cover art by Wayne Barlowe |
Dead but not Forgotten. Here we are, 30 years later, and Asimov's fans are struggling to accommodate themselves to Apple TV's Foundation series. As described previously, I recently watched Season One of the TV show and I was provoked to look back at the million and a half words that Asimov wrote in telling his story of the Foundation Saga. Also, I've looked back at my older blog posts about the seven novels that came to embody the Foundation Saga.
cover art by Gary Freeman |
Expanding the Foundation. My favorite Asimov novel is The End of Eternity. The Exode Saga is actually a sequel to both Foundation and Earth and The End of Eternity. It was Asimov himself who suggested a possible link between his positronic robots and time travel, and idea which I happily adopted.
cover art by Jim Burns |
After buying and reading the three novels in the original Foundation Trilogy, I threw away the first book and only kept the final two (Avon editions, printed in 1972). I felt that Asimov's story did not really become interesting until the telepathic Mule and Second Foundationers came onto the stage. Later, when Asimov extended the saga in 1982 with Foundations Edge, I was not impressed. Only with Foundation and Earth and the revelation that Daneel was part of the Foundation Fictional Universe did I achieve any real interest in the sequel novels.
genetically engineered Spacers |
cover art by Stephen Youll |
More telepaths. In addition to telepathic Gaians and Solarians, Asimov also included the telepathic Mule, the telepathic Second Foundationers and telepathic positronic robots like Daneel. I have the feeling that Asimov wrote himself into a corner with Foundation and Earth. Trevize expresses unhappiness with the idea that Humanity's fate is Galaxia and I suspect Asimov himself felt the same way. Since Asimov's death, I've tried to imagine a way to continue the Foundation saga beyond the ending of Foundation and Earth, and the method I arrived at involves a Reality Change. I also include many telepathic human variants in the Exode Saga.
Noÿs/Skaña/Trysta (image source) |
For the Exode Saga, I like to imagine that Noÿs originated as an Asterothrope named Skaña. While working to create a Reality Change that would end the Mallansohn Reality, she used the name Noÿs (as depicted by Asimov in The End of Eternity). I like to imagine that later, in the Foundation Reality, she began using the name Trysta Iwedon.
Reality Chain |
Isaac Asimov was very interested in history. When crafting the Foundation Saga, Asimov used plot and character ideas from The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. In The End of Eternity, Asimov introduced the idea of keeping records of past Realities within a library system of Eternity. Since I love the idea of having access to records of past Realities, for the Exode Saga I imagine that the Eternity space-time bubble was never actually destroyed.
The Big and the Little. In the early 1940s, Asimov began writing stories about an enormous Galactic Empire, but he was also concerned with the very small. Back in the 1930s, the first efforts were underway to map genes on chromosomes and as a chemistry student, it may have been obvious to Asimov that information could be stored in the structure of atoms and chemical bonds inside chromosomes (this idea became increasing popular after publication of Erwin Schrödinger's book What is Life? in 1944). Before anyone had figured out how to make electronic digital computers, Asimov imagined a fictional "postronic brain" that could be used to hold the thinking mind of a human-like robot.
In 1959, Richard Feynman gave a lecture called "There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom" which pointed towards the near future when nano-scale transistors would allow for the efficient storage of large amounts of data in a small space. In the 1960s, the genetic code was deciphered and in the 1970s restriction enzymes became available for cutting DNA at specific sites. By 1977, Hal Clement was encouraging science fiction story tellers to make use of genetic engineering in their stories.
So, by the time when Asimov began publishing new Foundation Saga stories in 1982, the scientific fields of biology and computing had undergone major revolutions since the early 1940s. Asimov included in Foundation's Edge a new computer-controlled spaceship navigation system and genetically engineered Solarians.
small devices |
I like how Apple TV's Foundation series is not afraid to make use of advanced technologies that Asimov never imagined, particularly nanotechnology such as nanobots (I prefer the term nanites). For the Exode Saga, I take nanotechnology to the next level by imagining that there are as-yet-unknown fundamental particles able to assemble like atoms, but using bonds that are much shorter than for electrons in covalent bonds. Specifically, hierions can form useful structures that are 1000 times smaller than nanites (I call them femtobots).
nanites are made of hadrons, femtobots are composed of M-hierions, zeptites use array sedrons |
positronic brain (source) |
Seldon's Plan or Daneel's Plan? Asimov did provide his readers with a sketch of how Seldon's 1000 year plan for the creation of a new Galactic Empire would play out. Eventually, the "psychologists" of the Second Foundation would have to merge with the First Foundation which specialized in physical science and was technology-oriented.
Gaia |
In the Ekcolir Reality. Original cover art: Michael Whelan and Fred Gambino. |
The Magic of Telepathy. There were multiple times during his Foundation Saga when Asimov rather abruptly pulled telepathy out of the box of Sci Fi plot elements:
1) The origin of telepathic positronic robots was "explained" as having been a chance occurrence.
2) The telepaths of the Second Foundation, starting with Wanda, just showed up on the stage of the crumbling Empire.
3) Gaia was a 20,000 year project by Daneel to create a society of telepathic humans, only revealed at the end of the project.
4) The Solarians were revealed after thousands of years their own project of genetic engineering and development of technology-assisted telepathy.
Not being comfortable with magic in a science fiction story, I'd prefer to describe a logical way to use imaginary future technology so as to make possible human and robot telepathy.
aliens |
In the Exode Saga, the positronic robots of Earth win a chance for Humanity to spread among the stars, but the specter of how Humanity can adjust to the existence of telepathy still hangs over the Final Reality.
twitinos and telepathy |
Bimanoid Interface. For telepathy in the FInal Reality of the Exode Saga, I make use of what was originally a Temporal Momentum system but it was later adapted for technology-assisted telepathy.
Socio-history. What are the social implications of telepathy? I make use of the idea that the Neanderthals has a weak form of telepathy that aided in social cohesion. I imagine that later advancements for technology-assisted telepathy made use of human brain regions related to inter-personal relationships and that means that telepathic mind control can't be imposed on anyone against their will. In the Final Reality, telepathy requires empathy and resonance.
image made using "April" by karlwikman available under the CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 |
For "The Cythyrya Investigation", I'm exploring how information from the future can reach Eddy and help make it possible for humans to develop a culture that includes telepathy. Eddy wants to find out if teleportation and FTL travel are still possible in the Final Reality.
Rylla's attempt to bring back useful nanites from the AR Simulator fails. The teleportation control nanites that work inside the simulator do not work at the Eternity teleporter of the Final Reality. Can information from the future of the Final Reality be used to solve this problem?
Next: Part 3 of "The Cythyrya Investigation"
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