labor under the
misunderstanding that he is a pious Christian, a left-wing liberal, a
Gandhian pacifist, or a teetotaler." - H. Beam Piper, "Double: Bill
Symposium" interview
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Grimmoer
08-29-2016
04:25 UT
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The faux Martian cave drawings were mentioned along with Piltdown Man in Little Fuzzy.
Jackson
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Jonathan Crocker
08-29-2016
04:14 UT
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I have forgotten the reference to the "fraud" writing in the cave - which story was that in, do you remember?
And a Piper-written "Cowboy Beebop" would make me want to actually watch anime, by the way.
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David Sooby
08-29-2016
03:30 UT
|
David Johnson said:
> nowhere in any Terro-human Future History yarn do we get any indication that Terro-humans understand themselves to
> be "immigrants" from Mars. Surely if this were understood there would have been some discussion of the point when
> the Freyans were encountered in "When in the Course--"
Yes,
but what are we to make of the reaction -- or rather, the glaring
non-reaction -- of the Human anthropologists in "Omnilingual" to the
Human appearance of the Martians? There is much discussion of the
extreme improbability of parallel evolution in "When in the Course--",
when it's rather incidental to the plot. Why, then, is there not even a
passing mention in the discussion of the Martians by the Human
anthropologists in "Omnilingual"? It's not like the story needed the
Martians to have an external anatomy indistinguishable from Human. The
story would have worked just as well if the Martians has been humanoid
but obviously not human. Yet Piper put this passage into the story:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"I
haven't seen any actual Martian skulls--these people seem to have been
very tidy about disposing of their dead--but from statues and busts and
pictures I've seen, I'd say that their vocal organs were identical to
our own."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
--"Omnilingual", FEDERATION p. 17
...and...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Here the murals were of heroic-sized Martians, so human in appearance as to seem members of her own race...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
--"Omnilingual", FEDERATION p. 27
Why
does Piper go so far towards making the Martians appear Human, or at
least indistinguishable from Human? And why do none of the
anthropologists remark upon this very remarkable fact? Why are the
characters so firmly ignoring the elephant in the room?
We
cannot, unfortunately, ask Piper directly, nor did he (so far as I know)
leave us any notes to provide a clue. But is it a coincidence that in
the story the protagonist, Martha Dane, is repeatedly warned not to
squander her career on the "obviously" fruitless endeavor of translating
Martian into English? This is only my opinion, only the opinion of one
ardent Piper fan, but it seems to me that Piper was obliquely
highlighting the fact that in every era, the scientific community
considers as "heresy" certain ideas, and any scientist daring to buck
the trend will very likely have his career ended, unable to find grants
or tenure. In the 1950s it was "continental drift", in the 1980s it was
the concept that the brains of women and men really do function
differently in some respects; quite recently it was the idea that /Homo
floresiensis/ might actually be a different species of our genus, rather
than just the bones of a few individuals suffering from various similar
genetic deformities.
That, coupled with a passing mention in a
later THFH story about a supposed "scientific fraud" of Martian writing
found in a cave on Earth, indicate to me that Piper was subtly -- or
perhaps not so subtly, given "Omnilingual" -- suggesting that Humans did
originate on Mars, but that Human scientists simply refused to consider
the evidence staring them in the face. And that the reason there is no
discussion of the "elephant in the room" among the anthropoligists in
"Omnilingual" is because it was considered scientific heresy to discuss
the possibility that Martians and Humans might be related.
Of
course, I could be reading into the story something Piper never
intended. But if so, why that later reference to the so-called
scientific "fraud" of the Martian writing in a cave on Earth? Surely
Piper intended for his fans to regard that as a reference to the
Martians in "Omnilingual".
|
David "PiperFan" Johnson 08-29-2016
03:23 UT
|
David Sooby wrote:
> Grimmoer said:
>
> > I never heard anybody complain about Bradbury's
> > Martians, or even ERB's.
>
> Hmmm, jokes about John Carter mating with Dejah
> Thoris [snip]
This isn't an Edgar Rice Burroughs forum, folks. Let's keep the discussion focused on Piper please.
Thanks,
David
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David Sooby
08-29-2016
02:34 UT
|
Grimmoer said:
> I never heard anybody complain about Bradbury's Martians, or even ERB's.
Hmmm,
jokes about John Carter mating with Dejah Thoris and producing an egg
used to crop up regularly in the fan press. Perhaps you haven't read
many older fanzines? At any rate, ERB was writing what I'd call
"science fantasy", pretty far indeed from the sort of hard-SF that Piper
generally preferred... Paratime stories notwithstanding. That is, the
Barsoom stories are closer to pure fantasy than to pure hard-SF. And
even within Paratime, the Kalvan sequence is completely lacking in any
of the mystical mumbo-jumbo seen in "Police Operation" and "Last Enemy".
As
for Bradbury's Martians: The stories in THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES are not
really a series. The stories are mostly unconnected other than being
set on Mars. The society and, as I recall, anatomy of Martians varies
from story to story, sometimes wildly. Furthermore, Bradbury was using
SF merely as a vehicle for social commentary, in the tradition of H. G.
Wells. His writings don't (so far as I know) attract the sort of
detailed canonical discussions and debates about how his stories fit in
with current scientific theory, such as are found amongst us hardcore
Piper fans. However, such discussions are not unique to hard-SF fans.
You'll see much the same sort of discussion and debate amongst hardcore
Sherlock Holmes fans, as detailed at great length in THE ANNOTATED
SHERLOCK HOLMES.
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David Sooby
08-29-2016
02:10 UT
|
Another reason I am unwilling to view the THFH and Paratime as occurring
in the same universe (or multiverse) is the philosophical foundation of
the two series. THFH is a fairly "hard" SF universe, the near-magical
material collapsium notwithstanding.
Contrariwise, the Paratime
series contains elements of mysticism that simply don't fit into the
THFH. I don't have my copy of MURDER IN THE GUN ROOM to hand, but in
that Piper has an apparently autobiographical character saying that he
wrote a series of stories for the SF magazines based on (this is from
memory, so may not be entirely accurate) the time travel hypotheses of
one J. W. Dunne. Some of that mumbo-jumbo about consciousness sliding
along the pathway of parallel timelines can be found in the first story
about Paratimers, "Police Operation". Furthermore, in "Last Enemy", the
existence of souls and reincarnation are revealed to be scientifically
proven fact. This is something I can't imagine Piper putting into his
THFH series.
* * * * *
Grimmoer wrote:
> Genesis should by no means be considered future history as it is the distant past. If Piper was
> saying something about the future why would he mention anything in the opposite direction?
This
is confusing the name of the thing with the thing itself. It's a
meaningless semantic argument, of the sort that Heinlein quite rightly
pointed out is a waste of time. I rather think that Piper would have
agreed.
The reason Piper was hesitant to include "The Edge of the
Knife" in his article on "The Future History" isn't because that story
is not set in the future! I think it's because, like the Paratime
stories, it has as its premise the mystical concept of human souls
traveling in time, subconsciously "sliding" along the timelines. And
again, that doesn't fit the more-or-less hard-SF background of the
Terro-Human Future History.
|
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David Sooby
08-29-2016
01:46 UT
|
Grimmoer said:
> The biggest problem I have with Martians colonizing Earth is the adaptive disparity. Bones, muscles
> and organs geared for the thin atmosphere, lower gravity and harder radiation of Mars would have a
> very hard time adjusting to Terran gravity and atmosphere. It would be like walking around with two
> men on your back. Doable, for some, but not for very long. Bones would be thinner and less dense,
> for example.
Yes,
and if Martians evolved on Mars, then why do they so closely resemble
Humans (as detailed in "Omnilingual") that they are visually
indistinguishable in every detail of external anatomy? Why would they so
closely resemble a species (Huumans) which clearly share a genetic
heritage with Terran animals?
My fanfix answer is that an unknown
starfaring entity transported a breeding group of Humans or
proto-Humans from Earth to Mars; that entity may also have transported
some to Freya, possibly at a later date.
Even then, the Martians
would have had to do something rather extreme to adapt themselves to
Earth gravity before making the trip; possibly living inside a huge
centrifuge for some months before the journey, since they apparently
didn't have artificial gravity tech.
Of course, this wouldn't be
Piper's explanation. He wrote in an era before genetic mapping, and he
actually defended the idea of parallel evolution producing genetically
compatible Humans on two different planets, as a result of independent
evolution, in "When in the Course--". But then, at least Freya isn't a
light-gravity world, as Mars is, so that makes the idea of parallel
evolution there slightly less implausible.
|
David "PiperFan" Johnson 08-28-2016
16:22 UT
|
Jack "Grimmoer" Russell wrote:
> Genesis should by no means be considered future
> history as it is the distant past. If Piper
> was saying something about the future why would
> he mention anything in the opposite direction?
I
think the point is that "Genesis" could be the story that shows the
Martian origins of the Paratime humans and, through its nebulous
connection with proto-sentients on "Tareesh," may also imply that this
particular world is the same one on which the Terro-humans eventually go
on to become Space Vikings and such. As you suggest there isn't
anything anywhere which contradicts this. There are some problems
though.
First, Beam himself backed away from the Martian origins
of Paratime Terrans with the "genetic accidents" explanation offered in
~Lord Kalvan~. It seems that between the time he wrote "Police
Operation" and when he wrote "Gunpowder God" Beam may have had a change
of mind/heart about the Martian origins of Paratime humans.
Second,
nowhere in any Terro-human Future History yarn do we get any indication
that Terro-humans understand themselves to be "immigrants" from Mars.
Surely if this were understood there would have been some discussion of
the point when the Freyans were encountered in "When in the Course--" or
even--as you suggest--when the problem of the Fuzzies' poor suitability
to the natural environment of Zarathustra was discovered. It would
seem that if Terro-humans were actually Martio-humans none of the
Terro-humans ever came to recognize this fact.
For this reason, I
classify "Genesis" as a Paratime yarn, with a caveat somewhat similar
to that used by Beam to classify "The Edge of the Knife" as a
Terro-human Future History yarn. It "fits" but only with a metaphorical
shoehorn. . . .
> The Mercenaries could go either way. They
> mention the early beginnings in the creation
> of collapsium so I have no problem with
> including it in the THFH.
There
are more than a few challenges in treating "The Mercenaries" as a
Terro-human Future History yarn. The U.S. is part of a "Western Union"
(and there is no Terran Federation). More importantly, the U.S. and the
Islamic "Kaliphate" seem to be adversaries in "The Mercenaries" while
in "The Edge of the Knife" they are apparently allies (who end up in the
Terran Federation together). Believe me, it takes a bit more than a
"shoehorn" to fit "The Mercenaries" into the Terro-human Future History.
> In Paratime the idea is that every timeline
> below 1st or 2nd loses their knowledge of
> their Martian origins
By the time he was writing "Gunpowder God" it seems _Beam_ lost his knowledge of the Paratimers' Martian origins. . . .
Down Styphon!
David
--
"Oh,
my people had many gods. There was Conformity, and Authority, and
Expense Account, and Opinion. And there was Status, whose symbols were
many, and who rode in the great chariot Cadillac, which was almost a god
itself. And there was Atom-bomb, the dread destroyer, who would some
day come to end the world. None were very good gods, and I worshiped
none of them.” - Calvin Morrison (H. Beam Piper), ~Lord Kalvan of
Otherwhen~
|
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Grimmoer
08-28-2016
16:03 UT
|
With you 100% on the Genesis/Omnilingual thing. Some people are against
the whole Martians are us thing because it doesn't fit something in
their own philosophy. Others can't get behind the pseudo science of
it. It is all FICTION, and should be recognized as such. I never
heard anybody complain about Bradbury's Martians, or even ERB's. We
read the stories, enjoy them or not, then move on to the next. I have
read all of ERB and Bradbury's Martian stories, plus Carson of Venus
and a few thousand others by now. If you want to really get into the
science of it, ERG is really not for you. Seriously, I don't think he
even walked past a scientific journal about Mars. Piper must have done
some research as he was something of an autodidact and leaned towards
practical advances in science rather than overly fanciful ones. Sure,
much of what he wrote is dated now. Still, he was pretty well grounded
at the time he was writing on what was believed to be eventually
possible.
Jackson
|
David "PiperFan" Johnson 08-28-2016
15:52 UT
|
~
jimmyjoejangles wrote:
> I just want to say that I believe all Piper's
> stories take place in a single universe.
Welcome
(back?) to our Piper forum, "JimmyJoe." We ask folks here to identify
themselves by their actual names, so please introduce yourself.
> Collapsium is one of the things that links them.
> Another is the fact that we are supposed to be
> fourth level of the paratime, and the base of
> Terran Future as well.
As
others have already mentioned, there's an opportunity for reasonable
people to disagree on this matter. For example, I can't find a specific
mention of collapsium in any Paratime yarn (Jack's point about the idol
in "Temple Trouble" notwithstanding).
Yes, it's possible to
assume that the Terro-human Future History yarns are all merely one
Paratime timeline but without any specific connection one can assume
that for just about _any_ fictional story. The ~Star Wars~ yarns could
be a Paratime timeline. Star Trek's "Mirror universe" could be a
Paratime timeline. ~Cowboy Beebop~ could happen on a Paratime timeline.
It's the nature of "alternate timeline" storytelling.
As others
have also already mentioned, it sure would have been easy for Beam to
drop a couple of hints. A Paratimer could have mentioned the "Thirty
Days' War" or the ~Kilroy~, the first robotic lunar rocket, or the
Islamic Caliphate. Someone in "When in the Course--" might have brought
up the Martians when they were arguing about the "human-ness" of the
Freyans. But Beam didn't seem to provide any such hints.
Likewise
with Beam's other yarns like ~Lone Star Planet~. Putting aside the
fact that "New Texas" doesn't use the naming convention of Terro-human
settled planets there's the fact that it--or its extraordinary form of
politics--is never mentioned in a Terro-human Future History yarn. And
then there are the z'Srauff. Sure, we can wonder what happened to the
Fuzzies but if ~Lone Star Planet~ were a Terro-human Future History yarn
the real question for the Space Viking and Empire eras would be, what
happened to the only star-faring sophonts encountered by humanity?
But,
again, these are all questions about which reasonable people might
disagree. In the meanwhile, I look forward to your introduction.
Be well,
David
--
"Why not everybody make friend, have fun, make help, be good?" - Diamond Grego (H. Beam Piper), ~Fuzzy Sapiens~
~
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jimmyjoejangles
08-28-2016
15:35 UT
|
I guess what I meant to say is that I believe THFH is one of the
Paratimelines. I remember the first time I came on here a long time ago
I read that someone said that Paratime didn't even have space flight,
which is totally untrue (Venusian night hound). I also thought there
were things in Lonestar Planet that fit in, but I'll read again.
Omnilingual ties in very nicely with Genesis, in fact as noted in
Typewriter Killer if there wasn't a linguistic background finding an
elemental table would be useless.
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Grimmoer
08-28-2016
14:26 UT
|
Genesis should by no means be considered future history as it is the
distant past. If Piper was saying something about the future why would
he mention anything in the opposite direction? As I see it, it is
really up to the reader, and maybe future writers in his universe to
make that call. If it reasonably fits, then go with it or not as you
like. The Mercenaries could go either way. They mention the early
beginnings in the creation of collapsium so I have no problem with
including it in the THFH. In Paratime the idea is that every timeline
below 1st or 2nd loses their knowledge of their Martian origins and
Little Fuzzy's timeline suggests that - - except where Diehr introduced
his own contribution, but he isn't Piper so make of it what you will.
The
biggest problem I have with Martians colonizing Earth is the adaptive
disparity. Bones, muscles and organs geared for the thin atmosphere,
lower gravity and harder radiation of Mars would have a very hard time
adjusting to Terran gravity and atmosphere. It would be like walking
around with two men on your back. Doable, for some, but not for very
long. Bones would be thinner and less dense, for example. It would
take months of conditioning, if not Martian years, to prepare the
colonists for what they would face. Piper glossed over all that by
simply starting the story at the point when the colony ship was
approaching Terra before the collision. However, since the survivors
seem perfectly capable of functioning on the planets surface one has to
conclude some sort of adaptive measures were taken.
Bioengineering, training, drugs or some combination thereof.
Jackson
|
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David Sooby
08-28-2016
10:36 UT
|
Whether or not the THFH (Terro-Human Future History) is one of the
Paratime timelines, or not, is a matter of continuing debate among Piper
fans. There definitely are two camps, and it seems pretty clear that
the two will never see eye-to-eye. Personally, I'm in the camp
that says they should be treated as two separate series. Piper's "The
Future History" article listed only THFH stories, and didn't mention
Paratime at all. Furthermore, Piper's article ends with this statement: "Nothing
else, with the possible exception of a novelette called THE EDGE OF THE
KNIFE, Amazing, May 1957, belongs to the History of the Future." Piper's
"Genesis" was published in 1951; "The Future History" was published in
1964. If the two series were meant to be considered as one, then
"Genesis" should be listed as a story common to both series. If Piper didn't consider "Genesis" to be a story in the THFH series, then why should we? Edited 08-28-2016 10:37
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Grimmoer
08-28-2016
04:04 UT
|
Paratimers do not use collapsium per se. The only mention of anything
even similar is a statue made of collapsed nickel. That was in "Temple
Trouble" I believe. And there are stories that do not fit into the
THFH, like "A Planet for Texans" and "Null ABC."
That said, I do
not see any inherent reason why Paratime and THFH would be mutually
exclusive. I heard that Diehr actually wanted to write a story that
merged the two. I don't know that he ever did it but it is an
interesting idea.
Jackson Russell
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jimmyjoejangles
08-28-2016
02:09 UT
|
I just want to say that I believe all Piper's stories take place in a
single universe. Collapsium is one of the things that links them.
Another is the fact that we are supposed to be fourth level of the
paratime, and the base of Terran Future as well.
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David "PiperFan" Johnson 08-13-2016
21:14 UT
|
~
Jonathan Crocker wrote:
> Looking back we know it took the Apollo missions 3 days to
> get to the moon, and I've read the machine could have made
> it in two, but wouldn't have had enough fuel to enter lunar
> orbit then. So figure if you're using unmanned missiles,
> that are trying to hit a target, and not slow down or enter
> orbit, figure at least a day.
>
> A lot can happen in a day - it's not a guaranteed victory
> to build moon bases, either peaceful or armed.
I
agree it seems impractical now but Beam used a similar idea as the
basis for the "Thirty Days' War" in the Terro-human Future History.
I've wondered if he was influenced by this bit of speculation:
http://www.zarthani.net/docs/rocket_blitz_...e_moon-colliers.pdf
> Long term? I could easily see MacLeod's team being hired
> to work on improving Abbott lift-and-drive, maybe even
> working with the Dillingham team on hyperdrives.
I
like it (though, of course, these would like be invented by folks other
than "Abbott" and "Dillingham" in the setting of "The Mercenaries."
Perhaps it's "MacLeod lift-and-drive?).
> Even longer term? I could easily see one of the great
> powers saying to teams, "look, you know too much that we
> don't want the other powers to have. Settle here voluntarily,
> or else."
Yes, I suspect you're correct here. I can't see the "Free Scientists" staying "free" indefinitely.
David
--
"You
either went on to the inevitable catastrophe, or you realized, in time,
that nuclear armament and nationalism cannot exist together on the same
planet, and it is easier to banish a habit of thought than a piece of
knowledge." - H. Beam Piper, ~Uller Uprising~
~
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Jonathan Crocker
08-13-2016
03:01 UT
|
Detente didn't seem to figure much in Piper's stories. Of course,
everyone sitting around being happy and content doesn't make for the
best stories.
Looking back we know it took the Apollo missions 3
days to get to the moon, and I've read the machine could have made it in
two, but wouldn't have had enough fuel to enter lunar orbit then. So
figure if you're using unmanned missiles, that are trying to hit a
target, and not slow down or enter orbit, figure at least a day.
A lot can happen in a day - it's not a guaranteed victory to build moon bases, either peaceful or armed.
On
the other hand, they say the spin-off technologies from Apollo
generated a lot more for the companies, over the years, than Apollo
cost. So as long as no one jumped the gun, it could certainly lead to
more long-term growth of the economy for the leading power vs the
others.
Long term? I could easily see MacLeod's team being
hired to work on improving Abbott lift-and-drive, maybe even working
with the Dillingham team on hyperdrives.
Even longer term? I
could easily see one of the great powers saying to teams, "look, you
know too much that we don't want the other powers to have. Settle here
voluntarily, or else."
|
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Jay P Hailey
08-12-2016
08:07 UT
|
> ~
> Been thinking about "The Mercenaries," a stand-alone yarn that's
> not part of Beam's Terro-human Future History (though it _is_
> loosely connected to the other "Hartley" yarns, "Time and Time
> Again" and the dreadful "Day of the Moron").
>
> What happens in the universe of "The Mercenaries" once one of
> the blocs competing to get to the Moon are successful? Does
> that bloc come to dominate the Earth?
>
> More interestingly, what happens to the Free Scientists? We
> already see a growing clash between them and the nation-states
> (including the U.S.-led Western Union). Are thee Free
> Scientists successful in maintaining their independence?
>
> David
All depends on how you want to see it? And, of course, how might Piper have written it?
|
David "PiperFan" Johnson 08-12-2016
00:39 UT
|
~
Been thinking about "The Mercenaries," a stand-alone yarn that's
not part of Beam's Terro-human Future History (though it _is_ loosely
connected to the other "Hartley" yarns, "Time and Time Again" and the
dreadful "Day of the Moron").
What happens in the universe of
"The Mercenaries" once one of the blocs competing to get to the Moon are
successful? Does that bloc come to dominate the Earth?
More
interestingly, what happens to the Free Scientists? We already see a
growing clash between them and the nation-states (including the U.S.-led
Western Union). Are thee Free Scientists successful in maintaining
their independence?
David
--
"Ideas for science fiction
stories like ideas for anything else, are where you find them, usually
in the most unlikely places. The only reliable source is a mind which
asks itself a question like, 'What would happen if--?' or, 'Now what
would this develop into, in a few centuries?' Or, 'How would so-and-so
happen?' Anything at all, can trigger such a question, in your field if
not in mine." - H. Beam Piper, "Double: Bill Symposium" interview
~
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